Consumed with God’s Glory
I will extol You, my God, O King, and I will bless Your name forever and ever.
Every day I will bless You, and I will praise Your name forever and ever.
Psalm 45:1-2
Every faithful pastor and dedicated church leader will experience seasons of sorrow and betrayal. In the early days of Charles Spurgeon’s ministry, the pain of slander and scorn was so great that he was tempted to quit. His wife Susannah would often hide the morning newspaper to protect him from further insults. He described his melancholy this way: “The iron bolt which so mysteriously fastens the door of hope and holds our spirits in a gloomy prison, needs a heavenly hand to push it back.” Every faithful servant of Christ knows the feeling.
What I’ve discovered from experience, and more importantly from Scripture, is that in order to press on effectively we need something more than knowing “God causes all things to work together for good” (Rom. 8:28); even more than knowing “the testing of (our) faith produces endurance” (James 1:3), as true and wonderful as those promises are. We need something so awe-inspiring, so motivating, that nothing can prevent us from getting back up when we get knocked down; something that will always inspire us to grab our sword and get back in the fight.
What we need is a zeal for the glory of God—a zeal that can only come from a soul-captivating and sin-destroying vision of the majesty of God. I’m speaking of a life-dominating obsession with the intrinsic glory of God—seeing Him as He has revealed Himself in creation and Scripture, and calling all people to worship King Jesus who has been given all authority over heaven and earth (Matt. 28:17-2) and granted “an everlasting dominion which will not pass away” (Dan. 7:14).
Having a preoccupation with the unfathomable glory and greatness of God is not a suggestion; it is a command! Speaking through His inspired psalmist, God adjures the whole of His creation saying, “Let all the earth fear the Lord; let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him” (Psalm 33:8). This kind of perspective puts everything else in life, both good and bad, in its proper place. Nothing in life compares to the incomprehensible perfections of our Creator and Redeemer whose glory we will one day share.
We are to “Sing to the Lord, bless His name; proclaim good tidings of His salvation from day to day. Tell of His glory among the nations, His wonderful deeds among all the peoples. For great is the Lord and greatly to be praised; He is to be feared above all gods” (Ps. 96:2-4). Why would Isaiah labor as a hated prophet of the Most High, knowing that virtually no one would heed his warnings? Why would Peter serve Christ faithfully for three decades, knowing all along it was God’s will for him to be crucified at the end of his life? Why would Paul endure unimaginable persecution and physical torture for the cause of Christ? The answer is this: they were utterly captivated by the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ!
May we live our lives with a passionate anticipation of that day when “the glory of the Lord will be revealed, and all flesh will see it together” (Isa. 40:5). And when others see our unfailing commitment to the majesty of Christ in our lives, and hear it in our words, may they also say, Soli Deo Gloria!
© COPYRIGHT NOTICE 2023 BY DAVID HARRELL AND SHEPHERD’S FIRE. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
