TEEN TREE OF LIFE
Receiving A Glimpse Of
The Resurrection Life Before We Die
Part 4
November 24, 2019

Before you begin, ask yourself a very important question: Do you believe that Jesus Christ died on The Cross for all of your sins? If you answered yes, you will need to be sure that you are filled with The Holy Spirit. How do you do this? You name your sins to God The Father in His Son’s Name. This is called Rebound. As a Christian, you must rebound any time you sin. This is taught in 1JOHN 1:9: If we confess [name] our sins [directly to God], He [God] is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Now, if you have never believed that Jesus Christ died on The Cross for all of your sins, all you have to do is say to yourself that you believe in Him and you are saved! The Bible verse which teaches us this is ACTS 16:31: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.”

Last week, we learned that the Resurrection Life also includes an extraordinary peace that God wants us to experience right here on earth. This sense of peace will ebb and flow because this newness in life, which comes from the Resurrection Life, is given in small increments. But, in the eternal state, you will be entirely filled with this peace! Imagine that!!!

In this life on earth, though, the dangerous trap, that gets many of us, is to get discouraged when things aren’t going right. These are the times when we face loss or hardship.  And this is why it’s so important to get to a point in our Christian walks at which we have attained that peace that goes beyond understanding. Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ talked to His disciples about this in JOH 14:25-27 (The Message Bible): “I’m telling you these things while I’m still living with you. The Friend, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send at my request, will make everything plain to you. He will remind you of all the things I have told you. I’m leaving you well and whole. That’s my parting gift to you. Peace. I don’t leave you the way you’re used to being left—feeling abandoned, bereft. So, don’t be upset. Don’t be distraught.”

What Our Lord was teaching here is that those who believe in and follow Him, will face adversity in life which can be faced head on by having His Peace. How do we get His Peace? By getting to know Him through the daily intake of Bible doctrine and being filled with The Holy Spirit. And when we face loss, adversity, trials, troubles or sadness, we should pay attention to what Paul wrote in PHI 4:6-7: Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Re-read that verse because it very well could be one of the most important lessons you’ll ever learn!

We do not always understand God’s Will – in terms of the things He puts in our paths or allows to happen to us in our lives; but in order to experience the Resurrection Life within us, we have to trust His Sovereignty completely.  Do you remember what God’s Sovereignty is? It’s one of His attributes and it describes His Supreme Authority and Rule over all He creates. We must always remember that God has complete control over EVERYTHING WHICH EXISTS and put our trust in Him because He is in control!! He is Perfect, All-Knowing, All-Powerful – so who better to trust to be in charge???

In your relationship with God, there will come a time when the question that you have to answer will be: “What is your motivation?” In order to experience the Resurrection Life, your motivation has to be Him and Him alone.  If you have this attitude, then you won’t be in bondage to the things of this world.  Receiving a glimpse of the Resurrection Life will allow you to ultimately go through your time on earth totally content in any and every circumstance. And you’ll be able to say what the apostle Paul said in PHI 4:11-13: Not that I speak from want, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know how to get along with humble means, and I also know how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.

The Message Bible translates Paul’s words in an extremely awesome way: Actually, I don’t have a sense of needing anything personally. I’ve learned by now to be quite content whatever my circumstances. I’m just as happy with little as with much, with much as with little. I’ve found the recipe for being happy whether full or hungry, hands full or hands empty. Whatever I have, wherever I am, I can make it through anything in the One who makes me who I am.

Paul’s words perfectly describe what is called Escrow Blessings in time. Escrow Blessings are infinitely superior to all other categories of Divine Blessings for both time and eternity. There are no external set of circumstances that can stand in the way of your receiving your Escrow Blessings in time, if you fulfill the conditions of the escrow.

God the Father placed Himself under legal obligation in Eternity Past to provide two categories of special and unusual blessings, both temporal (in time, on earth) and eternal, for every Church-Age believer. In Eternity Past, both categories of blessings were deposited with Our Lord Jesus Christ in escrow, pending the believer’s fulfillment of the conditions of the escrow. Escrow simply means that these blessings were put into the keeping of a third party (God The Son) for delivery to the intended receiver (the believer) after specified conditions have been met. The specified conditions are executing the Pre-Designed Plan of God with the result of advancing to spiritual maturity. Once this obligation is met, The Lord Jesus Christ will deliver the believer’s Escrow Blessings. You will receive your Escrow Blessings as a mature believer even if the rest of the nation is falling apart around you. Escrow Blessings are a metaphor designed to explain the ultimate blessings available to every Christian in time and eternity.

The idea which Paul is trying to convey in PHI 4:11-13 is that what you’re going to attain, by executing God’s Pre-Designed Plan for your life, is an incredible, superb inner peace which will be with you no matter what you’re going through, no matter what the circumstance!  There’s nothing wrong with wealth and overt prosperity – you know that. But they won’t get you through the trials and troubles of life. And if you become a slave to them by getting caught up in the cosmic system, you’ll never receive your Escrow Blessings. The peace you get, from putting God and His Word first, amounts to deliverance from the bondage of the cosmic system and its stronghold. Instead of feeling like you need money or material things like a big house, designer-label clothes and an expensive car, you can actually get to a point in your life, where those things mean nothing. Again, this doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy these things in life, but it means you should not be in bondage to them. They shouldn’t be the focus of your life. God and His Word should be. 

This is why the apostle John wrote: Don’t love the world’s ways. Don’t love the world’s goods. Love of the world squeezes out love for the Father. Practically everything that goes on in the world—wanting your own way, wanting everything for yourself, wanting to appear important—has nothing to do with the Father. It just isolates you from him. The world and all its wanting, wanting, wanting is on the way out—but whoever does what God wants is set for eternity. (1JO 2:15-17 The Message Bible)

This is why it’s so important, when you begin to encounter sufferings in this life, that you don’t run from the sufferings, but ACCEPT them.  You have to come to a point at which you’re no longer blown away by things people do to you or troubles that come your way. This will only be accomplished if you know such passages as EPH 4:11-14 (New International Version) : So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming.

{to be continued}