What are the promises of God?

First, God’s acceptance of the work of Christ as performed on behalf of sinners. This is proved by the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. Second, God’s acceptance of the sinner, who puts his trust in the Lord, and the bestowal upon him of salvation, forgiveness of sins, and eternal life. Salvation! “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:31). Forgiveness of sins! “I write unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for His name’s sake” (1 John 2:12). Eternal life! “He that believes on the Son has everlasting life” (John 3:36). Acceptance! “He has made us accepted in the Beloved” (Eph. 1:6). “We believe and are SURE” (John 6:69).

God's promise in Christ by the Gospel is for Jew and Gentile alike, without distinction and discrimination. The promises for the earthly people await the coming day, but here is something of a different order. Christianity has brought in what is entirely outside of dispensations, and this, God, in His wonderful love has given to us. To Titus, Paul speaks of this promise, saying, "In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began, but hath in due times manifested His word through preaching, which is committed unto me." Of this eternal life, John says, "And this is the promise that He hath promised us, life eternal."

A deeply interesting view of the gospel now opens up to us. The righteousness of God promised of old, is introduced, and the full salvation of God is preached. A new order of things has commenced. "Grace reigns, through righteousness, unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." The believer is now assured, on the authority of the word of God, that He has eternal life, and divine righteousness. Old Testament saints, no doubt, had eternal life, but it does not appear that they knew it. How sad to think that many New Testament saints, as to their experience, are just where the saints were in olden times. The grace that now shines under the title, "The gospel of God," meets the believer with heaven's richest blessings. Not one is lacking. And here, too, we have comfort in seeing that it always was in the purpose of God thus to bless. Eternal life was promised in Christ Jesus, before the world began; and the righteousness of God was witnessed both by law and prophets. Grace always dwelt in the heart of God, as in its native fountain. "God is love," and grace is the joyous giving forth of that love in blessing. Its streams may be many, and its application a thousand-fold, but the fountain is one.

We have just seen that Christ, in 2 Corinthians 1, is the One in whom every promise of God is set forth and confirmed. The promises of blessing for us all centre in Christ, and we have nothing from God apart from Him. This brings glory to God, but it brings blessing to us, the Holy Spirit giving us the present joy of all that lies in prospect.

There are two points therefore: — the establishment of all the promises in Christ, and the enjoyment, by us, of the effect of these promises. The thing is, as we have seen, not merely to say, to promise, something; but not to change one's intentions, not to depart from what was said, but to keep one's word. Now there had been promises. God had made promises, whether to Abraham unconditionally, or to Israel at Sinai under the condition of obedience. But in Christ there was, not promises, but the Amen to God's promises, the verity and realisation of them. Whatever promises there had been on God's part, the Yea was in Him, and the Amen in Him. God has established — deposited, so to speak — the fulfilment of all His promises in the Person of Christ. Life, glory, righteousness, pardon, the gift of the Spirit, all is in Him; it is in Him that all is we — Yea and Amen. We cannot have the effect of any promise whatsoever out of Him. But this is not all: we, believers, are the objects of these counsels of God. They are to the glory of God by us.

Those who have believed the testimony concerning the Lord Jesus Christ have tasted of the same mercy, and their faith in Christ is to life eternal. God has not only taken us up for the little time of our sojourn on earth: He has saved us with eternity in view. Nothing short of life eternal is His blessing for us, and nothing less than this is to be proclaimed in the Gospel. It is wonderful that God, in the riches of His grace, has forgiven our sins; but how surpassing wonderful that we are to live with Him and with Jesus in His own house for evermore. Death lies upon all in this world, and we ourselves may be called upon to pass through death; but God has promised us life eternal.

The apostle's work had a wholly different character; for it was based upon the total rejection and the heavenly exaltation of the Lord Jesus, whereby that hope of life eternal is realised now, and in a way altogether superior to the testimony of the prophets (Ps. 133, Dan. 12). So the Lord as the great Prophet on Olivet declared that the living righteous of the nations, who are severed from the wicked, enter into life eternal when He shall have come as the Son of man in His glory. Even the sheep realise their place but little: grace will abound exceedingly. But the apostle proceeds to show that the promise which the Christian actually enjoys goes not merely beyond the prophets, or the human race on earth, but back into eternity. This was necessarily a promise within the Godhead. The God that knew no falsehood promised it before the times of the ages. So we saw in 2 Tim. 1:9, that God saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace that was given us in Christ Jesus before the times of the ages. It was a promise within the Godhead when neither the world nor man yet existed, and therefore had a far higher character than promises made in time to the fathers.

The promises that God gave to Abraham and to David were wonderful, and the saints of God down the ages looked for their fulfilment in Messiah. Many of these promises were fulfilled in the coming of the Lord Jesus, and many more will be fulfilled when He returns to set up His kingdom. But those whom God has called by glory and virtue have promises of a much higher order than those that belong to Israel as His earthly people. The heavenly promises that associate the saints with a heavenly Christ are indeed "exceeding great and precious".

We are not left in uncertainty as to the PROMISE. It is life, eternal life. Life and incorruptibility have been brought to light by the gospel. Our Lord by His going into death has annulled death and opened the door into life. The blessed tidings of this are clearly set forth in the gospel of the grace of God.

Promise, in the sense in which it is used here, relates to the purpose of God which was fulfilled by the coming of His Son into the world to give effect to all that was in His heart for the blessing of men. It is clearly this in Titus and Ephesians; and even if we referred it to what the Lord Jesus said while on earth, it is still connected with the coming of the Son to fulfil His Father's will. Paul had written to the Corinthians, "For all the promises of God in Him are yea, and in Him Amen, unto the glory of God by us" (2 Cor. 1:20). This would include the promises of the Old Testament as well as the New; every promise of God is affirmed and confirmed in the Son of God. The promises related to Him, and have been fulfilled in Him, and God's glory secured through all; and we have come into the present blessing through and in Christ. Even the New Covenant, which belongs to Israel, with all its promised blessing for them, brings its blessings to the saints now, as is brought out in 2 Cor. 3.