01/18/2020
As we go through life, even the life of a staunch believer, how much attention do we pay to glorifying God? If a pastor is building up a church and it fails, he is disappointed, embarrassed, and even humiliated, but does he feel these things for God, or for himself? If a man prays he asks for many things, but how few are meant to glorify God, and how many for his own need, and glory? All we do should be done to glorify God; this is what Jesus taught us.
“So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”
1 Corinthians 10:31 ESV
If we intercede for someone in prayer and they are healed, do we accept the credit and the glory for this healing? When they come to us in perfect health and thank us for our prayers do we accept their thanks for ourselves, and go away thinking it was our prayer that healed them? In the life of an Intercessor this is the greatest pitfall. Even for Jesus this was a temptation, but He responded in this way...
“"I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me. If I alone bear witness about myself, my testimony is not true.”
John 5:30-31 ESV
This was especially true when He performed great miracles. Listen to His words to Mary just before He raised Lazarus from the dead...
“Jesus said to her, "Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?"”
John 11:40 ESV
We take pride in the works of our Heavenly Father, and even those works that He does through us, but special care needs to be taken that we don’t get so close to that pride that we mistakenly redirect it towards ourselves. We are simply the jar that contains the wine, and not the wine itself...
“But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.”
2 Corinthians 4:7 ESV
Sometimes we are even tempted to claim glory in our own faith, and looking in the mirror we see ourselves as saints. We endure great hardship and suffering only to look at it and smugly say to ourselves... “how great am I to have endured this as Jesus did.” But scripture tells us this...
“We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So death is at work in us, but life in you.”
2 Corinthians 4:8-12 ESV
In fact this isn’t our suffering, but the suffering of Christ which is being exposed through us, the death We face is His death, and the life that follows is His life... all provided to Him by God, and through Him to us. Jesus tells us that the Father abides in Him...
“Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works.”
John 14:10 ESV
And He also tells us that He in turn, abides in us...
“Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.”
John 15:4 ESV
He even tells us of ways in which this is accomplished...
“For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him.”
John 6:55-56 ESV
In this way we are one... the Father, the Son, and is...
“The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.”
John 17:22-23 ESV
So all glory is of God, and none is ours unless by His grace we are given a portion of it to us through Jesus. If we rightfully exhibit any glory at all it is never ours, but His alone, and all that we do should be to increase Him, and bring glory to Him.
Prayer:
Father, thank you for all you do for me, and through me, every day, and may all these things bring glory to you alone. Thank you for your Son Jesus, and help me Lord to bear fruit as a branch of Him... the true vine. Then Holy Father, let that fruit glorify you as it is tasted and consumed. Holy, Holy, Holy, are you my God in whom all glory resides; yesterday, today, and forevermore. Praised be your name Lord for becoming one by your glory with your Son, and through Him with me. How humbled am I that you would consider me your servant, and how loved am I that you would send your Son Jesus to redeem me by His life, death, and resurrection. Great are you in all ways, and great is your name that sings out in testament to your glory. Help me Merciful Father to accept your grace in humility, and to yield all glory to you now, and forevermore. You are my God, and my Lord, that all should glorify, and before whom all will kneel in worship. Praised be your name always.
“For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.”
Romans 11:36 ESV
Rich Forbes