Forever Home in the Eternal Family of God

Encouragement for the Family of God by Kenton Cheek

17 November 2025

Reading From Hebrews 12

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”—Hebrews 12:1-2

     The cloud of witnesses that the scribe of Hebrews is referring to is made up of those who lived by faith and have gone home to be with Him before us.  We are not alone.  Every person throughout history who has been born again is connected, sealed eternally by the Spirit of the Living God to one another and to the Father.  “This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words. The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit.”[1]  My prayer is that the Holy Spirit guides you into all truth as we explore these deep, spiritual subjects together of identity, community and destiny in Jesus.  May He comfort you on the deepest level with these truths.

• At the very moment a person decides to believe, repent, confess and receive Jesus as Savior and Lord, they are filled with the Holy Spirit.  “And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.’”[2]  The new believer becomes a temple of the Living God and their spirit is fused with His Spirit.  “Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?”[3]  “Whoever is united with the Lord is one with him in spirit.”[4]
• This same Spirit connects and seals them with every person who has ever been born again throughout all time.[5]  Every born again believer is connected through time and space with every member of the eternal family of God.  We need never to feel alone because not only do we have the Lord within us, but with our loved ones who were sons and daughters of God are with us and are cheering us on.  The Old Testament saints were saved by looking forward in faith to the atonement of Jesus Christ and followed Yahweh according to the revelation they had received up to that point in time.  We are saved by looking back in time to His sacrifice.  “All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth.”[6]  We are all connected and sealed to one another by the same Spirit.  “One Lord, one faith, one baptism, One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.”[7]  “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.”[8] 
• What happens to a person when they die?  God exists both within and outside of time and space.  He is Spirit and is not limited by any constraints.  “With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.”[9]  I believe that the moment the body dies, the spirit leaves the body and is with the Lord.  Time passes for them in an instant and they are with us and with the Lord at the resurrection.  What makes grief painful for us in our present reality on Earth is that we are still trapped in time and space and we feel that physical separation, but we are not separated from our born again loved ones spiritually.  We are still very much connected.  “But your dead will live, Lord; their bodies will rise. Let those who dwell in the dust wake up and shout for joy; your dew is like the dew of the morning; the earth will give birth to her dead.”[10]
• At the Second Coming of Jesus Christ, the dead will be resurrected and we who are living will be caught up to meet them in the air.  “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”[11]  Physical bodies will be perfected, glorified and reunited with their spirits.  “Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.”[12] “So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body.

If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. So it is written: ‘The first man Adam became a living being;’ the last Adam, a life-giving spirit.”[13]

• What will our resurrected, glorified bodies be like?  As Scripture promises we will be like Him, there are many clues given by the Lord after His own resurrection.  With sin has come weakness, debility, disease, decay and death to our mortal bodies, but our resurrected bodies will struggle with none of those things.[14]  The disciples of Jesus were able to physically touch Him and yet He was able to travel effortlessly, disappear and reappear in a way similar to what we see later with the Apostle Phillip’s teleportation after ministering to the Ethiopian.  Jesus was able to walk through walls and yet could also sit, talk, cook, eat and drink with His friends.  We will be more than spirits, but our bodies will not need sustenance in the same way we do now.  “And just as we have borne the image of the earthly man, so shall we bear the image of the heavenly man.  Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God.”[15]
• After the Second Coming, the resurrection from the dead and the final judgment, the entire eternal family of God will be united in perfect harmony with God at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb.  The eternal family of God is the universal Church, the Bride of Christ.  “Then I heard what sounded like a great multitude, like the roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder, shouting: “Hallelujah! For our Lord God Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory! For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready.  Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear.” (Fine linen stands for the righteous acts of God’s holy people.)  Then the angel said to me, “Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb!” And he added, “These are the true words of God.”[16] 

At that time the prayers of Jesus for unity recorded in the Gospel According to John will come true.  We will be one with our brothers and sisters in His eternal family.  “Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.”[17]  We will be one with God as Jesus said to the Father,  “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”[18]  The eternal family of God will live in perfect harmony with Him, reigning with Jesus for all eternity in the beauty and majesty of New Heaven and the New Earth, having amazing adventures with Him, enjoying His Presence and glorifying the Father forevermore.

“Heavenly Father, thank You for providing the way to salvation, sanctification and glorification through the blood of Jesus by grace and received with faith.  We are thrilled at the thought of seeing You face to face and living with You in glory.  I pray that You would fill our hearts with hope and that You would give us the strength we need to endure to the end, faithfully serving You.  Show us what it means for Your will to be done on Earth as it is in Heaven.  In the Name of Jesus Christ I pray these things.  Amen.”

However, as it is written: “What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard,
and what no human mind has conceived”— the things God has prepared for those who love him—these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.

The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us.

—I Corinthians 2:9-12

---

[1] I Corinthians 2:13-14

[2] John 20:22, see also Ezekiel 36:27, Acts 2:38, Galatians 4:6, Colossians 1:27, II Timothy 1:14

[3] I Corinthians 3:16, 6:19, II Corinthians 6:16

[4] I Corinthians 6:17

[5] Hebrews 12:1-2, II Corinthians 1:21-22

[6] Hebrews 11:13

[7] Ephesians 4:5-6

[8] Ephesians 1:13-14, 4:30

[9]Psalm 90:4, II Peter 3:8

[10] Isaiah 26:19

[11] I Thessalonians 4:16-17

[12] I John 3:2

[13] I Corinthians 15:42-45

[14] I Corinthians 15:42-43, 54

[15] I Corinthians 15:49-50

[16] Revelation 19:6-9

[17] Ephesians 4:3

[18] John 17:20-23