A Bible Study by Jack Kelley
I’m convinced most Christians don’t have a very good understanding of how God sees us. I’m not surprised about this because it’s really hard for us to comprehend. God sees us so differently from the way we see ourselves and the way others see us, that there’s really no comparison. It’s like He and we are looking at two different people. And in a way that’s true because we can only see ourselves from our past experience, but He has chosen to see us now as we will be in the future when we’re with Him forever. So let’s set aside how we see ourselves for a moment and take a look at five things the Bible says about how God sees us.
You Are His Child Forever
“Yet to all who did receive Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God—children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God”(John 1:12-13).
How many times have you heard someone say, “We’re all God’s children.” Did you realize that’s not a true statement? Only a born again believers can legitimately call themselves children of God because one of the things that happens when we become born again is that God actually adopts us as His own.
Galatians 4:4-7 says the way to our adoption into the family of God was opened with the death of Jesus. As soon as we were born again we received the adoption to sonship, and the Spirit of God’s Son came into our heart. So we are no longer slaves, but God’s children; and since we are his children, God has also made us His heir. This is why Ephesians 1:13-14 tells us the Holy Spirit was given to us as a deposit that guarantees our inheritance. As heirs of God we have an inheritance that no one can take from us.
From 2 Cor. 1:21-22 we learn that when we were born again, God set His seal of ownership on us and put His Spirit in our heart guaranteeing what is to come. Since then it’s God Himself who makes us stand firm in Christ. Having freed us from the one who held us in slavery, He set His own seal of ownership on us. We are no longer slaves but sons and daughters of God. Having been bought at a price, the precious blood of Jesus, we belong to God now, and no one can ever change that.
He has placed us under the care of His Son, as the owner of a flock of sheep would place them under the care of a shepherd. It’s the Father’s will that the Son should lose none of those He’s been given, therefore everyone who looks to the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life (John 6:37-40).
This is not something we accomplished through any personal effort of our own. It’s a work of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit that cannot be undone. Nothing in all of creation can change what they have done in us (Romans 8:38-39) and no one can ever take us out of their hands (John 10:27-30). Once we are born again, we are God’s children forever.
You Still Sin, But He No Longer Counts Your Sins Against You
Blessed is the one whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. Blessed is the one whose sin the Lord does not count against them and in whose spirit is no deceit (Psalm 32:1-2).
In Psalm 32:1-2 King David foresaw this and in Romans 7:15-24 Paul explained it. Having admitted that try as he might he just couldn’t completely stop sinning, he gave us God’s perspective on the matter. He said that when he sinned, it was no longer he himself who sinned, but the sin who lived within him.
Here’s what he meant. In Romans 7:9 Paul said, “Once I was alive apart from the law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died.” He was talking about reaching the age when he became accountable for his sins. Before that happened he was not accountable and had eternal life. It’s not that he didn’t sin before then, but his sins were not counted against him. However, as soon as he was old enough to be accountable, the penalty for his sins was applied and he no longer had eternal life.
Now let’s look at two seemingly unrelated statements Jesus made about what it takes to enter God’s Kingdom. In Matt. 18:3 He said, “Unless you change and become like little children you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” And in John 3:3 He said, “No one can see the Kingdom of God unless he is born again.”
By putting these together with Paul’s comments on accountability we can see the Lord’s two statements really weren’t unrelated at all. Remember, Paul said little children have eternal life because their sins are not counted against them. Jesus said in order to enter the Kingdom we have to become like little children again. But He also said in order to enter the kingdom we have to be born again. Therefore, the way to become like little children so our sins are not counted against us is to be born again.
The proof of this is when Paul was born again God no longer counted his sins against him, but attributed them to the sin that still lived within him. He had become like a little child again, not accountable for his sins, and had regained eternal life even though he couldn’t prevent himself from sinning.
You Are Perfect In His Sight, As Righteous As He Is
For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy (Hebrews 10:14).
In Romans 3:20-24 Paul explained that no one will be declared righteous by keeping the Law because the purpose of the Law was to make us conscious of our sinfulness. Therefore, God made known a righteousness from Him apart from the Law that comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe, being justified freely by His grace.
From 2 Cor. 5:17 we learn that if anyone is in Christ he or she is nothing less than a new creation in Christ. “The old has gone, the new has come.” This is not something that will happen some day, or that we have to bring about ourselves by changing our behavior. It’s something that from God’s perspective has already happened and is irreversible. It happened because we are “in Christ” or born again.
This is possible because when His Son, who was without sin, became sin for us, God was able to make us as righteous as He is (2 Cor. 5:21). From His perspective we’ve become perfect forever because the Son’s one sacrifice for sin applies for all time, covering the entire lifetime of every believer (Hebrews 10:12-14).
When Jesus went to the cross He forgave us all our sins (Colossians 2:13-14). Those who had already died believing He would come to save them were in Paradise awaiting His atoning sacrifice. When Jesus died, their sins were forgiven retroactively. Other believers were alive at the time of His death and received the benefits of His sacrifice immediately. Still others would not be born for many years, meaning all their sins were in the distant future. Their sins would be forgiven as soon as they heard the gospel and believed it no matter how far in the future that happened.
So even though the Lord’s death took place on a single afternoon in time, it had to apply for all time—past, present, and future. It also had to apply for the entire lifetime of each believer. Otherwise the phrase “He forgave us all our sins” could not be true. But because it is true, God can now see us as if we always have been and always will be perfect.
This is how He can guarantee our inheritance from the time we believed (Ephes. 1:13-14), and how He can assume responsibility for making us stand firm in Christ (2 Cor 1:21-22). Having already paid the penalty in full for all the sins of our life, He is able to regard us as being righteous, as if we never sinned in the first place. From His perspective we are innocent, like the little child Jesus said we have to become.
You Cannot Be Condemned For Any Reason
Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1).
Because of this, we can no longer be condemned for any reason. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him (John 3:17).
Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, whoever hears my words and believes Him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has passed over from death to life (John 5:24).
None of the above has required anything of you except to believe that when Jesus went to the cross, He went for you. Everything was settled for you the moment you believed that.
When You Stand Before God You Will Be As Perfect As He Is
Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is (1 John 3:2).
At the moment of the rapture we will be instantaneously changed from mortal to immortal and what we are now by faith we will become in fact (1 Cor. 15:51-53). All physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual imperfections will be gone forever. All desire to sin will be gone, as will the disappointment, shame, and guilt that accompanied it.
Our spirit will be in perfect alignment with God’s Spirit, our will in perfect harmony with His. The restrictions imposed on our abilities by the curse under which we’ve labored all our lives will be lifted as we emerge from the dark oppressive past into a bright and limitless future.
No matter what kind of sinner we have been here on Earth, or how often we stumbled and fell, or how disapprovingly we’ve been looked upon by our peers, when we stand before our Creator every hint of our earthly self will have disappeared and we will finally be the perfect example of ourselves He created us to be, fit to dwell in the presence of the Lord forever in the most luxurious environment He has ever designed.
What Should We Do About This?
As you can see, none of the above has come to us as a result of our behavior. As soon as we believed, it was accomplished in our lives as the free gift of God’s grace (Ephes. 2:8-9) and can never be reversed. We don’t know why God chose to make this act of His Grace such a polar opposite to His requirements of those who labored under the Law before us. And from reading prophecies that describe life on earth in the Millennium, we can see that once the Church is gone no other group of believers will ever enjoy such a lavish display of His love after us. The only explanation He gave was that through us He wanted to demonstrate the incomparable riches of His Grace in ages yet to come (Ephes 2:7).
But even though He placed no conditions on us other than to believe in the one He sent (John 6:28-29) I believe Paul was very clear in describing the appropriate response to such an overwhelming display of His kindness. We’ll cover this next time as we discuss “Responding To Grace.” See you then.