Isaiah 42:8.
Good morning, God-glorying
Christian! The question posed by this
morning’s title ‘Whose glory’, immediately
presents all mankind with a clear choice: ‘Will I glorify the
Living Lord God with every part of my being; or will I use every part of my
being to glorify myself?’ (Selah: meditate on this)
Well, what is YOUR answer to
the question posed this day? In our
daily lives, in public and in private, whose glory are we consistently seeking?
“Then
the people rejoiced, for that they offered willingly, because with perfect
heart they offered willingly to the LORD: and David the king also rejoiced with
great joy. Wherefore David blessed the
LORD before all the congregation: and David said, Blessed be Thou, LORD God of Israel our Father, forever and ever. Thine, O LORD is the greatness, and the
power, and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty: for all that is
in the Heaven and in the earth is Thine; Thine is the kingdom, O LORD, and Thou
art exalted as head above all. Both
riches and honour come of Thee, and Thou reignest over all; and in Thine hand
is power and might; and in Thine hand it is to make great, and to give strength
unto all. Now therefore, our God, we
thank Thee, and praise Thy glorious name.” (1
Chronicles 29:9-13)
Now,
let me ask the question posed again:
Whose glory do we consistently seek - our own, or the Living Lord God’s?
Wisdom:
All that glitters is not gold! You
cannot always tell a book by its cover!
Look before you leap! Never buy a
pig in a poke!
“Beloved,
believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God; because
many false prophets are gone out into the world.” (1 John 4:1)
We
live in a day of constant seeking after ‘strange fire’; constant seeking after
the next new phenomenon; the weird and wonderful; the ‘spiritual circus‘.
Walking
by faith alone and believing in God’s revealed Word alone, seems to be
increasingly the practice of ‘the God-Squad Christian’ believers - believers
just like you and, certainly, just like me.
True faith in God is not popular!
In
many professing ‘Christian’ circles today, it is not enough to merely believe
and trust in God’s Word. There often has
to be some element of ‘circus’ involved in what is portrayed as ‘Christian
worship’. What a sad day we live
in. Simple faith is frowned upon, while
the ‘circus’ is given priority, especially in the hearts of our younger
generations. Help us, Lord God!
But
the real question is often the one we are looking at this morning: Whose glory is being sought? Is it the glory of the Living lord God, or some
colourful, and entertaining ‘Christian’ clown?
This
is what lies at the heart of the problem in today’s Bible passage. The Lord Jesus is at this point surrounded by
unbelievers who refuse to give glory to Him, as the Son of the Living Lord God. Their nationality is given the glory, while
their long awaited Messiah is ridiculed and insulted as illegitimate. (V.41)
The
unbelieving crowd go further and actually accuse Christ Jesus of ‘…being a
Samaritan…’ (not adhering to Jewish traditions of worship); and to having ‘…a
devil…’ (being off His head, crazy!)
What insults thrown!
However,
look how the Master answered His detractors:
“…I have not a devil; but I honour My Father, and ye do dishonour Me.”
(V.49)
Then
the Lord Jesus puts His Divine finger upon the underlying cause of their
unbelief: “…I seek not Mine own glory;
there is ONE that seeketh and judgeth.”
(V.50) Hallelujah! What a Saviour we have in Christ!
Does
not the Lord Jesus clearly teach us, in that great model prayer he gave us to
pray: “…For Thine is the Kingdom, and
the power, and the GLORY, forever. Amen
(so be it).”? (Matthew 6:9-13)
Even
the ’…great voice of much people in Heaven…’ refused to receive glory or
worship from the apostle John when he was taken up in the Revelation
vision!
“And
he saith unto me, Write, Blessed are they which are called to the Marriage
Supper of the Lamb. And he saith unto
me, These are the true sayings of God. And
I fell at his feet to worship him. And
he said unto me, See thou do it NOT; I am thy fellow servant, and of thy
brethren that have the testimony of Jesus: worship God; for the
testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.”
(Revelation 19:9-10)
God Alone
gets the all the glory! Worthy is the
Lamb that was slain! Praise and all
glory to the Lord!
Thought: “Glory to God in the Highest, and on earth
peace, good will towards men.” We have peace and good will when we give God
Almighty all the glory!
No comments:
Post a Comment
I invite comments that are Christian in nature. All comments are moderated, and any negative submissions are deleted and never published.