Whereunto he called you by our gospel, to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
God calls people by the gospel to the obtaining of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. This calling belongs to God's saving choice from the beginning to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth. The Spirit's sanctifying work and belief of the truth are joined with the believer's active faith.
The glory to be obtained is Christ's character, the character He revealed and has given to His followers. The calling is a call to become conformed to the image of God's Son. This glory is a wonderful possibility and fullness that every follower has the privilege of receiving, nothing greater than what Christ asks the Father to bestow on believers. It is that they should be holy and without blame in love, sanctified and cleansed as a glorious church without spot or wrinkle, predestined to adoption by Jesus Christ and made accepted in the Beloved according to His own purpose and grace given in Christ before the world began.
The call stands in contrast to those who perish because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved but had pleasure in unrighteousness, to whom God sends strong delusion that they should believe a lie and be damned. This takes place under the working of the man of sin in the mystery of iniquity already working until the restrainer is taken out of the way, then revealed with a coming after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders and all deceivableness of unrighteousness, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of His mouth and destroy with the brightness of His coming. In the last great crisis when that deceptive working is revealed, those beloved of the Lord give thanks, stand fast and hold the traditions taught by word or epistle. They receive from the Lord Jesus Christ Himself and God the Father who loved them everlasting consolation and good hope through grace, with comfort of heart and establishment in every good word and work. Those so called are to work with God in seeking and saving the lost.
God calls people by the gospel to the obtaining of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. This calling belongs to God's saving choice from the beginning to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth. The Spirit's sanctifying work and belief of the truth are joined with the believer's active faith.
The glory to be obtained is Christ's character, the character He revealed and has given to His followers. The calling is a call to become conformed to the image of God's Son. This glory is a wonderful possibility and fullness that every follower has the privilege of receiving, nothing greater than what Christ asks the Father to bestow on believers. It is that they should be holy and without blame in love, sanctified and cleansed as a glorious church without spot or wrinkle, predestined to adoption by Jesus Christ and made accepted in the Beloved according to His own purpose and grace given in Christ before the world began.
The call stands in contrast to those who perish because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved but had pleasure in unrighteousness, to whom God sends strong delusion that they should believe a lie and be damned. This takes place under the working of the man of sin in the mystery of iniquity already working until the restrainer is taken out of the way, then revealed with a coming after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders and all deceivableness of unrighteousness, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of His mouth and destroy with the brightness of His coming. In the last great crisis when that deceptive working is revealed, those beloved of the Lord give thanks, stand fast and hold the traditions taught by word or epistle. They receive from the Lord Jesus Christ Himself and God the Father who loved them everlasting consolation and good hope through grace, with comfort of heart and establishment in every good word and work. Those so called are to work with God in seeking and saving the lost.