Pastor's Corner: All For His Glory

All For His Glory

Why am I here? What is my purpose? Who am I? These are the questions that nearly everyone ponders at some point in life. God has great plans and gifts for all of us. He has created us for His pleasure and to bring Him glory.

Jeremiah 32:40-41 And I will make an eternal agreement with them, that I will never give them up, but ever do them good…And truly, I will take pleasure in doing them good…

God created us for His pleasure and for His glory.

Psalm 147:11 The LORD takes pleasure in them that fear him, in those that hope in his mercy.

His love is unconditional, indefinable and indescribable, but His blessings are altogether different. They are for the most part contingent upon our actions, upon our motives and most definitely upon our beliefs.

So why not just believe? We are surrounded by people who say that they believe in God, but live a lifestyle that is in opposition to His Word. Drunks on the street corner say they believe. Unmarried people sleeping together say they believe. Folks who haven’t been in a church in years say they believe. All kinds of lukewarm, world-loving church goers say they believe.

Maybe it has come to the point where this phrase: “I believe” is actually empty of any real meaning at all.

My job as a preacher of the Gospel isn’t just to read and expound on Scripture but it is equally to pierce your hearts with the truths of God’s Word. There is a command in the Bible that forces our attention:

Mark 16:16 He that believes and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believes not shall be damned.

You see friends, believing is more than just acknowledging something as true. The biblical sense behind this word is that one who believes will in fact live by that belief system; and to live by the belief system of the Word of God is find ones desires, affections, and paths changed from a worldly foundation to a heavenly one.

What is there about God and man that make this necessary? And what has God done to meet our need? And finally what must we do to enjoy the benefits of His provision? These are actually pretty huge questions.

I would like to answer these questions today by looking briefly at six things:

1. God created us for His glory.

Isaiah 43:6-7 I will say to the north…and to the south…bring my sons from far, and my daughters from the ends of the earth; Even every one that is called by my name: for I have created him for my glory…

The proper understanding of everything in life comes from and begins with God. None of us will ever grasp our need to truly believe when we don’t have a sense of why He created us in the first place. He created us in His image to be lights that would display His glory. It’s almost like we are prism by which the Light of His glory shines through. We exist to help others see the goodness of God.

2. Because of this it is the duty of everyone to live a life for the glory of God.

1 Corinthians 10:31 Whether you eat, or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

If God created us for His glory than it only stands to reason that we should live for His glory. Bringing glory to God is the duty of everyone who truly believes; and without fail that glory will come forth in the characteristics of a changed life.

Hear me today! God isn’t going to judge someone for something they have no knowledge of; and yet even without the Bible we all have a sense that there is something…someone greater than us that created everything around us. All one has to do is look at the panoramic starlit night or an ocean sunset swept with vivid color to know that there is a God.

Romans 1:20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse…

Deep within each and every one of us is the innate sense that it is our duty to glorify our Maker by thanking Him for all we have, trusting Him for all we need, and obeying all of His revealed will.

3. Yet all of us have failed to glorify God as we should.

Romans 3:23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God...

What does it actually mean to fall short of the glory of God? It does not mean that we are supposed to be as glorious as Him. We all know that we will always fall short in that sense. The way that we fall short is that we tend to exchange God for something of far lesser value. And this my friends is the essence of sin: exchanging the glory of God for something less.

All of us have sinned. None of us have trusted God the way that we should. None of us have consistently remained thankful for all that He has done. None of us have been completely obedient to everything that He has instructed us to do.

We have exchanged His glory again and again. We trust in ourselves instead of Him. We take credit for things that are His gifts. We turn away from His commandments because we thought we had a better way.

Proverbs 16:25 There is a way that seems right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.

If we’re really honest with ourselves we can see that we have treated the glory of God with disdain and contempt. Sin is bad enough as it relates to the effect that it has on our lives and our eternity; but the great evil of sin is that fact that it is fundamentally disregard of God.

The psalmist David committed adultery with Bathsheba and even had her husband killed. He was an adulterer and a murderer and yet when God confronted David through Nathan the prophet, He address his sinful acts; but it went much deeper than that in the eyes of the Lord.

2 Samuel 12:9-10 Why have you despised the commandment of the LORD, to do evil in his sight? You have killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword, and taken his wife to be your wife, and slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon. Now therefore the sword shall never depart from your house; because you have despised me…

The problem is not only that we choose to sin, it is that we all have a sinful nature. The Bible describes our hearts as blind, hard, and dead. By nature we are children of wrath.

Ephesians 2:3 Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath…

4. Because of this all of us are subject to eternal condemnation by God.

Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death…

2 Thessalonians 1:8-9 In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power…

Because we have held the glory of God in contempt through ungratefulness, distrust and disobedience we are sentenced to miss out on the enjoyment of heaven to the eternal misery of hell.

I know…I know…no one wants to talk about hell, and many don’t even believe there is such as place. After all, how could a God who is love sentence His creation to eternal punishment?

The word hell or gehenna occurs 12 times in the New Testament; 11 of which came from the mouth of Jesus. Hell is not a myth created by angry fire and brimstone preachers. It is the severely serious warning of the Son of God who died to deliver you and me from its curse. And friend we ignore it at great risk.

Hell is a place of torment. It is not merely the absence of pleasure. Jesus repeatedly described it as a place of severe anguish in fire.

Matthew 5:22 But I promise you that if you are angry with someone, you will have to stand trial. If you call someone a fool, you will be taken to court. And if you say that someone is worthless, you will be in danger of the fires of hell.

Mark 9:43-48 …if your hand offend you, cut it off: it is better for you to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched: Where their worm dies not, and the fire is not quenched. And if your foot offend you, cut it off: it is better for you to enter halt into life, than having two feet to be cast into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched: Where their worm dies not, and the fire is not quenched. And if your eye offend you, pluck it out: it is better for you to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye, than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire: Where their worm dies not, and the fire is not quenched.

He warned more than once that there would be weeping and gnashing of teeth in this place called hell.

Matthew 8:12 But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Matthew 22:13 Then said the king to the servants, Bind him hand and foot, and take him away, and cast him into outer darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Matthew 24:50-51 The lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looks not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of, And shall cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Now…you tell me is hell a myth? Is the Lord Jesus speaking metaphorically? I contend that Jesus knew what He was talking about; and not only is it a place of torment, but it is also everlasting. Hell is not a remedial way station where you can pay some penance and finally get into heaven.

Matthew 25:41 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire…

Matthew 25:46 And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.

The punishment is eternal just as the life is eternal. John the Revelator sums up the torment and endlessness.

Revelation 14:11 And the smoke of their torment ascends up forever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night…

5. Praise God that in His great mercy, He sent His Son Jesus Christ to save us by dying in our place on the cross.
1Timothy 1:15 This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners…

Against the terrifying news that we have all fallen short of the glory of God and thereby condemned, stands the Good News that God Himself decreed a way to satisfy the demands of sin without condemning the whole human race. Hell may be one way to settle accounts, but friends I am here today to proclaim that God made another way!

The wisdom of God has ordered a way for the love of God to deliver us from the wrath of God without compromising the justice of God. And that wisdom was the death of the Son of God for sinners!

1 Corinthians 1:23-24 But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness; But unto them which are called…Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.

2 Corinthians 5:21 For he has made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

1 Peter 2:24 Who his own self bore our sins in his own body on the tree…

1 Peter 3:18 For Christ also has once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God…

6. The benefits purchased by the death of Christ belong to those who not only believe, but also repent and trust in Him.

Act 3:19 Repent…and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out…

Acts 16:31 …Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved...

Not everyone is saved just because they say that they believe. There is a condition we must meet in order to be saved. Our believing should manifest itself in the form of repentance and conversion.

Repentance and faith are our work. But we will not repent and believe unless God does something to overcome our hard and rebellious hearts.

Deuteronomy 30:6 And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart to love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, that you may live.

Jeremiah 24:7 And I will give them a heart to know me, that I am the LORD: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart.

Ezekiel 36:26-27 A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and you shall keep my judgments, and do them.

These verses show us that the work of regeneration comes by God’s divine power. He is the one who changes our hearts. Without this spiritual heart transplant, none of us would ever know, love or obey God.

In closing let me say that God has built the entirety of His dealings with you and me on faith. Consequently, all the answers to all of man’s questions begin with believing God’s Word whether it makes sense to our human minds or not.

One man dying on a cruel cross to atone for the entirety of the sins of all mankind is not logical in man’s way of thinking, yet it is the central Truth of God that will never change.

I started today’s message with the following questions: Why am I here? What is my purpose? Who am I? These are the questions that nearly everyone ponders at some point in life. We were created to bring glory to God. It is my prayer for you that you will glorify Him with your life today.

All For His Glory!
Pastor Rick