Glorification
The three-fold plan of salvation are justification (past), sanctification (present) and glorification (future).
After sanctification, there begins the third stage in the plan of salvation is glorification, salvation of our future. We won’t be glorified until after Jesus returns. John writes of this in his first letter when he states that “when he shall appear we shall be like him (1 John 3:2). Paul refers to this stage frequently. For example: “For this corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortal must put on immortality (1 Cor. 15:53). He also refers to a time when “we shall all be changed in a moment in do, twinkling of an eye at the last trump” (1 Cor. 15:51-52). Paul speaks further of the doctrine of glorification when he says in Romans 8:18, “For the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.” We get glorified bodies and a new name. Feasting with Jesus. Receiving eternal life and being with Him wherever he goes.
Glorification is the exciting day when Jesus comes in shining glory and He will present every believer to the Lord God in the same kind of glory that He has. It is the act of God transforming the believer’s body into a body like the resurrection body of our Lord Jesus (Rom. 8:11, 23; 1 Cor. 15:43–53; Phil. 3:21; 1 John 3:2). It will take place in the future. However, the apostle Paul speaks of it in the past tense. This has been called the “most daring anticipation of faith” in the New Testament. It is the ultimate and complete conformity of God’s chosen people to “the image of His Son.” In Rom. 8:19 Paul calls this glorification “the revelation of the sons of God.” Don’t confuse our glorification with His. The glorified Christ does not cease to be the eternal Son of God. It is the eternal and unique, only one of its kind, Son of God who is the glorified incarnate Son. We are His adopted children and we are conformed to His likeness. Jesus is the eternal only–begotten (unique, only one if its kind) Son. There is none other like Him!
However, when Christ shall appear in glory, then shall His Bride appear with Him all glorious and complete. Paul wrote in Col. 3:4, “When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.”
Remember that the whole creation is anticipating that day when God pulls back the curtains and reveals the sons of God in all their beauty. Rom. 8:22-23 reminds us, “For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body.”
We will be glorified with Christ. Rom. 8:17 tells us that as God’s children we suffer with Christ “in order that we may also be glorified with Him.” The Apostle reminds us in verse Rom. 8:18, “For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.” Even creation awaits the revealing of this glory (Rom. 8:19-20). When Christ returns we will bear the “image of the heavenly.” The Lord Jesus will come from heaven and “will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself” (Phil. 3:21).
Paul speaks of this future glorification as if it has already taken place. Why does Paul use the same past tense for this as he does for the foreknowing, predestinating, calling and justifying? We have yet to be glorified. However, as far as the decree of God our glorification has been determined from all eternity. Our glorification is stated as already consummated, though still in the future in the fullest sense. In a sense we “were raised with Christ” (Col. 3:1), and we were with Him when He ascended to heaven (Eph. 4:8).