MOVING BEYOND THE ENTRANCE

“[Christ’s] divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us to His own glory and excellence, by which He has granted to us His precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire… For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”  (2 Peter 1:3,4,11 ESV)

We come to Jesus Christ and He does for us what He promised; and the thing works out. To our amazement, it works out. And then we settle down. We have had our own first-hand and irrefutable experience. But, instead of opening the windows to the glory of the sunshine so evidently there, instead of being incited to a hugeness of faith by what Christ has already done for us, we can't believe that there can be anything more, or that even He can work, for us, anything better. That first foretaste satisfies us. And so we camp for life out on the confines of the Kingdom, and never press on to inherit what is there and meant for us. 

-- A. J. Gossip (1873-1954) in “Experience Worketh Hope” [1944] 

#6208

CLAIM YOUR INHERITANCE IN CHRIST

“But to all who received [Jesus], who believed in His name, He gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.”  (John 1:12-13 NRSV)

“For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’ it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ -- if, in fact, we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him.”  (Romans 8:14-17 NRSV)

The good news we share with one another is the gospel’s declaration that no matter where we are in life, we are the recipients of God’s limitless grace. We can have peace, joy, assurance, comfort, hope, tranquility, confidence, and companionship with God in Christ and beyond that, life eternal. With a life bank full of such gifts we are indeed rich. And yet, so often I permit myself to slip into poverty thinking and poverty living. I feel anxious, alone, fearful, faithless, without joy, and sometimes without hope. I feel this way because I have forgotten and lost grip on the inheritance that God gives me in Christ anew every morning.

Many of us live in spiritual poverty because we have forgotten who we are as God’s children and who God is as our loving Father. The fact that you are reading these words suggests that you are reaching out even now to claim your full inheritance as a child of God. May God grant grace and wisdom to do so more and more today and every day of your life. Claim your inheritance in Christ and live as God’s beloved child today. 

-- Adapted from Rueben P. Job in “A Guide to Prayer for All Who Seek God”

#6090

ACCEPTING GOD’S GRACE

God saw our entire lives from beginning to end, birth to hearse, and in spite of what He saw, He was still convinced “to adopt us into His own family by bringing us to Himself through Jesus Christ. And this gave Him great pleasure.” (Ephesians 1:5 NLT)

We can now live “like God’s very own children, adopted into His family -- calling Him ‘Father, dear Father’… And since we are His children, we will share His treasures -- for everything God gives to His Son, Christ, is ours, too.” (Romans 8:15,17 NLT)

It really is this simple. To accept God’s grace is to accept God’s offer to be adopted into His family.

Your identity is not in your possessions, talents, tattoos, kudos, or accomplishments. Nor are you defined by your divorce, deficiencies, debt, or dumb choices. You are God’s child. You get to call Him “Papa.” You “may approach God with freedom and confidence.” (Ephesians 3:12 NIV) You receive the blessings of His special love (1 John 4:9-11) and provision (Luke 11:11-13). And you will inherit the riches of Christ and reign with Him forever (Romans 8:17). 

-- Max Lucado in “Grace: More Than We Deserve, Greater Than We Imagine”

#5462

IN THE MEANTIME

“In Christ you also, when you had heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and had believed in Him, were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit; this is the pledge of our inheritance toward redemption as God’s own people, to the praise of His glory.”  (Ephesians 1:13-14 NRSV)

We are living "between the times" -- the time of Christ's resurrection and the new age of the Spirit, and the time of fulfillment in Christ.  Life in the Spirit is a pledge, a "down-payment", on the final kingdom of shalom.  In the meantime, we are to be signs of the kingdom which is, and which is coming.

-- David Kirk


#4315

A DIFFERENT KIND OF INHERITANCE

“Having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which He has called you, what are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints,…”  (Ephesians 1:18)

Have you dreamed about inheriting treasures from a long lost relative?  To be "in the will" would change your life forever!  Consider the rags-to-riches story of Jack Wurm.  In 1949, Mr. Wurm was unemployed and bankrupt.  As he strolled along a San Francisco beach, he found a bottle with a scroll inside.  He discovered that this "message in a bottle" was the last will and testament of Daisy Singer Alexander, heiress to the Singer Sewing Company fortune.

The faded paper read: "To avoid confusion, I leave my entire estate to the lucky person who finds this bottle, and to my attorney, Barry Cohen; share and share alike."  The courts discovered that she had written the note and thrown the bottle into the Thames River in London.  It had drifted across the oceans to San Francisco and reached a penniless Jack Wurm.  Jack inherited over $6 million in cash and Singer stock.

Similarly, God has sent us a "message in a Bible."  Within this book you'll find the "last will and testament of our Lord" with a different kind of inheritance -- spiritual treasures.  How will you respond?  Will you walk past it?  Or, like Jack Wurm, will you step out in faith and take action?  Failure to take God's promises seriously leads to spiritual poverty.  Jack's inheritance can't begin to compare with the spiritual wealth God offers His heirs!

-- Lenya Heitzig and Penny Pierce Rose in Pathway to God's Treasure: Ephesians

#4015

INHERITING PEACE

"For God in all His fullness
was pleased to live in Christ,
and through Him God reconciled
everything to Himself.
He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth
by means of Christ’s blood on the cross."  (Colossians 1:19-20 NLT)

Peace comes when there is no cloud between us and God.  Peace is the consequence of forgiveness, God's removal of that which obscures His face and so breaks union with Him.  The happy sequence culminating in fellowship with God is penitence, pardon, and peace -- the first we offer, the second we accept, the third we inherit.

-- Charles H. Brent


#3026