Called According to His Purpose
Dearly beloved of God, God called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before the time of the ages.
God called us to His kingdom and glory. He called us by the gospel of God concerning Jesus Christ. To what end did He call us? He called us to the obtaining of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Behold what manner of love the Father has given to us that we should be called the children of God, (and so we are)! God is our Father and He calls us His beloved. We are the children of the Living God, and members of His household.
We are now the beloved of God, the called, holy ones in Christ Jesus.
We know that in everything God works for good with those who love Him, who are called according to His purpose.
Those whom He foreknew, He determined beforehand for them to be conformed to the image of His Son, so that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. It is still hard for me to take this in; we will not only be with the Lord Jesus Christ, we will be like him!
Moreover, those for whom He determined things beforehand He also called, and those whom He called He also justified, and those whom He justified He also glorified.
Beloved, if God is for us, who could be against us?
He Who did not even spare His own Son but delivered him up on behalf of all of us, how will He not also freely give us all things with him? God our Father freely gives us all things with His Son. He has shown us such amazing grace in Christ Jesus.
In Christ, He blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realm; we are completely filled in him who is the head of all principality and power! It is all that Christ accomplished in all of us.
Who will bring legal charges against God’s chosen ones? God, the Justifier?
Who can condemn us? Christ? No, he is the one who died, and rather who was raised from the dead, who is also at the right side of God, and who also makes intercession for us.
Dearly beloved, nothing can separate us from God’s love that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
God our Father has made known to us the mystery of His will in accordance with His good pleasure, which He Himself purposed in Christ, so that in the administration of the fullness of times He might bring all things together under one head in the Christ, that is, the things in heaven and the things upon the earth, even in him.
He has enlightened us concerning the hope of His calling; it is Christ in you, the hope of glory. We will be glorified with him as joint-heirs in accordance with the purpose of the ages, which He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Who could ever have imagined such amazing grace toward us in Christ Jesus? It will take our Father the ages to come to display the exceeding riches of His grace in kindness to us in Christ Jesus.
God our Father will send His Son to gather us together. The Lord will raise the dead in Christ first, and after that, we who remain alive will be snatched up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. The Lord Jesus Christ will transform these death doomed bodies to be like his glorious body by the power he is able to subdue all things to himself.
The sufferings of the present time are not comparable with the glory that is to be revealed to us. Our momentary light weight of affliction produces for us an eternal, exceedingly heavy weight of glory.
Yes, dearly beloved, God called us according to His own purpose and grace which is in Christ Jesus, and what a calling it is!
Rejoice, God will fulfill every word of His promise concerning us from the new birth to the coming glory. It is certain!