ACC ~ John 17 v24b

OUR GLORY IS RECEIVED, NOT GIVEN

IRENAEUS: Service [rendered] to God brings no profit to God, nor does God need our obedience. However, he grants life, incorruption and eternal glory to those who follow and serve him, bestowing gifts on those who serve [him] because they do serve him and on his followers because they do follow him. But he does not receive any benefit from them because he is already rich, perfect and in need of nothing. Still, God demands service from men and women so that he can benefit those who continue in his service, since he is so good and merciful. For as much as God lacks nothing, that is how much we stand in need of fellowship with God, because our glory consists in continuing and remaining permanently in God’s service. AGAINST HERESIES 4.14.1. [1]

[1] ANF 1:478**; SC 100:538-40.

LOOKING FORWARD TO FUTURE GLORY

CYPRIAN: When we die, we are passing over to immortality by death; nor can eternal life follow, unless we depart from this life. It is not an ending but a transit, and this journey of time that we are traveling on is a passage to eternity. Who would not want to hurry on to something better? Who would not crave being changed and renewed into the likeness of Christ and to arrive more quickly to the dignity of heavenly glory, since Paul the apostle announces and says, “For our [citizenship] is in heaven, from where also we look for the Lord Jesus Christ who shall change the body of our humiliation, and conform it to the body of his glory”? [1] Christ the Lord also promises that this is how we shall be when—in order that we may be with him and that we may live with him in eternal mansions and rejoice in heavenly kingdoms—he prays to the Father for us, saying, “Father, I will that they also whom you have given me may be with me where I am and may see the glory that you have given me before the world was made.” The person who is allowed to go up to the throne of Christ, to the glory of the heavenly kingdoms, should not mourn or lament, but rather, in keeping with the Lord’s promise and his faith in the truth, he should rejoice in this his departure and translation. ON MORTALITY 7.22. [2]

[1] Phil 3:20-21.

[2] ANF 5:474**; CCL 3A:28-29.