Video from Desiring God
Does Faith or the Spirit Produce Love?
How Often Do You Think About Heaven?
"Wait a minute. That can’t be right, can it?
If you’ve taught the Bible a few times, you’ve had one of these moments. The construction of a biblical sentence just doesn’t look right. More often than not, you find that your concern was unwarranted or could be explained. But for me, one of these moments changed everything.
I had only been pastoring for about five years. We were preaching through the book of Colossians, and it was the second week in the series when I read this in my study:
We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love of that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. (Colossians 1:3–5)
I thought to myself, “No, no, this translation must be off. Paul wouldn’t ground his thanks in the hope laid up for the church in heaven, would he? He must mean to say that he thanks God for their love for all the saints, and their hope in heaven, because of their faith in Christ Jesus.” Nope. Paul wrote it just as both he and the Spirit of God intended. It changed my life. Paul was grounding their love and his thanksgiving in the Colossian church’s hope in heaven. Heaven was (and is) that foundational. That important.." from the article: How Often Do You Think About Heaven?
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