LEARNING DAILY

 

Ephesians 1:3-5, How we praise God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms because we belong to Christ. Long ago, even before He made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in His eyes. His unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into His own family by bringing us to Himself through Jesus Christ. And this gave Him great pleasure.  (New Living Translation)

 

If you read other translations of the Bible, you will read that “God chose us before the foundation of the world” and “having predestined us to the adoption as sons of God”. Some might believe this means God has chosen some people to be His and there are those who have no chance of becoming part of His kingdom. This is not true! Let me share two verses of Scripture that support this. “He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God.” (John 3:36). “For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.” (1 Timothy 2:3-4). “Predestined means to “mark put the boundaries beforehand” (DJSB).

 

Jesus made another interesting statement in Matthew 22:14, “Many are called, but few are chosen.” He was referring to the message of the gospel going out to the Jews first; but few responded. Because of that the invitation set forth in the gospel went out among the Gentiles. The difference between being called and chosen is about accepting what Christ did for us at the cross or not accepting what He did. Those who accept are chosen to put on the righteousness of Christ that is accepted by grace through faith. God desires all people to accept this call for salvation; the few who are chosen are those who respond to His call, repent of their sins, believe in Jesus Christ and follow Him by walking on the narrow way to His kingdom. The response to this call is by the free exercise of one’s will. I am really glad God gave me the opportunity to say yes to grace.

 

God’s plan has always been (other translations say “before the foundation of the world”) those who accept His plan of salvation should “be holy and blameless before Him” (NKJV). This group of people who identify themselves – that would include you and me – with the body of Christ (Ephesians 4:12) is also known as the true Church (Ephesians 1:22), a peculiar people that belong to God (1 Peter 2:9), the Bride of Christ (Matthew 25), and the wife of Christ (Revelation 19:7). God has decided before the creation of the world that all who accept His plan of salvation are to be holy and without blemish (Ephesians 5:27). All of us are in the process of being led by the Holy Spirit in the cleansing process known as sanctification to become pure in order to be presented holy or without blame before Him (Colossians 1;22-23).

 

Every person has a choice to make – to accept His call through the finished work of Jesus Christ or turn it down. Those who accept are to remain in Him through faith, walking the narrow way to His kingdom and eternal life. Predestination tells us about our destination and what God has prepared for us. All I know is all the struggles we face during the sanctification process will be worth all the discipline we must have to stay on the narrow way. Aren’t you glad you said yes to His call! I am!

 

From now on DJSB will be used to note information or quotes from the David Jeremiah Study Bible and LSSB will refer to information and quotes from the Life in the Spirit Study Bible.  I have added Jimmy Swaggart’s Expositor’s Study Bible to be referred to from now on as JSESB.