Today everyone who accepts God’s invitation and receives the offer of what He has prepared for us has the ground to participate in the New Testament jubilee and enjoy Christ in this age. But in order to receive the reward of the jubilee in the coming age, we need to enjoy Christ faithfully in this age. Many saved ones are not faithful to enjoy Christ today. For this reason, God has set up a reward as an incentive that we may enjoy Christ faithfully in this present age. If we do not enjoy Christ faithfully today, we shall lose the enjoyment of Christ in the coming age. Here we see that in His wisdom God has made the enjoyment of Christ in the coming age a reward for the faithful ones, the ones who enjoy Christ faithfully in this age.
Christians have neglected a number of important matters in God’s New Testament economy. One of these matters is the reward given to the faithful ones in the coming age. Most fundamental Christians emphasize God’s salvation, but they do not pay any attention to God’s reward. This reward in the coming age has been set up by God as an incentive to encourage all the Lord’s believers to enjoy Him and follow Him faithfully in this age.
We have pointed out that there are no terms, no conditions, for enjoying Christ in this age. As long as we believe in Him, accepting God’s invitation and offer, we may enjoy Christ today. Nevertheless, we need to enjoy Him faithfully in order to receive the reward in the coming age of the kingdom. Otherwise, we shall lose the enjoyment of Christ in the coming age.
The kingdom will be a reward in the thousand years to the faithful enjoyers of Christ, and that reward will also be a jubilee. Today’s jubilee is real, but it is only a foretaste, not the full taste. God has presented us such a foretaste, and we need to have a high regard for it. So many Jews have excused themselves from accepting God’s invitation and have denied this jubilee and as a result cannot share its enjoyment. But we Christians have accepted God’s invitation and His offer. Therefore, we are on the right ground to enjoy this jubilee. Yet we still need to be faithful to enjoy the jubilee; that is, we need to be faithful to enjoy Christ.
Many genuine believers, truly saved Christians, are not faithfully enjoying Christ. All these unfaithful ones will miss the jubilee in the coming age. This means that they will miss the coming kingdom. We all need to see that today’s jubilee is a matter of salvation, that the jubilee in the coming age is a matter of reward, and that the jubilee in the new heaven and new earth will be the full taste of God’s full salvation.
According to the New Testament, God’s kingdom today is Christ as our enjoyment. This enjoyment is the jubilee. The kingdom of God, which is Christ Himself, has set us free from the bondage of sin, Satan, the world, and the self. The kingdom of God has also recovered our right to the divine inheritance, the right to enjoy the Triune God in Christ. Today in God’s salvation we have the right to enjoy Christ, the right to enjoy the jubilee. Now we must remain faithful in this enjoyment. Properly and faithfully we need to enjoy God’s Son who is the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive Spirit. This faithful enjoyment of Christ will qualify us to enter into the kingdom in the coming age and there to enjoy a fuller jubilee. That fuller jubilee will be a reward. Receiving this reward requires the fulfillment of a condition, and this condition is that we faithfully and continually enjoy Christ today.
In our daily living we may fail to enjoy Christ. If you fail, simply repent and confess your failure, and the blood of Jesus will cleanse you. Then you will be brought back to the proper enjoyment of Christ. We may need to do this again and again, each time we fail. When you go to bed at night, you may sense your failures that day. But if you confess them, you will have a new beginning concerning the enjoyment of Christ.
Every day we should exercise to keep ourselves in the faithful enjoyment of Christ. Actually, this is to keep ourselves in God by praying ourselves into Him. It is also to keep ourselves in the kingdom of God for the enjoyment of Christ in this age. This enjoyment will then qualify us to enter into the coming kingdom, which will be a fuller jubilee as a reward to the Lord’s faithful ones.