So, except for what it takes to keep them, we agree on these things that are true for those who are saved:
- We are one with the Father and the Son (Jn 17:22),
- We are in Him and He is in us (Jn 17:23),
- We are joined to the Lord and are one Spirit with Him (1 Cor 6:17),
- We have eternal life because life is in Jesus and Jesus is in us (1 Jn 5:11–12), and
- We shall not come into judgement because we have passed from death into life (Jn 5:24).
And our agreement goes beyond assent to these truths. We also seem to agree that we have the means to assess that these things are true for us. We can sense that we are one with the Father and the Son. We can sense that we are in Him and He is in us. We can sense that we are joined to the Lord and are one spirit with Him. We can sense that we possess the eternal life that exists in the Father and in the Son. And we can sense that we will not come into judgement because we have passed from death into life.
In no place in Scripture is this ability to sense spiritual things more vividly portrayed than in 2 Corinthians 3:18 -- "But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord." (2 Co 3:18) When we look into our hearts, we see Jesus there and His glory. And not only that, but we also see that we are participating in His glory.
And Scripture also describes some of the Spirit-led goanings we all experience:
- Not only that, but we also who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body. (Ro 8:23)
- For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked. For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life. Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee. (2 Co 5:1–5)
These groanings are ours because Jesus lives in our hearts, because we are one with Him, because we are alive spiritually, because we have passed from death to life. We are not satisfied with our lives as they are now and we long for that future that awaits us when the flesh will be gone and we will be further clothed. And we inately know that this future awaits us.
Also, "We have the mind of Christ" (1 Co 2:16). Unlike the lost, because we have been given God's Spirit, we can understand and receive knowledge of the deep things of God from the Spirit of God who knows those things intimately. And as He teaches us those things, we deeply appreciate them.
And most importantly, it is because He lives in our hearts that we have come to know Him (Jn 14:19-23) -- not like the world knows Him as a historical figure. They can't know Him like we know Him. We have come to know Him personally and intimately. And we know that He is the greatest treasure in the universe.
We are not deserving of any of these blessings, and we will never be able to prove ourselves worthy of them. Fortunately, we don't have to worry about that because He will never leave us or fosake us (Heb 13:5). And I cannot imagine anyone who has come to know Him and who has learned all these deep things and who knows the contrasting misery of hell would willfully give up the gift of life and the personal relationship with his creator for something else that he knows is no comparison to Him.
