By: Mike Kelly
Retired Pastor
This is the second part in this series based on understanding the benefits of our salvation that are in addition to spending eternity in Heaven.
Many benefits of our relationship with Christ are also in the here and now. Many are a foreshadowing of what is to come and many are a direct benefit of our surrender to Christ while here on earth. Last week we spoke about being cleansed from sin and being set free from Satan’s control.
Let’s look at the third benefit: we have been rescued from death. While our bodies will most likely die, we, our personhood, our personality, our spirits will live past our bodies. We will never see true death. We will live for all eternity with him.
Those in hell will be alive but they will not have life like we will come to know it. We will lack nothing while they will lack everything including hope, love and comfort. “Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death.
But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us again…(2 Cor 1:9-10)
God even promises us new bodies. “For we know that when this earthly tent we live in is taken down (that is, when we die and leave this earthly body), we will have a house in heaven, an eternal body made for us by God himself and not by human hands…
For we will put on heavenly bodies; we will not be spirits without bodies…God himself has prepared us for this, and as a guarantee he has given us his Holy Spirit. (1 cor 5:1,3,5)
Another benefit of having Christ in our hearts is that we now can know Christ. Philippians 3:8 “What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ.”
It is a personal, deep, intimate and growing knowledge of God that scripture says will lead to knowing him as he knows us. All worry, doubt and pain will be replaced with His love and care. Our sorrow and fears will be replaced by his assurances and love.
The fifth benefit is being adopted by God Rom 8:17 “Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory”.
All that God possesses is now ours as well… a shared purpose of love and service, a true love and joy unspeakable here now as well as forever and ever!
What kinds of things will we inherit early? Think about the Fruit of the Spirit: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
Against such things there is no law. (Eph 5:22-23) Those are for us today. As are the gifts of the Spirit: “To some people the Spirit gives a message of wisdom.
To others the same Spirit gives a message of knowledge. To others the same Spirit gives faith. To others that one Spirit gives gifts of healing.
To others he gives the power to do miracles. To others he gives the ability to prophesy. To others he gives the ability to tell the spirits apart. To others he gives the ability to speak in different kinds of languages they had not known before.
And to still others he gives the ability to explain what was said in those languages. (1 Cor 12: 8-10). We have been given these gifts to strengthen the Body of Christ on earth. We will have no need of them in Heaven.
The 6th benefit is the Holy Spirit indwelling us and filling us with God’s wisdom, power, presence and love. 1 Corinthians 2:12: “What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us.” We are never alone.
We are never an inch from God as where we are, there he is. And we have all spiritual knowledge available to us. When we don’t know what to do next, we only have to ask and listen.
God is not trying to hide his direction and wisdom from us. He dwells inside us to provide all that we need for life and life abundantly.
All these benefits and more were not ours before being adopted by Christ. Now they are. What a set of gifts to welcome us to our new family.
Even the angels in heaven rejoice when one of us is saved. It reminds me of what happened when our 53 year old son and daughter-in-law adopted a 4 and 5 year old brother and sister. We threw them a party!
All the family came: parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, adult siblings, cousins of all stripes. We had a major family get together to welcome these 2 new young ones into our family. We wanted them to know that they were not alone anymore.
They were loved and would be cared for by all of us. And now they have access to all the resources this family has, just as we do with our heavenly Father. Our relationship with Jesus is not just about the life to come, but also the life we live today.
———————–
Mike Kelly is the founding pastor of Bryan’s Grace Community Church (retired) and Board Chairman of Bryan’s Sanctuary Homeless Shelter and Williams County’s Compassion (free) Medical Clinic.
