In God’s full salvation, we begin with regeneration and continue to experience and enjoy the rich life of Christ through renewing, sanctification, transformation, maturity, and conformation, and ultimately, unto glorification. To be glorified is to enter into God’s glory, to experience and enjoy, without measure and without limit, the infinite and eternal life of God in Christ.
1) “...the God of all grace, who called you into His eternal glory in Christ” (1 Pet. 5:10).
Here we are told that God’s purpose in calling us in Christ Jesus and in giving us all grace is that we may enjoy His eternal glory. In eternity past He predestinated us according to His foreknowledge, and in time He called us and justified us that we may be glorified (Rom. 8:29-30). This will be fulfilled when the Lord comes again. At that time we shall “be manifested...in glory” (Col. 3:4) together with Christ, who is our life today, and shall enjoy “the glory of the children of God” (Rom. 8:21). Our sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with “the coming glory to be revealed to us” (Rom. 8:18), that is, God’s own glory (1 Thes. 2:12).
1) “...Him, for whom are all things and through whom are all things, in leading many sons into glory” (Heb. 2:10).
Since God predestined that we should enjoy His own eternal glory, beginning from the day of our salvation, He leads us into His glory. As the Creator of all things, He orders and arranges all things, causing them to work for us (Rom. 8:28-30), that through them He may lead us into His glory.
1) “Our momentary lightness of affliction works out for us, more and more surpassingly, an eternal weight of glory” (2 Cor. 4:17). Here we see that the affliction which we suffer today for being Christians, for following the Lord, and for witnessing for Him is momentary and light. Our momentary lightness of affliction works out for us, more and more surpassingly, an eternal weight of glory. The working out of this affliction is God’s perfecting work. Through affliction, God perfects us to enjoy the coming weight of glory. We suffer together with Him that we also may be glorified together with Him. Through all the things created and ordered by Him, God leads us into His glory; through afflictions, or sufferings, God perfects us to enjoy His incomparable glory.
1) “What are the riches of the glory of this mystery...which is Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col. 1:27). Although we who believe into Christ have not yet entered into the glory which God predestined for us, we do have Christ in us as the hope of glory. This is a mysterious glory with tremendous riches.
2) “When Christ our life is manifested, then you also shall be manifested with Him in glory” (Col. 3:4). Today we enjoy Christ as our life. When He is manifested, we will be manifested with Him in His glory to enjoy His divine glory. That glory will free us from the slavery which the corrupted creation is under today. It is not only a glory which we desire to enjoy, but also a glory that the whole creation is eagerly expecting (Rom. 8:19-21). Today, that glory is the Christ who is in us, growing in us continually. When Christ comes, on the one hand, it is God who will lead us into that glory, and on the other hand, it is Christ who will permeate through us as the glory into which we will enter. This is Christ being glorified and marveled at in His saints (2 Thes. 1:10), that is Christ being manifested from within His believers and upon His believers as glory and as their enjoyment. In the future, our bodies will be permeated by the glory of Christ to manifest His glory; that is, our bodies will be redeemed in the life of Christ and conformed to His glorious body. We will then put off our bodies of the old creation and be freed from the slavery which both we and the corrupted creation are under, that we may enter into the freedom of the glory of the children of God to enjoy God’s eternal glory.