Glorification
Notes
Transcript
Introduction: Over the past several weeks we have taken a look at our salvation in light of the glory of God. We have seen that God is unique or holy, and being holy He desires for His holiness to be seen and cherished and for the whole earth to be filled with His glory. One of the ways He has chosen to do this is by filling the earth with images of Himself so that His moral attributes would be displayed from one end of the earth to the other. The problem is that even though the invisible attributes of God are clearly seen in His creation man chooses to look and say in His heart, “God is not worthy of being glorified with my life.” So instead man glorifies the created rather than the creator. This infinite devaluing of God is worthy of infinite separation from God in death. On all accounts man has failed to live up to his purpose and has fallen short of the glory of God.
Having fallen in love with lesser glories, man is totally blind to true glory. However, thanks be to God who has revealed His glory to us most fully in Jesus Christ. This is an indescribable gift. In Jesus, the Messiah, the Son who is God, is the power to see and worship Him who is infinitely valuable, and the way that we can get as much of Him as we can is by beholding the glory of God in the face of Jesus through the revealed Word of God. In doing this, we are changed from glory to glory.
Last week we sought to answer this question: since Jesus has revealed God’s glory by placing Himself under the wrath of God as the propitiation for mankind, what does that mean concerning how I should live my Christian life?
We found the answer in . Since your sins were crushed with Christ on the cross, and since Christ is raised, and since you are raised with Christ then you are raised no longer to seek the things of this earth but to seek those things which are above. God has graciously set forth the plan of redemption in order to redeem those who were to be His image-bearers so that they could be holy-characterized with blamelessness and above all to put on love (which is the crowning jewel of the believer). God has purposed for all believers to praise the glory of His grace, and so those who are in Christ do not and cannot seek those things which are of this earth, but instead they seek those things which are above. Having once been blind, we now see that which is worth seeing and the desire to be blind is totally gone. We are free from the desire of returning to our vomit because we have tasted Him who is sweeter than honey.
John put it this way:
This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.
So the standing of the believer is that he is justified (he is totally right and righteous before God), and then the experience of the believer is that he is progressively being sanctified (he is being continually changed so that the way he lives his life is closer and closer to his legal standing before God). Now that leads us to this final question: don’t you long for the work of sanctification to be complete? Don’t you long for the day when your heart will no longer be tricked by sin and you will forever be totally enthralled without interruption with the matchless glory of the infinitely holy God? That day will be glorious! I am glad to be able to say that this glory is a vital part of the Christian life. One day you will be totally beyond the power, the experience, and the impact of sin and the fear of death will be no more. In fact, because sin has already been defeated on the cross and the sting of death has been removed it has absolutely no power.
Glorification
Glorification
Death has no power because God is in heaven preparing a place for us. A place we refer to as heaven which is the last and greatest chapter of God’s love for us. Since the fall of man the god of this age (Satan) has blinded the minds of men lest they see the glory of Christ, and men have been accumulating for themselves wrath in the day of judgment by being willingly blinded. You see, there is a cooperation. Satan provides us with blinders but men willingly put those blinders on. Satan blinds but men submit themselves to that blindness. In fact, as we have seen, men love the blindness that Satan offers because his deeds are evil.
During all of this time, what do you suppose God has been doing? God has been pouring out grace. God has been longsuffering.
And the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh; yet his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.”
The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.
God is not pleased when men perish. He has endured the wickedness of man so that all those who would come to Him in Christ would come and live, and the goal for all those who come to God in Christ is glorification.
So, what is glorification? The reality of glorification is staggering. It is so staggering that no Bible believing Christian would have the guts to make it up.
Let’s consider
as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you,
Being in Christ, grace is multiplied to us in this extreme degree. The extreme degree that God’s grace is multiplied to us is that God’s own power will keep us so that all of the promises of God (which are exceedingly great and precious) will be reserved in heaven for us. Well what has God promised? God has promised for those who obtain this grace through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue that we may be partakers of the divine nature. Now wait just a minute! Isn’t this the promise that Satan used in the garden?! Not at all! In the garden the serpent’s argument was that they could be like God in ways that only God can be like God. The serpent was tempting them with independence from God. In other words, “You don’t need God!” That is totally opposite of what Peter is saying. Peter is saying, “In as much as a creature can be like God those who are dependent on the promises that God has made to him will be like God.”
If Eve had grasped this concept she could have responded to the serpent, “Serpent, don’t you know that your arguments are weak and stupid. I already am like God in as much as any creature can be like Him. I am morally perfect and that is God’s design for me. Serpent you need to learn a better theology because I am designed to glorify God in moral perfection by relying on His revealed Word to me.”
That is the divine nature that we will be partakers of. We will be as he made us to be and we will rely on His promises to us forever. We will trust His Word to us forever, and His Word will never perish or fade away. It will stand forever!
Let’s consider
“I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me.
“Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved Me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father! The world has not known You, but I have known You; and these have known that You sent Me. And I have declared to them Your name, and will declare it, that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them.”
This is the prayer of Christ for us, and when we sanctify our minds through the reading of the Word of God and experience what Christ is praying here we are nearest to the heart of heaven and the heart of God. He is praying that we would be one in Him who is one with the Father who gives life through the Spirit. He is praying for our glorification. Through sanctification we experience degrees of glory, but in glorification we will have and experience God Himself for all eternity without hindrance. There is no stronger motivation for sanctification than glorification. Being one with the Father, Son, and Spirit is infinitely more joyous than than all the riches of earth. In heaven there will be nothing but God and His glory to enjoy for all eternity. All will be as it should be. His glory will permeate everything. Reality will finally be realized that He is all and in all.
Conclusion: So, as we close this series what does this have to do with my daily life and experience? First, since we are new creatures we must understand that it is not an option to be transformed from one degree of glory to the next. It becomes our joy and our duty. Since we are united to Christ, and Christ is united to the Father, we are united to God. We are the temple of God, and God has chosen to communicate His glory through us to the world. One day it will be perfectly communicated through us but for now we have the attributes of God to some degree. As we said earlier, glorification is our strongest motivation for sanctification. It is God’s design to communicate to us through the Son and to the world through us. If we refuse to allow God to transform us from one degree of glory to the next then we confess with our lives that we love the darkness rather than the light. We confess with our actions that our deeds are evil, and this we confess to our condemnation. So, we must strive with the Spirit of God who bears witness to our spirit that the glory of God is the greatest treasure in the universe and we must be transformed by it.
Second, as Christians we live and endure a fallen world because we live and endure in hope.
These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off were assured of them, embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.
Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,