Called To Possess God's Hope

by ROSS, L.M. | Category: The Call Of Christ | Apr 2009

Do you have any financial investments? If not, you'll have been spared a lot of the anxiety and disappointment that those who do, have experienced in recent months. But what about God, does He have investments? He who owns 'the cattle on a thousand hills ... the world is Mine and all its fullness' has no need to invest in material things.(1) But He does invest in people, and if you are His child, having responded to His call through the gospel, He has invested in you. 'He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?'(2) - what an investment! But it's a poor investment that gives no return, and surely God expects one on His investment, and He will, of course, get this! There will come a day when Father and Son will see 'the labor of [the Son's] soul, and be satisfied',(3) when the 'eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord' is fully realised.(4) But what about 'today'?

Previous articles in this series have described the many spiritual blessings made available to those who are 'in Christ' not least of which is our 'hope' and our 'inheritance'. Peter tells us about these - God in His mercy has 'begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you';(5) these are absolute certainties. But God also has a 'hope' and an 'inheritance', and that's what this final article is about. Paul's prayer for the saints in the church in Ephesus was 'that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe'.(6)

Robert Louis Stevenson wrote, 'To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive', and you can perhaps understand what he meant. However, that's not true of Christians. To 'arrive' for them will be very far better than the journey they have taken through life's experiences!

But what Stevenson wrote begs the question of those of us who are Christians: just how are we 'travelling' in our journey as disciples of the Lord Jesus? God has an expectation that our redeemed lives will respond fully to His call. The first article in this series referred to the 'purpose of the call and its place in the scheme of things ... given in Romans 8:28-29'. How is it that 'all things work together for good to those who love God'? Sometimes life's experiences don't seem to match such a statement, do they? It's because 'whom He foreknew, He also predestined ... these He also called ... justified ... glorified'. What was His eternal purpose? That those whom He called would be 'conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren'.(7) Let's just try to understand this uplifting truth, that for the Son to be 'firstborn' - that title of excellence - He needs us: all of us who since Calvary are 'in Christ', have responded to the call to salvation. This, in turn, involves something which is a great mystery to us: the sovereignty of God and human responsibility. There are some things that with our finite understanding we just have to accept by faith, and worship the God and the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ! It's true that at salvation we are, in God's view, already 'conformed', for 'whoever has been born of God does not sin',(8) but the reality is that daily we have a battle with our 'flesh' and the real challenge is daily to show that we are indeed trying with best endeavour to conform ourselves by living in a Christ-like way. And so there are ...

Things that accompany salvation

God's hope, or expectation in His calling through the gospel is that we will 'work out [our] own salvation with fear and trembling';(9) this does not give us licence to do this as we please. The Lord has provided a blueprint for disciple service. We must be clear that no service enhances in any sense the security of our eternal salvation, but Peter writes about the need to be 'diligent to make [our] call and election sure ... for so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ',(10) diligent to live in such a way as to 'adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in all things'.(11) When the Lord during the forty days met with the apostles He was 'speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God';(12) this was not the 'everlasting kingdom' to which Peter referred, but a kingdom composed of obedient disciples, united in corporate service according to the pattern of Acts 2:41-42, and as valid and fundamental in 2009 as it was back then.

Even further back in time, we can read in Deuteronomy 32:9 that 'the Lord's portion is His people; Jacob is the place of His inheritance' and, dependant upon their obedience to God's covenant then, Israel would be identified as a 'kingdom of priests and a holy nation'.(13) The New Testament spiritual counterpart is what the Lord taught His apostles, and which then became known as 'the apostles' teaching', the basis for collective service of disciples then, and now. So God has an expectation in His calling that redeemed lives will respond to Him and give their lives in service, and in corporate testimony be found as His inheritance today. Yes, we do have an inheritance, guaranteed, but so does God, and Paul's longing was that the disciples in Ephesus would be given that 'spirit of wisdom and revelation ... [their] understanding being enlightened' to know this, and appreciate this as they served the Lord there.(14) Along with the great panoramic view of the truths of the Body of Christ throughout the Scriptures and the eternal purpose which God purposed in His Son, let us be aware that He also has a present purpose - as in Old Testament times - in a gathered-together and identifiable people today. In an increasingly liberal Christian society, fundamental doctrine is not really the 'in thing', and of course we all face the challenge of what, sometimes, seems 'compromise', but here is the encouragement to try, by His grace and with His power to be ...

Fit for purpose

'Fit for purpose ... the fulfilment of a specification' is one definition. Those 'whom He called' are intended here and now to meet the 'specification' of 'conformed to the image of His Son',(15) and the wonderful call through the gospel envisages a life of service from those who respond, requiring of us, like Paul, to 'testify to the gospel of the grace of God ... preaching the kingdom of God ... [declaring] the whole counsel of God'.(16)

Worthy of God's 'investment' in us? Giving Him a return? Fit for His purpose in us?

Bible quotes from NKJV

(1) Ps. 50:10,12 (2) Rom. 8:32 (3) Is. 53:11 (4) Eph. 3:11 (5) 1 Pet. 1:3-4 (6) Eph. 1:18-19 (7) Rom. 8:29,30 (8) 1 John 3:9 (9) Phil. 2:12 (10) 2 Pet. 1:10-11 (11) Tit. 2:10 (12) Acts 1:3 (13) Ex. 19:5-6 (14) Eph. 1:17,18 (15) Rom. 8:29,30 (16) Acts 20:24-27

ROSS, L.M. | Apr 2009
The Call Of Christ