God’s grace and God’s glory were uppermost in my mind and heart when I started this blog. Yet, the ability to write about this realm was difficult to grasp. Four years later these are still not simple things to write about but they are worthy to be expressed as best as possible, using His words. As, from my experience of the past years, it is good and nourishing to go, filled with grace, into another year, wrapped in His glory. Such of God is unsearchable, and what we find is more than enough for a book. When we look to the source we find this pouring out by His grace and from His glory. Please read and meditate on what God speaks to us as His children. We may take each as a separate part, but to meditate on His words are important to understand the content and the effect of His grace and glory.

We speak of these separately and yet they are both part of the wholeness of God. Both are realized in and through the trinity, especially as they are revealed in Jesus Christ, the Son.

 Filled With Grace
The fullness of grace is at first seen in its source. The apostle Paul to the Colossian church tells us that Christ, being the image of the invisible God, by whom all things were made (to be receptacles of His grace) by whom all things consist; (everything is held together by Him) and it pleased the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell ~ all of which we are in need. (Colossians 1:15, 17, 19)

 In John 1:14, and 16 Jesus was the Word made flesh, to dwell among men, full of grace and truth.  And of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace.

“As many as received Him to them gave He the power to become sons of God; born not of the will of man but of God.” (John 1:12-13)

Grace births us into His family and His kingdom (a new realm).   This is to be filled with grace, filled with His fullness (Ephesians 3:19). This is the mystery of which Paul spoke.

“Christ in you, the hope of glory.” Colossians 1:27

 Our justification, our faith, our joy and hope are through the grace that is given in Christ. “Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:” (Romans 3:24); and by which we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.” (Romans 5:1)

Paul speaks extensively of grace and faith, being of Jesus Christ, and planted in us; “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?”
2 Corinthians 13:5

“I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.” Galatians 2:20

“That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,” Ephesians 3:17

“so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life, or by death.” Philippians 1:20

“Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:”  Philippians 2:5

“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom;” Colossians 3:16

God’s grace and glory are accorded with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus.

“And the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus.”  1 Timothy 1:14; 2 Timothy 1:13

 

In Christ ~ Wrapped in Glory
Grace is that power that fills us and brings us into God’s glory, which is Christ. He is both the filler of grace and the wrapping of His glory.

 “As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him:”
Colossians 2:6

 Christ is not only the hope of glory, but the manifestation of glory in us and surrounding us. We experience this glory, not only by the power of Christ in us, but bringing us to the reality that we are “IN CHRIST.” The person who is born of the Spirit of Christ, the Spirit of God, is brought to dwell in Christ.

 We are “sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints,” 1 Corinthians 1:2  

 The promise of life is in Christ Jesus.  2 Timothy 1:1

“Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began,”  2 Timothy 1:9

 “But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption:”  1 Corinthians 1:30

 “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”  2 Corinthians 5:17

 Baptism is the sign that Christ is in us and we are in Him.

“For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ.”  Galatians 3:27

Christ in us, and us “in Christ” is the reality that we are filled and wrapped in Him.

 “In Him we live, and move, and have our being.”  Acts 17:28

In His church,  He fills all its members with all the grace that is needed. (Ephesians 1:23) Paul prayed for this as the power (of the Holy Spirit) working in us exceeding abundantly above all that we could ask or think (Ephesians 3:14, 16, 20).  The fullness of His grace, and the completeness of our being in Christ and His glory are not for our fulness alone. It comes in the unity, as each member comes together as one body of Christ; each one bringing the measure of grace that we receive. (Ephesians 3:18-19) We continue to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ as we together wait for His coming.

 “For ye, brethren, became followers of the churches of God which in Judaea are in Christ Jesus:”  1 Thessalonians 2:14

“And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:”  Ephesians 2:6

 “teaching every man in all wisdom; that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus:”  Colossians 1:28

“Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ:”  Ephesians 4:13

His fullness and His wrapping keep us; yet, in this world, His grace and glory in us will be always susceptible to attack by the enemy.  But His grace is sufficient.

 “Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.”
2 Timothy 3:12

“be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.”   2 Timothy 2:1

“Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ,”  2 Corinthians 2:14

There are promises given in Christ for future glory.

“For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.” Colossians 3:3

“When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.”   Colossians 3:4

“That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him:”  Ephesians 1:10

“the dead in Christ shall rise first:”  1 Thessalonians 4:16

As we continue in Christ we experience more of His fullness of grace and more of His glory. It is the Spirit’s work of sanctification in and through us.

“But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.” 2 Corinthians 3:18

Dear Father, all grace and peace are from you, in Christ, and by your Holy Spirit.  We thank you and praise you for a blessed year; and pray your blessings on your people and mercy for all in the coming year  ~ for your glory and our joy.  In Jesus’ name I pray.  Amen.

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