Glorious

What is this beauty and mystery that is taking shape before my eyes? What is this allure in my mind toward something I never understood before? How easy it was for me to miss truth and yet, how could I? I am so blind. God wants me! I never could see how God could be so desperately and incurably relational. Everything He has done proves His desire for me to know Him. And I’m not talking about just knowing who God is and raising my hands to Him way up there in shiny Heaven (thanks, Matt O). This is down and dirty, intimate, all-stops-out, LOVE.I’ve been learning a lot this weekend. Crossroads Winter Conference in Gatlinburg, TN – workshops, services, discipleship, community – in all, God worked to peel away layers of misguided assumptions about who He is and what this really is all about. Two things really stand out to me – two things my heart cannot keep silent about.
A lot was said this weekend about how our culture tells us to view ourselves. Even in the Christian circle, a lot goes around about self-image and esteem and how we should love ourselves because we are special in God’s eyes and a bunch of other crap. Then there’s more that says, “It’s not about me, it’s about Christ,” which is totally true but what does that mean? If you think about it, there is nothing good in our flesh, so why would we want to esteem it or “believe in it” anyway? But many times, in fact most of the time, even when I think I can claim that I’m doing it all for Christ, I am still thinking of myself. Obviously, I’m not perfect but my point is that the focus should be on who CHRIST IS, not who I am. A speaker from this weekend said something that sums this up: “HE is the Person, we are just the Environment.” (Scott Pitts) He pointed out that we often get that tragically mixed up. He is the life that came to take over mine, it is His righteousness. Since I have no claim to my life anymore, there is nothing I can do. What self of me is there to love or esteem anymore? Goodbye, self-help, -worth, -image, -esteem, etc., books, one and all, even “Christian” ones! I don’t want to know myself, find myself, or any other excuse; I want to know Christ and Him crucified.
The other thing that has just been incredible to learn about this weekend is “glory.” The glory of God. What is the glory of God? Matt Orth gave two messages on this topic, based on John 1:14, and this new perspective has me wheeling. I’m not even sure how to sum it up because there was so much depth to understanding. But I’ve never understood how to glorify God. I mean, REALLY glorify God. It’s something everyone says and everyone assumes to be the highest calling, “…to GLORIFY God…” We say that to live our lives the best that we can, and pray and read our Bibles, and try to love other people, that this is glorifying to God. And it is. But there’s so much more to glory! The Glory is in the grace and truth of Jesus Christ! Why did God reveal His glory in Jesus Christ? To make the Father KNOWN to us! He didn’t send “glory” down to earth so He could get MORE glory from His “subjects” seeing how big He is and worshipping Him and doing whatever He commanded. The point of “glory” is in John 17. There’s a bunch of glorifying going on there but the point is that we can be ONE and be ONE with the Father and be part of the Father’s LOVE. The most glorious act was Jesus’ death on the cross. Doesn’t sound very glorious? Well, it was, because that is what ripped the curtain and brought us into direct relationship with God. Christ was the exact representation of God (Heb. 1:3) so by bringing Him to earth and glorifying Him, we have the chance to truly know Him. We can know Him because He saved us, oh glorious thought! Back to John 1:14 – He was full of grace and truth, which was the exact representation of God and His glory. John is saying, “I saw the glory of GOD in His Son Jesus Christ and it was His covenant LOVE!” We’ve become His children and now we can know the Father and THIS is the greatest glory. Dang it, it’s going to get even better!! 2 Cor. 3:12ff: we can reflect this glory if we live IN CHRIST (Eph. 1) because He is the glory of God. The grace and truth and mercy, etc, that is in Jesus Christ should be reflected in our lives. We are in relationship with the most glorious God imaginable. And what does He want? What is the most glorious thing to Him? Revealing Himself to us so that we can know Him and love Him, because He already knows and loves us. Jeepers!!! This is way better than we thought! Come on! Whatcha gonna do about it?