Sons of God

⁴ just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, ⁵ having predestined us to adoption as sons by Yeshua Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will…⁹ having made known to us the mystery of His will… (Eph 1:4-5, 9)

The greatest revelation in the Bible is found in Paul’s epistle to the Ephesians. Though different aspects of this revelation, or mystery, are mentioned in various epistles, it is in this epistle, particularly in the first three and half chapters, that Paul most clearly unveiled the greatest mystery which God kept hidden from the foundation of the world:

In Christ, we are the sons of God, and with Christ, we are the corporate Son of God!

For many, the above statement may seem to be blasphemous if we do not allow the Holy Spirit to help us understand God’s truths. Please allow Paul’s prayer to open your eyes as we go along:

¹⁷ that the God of our Lord Yeshua Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, ¹⁸ the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, ¹⁹ and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power…(Eph 1:17-19)

Friends, our adoption as sons of God is not just a mere change of status, but also a change of state in that there is a regeneration or born again of our spirit by the Spirit of God, and we are delivered from the kingdom of darkness and Satan, into the Kingdom of Light and God. We now partake or share in God’s divine nature. Let me say reverently that though we are human, nevertheless, we who are in Christ are divine because we have the divine nature of God!

⁴ by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. (2Pet 1:3-4)

For as a father and his son have the same nature of flesh and blood, so God, Christ and the sons of God all have the same divine nature. In a mysterious way that is yet to be understood, even the rest of the creation that will be delivered from the bondage of corruption (Rom 8:19-22) will be renewed in such a divine way so as to join the sons of God to be made ONE with and in Christ in eternity.

¹⁰ that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth—in Him. (Eph 1:10)

This is the state of eternity: CHRIST! Just as creation came through Christ the Word, so everything will be summed up and reconciled in Christ! We will all be in Christ. Heaven is in Christ, and in fact, Heaven is Christ Himself. The glorious revelation that Paul had was not so much that he saw Christ in heaven, but that he saw heaven in Christ!

He who descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might fill all things (Eph 4:10).

This is how Paul spoke about Christ in another place:

¹⁵ He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. ¹⁶ For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. ¹⁷ And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. ¹⁸ And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence.¹⁹ For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, ²⁰ and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. (Col 1:15-20)

Finally, even God is in Christ!

⁹ For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; ¹⁰ and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power. (Col 2:9-10)

There is a greater implication of us being the sons of God. Friends, do you know that Yeshua Christ before and after the incarnation and resurrection is not the same? Think about this: in Christ’s incarnation as a man, He took humanity into Him, and therefore, into the Godhead! Furthermore, in His resurrection, He took us into Him and also into the Godhead! Thus, from our time-space perspective, the Godhead had been forever changed because we who are in Christ have been brought into the Godhead! (Though from the eternal perspective, God never changes...this is still a mystery to us!) God is in Christ. We are in Christ. Christ is in us. We are all ONE in Christ. Thus, Paul reverently wrote:

To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is Christ in you, the hope of glory (Col 1:27)

Christ and the Godhead are forever changed after the incarnation and resurrection, and so are we. Christ the Divine took humanity into Himself while we humans partake of His divinity! Forever we have become His Body, and He our Head. Christ now does not exist without or apart from us, His Body, and neither can we exist without Him as our Head. This is the New Race. This is the New Man. This is the New Humanity: Man and God in One Body.

¹⁴ For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, ¹⁵ having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, ¹⁶ and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity (Eph 2:14-16)

I can confidently tell you that the passage above is not talking about reconciliation of Jews and Gentiles because the eternal purpose of God is exceedingly much more glorious than just trying to unite two warring human races. No! Rather, it is the merging of two orders of existence and lives- God and Man, Divine and Human- into one new Entity! Once Christ perfectly fulfilled the Law for us, the enmity between God and Man was removed and thus God and Man was made One in Christ, resulting in a new Body, Man and Race. Therefore, we can say reverently that Christ and the Church have now become the corporate Son of God!

This was the revelation of the mystery that had been kept hidden from ages and generations, but now revealed to His saints! I believe this was what Paul saw and heard in Paradise about the New Man that he knew was too glorious and beyond human descriptions, lest he says too little and devalue the glory of God, or if he say too much and stand accused of blasphemy. To him, it was just "inexpressible words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter" (2Cor 11:1-4). This revelation released the fullness of the mighty resurrection power in him to work and preached unceasingly and tirelessly the unsearchable riches of Christ for the perfection of the sons of God on the earth. To this end, God and creation are waiting for the fullness of the number of the sons of God to be revealed, both of the Gentiles and the Jews, leading to the consummation of all things.

Therefore, as the corporate Son of God, as He is, so we are in this world (1Jn 4:17). We have been raised and now sit in the heavenly realm with Christ (Eph 2:4-6), above Satan and his kingdom (Eph 1:21-23), who are underneath our feet (Rom 16:20). Truly, even now we reign with Christ in His Kingdom in the eternal spirit realm (Rom 5:17, 2Tim 2:12, Rev 5:10; 22:5). We are as Christ to the dying world. We have all the authority to bring forth the purposes of God on the earth (Mt 28:18-20). Whatever that God had said and promised to His Son, it is for us, His sons, to claim, share and receive as co-heirs. “For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us” (1Cor 1:20). That’s why Yeshua said that we have the authority to pray down God’s Kingdom and purposes on the earth (Mt 6:10). We who are on earth can bind and loose to effect changes in the heavenly realm because where the sons of God are, the Son of God is (Mt 18:18-20). As sons of God, we cannot live or act independently, but always according to the will and purpose of the Son of God, because He is the Head and we are His Body.

And He put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, ²³ which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all (Eph 1:22-23).

This is the main difference between the sons of God and the sons of the devil who are in the churches today, who are deceived into thinking that they now have the freedom in Christ, under grace, to indulge in all sorts of devilish passions of the flesh, eyes and pride. For Christ is our Inheritance, our Riches, Reward and Treasure, our Kingdom, our Source and Life, our All, our God. To be in Christ is to have our flesh or old man crucified and resurrected as a new creation in and with Him (Rom 6:5-6), now dead to self, sin, satan and the world, and to rejoice in our partaking of the heavenly calling.

If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. ² Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. ³ For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. ⁴ When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory (Col 3:1-4)

Joint together in the Spirit, we have now become the eternal dwelling place of the Godhead. Thus, there is no other temple, here or in heaven, except us with Christ and God (Rev 21:22-24).

Yeshua Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, ²¹ in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, ²² in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit (Eph 2:20-22)

Those who understand and live in the revelation of their sonship in God are the true Church on earth, whose very existence is itself a demonstration to the demonic realm of the wisdom of God in bringing forth His eternal purpose to fulfillment. This is the Church against which the gates of hell cannot prevail, which Christ, not man, is continuously building.

⁸ To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, ⁹ and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Yeshua Christ; ¹⁰ to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places, ¹¹ according to the eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Yeshua our Lord (Eph 3:8-11)

In the spirit realm even the demonic kingdom tremble in awe and fear at the glorious edifice of the ever growing Church and Family of Christ that stretches from the heavenly to the earthly realms.

¹⁴ For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, ¹⁵ from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named…that you, being rooted and grounded in love, ¹⁸ may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height— ¹⁹ to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God (Eph 3:14-19)

Those who have gone ahead into heaven and those who remain on earth are linked and united in the same Body in the Spirit. Denominationalism that divides the Body of Christ is really "demonizationalism", of the devil. Christ died to give birth to ONE Body and Church, not many. And in this Body, the Godhead is pleased to dwell and rest because the glorious eternal purpose of God is already accomplished in Christ Yeshua.

¹³For the Lord has chosen Zion; He has desired it for His dwelling place: ¹⁴“This is My resting place forever; Here I will dwell, for I have desired it (Ps 132:13-14).

And as the sons of God dwell and rest in the revelation of Christ’s love that has brought us into the Son of God, we shall be filled with the fullness of God.

³³ Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out! ³⁴“For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has become His counselor?” ³⁵“Or who has first given to Him And it shall be repaid to him?” ³⁶ For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen. (Rom 11:33-36)

Friends, the day is far spent and the night is at hand. With all the signs of wars, rumor of wars, pestilences, earthquakes and famines fulfilling what the Lord prophesied in Mt. 24, we are surely living in the end of the end times. It is only those who are spiritually blind and deceived that will not agree with this conclusion, and continue to love to live in darkness. However, the sons of God shall live differently in the light, according to the Life of the Son of God.

Like the Son of God, we ever live to intercede for the Church and the lost world (Rom 8:34, Heb 7:25). The Lord and His apostles continually urged us to always watch and pray in the end times (Lk. 21:36, Mt 24:42, 50; 25:13, 1Thess 5:17, Eph 6:18, 1Pet 4:7) that we may not be deceived but be triumphant and overcomers until the end. For by our intercession with the Son of God we bring the Kingdom of Heaven down on earth and possess the nations as Yahweh had promised (Ps 2:8). Just as we have divine authority to pray into reality the purpose of God, we also have been commissioned and authorized to urgently go into the world and make disciple of all races to obey all of the Lord’s commandments (Mt 28:18-20). Until the fullness of the gentiles have come in, Israel cannot be saved, and God’s eternal purpose waits to be consummated on the earth (Mt 24:14, Rom 11:25-26). Unbelief, prayerlessness and lack of love for lost souls are the greatest sins of the self-serving “believers” today. But if we would believe God’s Word, and give ourselves to prayer and making disciples, we will very soon discover that our manifestation as sons of God is to destroy the works of the devil and plunder his kingdom for the Kingdom of God (1Jn 3:8)!

Friends, the nations are even now uniting and gathering against Israel and the Church. Soon the anti-Christ, the man of sin, the son of perdition, the son of the devil will be revealed to deceive many in the church (2Thess 2:1-4). Israel will be invaded and Jerusalem will be trampled upon by the gentile armies (Lk 21:20-24). Then will begin the greatest persecution against Israel and the Church of Yeshua Christ (Mt 24:20). Satan will use this tribulation as a final attempt to thwart the eternal purpose of God but he will not succeed simply because God’s purpose is already irrevocably accomplished in Yeshua Christ (Eph 3:11)!

God will use this dark tribulation period to separate the wheat from the chaff and His sheep from the devil’s goats in the earthly church. He will gloriously bring about the full manifestation of the sons of God which God, Christ and creation have been eagerly anticipating from the foundation of the world (Rom 8:10). And then the end will come and eternity takes over.

What is it like in eternity?

²Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is, ³ And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure. (1Jn 3:2).

With the Apostle John, we need to confess that we do not fully understand yet this mystery of our sonship in Christ. But one thing is sure- we the sons of God will be like Christ, the Son of God. We shall be glorified with Him (Rom 8:17, 18, 30, Jn 17:22). Even now, as we continually behold Christ, our Beloved, we are being transformed by the Spirit in increasing glory into His image (2Cor 3:18). We, the Bride and the Church of Christ, are the glory of Christ (2Cor 8:23). Beloved, in any wedding, the eyes of all are on the bride, the glory of the groom. It is not too much for me to believe that, on that Day, it will be Christ’s joy and delight to hold up His Bride as His Glory! This was what the Father sent His Beloved Son to shed His precious blood for. All glory and worship to Yahweh Elohim our Father and His Only Begotten Son Yeshua!

If you have any comment or query, or if you want to know how you can be saved and have a personal relationship with your Creator God through Yeshua Christ, please write to thekingdompeople@yahoo.com. It will be my pleasure to help you to know God personally. All sincere inquiries will be responded to.