Bring Them Home to Glory

The heavenly Father wasn’t willing to lose his beloved creatures to the powers of hell, so he formed a rescue plan for us. “Of old you spoke in a vision to your godly one, and said: ‘I have granted help to one who is mighty; I have exalted one chosen from the people.’” (Psalm 89:19, ESV). The Father said to his Son, “Humankind is going to grow weak and miserable because of their sin, helpless to find their way back to me. I appoint you as my holy one to help bring them back into my favor.”

We hear the Son’s own covenant words: “I delight to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart” (Psalm 40:8). Everything Jesus did on earth was in fulfillment of his terms of the covenant: “For I have not spoken on my own authority, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment—what to say and what to speak” (John 12:49).

The Bible states the terms of this covenant clearly. Jesus was to divest himself of all heavenly glory, taking on a human body: “…who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men” (Philippians 2:6-7). He was to endure reproaches and suffering: “He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not” (Isaiah 53:3). After all this, he was to submit himself into the hands of wicked men; and in great agony, he lay down his life as an offering for humankind’s sin. In making atonement, he would have to endure God’s wrath for a season.

God then laid out the type of ministry his Son would undertake to redeem humankind. He told Jesus, “Your ministry is going to be that of a priest. I’ve known all my children from the foundation of the world, and now I give them as a flock for you to shepherd.” Jesus testified on earth, “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out” (John 6:37).

This is our great hope and glory in Christ! Let us rest in that today.