The grandest mystery of all Paul tells us is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
Christ in me creates the hope of glory. The word does not say Christ among us ,but in you personally
It is the mystery indwelling of Christ in His people, both Jewish and Gentiles.
The declared hope of glory is Christ in you.
Paul has in mind the indwelling Christ in the heart of every believer.
Though among you makes good sense, it is more probable in you or within you Rom. 8:10; 2 Cor. 13:5; Gal. 4:19; Eph. 3:17.
It is the personal experience of the living presence of Christ in the individual life of the believer that is the mystery of mysteries.
Ephesians 3:17 tells us Christ dwells in your hearts by faith
The central fact of an intimate personal relationship with Christ is this great truth of Christ in you.
This indwelling constitutes the hope of glory for every believer.
Jesus is the Shekinah glory of God and He shines in our hearts so that we see the glory of God in the face of Christ (2 Cor. 3:18; 4:6, 16; 1 Jn. 3:2-3).
The Christian has experienced the superior light and knowledge of Jesus Christ and
All other religious experiences and claims of secret cults fade into nothing when compared to the inward knowledge of an intimate love relationship with Him.
The first Adam fell , and we fell in him.
The second Adam took up within Himself all His people and stood for us and kept the covenant with God the Father,AND WE STAND IN Him and with him Acts 17:28
Now every blessing of that new covenant is infallibly secure to all who are risen in Him.
Whatever Christ is His people are in Him.
We are crucified in Him,
We are dead in Him,
We are buried in Him,
We are risen in Him;
In Him we live eternally,
In Him we sit gloriously at the right hand of God, who has raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. In Him
We are accepted in the beloved, both now and forever;
And this, , is the essence of the gospel; he who does not preach Christ, preaches no gospel. . . .
Christ Himself is the life, soul, substance, and essence of the mystery of the gospel of God
Anything short of Jesus Christ will leave you short of salvation.
You have to reach Christ, and touch Christ and nothing short of this will save you.
Jesus gives us Himself. To have Christ is to have eternal life.John 6:35-37
He does not merely give us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, redemption etc., but He is made of God all these things to us.
He is our life. Therefore, we cannot do without Him.
The Christian experience heightens every individual power we have.
Keep in mind the person in whom Christ begins to possess does not cease to be himself.
He does not become a robot. This is not some religious philosophy that Paul is teaching.
Christ in me means that He is bearing me along from within.
His power carries me on giving my whole life a wonderful sense of God’s presence.
It gives me life with an endless song in my heart
Christ in you accepted by faith alone means Christ possessed.
When Christ is in you the law has nothing more to say to you.
It can no longer condemn you because God has declared you acquitted.
You have been justified by faith in Christ.
Christ in you means Christ experienced in all His power.
Christ in you fills your life with His holy presence and power.
That which the law can never do, Christ does by indwelling you.
Christ in you is His sovereign rule in your life.
Christ in you is Christ’s authority and power from the centre of your being over every facet of your personality.
Christ in you is His power bringing every thought into captivity to Himself.
Christ in you means the imperial sovereignty of Jesus Christ over your life.
We find our freedom by being in submission to His sovereign hand over our lives.
Christ in you means His filling you with His wonderful presence.
Christ in you transforms your person until you become like Christ.
When Christ enters into our lives and we yield to His presence He transforms, elevates us to His likeness.
The apostle Paul declared, “I live, yet not I, Christ lives in me”
When Christ enters in He sanctifies us, and sets us apart for His glory.
Christ in you means He enters into us and becomes our life.
Christ in you means His power in you.
We were without spiritual strength until Christ came into our lives. We were dead in trespasses and sins. Romans 5:6-8
Now our spiritual victory is guaranteed.
Christ in you means we are spiritually rich.
We were in spiritual poverty until Christ came in and now we have all the riches of Christ Jesus.
We are now rich because He is rich. Rev 5:12-13
Christ in you means honor and glory. He glorifies the place where He dwells even for a moment.
If Christ comes into your heart His whole court comes with Him!
Rejoice for you have Him as a holy guest. People who value and love Him cannot be happy without Him.
OUR HOPE OF GLORY
The indwelling Christ is the ground for the expectation of glory both now and the future.
Christ in you, the hope of glory
The word glory points to the excellency of God’s glorious presence in your life here on earth and in God’s eternal purpose,
It is comprehensive word for God’s glorious presence with His people.
Glory refers to the glory of the mystery; the glory which shall be revealed at Christ’s coming
The glorified saints around the throne of God have no higher source of joy than the saints on earth.
They have no higher theme or song of praise to the Father.
They are only happier because their discovery of these things is more complete now
And they are now freed from all earthly hindrances and limitations that interrupt our enjoyment in our present state.
Christ alone is our foundation for the blessed hope in the future.
The fact that we now have Christ in us is the pledge of final glory when Christ returns.
The final glory is yet future. We will share in the full manifestation of God’s glory in Christ.
Jesus Christ focuses our minds and desires on that which is above in heaven and the eternal future.
Christ in you gets eternity into the picture.
He gets our minds off our past through the forgiveness of our sins
He gets our minds into the present as He lives within us
He gets our minds into the future as we concentrate on our blessed hope in Him alone.
Christ in you energizes the present and gives us a song to sing each day.
Lord Jesus, you are the pillar that holds my life
Paul wrote in Colossians 3:4, “When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall you also appear with Him in glory.”
The apostle Paul prayed that this great truth would become a reality for the believers in the church at Ephesus. Ephesians 3:16-19).
He prayed, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man; so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God(
When Christ in you offers all of those glorious benefits why in the world do people go turning to new age movements, secret mystery religions,
Witchcraft ,occults and cults seeking all kinds of satanic powers?
If you know Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior He wants to settle down and make Himself permanently at home in your heart.
He wants to settle down in your inner man that is, your personal, rational self
He wants to settle in the moral YOU that has experienced spiritual renewal by the Spirit of God.
He is talking about the very core of your inner spiritual being
The place where the Holy Spirit works to BUILD His temple since the moment you were born again.
That is the place where He is at work forming you in the image of Christ.
It is there Paul tells us Christ dwells in your hearts through faith.
Christ wants to settle down in a dwelling, to dwell fixedly in a place, to live in a home.
He wants to settle down and feel completely at home as a permanent resident in your heart.
Do you make Christ feel at home? Do you invite Him in as a permanent resident?
Does He feel comfortable in your heart?
Are there two masters trying to be sovereign in your life?
Do you give Christ the free reign of your life?
Do you have any junk room where He is forbidden to enter?
Are there any secret hideouts in your heart?
Can you honestly drag everything in your heart out in the glaring holy light of the Son?
Paul also says in Eph. 3:20-21.Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen(
Literally Paul writes, But to Him [God] who is able above all things to do exceedingly above . .
It is exceeding some number or measure, over and above, more than necessary
It is intensified by adding the idea of exhaustlessness and above.
The apostle Paul has in mind something that is beyond all things.
It is superabundantly and over and above anything he can imagine.
Now to our God who is able to do exceedingly beyond all things, superabundantly and over and above all things,
Exceeding all things beyond all things, we ask or think, according to the power that works within us.
What a great God and Savior we worship!
Our weakness is connected to God’s omnipotence and omniscience. God is able!
The amazing thing is the best is yet to come!
These are words of hope and confident assurance of the believer’s life now and in the future.
The apostle John wrote of that final glory in 1 John 3:1-3.
What glory is ours, glory unspeakable!
We shall have glorified bodies just like the resurrected body of Christ when He appears in glory.
He who has come to live in our hearts, and reigns as our bosom’s Lord, makes us glorious by His coming.
When Christ reigns in your heart He brings countless blessings with Him. Just think of it.
He who went to the cross for me will never be ashamed of me:
He who gave me Himself will give me all heaven and more:
He that opened His very heart to find blood and water to wash me in, how shall He keep back even His kingdom from me? Rom 8:31-32
The Lord Jesus, is indeed to us the hope, pledge, the guarantee of glory.
The Lord Jesus Christ entered into a covenant with God the Father to bring His people home to glory.
He who pledged to bring every sheep of His flock safe to His Father’s right hand will not fail.
He has never failed one of His covenant promises. He never will.
Christ in you is glory. If indeed you have Christ, you do have glory.
Christ’s glory and your glory are wrapped up together.
If Christ were to lose you it would be a great loss to Him.
If I can perish with Christ in me He will lose His honor.
His glory is gone if one soul who has put their trust in Him for eternal life is ever cast away.
As sure as the Lord God lives, Christ in you means you in glory with Him for all eternity.
This is the most astounding truth taught in the Bible.
Christ in you.
Christ in me is a prophet teaching me His way, giving me His direction so I can proclaim His message with clarity and boldness.
God says, Now that you know all my deep secrets in Christ, go into the entire world and tell them.
Instead of piously keeping them to yourself, or your select group, go out and tell the secret to everyone who will listen.
Only Christians can understand the mystery because it is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
THIS BLESSED UNION WITH CHRIST IS A VITAL UNION WITH GOD.
The more a person is in Christ the more he is in God.
To be united with Christ is to be united with the God who raised Him (Rom. 8:11; Col. 2:12).
The heart of Paul’s fellowship with Christ is found in his certainty that God was in Christ.
The believer is risen with Christ through faith of the operation of God who raised Him from the dead.
The apostle John says, Truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ(1 John 1:3).
It is Christ in you or within you that gives us the riches of His glory.
Christ in me is my High Priest interceding and giving me immediate access to God
So I can go directly into His presence with my petitions on your behalf.
Christ is me is a king demanding my loyalty as I bow in worship only to Him as my Lord and Master and as His servant I go out of my way to serve Him
Don’t be ashamed for one moment of the fact that Christ in you is your hope of glory.
This is the greatest mystery of the universe that God of the Jewish people would take up residence in Gentile men and women.
The idea of salvation of the Gentiles was nothing new.
The prophets spoke of it and David wrote of it in the Psalms.
But the idea that He would tabernacle Himself in a Gentile was something wholly new.
That is the mystery of Christ in you the hope of glory.
Christ in HEREROS! Christ in NIGERIANS. Christ in the INDIANS. Christ in the Chinese. Christ in the Japanese, the Russians, the African.
Christ in me! That is my hope of glory and I pray that it is yours, too.
It is the only hope for the world in which we live TODAY.
Do you have that hope? Do you share that same expectation of glory with God in Christ?
Do you have Christ dwelling within your heart? Do you have Christ in you? You can begin right now.
