GLORY THAT EXCELS

#1 · April 14, 2004, 2:23 pm

Quote from Forum Archives on April 14, 2004, 2:23 pm
Posted by: henkf <henkf@...>
"THE GLORY THAT EXCELS"

     On a normal, run-of-the-mill day, would you describe your life as glorious? Probably not. In fact, for me as well as for you, the days when you feel glorious are few and far between.

     I remember leading a Bible study with some high-school youth. The Bible study was about forgiveness. Now the students listened and paid attention when we talked about forgiving someone who has wronged you, but they really sat up and listened when we talked about God's forgiveness for each of us personally. Deep down, many young people feel insecure. Beneath their clothes and cosmetics, beneath the parties and fun, many a youth feels that his or her life is most inglorious.

     A gerontologist tells me the same thing about people at the other age of the spectrum. Many people come to the last years of their lives filled with regret. They look back at what they did, or what they didn't do. They recall their virtues and they remember their vices. And, sadly they conclude that their life was insignificant, maybe misdirected. Maybe wasted. Most of you who are older would not look back at your life and say, "Oh, it was glorious!"

     A glorious life is something that we attribute to someone else, not to ourselves. We stand in the checkout line at the supermarket and look at the covers of the gossip magazines. The stars on those covers seem to glitter. Sure, we know that all that glitters is not gold, but they do seem to have such a glorious life. And here we are, standing in a checkout line with groceries and coupons and an ever-dwindling supply of money. High school student, senior citizen, anyone in-between: the days when we feel glorious are few and they are far between.

     We think that we're missing out on something in life. And if you think about it in terms of God, you wish that God would deal differently with you. Why did God choose to give you this lot in life? Couldn't He have made your situation a little different?   A little better?

     Consider, please, a painter and a painting. Now if, on the one hand, the painter slapped some paint on a canvas and left it that way, you would say that the painter wasn't too concerned about his work. But if, on the other hand, the painter kept working on that painting.... If the painter kept changing this and improving that.... If the painter insistently sought to bring the painting closer to perfection, then it would be obvious that the painter really did care. The painter was refining that painting over and over and over again in order to bring it ever closer to perfection, ever closer to glory.

     And if that painting were conscious--now I know this is absurd--but if that painting were conscious, it would know that those continual aggravations, those constant changes, come because it has a painter intensely interested in it. The same is true for you. Those constant refinements, hard as they sometimes are when you're not yet perfect, come when you have a creator intensely involved in you, His creation.

     God has glory in mind for you. Your life now is not glorious. The days when you feel sure of yourself, when you feel like you've got the world by the tail, those days quickly give way to the ho hum days. However, that doesn't mean that your life is unreal. And that doesn't mean that God is short-changing you. Your life now, inglorious, standing in checkout lines, pained by this, or suffering that, your life now is a canvas on which God your Creator is striving to fashion a glorious eternal life. The apostle Paul says in Romans 8, "I consider our present sufferings to be unimportant when I compare them with the glory soon to be revealed to us."

     You are probably much like the author of Psalm 73. He had looked at his life and became dissatisfied. When he compared himself to other people, it seemed that his life had been counterfeit, vain, even wasted.

     Listen to what he says: Psalms 73:3-12 MKJV
  (3) For I was jealous of the proud, when I saw the peace of the wicked.
  (4) For there are no bands in their death; but their strength is fat.
  (5) They are not in trouble like other men; neither are they plagued like other men.
  (6) Therefore pride enchains them; violence covers them like a robe.
  (7) Their eyes stand out with fatness; they have more than the heart could imagine.
  (8) They scoff and speak in malice of cruelty; from on high they speak.
  (9) They set their mouth against the heavens, and their tongue walks through the earth.
  (10) Therefore His people return here, and waters of a full cup are wrung out to them.
  (11) And they say, How does God know? And is there knowledge in the Most High?
  (12) Behold, these are the ungodly, who are at ease in the world; they increase in riches.

     There are two kinds of people described here in Psalm 73: The self-sufficient person who regards neither God nor man and the person who knows himself, herself to be insufficient, not glorious. Which kind of person are you? The fact that you are reading this "SermonOnTheNet" suggests that you are not in the first category. For if you felt yourself self-sufficient with no need for God or man you wouldn't be reading this. But if you are in some measure dissatisfied with your life, if you are looking for a bit more glory than you have now, if you're yearning, then you need to know that your dissatisfied, seeking, inglorious life is the very canvas on which God the Creator is intently striving to fashion for you the glory of eternal life.

     The author of Psalm 73 came to realize that God was present with him in his less than glorious life. He writes at the end of the Psalm, Psalms 73:23-26 MKJV
  (23) But I am always with You; You have held me by my right hand.
  (24) You shall lead me with Your counsel, and afterward receive me to glory.
  (25) Whom have I in Heaven? And besides You I desire none on earth.
  (26) My flesh and my heart fail; but God is the strength of my heart, and my part forever.

     Now I'd like you to realize the same thing that the Psalmist came to realize: God is with you in your less than glorious life. C.S. Lewis, from whom my earlier illustration of the painter and painting is taken, said this: "God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world" (The Problem of Pain, p. 93). Yours is a real life. The pains you feel, the dissatisfactions within you, the inglorious things that occupy your daily routine, these are God's megaphone calling you to be thankful for your present life and to be drawn to the glory to be revealed.

     And when God calls, He calls you to the cross and the empty tomb of Jesus. In the incarnation of His Son, Jesus Christ, God emptied Himself of His glory. God is glorious. He dwells in inaccessible light. You and I can't begin to fathom His glory. "O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Thy name" begins the writer of Psalm 8. And yet this glorious God emptied Himself by sending His Son, Jesus Christ into our inglorious world. On Calvary's cross Jesus died an inglorious death so that he might draw you to an eternal glory that is guaranteed to you by His splendid resurrection from the dead.

     Philippians chapter two says, Philippians 2:6-11 MKJV
  (6) (Jesus) who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God,
  (7) but made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Himself the form of a servant, and was made in the     likeness of men.
  (8) And being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of    the cross.
  (9) Therefore God has highly exalted Him, and has given Him a name which is above every name,
  (10) that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of heavenly ones, and of earthly ones, and of ones under    the earth;
  (11) and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

     There's your identity, friend. Whether you're a high school student unsure of yourself or a senior citizen brooding over a life you wrongly think is insignificant.... Whether you're standing in a checkout line dreaming of glorious people or you're one of those "glorious" people who knows that all that glitters isn't gold.... Whoever you are, wherever you find yourself, God wants you to identify yourself with Jesus Christ. He wants you to see your place in life at the empty tomb of the resurrected Christ. He wants you to see yourself moving to glory.

     Now is there a more practical, real way to evaluate yourself than through Jesus Christ? I don't think there is. Jesus Christ, the eternal and divine Son of God, had all the glory of God but emptied Himself of it when He came into our inglorious world. He chose suffering rather than comfort. He died so that you might have life, a meaningful life now whatever your outward circumstances and an eternal, glorious life in heaven. Jesus Christ, the Son of God who willingly subjected Himself to human suffering and to our inglorious lot, is the one to bring you through your sufferings and into heavenly splendor.

     Hebrews chapter two says Hebrews 2:9-10 MKJV
  (9) But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with    glory and honor, that He by the grace of God should taste death for all.
  (10) For it became Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons into glory,    to perfect the Captain of their salvation through sufferings.

     I think there is no more practical way for you to live your real life than to find your identity with Jesus Christ. He knows and has lived the spectrum of life from the glorious to the inglorious. By His coming into the world, He wants to meet you where you are and lead you to glory. C.S. Lewis, whom I mentioned earlier, says this: "You asked for a loving God; you have one" (Pain, p. 46).

     So come to Him, inglorious as you are. Coming to Jesus is not a meeting of equals. We do not deserve what He has done for us. Your life is inglorious because of sin, your sin. You're not just an innocent victim of what Adam and Eve did a long time ago in the Garden of Eden. You're not just an innocent victim of the systems in your life that have conspired against you. You yourself are a sinner. I, too. And when all the blaming and the passing of the bucks is done, your inglorious life is our humanity's own doing. No, coming to the Son of God, Jesus Christ, is not a meeting of equals.

     But still Jesus bids you to come and I pray you will come. "Just as I am, without one plea but that Thy blood was shed for me and that Thou bidd'st me come to Thee, O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

     "Just as I am, though tossed about with many a conflict, many a doubt, fightings and fears within, without, O Lamb of God, I come, I come"

     Coming to Christ you have a part in "the glory that excels."(2 Corinthians 3:10 MKJV (10) For even that which was made glorious had no glory in this respect, because of the glory that excels. )
This glory overcomes so much. Christ's glory excels the little things of life. It overcomes envy when you long to be like those people who seem to "have it all together." The fact is, they don't have it together. Even if they're Christians, even if they share with you faith in Christ the hope of glory, even then they too, just like you, are objects of the Creator's constant refinement.

     The glory of Christ excels the nagging suspicion that your life is counterfeit, that somehow you're not experiencing a life that is fully real. I mean what is "real" life? It's your life, not someone elses! You can't walk in anyone else's shoes, but you walk in your own. Your life is real life. Jesus Christ wants to meet you where you are and draws you day by day deeper into His glory that excelleth all, a glory that one day will be fully revealed in heaven.

     Jesus Christ the Lord, is not only the Savior for certain people, but the Savior for every human being, including you.
And, including you, too. Whoever you are, wherever you find yourself, no matter how inglorious the circumstances of your life, you can find yourself in God's Son Jesus. The glory that excels is His, for you, through faith now, and fully one day to be revealed in heaven.
"You asked for a loving God; you have one." Amen.
  ************************************  Weekly messages of hope and comfort for those who want to learn more about Jesus and His glorious plan for our lives.  To find out more about our ministry go to : worldoutreach.ca/sotn.htm  visit our "Ultimate Bible Quiz Site"  folsom.sk.ca/k4j/BQuiz/Quiz.html  *************************************                                                                              --  To unsubscribe, send ANY message to: [email protected]  

Posted by: henkf <henkf@...>

"THE GLORY THAT EXCELS"

On a normal, run-of-the-mill day, would you describe your life as glorious? Probably not. In fact, for me as well as for you, the days when you feel glorious are few and far between.

I remember leading a Bible study with some high-school youth. The Bible study was about forgiveness. Now the students listened and paid attention when we talked about forgiving someone who has wronged you, but they really sat up and listened when we talked about God's forgiveness for each of us personally. Deep down, many young people feel insecure. Beneath their clothes and cosmetics, beneath the parties and fun, many a youth feels that his or her life is most inglorious.

A gerontologist tells me the same thing about people at the other age of the spectrum. Many people come to the last years of their lives filled with regret. They look back at what they did, or what they didn't do. They recall their virtues and they remember their vices. And, sadly they conclude that their life was insignificant, maybe misdirected. Maybe wasted. Most of you who are older would not look back at your life and say, "Oh, it was glorious!"

A glorious life is something that we attribute to someone else, not to ourselves. We stand in the checkout line at the supermarket and look at the covers of the gossip magazines. The stars on those covers seem to glitter. Sure, we know that all that glitters is not gold, but they do seem to have such a glorious life. And here we are, standing in a checkout line with groceries and coupons and an ever-dwindling supply of money. High school student, senior citizen, anyone in-between: the days when we feel glorious are few and they are far between.

We think that we're missing out on something in life. And if you think about it in terms of God, you wish that God would deal differently with you. Why did God choose to give you this lot in life? Couldn't He have made your situation a little different? A little better?

Consider, please, a painter and a painting. Now if, on the one hand, the painter slapped some paint on a canvas and left it that way, you would say that the painter wasn't too concerned about his work. But if, on the other hand, the painter kept working on that painting.... If the painter kept changing this and improving that.... If the painter insistently sought to bring the painting closer to perfection, then it would be obvious that the painter really did care. The painter was refining that painting over and over and over again in order to bring it ever closer to perfection, ever closer to glory.

And if that painting were conscious--now I know this is absurd--but if that painting were conscious, it would know that those continual aggravations, those constant changes, come because it has a painter intensely interested in it. The same is true for you. Those constant refinements, hard as they sometimes are when you're not yet perfect, come when you have a creator intensely involved in you, His creation.

God has glory in mind for you. Your life now is not glorious. The days when you feel sure of yourself, when you feel like you've got the world by the tail, those days quickly give way to the ho hum days. However, that doesn't mean that your life is unreal. And that doesn't mean that God is short-changing you. Your life now, inglorious, standing in checkout lines, pained by this, or suffering that, your life now is a canvas on which God your Creator is striving to fashion a glorious eternal life. The apostle Paul says in Romans 8, "I consider our present sufferings to be unimportant when I compare them with the glory soon to be revealed to us."

You are probably much like the author of Psalm 73. He had looked at his life and became dissatisfied. When he compared himself to other people, it seemed that his life had been counterfeit, vain, even wasted.

     Listen to what he says: Psalms 73:3-12 MKJV
  (3) For I was jealous of the proud, when I saw the peace of the wicked.
  (4) For there are no bands in their death; but their strength is fat.
  (5) They are not in trouble like other men; neither are they plagued like other men.
  (6) Therefore pride enchains them; violence covers them like a robe.
  (7) Their eyes stand out with fatness; they have more than the heart could imagine.
  (8) They scoff and speak in malice of cruelty; from on high they speak.
  (9) They set their mouth against the heavens, and their tongue walks through the earth.
  (10) Therefore His people return here, and waters of a full cup are wrung out to them.
  (11) And they say, How does God know? And is there knowledge in the Most High?
  (12) Behold, these are the ungodly, who are at ease in the world; they increase in riches.

There are two kinds of people described here in Psalm 73: The self-sufficient person who regards neither God nor man and the person who knows himself, herself to be insufficient, not glorious. Which kind of person are you? The fact that you are reading this "SermonOnTheNet" suggests that you are not in the first category. For if you felt yourself self-sufficient with no need for God or man you wouldn't be reading this. But if you are in some measure dissatisfied with your life, if you are looking for a bit more glory than you have now, if you're yearning, then you need to know that your dissatisfied, seeking, inglorious life is the very canvas on which God the Creator is intently striving to fashion for you the glory of eternal life.

     The author of Psalm 73 came to realize that God was present with him in his less than glorious life. He writes at the end of the Psalm, Psalms 73:23-26 MKJV
  (23) But I am always with You; You have held me by my right hand.
  (24) You shall lead me with Your counsel, and afterward receive me to glory.
  (25) Whom have I in Heaven? And besides You I desire none on earth.
  (26) My flesh and my heart fail; but God is the strength of my heart, and my part forever.

Now I'd like you to realize the same thing that the Psalmist came to realize: God is with you in your less than glorious life. C.S. Lewis, from whom my earlier illustration of the painter and painting is taken, said this: "God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world" (The Problem of Pain, p. 93). Yours is a real life. The pains you feel, the dissatisfactions within you, the inglorious things that occupy your daily routine, these are God's megaphone calling you to be thankful for your present life and to be drawn to the glory to be revealed.

And when God calls, He calls you to the cross and the empty tomb of Jesus. In the incarnation of His Son, Jesus Christ, God emptied Himself of His glory. God is glorious. He dwells in inaccessible light. You and I can't begin to fathom His glory. "O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Thy name" begins the writer of Psalm 8. And yet this glorious God emptied Himself by sending His Son, Jesus Christ into our inglorious world. On Calvary's cross Jesus died an inglorious death so that he might draw you to an eternal glory that is guaranteed to you by His splendid resurrection from the dead.

     Philippians chapter two says, Philippians 2:6-11 MKJV
  (6) (Jesus) who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God,
  (7) but made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Himself the form of a servant, and was made in the     likeness of men.
  (8) And being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of    the cross.
  (9) Therefore God has highly exalted Him, and has given Him a name which is above every name,
  (10) that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of heavenly ones, and of earthly ones, and of ones under    the earth;
  (11) and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

There's your identity, friend. Whether you're a high school student unsure of yourself or a senior citizen brooding over a life you wrongly think is insignificant.... Whether you're standing in a checkout line dreaming of glorious people or you're one of those "glorious" people who knows that all that glitters isn't gold.... Whoever you are, wherever you find yourself, God wants you to identify yourself with Jesus Christ. He wants you to see your place in life at the empty tomb of the resurrected Christ. He wants you to see yourself moving to glory.

Now is there a more practical, real way to evaluate yourself than through Jesus Christ? I don't think there is. Jesus Christ, the eternal and divine Son of God, had all the glory of God but emptied Himself of it when He came into our inglorious world. He chose suffering rather than comfort. He died so that you might have life, a meaningful life now whatever your outward circumstances and an eternal, glorious life in heaven. Jesus Christ, the Son of God who willingly subjected Himself to human suffering and to our inglorious lot, is the one to bring you through your sufferings and into heavenly splendor.

     Hebrews chapter two says Hebrews 2:9-10 MKJV
  (9) But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with    glory and honor, that He by the grace of God should taste death for all.
  (10) For it became Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons into glory,    to perfect the Captain of their salvation through sufferings.

I think there is no more practical way for you to live your real life than to find your identity with Jesus Christ. He knows and has lived the spectrum of life from the glorious to the inglorious. By His coming into the world, He wants to meet you where you are and lead you to glory. C.S. Lewis, whom I mentioned earlier, says this: "You asked for a loving God; you have one" (Pain, p. 46).

So come to Him, inglorious as you are. Coming to Jesus is not a meeting of equals. We do not deserve what He has done for us. Your life is inglorious because of sin, your sin. You're not just an innocent victim of what Adam and Eve did a long time ago in the Garden of Eden. You're not just an innocent victim of the systems in your life that have conspired against you. You yourself are a sinner. I, too. And when all the blaming and the passing of the bucks is done, your inglorious life is our humanity's own doing. No, coming to the Son of God, Jesus Christ, is not a meeting of equals.

But still Jesus bids you to come and I pray you will come. "Just as I am, without one plea but that Thy blood was shed for me and that Thou bidd'st me come to Thee, O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

"Just as I am, though tossed about with many a conflict, many a doubt, fightings and fears within, without, O Lamb of God, I come, I come"

Coming to Christ you have a part in "the glory that excels."(2 Corinthians 3:10 MKJV (10) For even that which was made glorious had no glory in this respect, because of the glory that excels. )
This glory overcomes so much. Christ's glory excels the little things of life. It overcomes envy when you long to be like those people who seem to "have it all together." The fact is, they don't have it together. Even if they're Christians, even if they share with you faith in Christ the hope of glory, even then they too, just like you, are objects of the Creator's constant refinement.

The glory of Christ excels the nagging suspicion that your life is counterfeit, that somehow you're not experiencing a life that is fully real. I mean what is "real" life? It's your life, not someone elses! You can't walk in anyone else's shoes, but you walk in your own. Your life is real life. Jesus Christ wants to meet you where you are and draws you day by day deeper into His glory that excelleth all, a glory that one day will be fully revealed in heaven.

Jesus Christ the Lord, is not only the Savior for certain people, but the Savior for every human being, including you.
And, including you, too. Whoever you are, wherever you find yourself, no matter how inglorious the circumstances of your life, you can find yourself in God's Son Jesus. The glory that excels is His, for you, through faith now, and fully one day to be revealed in heaven.
"You asked for a loving God; you have one." Amen.

  ************************************  Weekly messages of hope and comfort for those who want to learn more about Jesus and His glorious plan for our lives.  To find out more about our ministry go to : worldoutreach.ca/sotn.htm  visit our "Ultimate Bible Quiz Site"  folsom.sk.ca/k4j/BQuiz/Quiz.html  *************************************                                                                              --  To unsubscribe, send ANY message to: [email protected]