190317 Groaning in Hope

Romans 8:22-25 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. ²³ And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. ²⁴ For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? ²⁵ But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

As far back as Isaiah’s prophecies, about 700 years before Christ’s birth, God said there would be new heavens and a new earth and we will live there with God. Heaven is the place where God makes his presence known to bless his people. We know that it is a real place because the Bible says so! It is the place where Jesus ascended into the clouds after his resurrection in his last days with his apostles. It is the place Stephen saw as he was being stoned to death! It is the place Paul saw when he was stopped on the Damascus Road! It is the final resting place for the people of God!

The eager expectation that we have is that God has given us hope. The problem we have is the way we understand the meaning of the word “hope”. The average person today will use the word hope to speak of something that they wish would happen. For instance we might say, “I hope it does not rain tomorrow”, or, we might say, “I hope to be able to pay off all my debts”. In neither case are we able to be sure it will happen. But when God gives us a promise we can rest assured that it will come to pass. Biblical hope is the promises of God. We are often impatient while waiting on God.

The fact is…

The creation is certainly groaning now. Let’s look at what happened in the beginning Genesis 3:17-19. And to Adam he said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; ¹⁸ thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. ¹⁹ By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

When mankind sinned the punishments did not give new roles or responsibility. The punishments introduced pain and suffering which was added to their responsibilities. It was not just a curse placed on man the curse extended to the entire Cosmos. The ground, which previously had given them food now required real effort to extract the food from it. By God’s common grace the earth doesn’t just bring forth thorns and thistles. Along with the thorns and thistles and ground that has to be cultivated the land brings forth sufficient food for man to live.

The curse includes strife and conflict among groups of people. None of which could have been expected by Adam and Eve. In the very beginning there were no other people for them to relate to or to have conflict with. In the very next generation Cain and Abel developed sufficient animosity that resulted in Abel’s death and Cain’s banishment!

Jesus told us these things would happen. Let’s look at the words of Jesus found in Mark 13:6-8. Many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he!’ and they will lead many astray. ⁷ And when you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. This must take place, but the end is not yet. ⁸ For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines. These are but the beginning of the birth pains.

The antagonism caused by man’s sin reaches to religious conflicts as well as civil wars. In every generation there have been conflicts. Many of those conflicts have no real explanation. Jesus wanted his disciples, and us, to understand that there would be many who claim to speak in his name and even claim they are the Messiah. Many people have been led astray and are being led astray by these false teachers. Along with false teaching there will be wars and rumors of wars. Nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom. The earth itself will continue to groan and produce earthquakes and tsunamis. The weather will become increasingly violent. Not just the creation and people influenced by false teachers — Christian believers will groan. However…

Our groanings represent birth, not death. Let’s look at 2 Corinthians 5:2-3. For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling, ³ if indeed by putting it on we may not be found naked.

Paul observed that the groanings we experience do not represent an entirely negative thing. Our groaning is like the pains of childbirth. I will never experience that pain and I do not wish to observe it. At the same time I know that it is usually very severe. My own birth, so I’m told, was very difficult on my mother. That difficulty caused me to be the first person in my family, on either side, to be delivered by a Doctor.

Our bodies are fragile. I believe that Adam’s body was far and away superior to ours. As it was, he survived nearly a thousand years. We are only promised, by means of special grace, lives of about 80 years. We groan but not in despair! We groan like a woman in childbirth. It can be endured because we know the result will be worth it. Our bodies, while on this earth, are like tents — easily destroyed! Our heavenly dwelling will be far superior to the earthly body we now live in.

Not just the creation, but the new creatures. 2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

Everything that was taken away from mankind as a result of Adam and Eve’s sin will be restored. That is part of our hope. Remember biblical hope is not just a guess as to what might happen it is a promise. The promise contained here is that we who believe in Christ become new creatures. The old creation is fading away and the new creation has come.

Mankind lost everything in Adam and potentially have had all things restored in Jesus Christ.

This is a desperate need! We are born sons and daughters of Adam and Eve and as such are born separated from God. Everyone is in the same condition. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God, Romans 3:23! And sin pays its wages! The wages of sin is death — spiritual death, Romans 6:23, and that’s bad news! Yet, God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son to bear our sins in his own body the cross, 1 Peter 2:24. He demonstrated his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us, Romans 5:8. And as a result of God’s work on our behalf if the separated sinner will confess that Jesus is Lord and believe in the heart that God raised him from the dead you will be saved, Romans 10:9. Our hope includes the fact that…

We have been adopted — but not yet complete. Let’s look at Ephesians 1:5-6. He predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, ⁶ to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.

We live lives of adopted — but not yet! We are heirs not owners! We look forward to a time when we will be fully brought into the household of God. The will has not yet been fully executed. It is safe! The Bible tells us that we have been born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus. We have been brought to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, that is kept in heaven for us. That inheritance is guarded through faith, 1 Peter 1:3-5. If the will that our inheritance is based on were anywhere else it would be insecure. It is reserved for us in heaven and is as secure as God himself. It can’t be lost nor can it be questioned. If it were a human will some judge might overturn it. Our promised inheritance was prepared by our advocate and judge before the world was created. Our hope is secure.

Our new heavenly body will replace this fragile shell we live in when Christ returns…

We will be like our Lord Jesus. Let’s look at 1 John 3:2-3.  Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. ³ And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.

We have a building from God waiting us in heaven. This perishable body will put on the imperishable! This mortal body MUST put on immortality, 1 Corinthians 15:53. When Christ returns we will be like him.

When Jesus was raised from the dead he still had his human body. He allowed his disciples to see him and touch him. He gave assurance that he was the same person they knew before. He even ate with them. I do believe that his body was perfect. The women who met him at the tomb did not immediately recognize him. The two disciples that made them on the Emmaus Road did not recognize him immediately. The last time any of them had seen him he was hanging on a cross and his body had been severely beaten.

Though we are groaning now…

We are able to be patient. Let’s look at Romans 2:6-7. He will render to each one according to his works: ⁷ to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life.

We are able to be patient because we have confidence in God. He keeps his promises yet we are often faithless. We hope for what we do not see and are able to wait for it with patience. The God who brought us to salvation continues to work in us that our salvation will impact and change the lives of those around us.

In the words of Isaac Watts’ great hymn:

1 Am I a soldier of the cross, a foll'wer of the Lamb,
and shall I fear to own his cause, or blush to speak his name?

2 Must I be carried to the skies on flow'ry beds of ease,
while others fought to win the prize, and sailed thro' bloody seas?

3 Are there no foes for me to face? Must I not stem the flood?
Is this vile world a friend to grace, to help me on to God?

4 Sure I must fight if I would reign: increase my courage, Lord;
I'll bear the toil, endure the pain, supported by thy Word.

This passage of Scripture is God’s answer to a false teaching going on all over the world. That false teaching is called by many the “prosperity gospel”! Such a gospel is not good news it is false and we must remember that. Here Paul tells us what we have but NOT YET! We are adopted into the family of God but we are not there yet. We get impatient and want to have it all NOW. That is not God’s plan nor his intention. Our Father God teaches us to wait patiently for what we have promised to us. We have the Holy Spirit and are God’s firstfruits. We are saved in a hope that includes redeemed bodies. But we don’t see that yet! Be patient! God loved us enough to allow God the Son to bear our sins on the cross so that we could receive this inheritance.

Him

All scriptures quotes are from: The Holy Bible: English standard version. 2001. Wheaton, Ill, Standard Bible Society.

190303 Eager Expectations

Romans 8:18-22 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. ¹⁹ For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. ²⁰ For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope ²¹ that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. ²² For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.

Approximately 700 years before Jesus’ birth, Isaiah spoke of the future that awaited believers in Isaiah 64:4. “From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides you, who acts for those who wait for him.” Jesus, speaking of the final judgment, had these words for us: “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” (Matthew 25:34) God has already prepared an unimaginable glory for us.

When Paul wrote the words “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.” He was writing about something that he had experienced. Using the words of Isaac Watts, he had certainly not been,

“carried to the skies on flowery beds of ease,

while others fought to win the prize and sailed through bloody seas”.

In Paul’s own words we can see that…

Paul understood suffering. Let’s turn to 2 Corinthians 11:23-27. Are they servants of Christ? I am a better one—I am talking like a madman—with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless beatings, and often near death. ²⁴ Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. ²⁵ Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; ²⁶ on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; ²⁷ in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure.

We can see from this passage that Paul understood what he was writing. I have often wondered if Paul took a quick tour of the prison wherever he traveled, knowing that he would be in it pretty soon! He didn’t even bother to count how often he had been beaten. He recalled five times when he was whipped with 39 lashes. He could remember being beaten with rods three times. He was stoned once. When he wasn’t being beaten nearly to death his ship was sinking under him. Danger marked most of his activity! When he looked back on his ministry he recalled being tired a lot. He lost a lot of sleep carrying the gospel to the nations. He remembered hunger and thirst, cold and exposure!

In spite of all that he could say that the suffering experienced in service to Christ would dim in the light of the glory yet to come.

Paul had not been there but Peter, James, and John were. You recall the story. The three disciples had gone with Jesus to the top of a mountain where they had seen Jesus meeting with Moses and Elijah. There…

Peter had seen the fading glory — now the unfading. Let’s look at 1 Peter 5:4. And when the chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory.

The disciples experienced something similar to Isaiah’s vision in the temple. It had happened in the year that King Uzziah died! Isaiah saw the Lord sitting on the throne, high and lifted up.

Another example would be Moses when he went into the presence of God. When he was surrounded by the glory of God he glowed but the glow faded. Now Peter tells us that the crown of glory we receive will be unfading.

After reflecting on his sufferings.

Paul had thought about these things. Let’s look back at Romans 8:18. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.

Paul begins verse 18 by saying, “I consider,” meaning “I have thought it over carefully—I have weighed the evidence and thus reckon it to be so.” He says essentially the same thing in 2 Corinthians 4:17—“For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.”  No matter what we have gone through, are presently going through, or will go through, the sum total is not worth comparing with the glory that awaits us. We can compare a thimble of water with the sea, but we cannot compare our sufferings with the coming glory.

Like the old song tells us:

This world is not my home I'm just a passing through
My treasures are laid up somewhere beyond the blue
The angels beckon me from heaven's open door
And I can't feel at home in this world anymore

— Mary Reeves Davis (Jim Reeves wife)

There must’ve been many days when the apostle thought about the world that lay beyond the veil. Certainly, his tiredness while enduring constant pain must’ve held him down some days. Paul must’ve recognized that he was no longer subject to this world. In fact, believers in the Lord Jesus Christ should agree with him that…

Our citizenship is not earthly. Let’s look at Philippians 3:20-21. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, ²¹ who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.

It is a marvelous thing to consider who we really are! We are not just men and women subject to the things of this world. We are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God (Ephesians 2:19). Or, as the writer of Hebrews would have it, “But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, ²³ and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, ²⁴ and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.” (Hebrews 12:22-24).

So, we see that throughout Scripture there is evidence for our changed allegiance. Not only are we now subject to a new set of rules we will be restored to bodies that must be like those Adam and Eve had before they sinned. When they rebelled against God their bodies begin to die. Previous to that they had been part of creation that God, himself, said was very good. Having lost their perfect bodies they began to decline generation after generation until we have what we have today. When Christ comes again he will restore us to perfection! In the meantime, we will not be disembodied spirits. We are in a body today that is similar to a tent. It is fragile and subject to all sort of difficulties. But, we will lay aside this tent and it will be replaced with a building from God. We are not told exactly how that body will differ from the one we have now. The comparison is given in 1 Corinthians 15, the present body — earthly — is like a seed that will be put in the ground and the future body — heavenly — will be like the full stalk that grows from the seed. Jesus, after his resurrection, had a recognizable body but it was enough different that his followers did not immediately recognize him. We do not know exactly what our heavenly body will be like but John told us that, “when he appears we shall be like him” (1 John 3:2).

While we await that new body…

In the meantime — creation groans. Let’s go back to the original creation found in Genesis 3:17-19. And to Adam he said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; ¹⁸ thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. ¹⁹ By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

Before Eve ate the fruit and handed it to Adam they lived in a perfect world. They ate the forbidden fruit and suddenly were afraid of God and ashamed of their bodies. In fact, their bodies may have begun to change immediately. We are not told so we can only speculate. We should always be careful when speculating anything regarding Scripture. What was the world like where Adam and Eve lived? Apparently, all creation lived together without fear or anger. Apparently again, every creature — including humans — lived off of vegetation. They did not eat meat until after the flood covered the earth. (Genesis 9:3)

All creation fell when Adam and Eve sinned. Before that, they had access to all kinds of fruit and edible vegetation. They did not have to work the ground. After sin came into the world they had to scratch their living out of a resistant earth. For the first time, they had to sweat in order to eat. Ultimately, their bodies would return to the earth out of which they came.

The animal world was invaded by fear and violence. The most beautiful scenes in nature are also witnesses to horror: floods, hurricanes, droughts, tornadoes, blights, avalanches, and earthquakes are common today.

Not just mankind, but all of the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. Since the fall of mankind, the whole creation has been groaning together in the labor to produce a new world where we will all be at peace. We are in expectation of a new world…

Until all things are made new. Let’s go to the end of the story Revelation 21:1-5a. Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. ² And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. ³ And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. ⁴ He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” ⁵ And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.”

Everything that was lost in Genesis is restored in Revelation. Everything that was twisted and destroyed by sin is going to be straightened and restored. The earth as we know it today will be changed. There will no longer be a need for the vast seas that cover much of our earth today. And there will be a connection between heaven and earth in the city -- the New Jerusalem! Again, God will dwell with man. He will be our God and we will be his people. There will be no more tears, no more death, no mourning, no crying, no pain, our God will make all things new!

We can expect that the new heavens and new earth will be a fully perfect creation that was once proclaimed to be — and will be again — “very good”! Eventually, all things will be subjected to the people of God under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. God’s original plan to have everything in the world subject to human beings will be accomplished. Mankind will once again fill the earth and subdue it having dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the heavens and every living thing that moves on the face of the earth. I would encourage you to look at the prophecy of Isaiah chapter 65, which ends with the fabulous promise, “They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain,” says the Lord.

Believers in the Lord Jesus Christ will be a part of that new world. Jesus will call us to inherit the kingdom he has prepared for us. Recall that he promised his disciples — and that includes us — that he would come again so that they would be where he is at even today. The Bible assures us that such a place where he is at exists even now. As far back as Isaiah’s prophecies, God said there would be new heavens and a new earth and we will live with God there. Heaven is the place where God makes his presence known to bless his people. We know that it is a real place because the Bible says so! It is the place where Jesus ascended into the clouds after his resurrection in his last days with his apostles. It is a place Stephen saw when he was being stoned to death! It is the place Paul saw when he was stopped on the Damascus Road! It is the final resting place for the people of God!

I pray that you will be there.

All scriptures quotes are from: The Holy Bible: English standard version. 2001. Wheaton, Ill, Standard Bible Society.