Glory

“The Lord said to Moses, ‘I will also do this thing of which you have spoken; for you have found favor in my sight and I have known you by name.’ Then Moses said, ‘I pray You, show me Your Glory!’ –Exodus 33:17,18

       

The glory of God is often times such a vague, distant term. When Moses asked God to show him His glory, God responds by saying, “I Myself will make all My goodness pass before you…” (Exodus 33:19). God’s glory is the fullness of His goodness. Often it is taught that the reason we were created is to glorify God. In the context that it is most often used, I completely disagree with that statement. It is often used to mean “giving credit to God.” God did not design you to give credit to Him. He didn’t create mankind so that we could tell Him how awesome He is. You were purely and solely designed to experience the fullness of His goodness. The way we experience that is only through relationship with Him.

                

Moses’ cry was not for God to show Him how awesome He was so He could go tell everyone. Moses was simply acting on the innate desire that all humans have to experience the fullness of God’s goodness, to experience His glory. Look what happens after Moses has an encounter with the glory of God:

                

“It came about when Moses was coming down from Mount Sinai (and the two tablets of the testimony were in Moses’ hand as he was coming down from the mountain), that Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone because of his speaking with Him.” –Exodus 34:29

                

The only way glorify God is for you to experience it, and when you experience it your face glows with His glory. Glorifying God is not a submissive obedience where you agree to tell everyone you know about His goodness (a goodness that many of us have never experienced). It isn’t giving credit where credit is due. It is experiencing His goodness and letting your face and your life shine with the goodness that is His glory!

                

“So when Aaron and all the sons of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come near him.” – Exodus 34:30

                

When we walk in the constant goodness of God and our lives begin to glow, it’s going to frighten people. God’s goodness invokes fear in many of us because it breaks down our defenses that we’ve worked so hard to build up. These defenses are often based on feelings of not being good enough and in places where we haven’t measured up so we believe we don’t deserve His goodness. Let me tell you though that God’s goodness has never been about us deserving it. Adam and Eve were created in His goodness to enjoy His goodness. God begins pouring His goodness on you before you even have a chance to screw it up. Adam and Eve chose independence, claiming that if they could know what was right and wrong, they could help God out, therefore earning and deserving His goodness.

Our fleshly response to God’s goodness is always one of striving and effort. His goodness is so far beyond everything that we deserve in ourselves that we strive to somehow balance His goodness with our service. Let me assure you that no amount of service will even budge the scales in your favor. His goodness is infinite and your service is finite. Your good works are only a drop in the ocean of His grace and goodness. By claiming independence and the ability to earn God’s favor, we actually demean God’s glory by trying to contain it to something feasible and attainable.

The wonderful kicker of it all is that on the cross, Jesus said, “It is finished.” Once and for all God destroyed the battle between your goodness and His. At the cross, God caused the fullness of His goodness to be placed in you, so that rather than striving for a goodness of your own, you now carry His glory and His goodness.

                

“The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.” – John 17:22,23

                

Do you see it? Jesus is the full outpouring of God’s goodness. Christ in you is the hope of glory.

                

“…that is, the mystery which has been hidden from the past ages and generations, but has now been manifested to His saints, to whom God willed to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.” – Colossians 1:26,27

                

God’s goodness is found fully in Jesus who lives in you. So are we designed to glorify God? Absolutely. But, glorifying God is not giving Him credit or worshipping Him. Don’t hear me wrong, giving God credit and worship are good things, but they are not first and foremost your purpose in life. They are the natural outflowing of having God’s glory fully present in you. Christ in you is the hope of glory. He is the fullness of glory. So rather than trying to figure out ways to glorify God with your life, rest in the truth that He has already been fully glorified in you at the cross and enjoy the ride that is sure to follow!

               

                

Obedience

Obedience is an effect, not a cause. Many Christians (including myself) have lived as though obedience were the cause. Certainly we wouldn’t claim obedience brings salvation, but what about a good life? What about a good relationship with God? Obedience is not a catalyst that brings change in your relationship with God, relationship with God is a catalyst that brings change in your obedience. I firmly believe that if you live your life with the idea that obedience has any effect on your relationship with God, you will live absent of peace, joy, and the abundant life of rest that Christ came for. I can say that, because that’s how I’ve lived most of my life, and for the majority of life I’ve lived striving for something I’ve already been given.

As I was growing up, my obedience came from wanting to avoid consequences. Disobedience was the cause that brought about a negative effect. If I started fighting with Luke, maybe I would have to go to my room. At school, if I pulled a friends chair out from underneath them (sorry Hannah) I had to move my clothespin. At college, if I study hard I get good grades. It’s a pretty simple system. Do good, get good. Do bad, get bad. So isn’t that how God relates to us? Sow obedience; reap good relationship. Sow disobedience; reap ‘not-so-good’ relationship. Sorry, but that’s Buddhism. God doesn’t operate under a system of Karma. At salvation you received His Righteousness in Christ Jesus, and God now is only able to relate to you according to His Righteousness that has been given to you. He cannot relate to you according to your sin because He has once and for all dealt with sin at the cross.

But doesn’t God desire our obedience in response to our salvation? This idea has permeated our thinking saying that obedience is the thing God desires most. It’s not. You are. You are the object of the His affection. You are His beloved. Just as a husband desires his bride, so Christ desires you. As you strive for obedience, you are like the wife that lives her life only to serve her husband rather than to spend time with him. If the husband wanted a maid, he could have hired one. He wanted a bride though, and as the bride of Christ, His call to you today is one of intimacy not of service. And beyond that, His call to intimacy isn’t a precursor to His call for obedience. His motivation for intimacy is for intimacy. He desires relationship for relationship. He has no ulterior motives. To live as a slave is to mock the cross of Christ. He did not die on the cross to receive a mob of slaves, but to receive His beloved bride.

Am I saying that obedience should not be a point of focus in your life? Yes. An obedience focused life is one not focused on Christ. Growing up, we learn a system where obedience brings rewards and disobedience reaps punishment. The purpose of this system is first and foremost protection, not relationship. As a child if I have no punishment for running out in the street, I will continue to run out into the street. Once again, this system isn’t designed first and foremost for relationship.

As I’ve grown up and I’ve come out of a rewards/punishment based system, my parents have become two of my best friends. The purpose of the ‘karma’ based system was to protect me and bring me to relationship. The law was there to protect me when I was a child. Now that I’ve grown up I don’t need this law to protect me and I’m free to walk in intimate relationship with my parents. And I can tell you this; there are no two people that I respect more now because I know them as friends. When they ask me to do something, it is no longer even a choice, it just happens. Beyond that, they rarely have to ask, because I know what blesses them. I become free to pour that out on them because I love them, not because I want to earn favor or rewards. It is not me trying to obey for relationship. It’s intimate relationship expressing itself in love.

“But before faith came, we were kept in custody under the law, being shut up to the faith which was later to be revealed. Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.” – Galatians 3:23-27

God’s doesn’t want you close to Him so He can order you around easily. He wants you sitting on His lap because there is nothing He loves more than having your head leaning up against His chest, just resting. When you feel the way His heart beats for you, you become free to love Him back. I would make a claim that obedience isn’t hearing and doing, but knowing and resting. If you can keep yourself from doing it, it’s not Christ living through you, it’s you striving for something you already have. Jesus didn’t have to fight with Himself to heal the sick and raise the dead. His twelve disciples couldn’t have held Him back from raising Lazarus from the dead because His desires were one with the Father’s desires and His desires burn far brighter than the desires of your flesh. When you walk in relationship with the God of the universe, your Spirit comes alive and puts to death the desires of your flesh, so that obedience is no longer a choice, but an expression of something much deeper.

“But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.” – Galatians 5:16