Returning to God’s Glory
The glory of God is the sum and the substance of all that He is. God is infinitely holy and He is utterly perfect. No one is more beautiful than Him given His grandeur and majesty. He reigns with utter sovereignty, absolute authority, and great power. He is independent to none and yet all depends on Him. He is self-sufficient and in need of nothing. Truly, He is the glorious God.
The Scripture teaches that the heavens declare the glory of God (Psa. 19:1). All of creation is all about showcasing God’s glory. From the most minute of subatomic particle to celestial bodies such as the stars, all shows His manifold attributes. The Scripture also tells us that man was created in the image of God, according to His likeness (Gen. 1:26). Now, the purpose why God created man is also for His own glory. He said,
Everyone who is called by My name,
Whom I have created for My glory;
I have formed him, yes, I have made him.”
Isaiah 43:7
The first question in the Westminster Catechism goes like this, “What is the chief end of man?” and the answer is this, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.”. Yes, that’s why we exist. Our life is never about us so it must not revolved around us. In fact, it is written that,
…whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God
1 Corinthians 10:31
God displays His glory through the creation and He created us for His own glory. The point is that our lives should be about glorifying Him by enjoying Him forever. However, is that what we see today?
The Fall: Falling Short of God’s Glory
It has been widely known among Christians the verse which says, “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23)”. But do we really know what it means? What does “have sinned” mean? What does falling short of God’s glory mean? We’ll answer that as we consider the following account of the Fall of man in the Garden of Eden.
So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate.
Genesis 3:6
The Garden of Eden was where God put our first parents, Adam and Eve. There they walked with God and they could freely talk to Him. No chasm was there to divide them. The access to the divine presence was wide open and free. Nothing hindered them from enjoying God. But all of that were only a reality until Eve “saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise”. Being influenced by the serpent’s deception, the created tree of which the fruit was forbidden to be eaten was found good, pleasant, and desirable by Eve. This led her into eating the its fruit and then she gave it to her husband Adam and it was at that moment that “through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men (Romans 5:12)”.
In that narrative we see what it means to fall short of God’s glory. Eve and Adam fell short of God’s glory when they saw that the fruit of the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil was good for food, pleasant to the eyes, and desirable. It was as though God was not enough for them anymore. So they esteemed with higher regard than the glory of God the fruit of the created tree. That shifted desire from a desire for the Creator to the desire for the creation became the framework in which man’s inclination is based. Every man is so radically depraved to the degree that he exchanged the glory of God for a created thing (Romans 1:23). Man’s affections are naturally towards the anything less than God. The creation which is meant to be external to us is now man’s pursuit. Man’s life which is ought to be lived for God’s glory is now being lived wastefully for himself. Oh, what a depraved being we are apart from God’s grace!
The Extent of “Have Sinned”
Man’s sinfulness goes beyond his actions. Man is a sinner not only because he commits sin but also, or more accurately, that he commits sin because he is a sinner. So man’s sinfulness is not just an issue of behavior, it is an issue of nature. Sin is a nature. It is like a prison. Man follows it and this makes him a “slave of sin (Rom. 6:16,17)” and at the same time it is his pursuit: “we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind (Ephesians 2:3)”.
Sin brought spiritual deadness in us. For that reason, we cannot savor the glory of God. We cannot respond to His beauty. We are blinded by sin that we cannot see His infinite worth. Our hearts became a factory of many idols that we cannot regard Him as a precious treasure. We cannot because we will not. It’s not only about having an inability to see Him but it’s really about our lack of willingness to see Him and our lack of desire for Him. Our Lord Jesus Christ testified of this when He said:
And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
John 3:19
So, the light is there but men won’t come for their desire is darkness. Men “loved” darkness rather than the light. So men run to darkness not because there is no light but because they are inclined to it deep within their heart. Now, given our natural condition, how can we regard God again with the highest esteem? How can our enjoyment of Him be restored? How can the divine glory which was trampled and exchanged for lesser things become the most precious treasure of our heart?
Savoring God through Christ
Jesus Christ is the Son of God. He is the image of the invisible God, the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person (Col. 1:15, Heb. 1:3). He is the Word from the beginning and the Word who became flesh (John 1:1, 14a). The Apostle John testified:
we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
John 1:14
John later tells us,
No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.
John 1:18
The point of all that is that Christ is the greatest revelation of God. In Christ, God is revealed. From His birth, in His life, in His ministry, at the cross, in His resurrection to His ascension, God is revealed.
The coming of the Lord Jesus Christ is pivotal not only to history but more importantly to the life of a sinful man. The word of God tells us that Jesus was born “for He will save His people from their sins (Matt. 1:21)”. That promise is not only about saving us from the consequences of sins such as God’s wrath, death, and eternal damnation. In that salvation our spiritual regeneration is included. It was said by the LORD Himself,
Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean;
I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols.
I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you;
I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes,
and you will keep My judgments and do them.
Ezekiel 36:25–27
That is the gospel in summary. That promise includes our cleansing and the giving of a new heart to us. That new heart is no longer a heart of stone which is cold towards God. That new heart is a heart the delights in God.
Through the preaching of the gospel, the person and works of Christ is proclaimed to the unregenerate. By that, the light of the knowledge of the glory of God is given in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 4:6). Thus, if we want to truly behold God in His glory, we have to fix our gaze upon Christ. We have to look to Him continually. “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord (2 Corinthians 3:18)”.
When the Lord Jesus said that He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, what He is essentially saying is that He is the Way not only to be with the Father but also the Way to know the Father. He is the Truth through whom we can know all about God. He is the Life who gives us life eternal that we may enjoy God now and for all eternity.
The Apostle Paul wrote,
For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.
And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.
Romans 5:10–11
The reality that we are saved from God’s wrath and that we have now peace with God is indeed worthy to be celebrated. But Paul, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, reminds us that our reconciliation with God through Christ is a cause of rejoicing. He is also telling us that it is only through Christ that we can truly rejoice in God.
So then, in order to be able to return to God and to savor His glory again, we need Christ. Our original purpose which was marred by sin is restored through Christ. Through Christ we can now rejoice in God. We can now be one with the Psalmist when he said,
My flesh and my heart fail;
But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
Psalms 73:26
We can now say with confidence that the Lord is our portion forever, meaning that He is all that we have and therefore He is the very Treasure of our hearts. True and lasting joy is in His presence alone as well as the good and satisfying pleasures (Psa. 16:11). And thanks be to God for in blessing us with “every spiritual blessing”, He bestows upon us this great privilege of glorifying Him by enjoying Him forever through our beautiful Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is how we return to God’s glory.
-jep
