Guaranteed

“In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.” (Ephesians 1:13–14, ESV)

A guarantee is only as reliable as the one who gives it.

Human guarantees sometimes fail. Companies close. Contracts are broken. Promises are forgotten. People die before they can fulfill what they intended to do. Even the most sincere human promise is limited by the ability of the person making it.

God has no such limitation.

Paul says that Christians have an inheritance. That should not surprise us after what he has already said. God has adopted us as His children through Jesus Christ. Children belong to a family, and children receive an inheritance.

But Paul tells us something more.

Our inheritance is guaranteed.

And the guarantee is not a document, an agreement, or merely another promise.

The guarantee is the Holy Spirit.

When we heard the gospel and believed in Christ, Paul says that we “were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.” (Ephesians 1:13, ESV) The Spirit who dwells within every believer is God's own pledge that what He has promised will finally be possessed.

That changes the way we think about the Christian life.

We are living between promise and possession.

We have been adopted, but we have not yet received everything that belongs to our adoption. We have been redeemed, but our bodies still await resurrection. We have eternal life, yet we still live in a world of suffering and death. We belong to the kingdom of God, yet we await the day when Christ's kingdom will be seen in all its fullness.

We are heirs who have not yet received the entire inheritance.

But God has not left us wondering whether we will receive it.

He has given us His Spirit.

The word translated guarantee carried the idea of a pledge or down payment—a first installment that assures what remains will follow. God has given something of the future to His people in the present.

The Holy Spirit is not merely evidence that God has begun His work in us. His presence assures us that God will finish it.

That means the believer's final salvation does not rest upon the strength of his grip upon God.

It rests upon God's grip upon him.

There will be days when faith seems strong and days when it seems weak. There will be victories over sin and humiliating failures. There will be seasons of confidence and moments when assurance seems distant.

The guarantee does not change.

God does not adopt His children and then wait to discover whether they will finally remain His children. He does not begin redemption without determining its completion.

Peter describes our inheritance as “imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you.” (1 Peter 1:4, ESV)

Kept.

And those who will receive it are themselves “being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” (1 Peter 1:5, ESV)

The inheritance is kept for us.

We are kept for the inheritance.

And between the promise and its final possession stands God's own guarantee—the Holy Spirit.

Someday faith will become sight. Resurrection will replace mortality. What has been promised will be possessed.

Until then, every believer carries God's guarantee within.

The children will receive their inheritance.

God has guaranteed it.

Just a thought.