The Elects Hope and our Forordination.
Romans 8 says 29 For whom Father God foreknew, He also did predestinate (planned and purposed us) to be conformed to the image of His Son”.
Our for-ordination has to do with the truth that before we became flesh, speaking of our carnal existence, we were already in the mind of our Heavenly Father and in the bowels of Christ, with all of our intricacies figured out.
We were precisely in the only Begotten from the beginning, similar to how all the genetic sequencing for mankind was “in Adam” from the beginning, but they all had to be developed in their own time and in their own order as do we who are “in Christ”. It is us who have our new person now fully in tact by faith, which is the control mechanism for things invisible. For this reason we have reconned, which is an accounting term where our old Adamic nature is expired and done because that’s what expired means, useless. We perform this eternal work by faith, to recieve our do-over, to now be reconned and reconnected to God the Father “in Christ”. This is our fore-ordination and a foregone conclusion because we say so. Isn’t that what our protege did? He said things to be and it happened?
We take the Word of God by the projection and impetus of God Holy Spirit in us called the breath of God, different from oxygen. Then speaking the word by the power of faith, we get the same results as our Heavenly Father.
It is by faith that God gives us His Words and His Spirit to do a work like the only Begotten by speaking it so. But we do NOT alter the created realm because that would insult Him who said at the end of the sixth day of creating, that “it was good, very good”. God had played out all the variables and knew He had it covered, and we believe this to be true so it is. That is what Amen, means, so be it!
“If we had the faith the size of a mustard seed we could move mountains”? Yes there is many other things you can do.
Those whom God “foreknew” comes from the Greek word proginōskō. That’s where we get the English word prognosis and means to pre-know or know ahead of time. And with God that would be before time altogether “for known to God from eternity are all His works”. He knows the end of all things. And because time is measured by the passages of the sun with seasons and years, they started with God’s first declaration of “let there be light”. But of the elect it means that God knew them/us and forordained them/us ahead of time, and before time began with the sun and seasons. We were forordained to take on this life on a timeframe for developmental purposes, to understand by way of contrasts, what we genetically possess of that before the beginning of time. That is what forordained means from Gods perspective, preplanned before production. They/we are what creation is for.
29. For whom Father God foreknow, He also did predestinate (planned their purpose) to be conformed to the image of His Son”.
According to James “we are a kind, (of kind begets according to kind) pf firstfruits of His creating”. Meaning It was during the creating that God crowned His creation on the 6th and final day saying “let Us create mankind in our image and our likeness and let them have dominance”. Man was made in Gods likeness with similarities I contrast, but was not like the Godhead itself. Adam was a mimick for and Gods word cannot be circumvented.
30 Moreover whom the Father did (think of at first( predestinate, them He also called: and whom He called, them He also justified: and whom He justified, them He also glorified.” This is reference to salvation and restoration through the resurrection from being dead to God, to the ascension of waking back up there at the place we call “in Christ” as indistinguishably different from being accounted “of Adam”.
These are all spoken of as accomplished facts because that’s how God sees it, and why He sat down on the seventh day. Amen!. God and His Son are seated waiting for our arrival and their enemies to become their footstool because the the outcome for them is a foregone conclusion. (Hebrews 1.1+)
“Known to God through eternity are all His works”. And before He sat down from creating, He looked upon all He had done and said “it is good”. Then in a fraction of a moment He played out all the variables, what man could do and the rogue powers of contrasts could do, and foreknew that He had all the variables coersed and corrected. He had it all covered, and He rests assured in that, as should we.
In this way we enter into His rest of not having to struggle or wring our hands about such things. If this were not true the Only Begotten would not have been able to enter His Glory, to sit down or to rest. Because it is true for Him, for us who are “in Christ” it is true for us too. For even before His appearing, this gospel truth was given “For there remains a rest to the people of God. For those who have entered their rest have ceased from their works as God did from His.” This is a promise quoted from Hebrews 4 that was speaking of the 7th day, meaning the day after God the Father was done with all of creation. The only work left to do is to deliver the gospel for how the saving is accomplished. And this is assured because His word has gone out to all the world even unto the end of the age. Amen!
To this we are “the called”. That “we all with unvieled faces, like looking into a mirror are (in the process of) being transfigured into His self same image, from the Glory to the Glory (through the word of God) as by the Spirit.” 2 Corinthians 3.18+
It is by our residence here that we observe through the contrasts of light and darkness and flesh and spirit to more clearly ascertain who we truly are and what we truly have. And just as a weary wanderer in a desert without food or water, when we eat and drink of the goodness of God cooked up in the spirit of things eternal from scripture, it is as though we awaken to what was ours to begin with, that we had not properly understood or appreciated until we participated of this age, where we temporarily interact with what is called creation. We are called the new creation, however we are not so much created as we are made alive and awakened to “The New Creation” of not being new as in just being made, but new in the sense that it never gets old or fades and is the same yesterday, today and forever, and fulfill the words in scripture that “if anyone is in Christ, old things having passed away behold all things have become new and all things are from God”.
We have seen as lessons from the law that “we would not have known sin apart from the law”. That is because the law takes on the opposite of grace being cumbersome and unforgiving, of something you have to earn. The consequences of sin in contrast to the rewards of faith. That “the law was established to make sin exceedingly sinful” and rightfully called the gospel of death because all that lived by the law died as such and didn’t learn the lesson. But we learned that we needed something that our carnal way of getting things done can not do. You have to go beyond that old way and adopt something new to be the adopted into a new way of thinking we derive from the gospel. The “old things have passed away and all things become new and all things are from God”. So you should not be confused about how to trade in your old for your new features, where they come from and who they resemble and what is the power source that makes it all work, the Holy Spirit.
Here are your primary tools for your task at hand, Hope and Faith
Romans 8 says. For we were saved in this (invisible) hope, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one still hope for what they can see? But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance.”
And “faith is the substance of things hoped for, being the evidence of the things that are not seen” as being more substantial and enduring then anything you can “taste handle and touch, for all are to perish with using according to the commandments and doctrines of men”. (Colossians)
In this way we are like the prodigal son who after being poor, destitute, cold, hungry and over-worked, to be eating with the swine that he fed, then to wake up and remember (something he knew before, thst he foreknew, being the remembrance of the provisions in his Father’s house, then he commenced to return home. “But when he was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him.” This is a picture of what the gospel delivers, and we will quite “be ye reconciled to the Father, for God made Him who knew no sin to become our sin, for us to become the righteousness in Him”. Speaking of us being “in Christ” where all things things come in crystal clear to our understanding.
So then the father said to his servants, [f]‘Bring out the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet. 23 And bring the fatted calf here and kill it, and let us eat and be merry; 24 for this my son was dead (in the way that Adam died) and is alive again; he was lost ( like those in the wilderness) and is found.’ And they began to be merry.”
25 “Now his older son was in the field (by feelings of obligations) And as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. 26 So he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. 27 And he said to him, ‘Your brother has come, and because your father has received him safe and sound, he has killed the (best choice) fatted calf.” This was not your standard meal.
The Father had met the prodigal from a long way off as ours does for us, and restored to him his full inheritance, as He does for us. And of his grumpy brother that never left home? In his jealousy he complained to the Father for making a celebration for his brother who had been thought of as dead. It was the son who never left home who seamingly overlooking what he always had but didn’t appreciate it because he had nothing to compare it to, as we would all do if we had not experienced life here being our carnal experience on a temporary earth in contrast to the eternal with the Father “in Christ”. (2 Peter 3.10+)
As a matter of fact, there are many even now doing work for the faith, not even realizing that those works they think they are doing for God and His Kingdom out of drudgery and feeling obligated to do so, are like the son who never left his father like the prodigal did. It is these things that don’t please God. Even the crazy man at the Gadarenes was soon seated in his right mind upon his encounter with Christ.
One thing you need to keep in mind is that if your faith keeps you under continual mandates of doing and helping and saving people, maybe you’ve forgotten what the cross is about. Please, please don’t be mandate driven to perform the duties of God out of necessity or begrudgingly ‘”for God loves a happy giver”.
A prodigal is like a person in a desert near death and in need of water who tastes the water to come back to life, to appreciate life in a whole new way. Such are we who’ve experienced this age in such a way to really appreciate what we’ve had all along but didn’t know how to recognize it without the gospel. We didn’t know how to use it, enjoy it or appreciate our gift from the Father. “Those who the Son set free are truly free”. This is the gift of God “in Christ”. And whatever He did, He did for us so that we wouldn’t have to.
If you fully understood this, Satan would not be able to prod you to perform with the wrong motives. All your best efforts are just filthy rags anyway, especially if you look back at your trail behind you. However we have something better.
Romans 5. 5 Therefore, having been justified by faith, [a]we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2 through whom also we have access by faith into (the contents stored in) this grace in which we (proverbially) stand, and rejoice in hope (during our realization) of the glory of God. 3 And not only that, but we also glory in adversity, knowing that adversity produces [b]perseverance; 4 and perseverance produces character; and character, produces hope. 5 Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us. (As our strength and a constant reminder to help us keep our resolve strong, as part of our sanctification package benefits)
And like Abraham “who, contrary (to any evidence) to hope, believed in hope, so that he became (as a huge reward) the father of many nations (meaning the whole age of the gentiles), according to what was spoken, “So shall your descendants be.” And the curious thing about this promise to Abraham is that, he was not in human form when his promise was fully realized. As a matter of fact, the promise God gave him to be “father of many nations” is still being played out today to include you and me.
Remember? “Your seeds as the sands of the sea”? And “as the stars of the sky so too your descendants shall be?” For this reason he became the father of many nations, according to the promise spoken, Earthen and Heavenly. What a huge pay off. It still yields unwavering dividends.
Romans 15.13 goes on further to say “Now may the God (who supplies you the) hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing (to receive the contents of the hope), that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit”. Who was also given to remind you and keep you flourishing in this hope, as you grow more and more in all patience and understanding.
Till the end of this age, to harvest Gods offspring. And when you’ve reached the full conclusion and realization of your hope, you will find out that you had agreed before time, your foreknowledge, to participate in the testings of this age as a means of realizing more fully what our true self is. That is what forordained means.
As the elect we were foreordained in the foreknowledge and the mind of God for this cause. Otherwise how could God give us eternal life if there is a specific starting point? That would indicate that you are on a timeframe and you do not have access to what was before, and therefore the gift would not be eternal but linier on a timeframe with a beginning point and God has no such limitations, and “He has given us every spiritual blessing in Heavenly places in Christ”. Ephesians 1
Even as scripture had said that the sons of God shouted out in glory from the time of creation. Shouted out for Glory because apart from experiencing the contrast between Heaven and Earth we really didn’t know what we had. And as God spoke through Isaiah “for as the Heavens are higher than the earth, so are My thoughts and My ways higher than your thoughts and your ways”. Our experience here is wake up call from contrasts that solidify us with great un-waving resolve to be who we truly are in the image of “the eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God”. If this were NOT true, scary could not say that “God has given us every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places” because there would be something with held but there is not. We are joint heirs of Him who is “the same yesterday, today and forever” meaning eternity This is our fore-ordination and the conclusion of the matter. (Hebrews 13.8)
And it is the ways of this age that are always trying to keep people off guard, to detain, to entertain and maintain your existence here focusing you away from your inheritance “in Christ”. However we have been trained to be constantly on watch for our Lord, He comes in the first watch the second watch and the third watch and every watch, and blessed are we because we’ve been found watching, waiting and listening and receiving from each one of Christ’s successive personal encounters that increases our inner capacity in the Spirit of our minds for more of Them. We are those who are rewarded for diligently seeking Him.
In this way “The Kingdom of God, and all our inheritance is at hand”. The Kingdom is preached and the violent take it by force”. Meaning, we won’t take no for an answer, and the Father is not insulted by our persistence. Amen