1 Peter 1:3-9 – “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.”  (bolded by me)

The goodness of God is worth our daily meditation, it’s worth our awe, it’s worth our praise, and it is a source of great joy for the believer, who has been reconciled to Him.  We do not worship a statue or an idea – what differentiates Christianity from every other religion is that our hope is a living hope.  Our hope is in the resurrected Christ.  Acts 2:22-28 explains this – “Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know— this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.  God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it. For David says concerning him,

“‘I saw the Lord always before me,
for he is at my right hand that I may not be shaken;
     therefore my heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced;
my flesh also will dwell in hope.
     For you will not abandon my soul to Hades,
or let your Holy One see corruption.
     You have made known to me the paths of life;
you will make me full of gladness with your presence.’

The grave could not hold Him!  Our God, died in our place, was dead and buried – but God’s justice would not allow perfect righteousness to be separated from Him.  This is not myth, at least 11 of the 12 disciples were martyred for this fact claim.  In 1 Corinthians 15:6 Paul exhorts the readers of the his letter in presenting the to them gospel – telling them essentially, “look if you don’t believe me, there are 500 people who witnessed the resurrected Jesus, go ask them!”  If Jesus could not be held by death, and we are given the Holy Spirit when by God’s grace we believed on Christ – the same Spirit that could not be bound by death in Christ dwells in us – we’re never going to die!  If He is alive, we will be alive with Him!  Where He is, we will be.

We are going to be in the presence of our God and Father, and as David said above, we will be full of gladness in His presence for all eternity.  Words cannot express that “fullness of gladness” truly means.  We’re going to have to have new glorified bodies to even withstand the amount of joy we will have in the presence of God.

How merciful is our God?  We may ask of Him, “Doesn’t He realize what I’ve done in my past?  Doesn’t he realize what I’m struggling with today?  Why would He want me?”  Perhaps God’s mercy to any of us is the greatest mystery of all about God; but we, for all eternity, will be an echo of God’s glory – His unending, never failing, constantly pursuing, perfectly faithful love and mercy.  That is our God, and in Christ we have the hope of our salvation, our reconciliation to Him.  Here’s a question – do you love Him?  Does your heart rejoice at knowing that He is in You even now with the Holy Spirit, and you are guaranteed to see Him face to face for all eternity?  I hope so – our joy in Him is the assurance of our salvation.  What do I mean by that?  You can fake a smile, but you can’t fake joy.  In fact, you can fake a lot of things, but joy in the Lord only comes from Him.

Do you let your heart dwell on these things that stir up your joy in God, or do you pursure a phantom “greater joy” in other things in life?  Don’t allow yourself to be distracted by lesser pleasures – we were made to enjoy God with a fullness of joy forever.  Soak into your heart God’s truth and promises in His Word, that you can rest in your salvation, and that your joy will overflow in praise to the glory of God.

Grace and Peace,
Adam