Amazing Hope

There is a beautiful songbook “Praise”, which I recall when reading Psalm 139. In the chorus, it says about Jesus Christ: “HE is the Centre of history, HE is the Anchor in time. HE is the Source of all life and our eternal goal. ” One can only marvel at God (which, by the way, is also a title of a song) and feel really safe, beyond all our limitations. God is omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent – the Eternal and Perfect, who has no beginning and no end and therefore He is also the First and the Last (Revelation 1:17). We Christians don't really comprehend with Whom we have to do. But, we have an infinitesimal idea, and are able to penetrate dimensions (still) impenetrable by man, through the Holy Spirit, which makes it clear to us that there is light, power, strength, truth, holiness, purity and bliss. Our inner (new) man is drawn inevitable towards it. And Jesus has indeed said and promised in John 14:1-3 “Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.'' That is the goal, namely to spend eternity in the heavenly Jerusalem with Jesus Christ and to praise and honour God in the inconceivable, still unknown, eternal reality. We read in Isaiah 64:4 “For since the beginning of the world men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye seen, O God, beside Thee, what He hath prepared for him that waiteth for Him.” If we now read the text at the beginning, that God has already seen every future day of every person, how does this relate to our conversion? Is election then only foreknowledge and still depends on me alone, because God ultimately only reacts thereto? No, it can't be. We read in John 15:16 “Ye have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in My name, He may give it you.''

From this I understand that God always brings about repentance (Romans 2:4) and people then have the opportunity to ask God to come into their lives and forgive their sins through faith in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. God desires salvation for all people (1 Timothy 2:4), but it has to be our own mature, adult decision. But, without God's fundamental will that all be saved, it would also be useless. Perhaps one can envision it in this manner – one stands before a door upon which one is invited in writing (or some other way) to enter (figuratively this could be through a sermon in which one is lead to believe in accordance with Romans 10:17). And when one goes through the door, one reads on the inside that one has been elected to faith! Nevertheless, the way in which faith, the election, the Holy Spirit and God's sovereignty all correlate, still remains a mystery. Jesus pointed it out in John 16:8-15 “And when He is come, He will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: Of sin, because they believe not on Me; Of righteousness, because I go to My Father, and ye see Me no more; Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged. I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth: for He shall not speak of Himself; but whatsoever He shall hear, that shall He speak: and He will shew you things to come. He shall glorify Me: for He shall receive of Mine, and shall shew it unto you. All things that the Father hath are Mine: therefore said I, that He shall take of Mine, and shall shew it unto you.” It is the Holy Spirit, who represents the Truth, which ultimately leads us to salvation. You cannot, by yourself, come to the knowledge of this, it has to be revealed to you, in a certain manner, through the eternal God so that you are able to seize it and desire it (Philippians 2:13). Amen

Jörg Bauer