Articles
Inheritance
Inheritance: it is something given to you upon the death of someone. In a physical sense, it could mean a piano from your great grandfather, or even land from your grandmother. This goes for the death of Jesus Christ as well. His inheritance is not something physical in our life, but spiritual, in heaven. His inheritance is rewarded if we follow the terms laid out in the Bible. His inheritance is only given then, not by doing nothing.
Ephesians 1:11-14 explains how God, from the start, has planned out everything for you. How you would be given the salvation and glory to live with him. We should take advantage of that. We’ve been given the opportunity to live the life he has laid out for us. If we do what he says, our inheritance will remain true.
Jesus Gave the Inheritance
According to God’s plan, He would send His son Jesus to die on the cross, relieving us of our burdens of sin. His death is what gave us this inheritance, and we should thank him and God for his sacrifice. However, as something can be given to us, it can also be taken away. Our opportunity to be called God’s children can be taken away if we do not listen and forfeit our inheritance.
Psalm 37:29 says that the righteous man will live with the inheritance he was promised for eternity. Not being righteous, something we ought to be, will not let us claim the inheritance God has laid out for us. Hebrews 9:17 shows how inheritance can only be given by death, and how Jesus had to give up his life on the cross to share his inheritance with us.
God has told us in Galatians 6:7 that we reap what we sow. What we reap is the inheritance. Our lives should involve sowing the seeds to inheritance and working our way to reap the rewards that God will give us.
How Do We Claim the Inheritance?
Many verses and scriptures will talk about how the impure and the immoral will not be able to claim the riches of the inheritance, as said in Ephesians 5:5. We must not be impure or immoral, which we will certainly be at some point, regardless whether or not it was intentional. That is the beautiful thing about Jesus' sacrifice: God makes us clean, pure and holy--"good enough"--to claim the inheritance as His children. When we sin in our weakness, we must also ask for forgiveness and repent to our Lord for when this happens.
As said before, we have to do more than just claim the spiritual inheritance as we may do with a physical inheritance. Ephesians 1:8 says that our hearts must be enlightened to be rewarded of Jesus’ glorious inheritance. It was laid out to be a reward to those that are holy, righteous people. Luke 16:11 will explain to us that one cannot be trusted with the riches of heaven if we cannot be faithful in our physical life. We must live the faithful and righteous life to be able to prove worthy of the riches of heaven.
Conclusion
We are given an inheritance when someone we are closely related to dies. We can enjoy the inheritance Jesus has laid out for us by living lives closely relatable to him. We are not perfect, but God has made us worthy through His son and we must strive to be like him. Asking our Lord for forgiveness is important, and asking for help to live our lives in the purest and holy way is the best we can ask.
