God’s calling is the sum total of all the blessings listed in verses 3 through 14: God the Father’s selection and predestination; God the Son’s redemption; and God the Spirit’s sealing and pledging. When we were called, we participated in the Father’s selection and predestination, in the Son’s redemption, and in the Spirit’s sealing and pledging.
Have you ever considered that in our calling we have received all the blessings of the Triune God? Few Christians realize this. Nevertheless, these blessings are the contents of God’s calling. Therefore, the calling of God means a great deal. God’s calling is His selection, predestination, redemption, sealing, and pledging. This means that God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit are all involved in God’s calling. The Triune God is our portion in His calling.
We have pointed out that God’s calling includes selection. The Father has also predestinated us; He has made a destiny for us beforehand. This destiny is sonship. What a wonderful destiny! After being selected and predestinated by the Father, we were redeemed by the Son. Then the Spirit came to seal us and to pledge God into us. Since we have all this, what else could we desire? I am fully satisfied and content with what the Triune God is to me.
Now we come to the riches of the glory of God’s inheritance in the saints. We have pointed out many times that God’s glory is God Himself expressed. When God is expressed, that is glory.
The riches of God’s glory are the many different items of His attributes, such as light, life, power, love, righteousness, and holiness, expressed in different degrees. Since glory is God’s expression, the riches of glory are the riches of God’s expression. Some examples of the divine attributes are divine love, humility, patience, and holiness. I specifically use the word “divine” because we were made in such a way as to have the form of the divine things. For example, we have human humility. Human humility, however, is not the real humility; it is simply the form of the genuine humility, which is the divine humility. The same is true of human love. It also is a form of the genuine, divine love. Hence, divine love is the reality of human love. Every human being has love. But this love is not lasting. You may love your parents, but your love for them may last only for a few days. Likewise, a brother may love his wife, but perhaps only for a period of weeks. We all love others, but our love is like a fleeting shadow. One day a brother may love his wife to the uttermost, and the next day he may drag her down to hell. Such love is not a part of the riches of God’s glory.
I repeat, the riches of glory are the expression of the divine attributes and divine virtues. There are not only two kinds of love and humility, human and divine, but also two kinds of righteousness and patience, human righteousness and patience and divine righteousness and patience. Many Christians mistake human virtues for divine virtues. In doing this they make a serious error. We do not need to develop human virtues; we are short of the divine virtues. When God in Christ is wrought into us, our love, humility, patience, and righteousness become divine. These divine virtues are the riches of the glory of God. Such virtues are God’s inheritance among the saints. It is important to see this.
If we see this matter, our Christian life will be changed. Nearly all who seek the Lord still live in a natural way and condemn only their natural evil, not their natural goodness. The evil is condemned, but the good is appreciated. There is no discernment between the natural and the divine. As long as a certain thing is good, it is justified and accepted. This practice is wrong. We must discern the natural from the divine. Only the divine attributes, not the human virtues, are the riches of God’s glory. If we see this, we shall have the proper church life. The proper church life is not filled with natural human virtues; it is filled with the divine virtues as the riches of God’s expression in His inheritance among the saints.
Now we need to see what is God’s inheritance in and among the saints. In verse 18 the Greek word translated “in” may also be rendered “among.” God’s inheritance is in and among the saints. We, the saints, are God’s inheritance. What we are by nature, however, cannot be God’s inheritance. God does not desire to inherit our nature, our flesh, our natural being. He desires to inherit all that He has wrought into us of Himself. Therefore, whatever God has wrought into us of Himself becomes His inheritance.
God has firstly made us His inheritance (v. 11) as His acquired possession (v. 14) and gave us to participate in all He is, all He has, and all He has accomplished as our inheritance. Consummately, all these become His inheritance in the saints for eternity. This will be His eternal expression, which is His glory with all its riches to express Him to the uttermost universally and eternally (Rev. 21:11).
We have seen that God is in the process of dispensing Himself into us little by little. Whatever God dispenses of Himself into us becomes His inheritance. Eventually, God will inherit us, actually Himself in us. Within us we have a certain amount of God’s inheritance. The amount depends upon how much God has wrought Himself into our being. We need to pray and ask the Lord to show us how much of Him is within us. Do not think that doing so is to be introspective. We need to ask the Lord to show us how much in us is God and how much is ourselves. Christians very seldom consider matters in this way. Instead, they weigh themselves according to an ethical scale, according to good and bad, right and wrong, love and hate. However, the scale upon which we must weigh ourselves is God Himself. How much of God is in you, in your family life, and in the church life? If we weigh ourselves in this way, we shall discover that we still do not have very much of God. Nevertheless, we thank Him for what we have. What we need now is the increase of God within us. It is God Himself within us that constitutes His inheritance among the saints. In this inheritance there are the riches of His glory. Therefore, in 1:18 Paul speaks of the riches of His glory in the saints. The proper church life is not a life of natural virtues, but a life of the divine virtues as God’s expression in His inheritance among the saints.