ETERNAL LIFE
In Scripture it is commonly presented in contrast to death. Eternal life has been revealed in the Lord Jesus Christ.
“This is the true God, and eternal life” (1 Jn. 5:20). «And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life; and this life is in his Son.
He who has the Son, he has life; He who does not have the Son of God does not have life” (1 Jn. 5:11, 12). Therefore, he who has the Son of God has life now, and he knows it through the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of life.
The apostle John speaks of life as a subjective state of believers, although inseparable from, and truly characterized by, the knowledge of God fully revealed as the Father in the Son.
The Lord said to the Father in prayer: “This is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent” (John 17:3).
The apostle Paul presents eternal life more in its aspect of hope placed before the Christian, which nevertheless has a moral effect in the here and now (Tit. 1:2; 3:7).
From this it can be seen that for the Christian eternal life is related in its fullness to the glory of God, when the present body that is part of the old creation will be transformed, and there will be a total conformation in the likeness of Christ, in fulfillment of God’s purposes.
In this time of waiting, God’s purpose is for the Christian, in whom the Holy Spirit indwells, to know (have conscious knowledge) that he has eternal life (1 Jn. 5:13), a life totally different from the life in the flesh, related to the resurrected and exalted Lord (Col. 3:1; cf. Eph. 1:19, 20; 1 Pet. 1:3).