How to Glorify God

2 Corinthians 3:18

How to Glorify of God?

2 Corinthians 3:18, But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.

The culminating reality of the new covenant is that it is a transforming covenant. In the new covenant we look at the glory of the Lord revealed in the face of Jesus Christ unobstructed. We see Christ in all His wonder, in all His beauty and all His glory!

2 Corinthians 4:6, For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. So, as we look at the face of Christ, we see the glory of God revealed. Nothing obscures us.

We don’t have a veil over our face like Moses did. There’s nothing obscure or hidden or dark or shadowy. The new covenant, the gospel, the message of Jesus Christ is clear. The light has been turned on, and we can look with an unobstructed view right at the glory of God revealed in the face of Jesus Christ.

As we look at the glory of God and focus on the glory of God revealed in Christ, we are moved from one level of glory to the next by the Holy Spirit, who is moving us into the image of the very glory we behold. This is what progressive sanctification is all about.

This is Christian growth. This is the process of becoming like Christ. Moving from one level of glory to the next as we gaze at the glory of the Lord. We as believers, who have come to participate by faith and by grace in the new covenant, have been put into a relationship with God by which we can see His glory radiated through Jesus Christ. As we look at Him unobstructed on the pages of Scripture, and in so looking can literally be transformed into His image from one level of glory to the next.

All of that simply to say we are to live to the glory of God.

We are to live to move from one level of glory to the next level, ever more and more like Jesus Christ, increasingly devoted and manifesting to the glory of God. If we say we are going to glorify God with our lives, how do we do that?

How do we really move from one level of glory to the next? The Bible teaches about glorifying the Lord, how to move from glory to glory in your life. Aim for the Glory of God. If you want to glorify God you have to aim your life at that purpose, you must aim your life at that purpose.

The very goal of your life is the glory of God. That is the focal point. That is what you direct your life toward. Jesus certainly did that.

John 8:50, And I do not seek My own glory; there is One who seeks and judges. Jesus didn’t live for His own glory. Jesus didn’t live to fulfil His own agenda. Jesus always honoured, exalted, pleased, and lifted up God.

Even when lifting God meant humbling Himself, Even if exalting God meant humiliating Himself, Even if setting God in the place of worship meant putting Himself in the place of cursing. He was willing to do that because He was always focused on the glory of God.

God being glorified was His purpose. So it is in our lives that we must live to glorify God.

1 Corinthians 10:31, Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. it’s a life focus. It isn’t so much talking about eating and drinking, it’s talking about all of life going down even to that which is as mundane as eating and drinking.

The commonest thing we do. You would think that might get left out. Glorify God when you speak, glorify God when you act and behave, glorify God when you do ministry, glorify God when you worship, glorify God when you meet people’s needs, glorify God in spiritual and religious ways Glorify God in the ways of your behaviour.

But eating and drinking? That’s mundane thing. That is the whole point. At the very basest point of human existence, eating and drinking, when you are just meeting biological need, do it to the glory of God. That becomes the focal point of everything you do in your life. That’s the focus.

Ask yourself, “Does it glory God?

Will it glorify God?

Will it bring honour to His name?

Will it exalt Him? Whatever it is, no matter how apparently or superficially mundane, it has inherent in it a capacity for you to honour God, even the simplest behaviour like eating and drinking. Now, you must aim your life to glorify God.

That must be the all-consuming purpose of your life. That must be all-consuming direction of your life. You are never going to do anything wilfully, knowingly, that does not bring honour, that does not bring glory to God.

You want to honour Him with everything you do. You want to exalt Him, praise Him, lift Him up, worship Him, glorify Him.

But let me take that a little deeper because that’s general. Do a little inventory in your life, and you can ask yourself a few questions that will help you know whether you are aimed at that purpose. Do I prefer the glory of God above everything else?

Simple question yet it has profound implications. Is the very purpose of my life to bring glory to God so much that His glory transcends any of my own personal desires, relationships, goals, dreams, ambitions? 1. Glorify God by confessing sin.

When we confess our sin, we take responsibility for our evil, wickedness, disobedience, and God disciplines us. God appears rightly to be just and holy and do what is to be done. For a holy God should indeed have a holy reaction against sin.

If God chooses not to chasten but to be gracious, then He receives glory for being gracious to one who is so utterly unworthy. The thief on the cross is a good illustration of this.

He really did glorify God in his death because he had failed to glorify God all his life. But in his death, he glorified God.

How?

Luke 23:41, And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this Man has done nothing wrong.”

We are getting exactly what we deserve. Confession of sin.

What that does is glorify God? Because it frees God from any accusation of impunity for being unkind or ungracious or unjust. They are not shaking their fists in the face of God like those in Revelation 16.

Revelation 16:21, And great hail from heaven fell upon men, each hailstone about the weight of a talent. Men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail, since that plague was exceedingly great.

The thief said, “we are getting exactly what we deserve. We sinned. This is what we deserve.” Freeing God to do whatever God would justly do without any accusation against Him.

• One of the reasons you confess sin is just to restore the fellowship with God.
• Second reason you confess sin is to free God up to do whatever He wants to do to you.

If you confess your sin to God and God chastens you. Then you have acknowledged that He has every right to do it. It’s a holy reaction against your sin. On the other hand, if you confess your sin and God doesn’t chasten you, then you have glorified God also, because now you are going to understand the greatness and the magnanimity of His grace!

But if you don’t even acknowledge your sin and don’t even confess your sin and if God chastens you, you are liable to shake your fist at Him and say, “Why is this happening in my life? I don’t understand this.” Or if God is gracious to you, you are not even going to understand it at all. You are going to think you deserve it because you are a good person.

If you won’t accept the responsibility for your sin, then He gets no glory either way. People don’t want to take responsibility for their sin in our culture.

They are not responsible for anything in their lives, and consequently they do not glorify God. It doesn’t not glorify God when you blame somebody else for sin that is only your problem. Nobody is responsible for your sin but you, not your mother, not your father, not your aunt, your uncle, not your orphanage, not anything. Nobody but you is responsible for your sin.

The sooner you acknowledge that responsibility then the Lord in chastening you can be glorified, because it’s a just chastening. When God not chastening you, you can praise Him and thank Him for the grace that He gives you because you know what you really deserve.

But men are good at denying sin. Adam started it. The first sinner launched the first dispossession of responsibility.

Genesis 3:12, Then the man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate.” It’s not my fault. I went to bed single. I didn’t ask for a wife, You didn’t give me a choice.

Who did Adam blame? God. God said, “I do hold you responsible. I hold everybody responsible for his or her own sin.”

Illustration

When the children of Israel were delivered from Egypt through the power of God and the ten plagues and crossed the Red Sea and it drowned Pharaoh’s army. They then were in the wilderness and they wandered there for forty years, and eventually got into the Promised Land. Their entry point to the Promised Land was Jericho.

They came into Jericho, and they won a great battle. They marched around the walls for seven days and seven times the seventh day, and the walls fell and they took the city. God had said to them, “Now when you take the city of Jericho don’t take any spoil.”

“Don’t take anything.” But there was one guy who just couldn’t resist. There was complicity on the part of his whole family. I mean, after all, he buried the whole pile of treasure in the middle of his tent, and you couldn’t be digging a hole in the tent your

whole family was living in without somebody knowing what was going on. So, they were all a part of it. There was complicity in the whole family. Instead of obeying God, he went in there and just stole everything. Very crucial point in God’s redemptive history.

• Obedience brings blessing,
• Disobedience brings cursing.

Very key points in redemptive history. God punctuated that reality. Don’t take anything, and Achan and his family did. This is got to be confronted.

Joshua 7:19, Now Joshua said to Achan, “My son, I beg you, give glory to the Lord God of Israel, and make confession to Him, and tell me now what you have done; do not hide it from me.” How is Achan going to give glory to the God of Israel? Confess your sin, don’t hide it. Confess your sin and give glory to God.

If you will accept responsibility for your sin, then nobody is going to accuse God of being unholy when He judges you. That was the point.

Joshua 7:20-21, And Achan answered Joshua and said, “Indeed I have sinned against the Lord God of Israel, and this is what I have done: 21 When I saw among the spoils a beautiful Babylonian garment, two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold weighing fifty shekels, I coveted them and took them. And there they are, hidden in the earth in the midst of my tent, with the silver under it.” That’s what he did. Achan didn’t say,

• I demonstrated a moral weakness.
• I had a moral failure.

He said, “I sinned,” and even told him what order the stuff was stacked in.

Joshua 7:22-26, So Joshua sent messengers, and they ran to the tent; and there it was, hidden in his tent, with the silver under it. 23 And they took them from the midst of the tent, brought them to Joshua and to all the children of Israel, and laid them out before the Lord. 24 Then Joshua, and all Israel with him, took Achan the son of Zerah, the silver, the garment, the wedge of gold, his sons, his daughters, his oxen, his donkeys, his sheep, his tent, and all that he had, and they brought them

to the Valley of Achor. 25 And Joshua said, “Why have you troubled us? The Lord will trouble you this day.” So all Israel stoned him with stones; and they burned them with fire after they had stoned them with stones. 26 Then they raised over him a great heap of stones, still there to this day.

So the Lord turned from the fierceness of His anger. Therefore the name of that place has been called the Valley of Achor to this day.

• Obedience is better
• Obedience is a better choice.
• Obedience is wiser.

Every time a person disobeys God doesn’t kill them, but periodically to make His point, He’s done that at crucial junctures in Israel’s redemptive history. Even in the beginning of the church, with Ananias and Sapphira, to remind us that it’s all about blessing and cursing, those who obey are blessed, those who disobey are cursed.

If Achan hadn’t confessed that sin and God had just wiped out that whole family, somebody might say, what kind of a God are You? why would You do that?

When Achan confessed that he had sinned against God, then what everybody would have to say was, “This is a God who is so holy He will not tolerate sin.” That is the reputation that glorifies God! Of course, this sets up the whole significance of the atoning work of Jesus Christ. We can see that what Jesus Christ did on the cross was appease the wrath of God by satisfying His justice for us.

Do you want to glorify God? Then aim your life at that purpose, and confess your sin and confess it specifically, so that when God chastens you, He will not be impugned for being unjust. When God shows you grace, He will not be forgotten for His mercy.

Nehemiah 9:33, However You are just in all that has befallen us; For You have dealt faithfully, But we have done wickedly.

Genesis 44:16, Then Judah said, “What shall we say to my lord? What shall we speak? Or how shall we clear ourselves?

God has found out the iniquity of your servants; here we are, my lord’s slaves, both we and he also with whom the cup was found.”

Daniel 9:20, Now while I was speaking, praying, and confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my supplication before the Lord my God for the holy mountain of my God,

Luke 5:8, When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!”

Luke 18:13, And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’

1 Timothy 1:15, This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief.

When we admit our sin that glorifies God, because it puts on display His holy wrath against sin and it puts on display His sweet merciful grace for the sinner. Do you want to move from level of glory to level of glory and become more and more like Christ?

Do you want to become all that God wants you to be? Then aim your life at glorifying God. Confess your sin.

So, we glorify God by aiming our life at that focus, and we glorify God by confessing our sin. 2. We glorify God by trusting Him. If indeed in our lives, we are to glorify God moving from one level of glory and becoming more like the one we worship. The God we adore revealed to us in the face of Jesus Christ. Then we are going to bring Him glory when we trust Him.

We honour Him by trusting Him. It’s a very simple principle. If I say that I respect, regard, and honour my father and mother then I should demonstrate in the way I live. If I have no regard for their word, that I don’t trust what they say, then you can question the legitimacy of my respect.

If, on the other hand, I have tremendous trust in their integrity, wisdom, decisions, and leadership in my life and I follow that leadership, then I am affirming my trust without any ambiguity. The same thing is true in the Christian’s experience.

If we say God is worthy to be believed in, He is worthy to be trusted, and we demonstrate that we don’t trust Him, question what He does, doubt, fear, dismay, and sometimes sorrow, worry, anxiety characterize our lives, then people should have a right to say, “if you trust God so much, why do you live in doubt? Why do you live in fear? Why do you live in anxiety?

If God is who you say He is, shouldn’t He be trusted?” So again, we will bring honour to God by our trust. We will truly say that we see the glory of God when we trust God.

Illustration

Romans chapter 4. The wonderful account reiterated of Abraham and Sarah, and the promise and the fulfilment of the birth of Isaac. God had promised to Abraham that he would have a seed. In fact, his progeny would be so prolific that they could be numbered.

Genesis 15:5, Then He brought him outside and said, “Look now toward heaven, and count the stars if you are able to number them.” And He said to him, “So shall your descendants be.”

We now know that there is probably some equality in those two. Maybe there are as many stellar bodies as there are grains of sand. It’s far greater then we could ever imagine. The unaccountable stars and grains of sand on the seas of the world were what the Lord selected to illustrate the vastness of the seed that would come from the loins of Abraham.

God made that promise. However, by the time Abraham reached one hundred years of age they had absolutely no children. Sarah’s womb was dead, and they had no fulfilment of the promise.

Romans 4:17-21, (as it is written, “I have made you a father of many nations”) in the presence of Him whom he believed—God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did; 18 who, contrary to hope, in hope believed, so that he became the father of many nations, according to what was spoken, “So shall your descendants be.” 19 And not being weak in faith, he did not consider his own body, already dead (since he was about a hundred years old), and the deadness of Sarah’s womb. 20 He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God, 21 and being fully convinced that what He had promised He was also able to perform.

Abraham believed in order that he might become a father of many nations. Abraham believed that God had the power to do what seemed humanly impossible. From a human perspective it just wasn’t going to happen. Yet, with respect to the promise of God he did not waver in unbelief but grew strong in faith and giving glory to God.

It was that very faith in God that saved him, as faith always saves. It saved Abraham. He believed God for that which was humanly impossible. He was strong in faith and gave glory to God. Unbelief is an affront to God. For God to make a promise and you not to believe it is to question His character.

Example

Philippians 4:19, And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.

Matthew 6:25-34, “Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? 26 Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your

heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? 28 “So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; 29 and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not [l]arrayed like one of these. 30 Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?

31 “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

If the Scripture says inspired by the Holy Spirit that there never will come a trial into your life that is more than you can bear, do you believe it?

1 Corinthians 10:13, No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.

The Scripture says that in the midst of the seemingly unbearable trial there will always be a way of escape, do you believe it? Because if you don’t, and if you doubt, fear, anxious, worried, and question whether God can perform His Word, you have denied Him the glory that is due His name.

• He is worthy to be trusted.
• He can do what He says.
• He will do what He promises.

Unbelief questions His integrity that doesn’t bring Him honour any more than questioning somebody’s integrity brings them honour, it brings them dishonour to question anyone’s integrity.

1 John 5:10, He who believes in the Son of God has the witness in himself; he who does not believe God has made Him a liar, because he has not believed the testimony that God has given of His Son. You are treating God as if He lied.

The Lord says

• He is going to meet your needs,

• He is going to lead through all the trials,
• He will give you escape route to all the temptations of life,
• He promises that you will not be tempted more than you can bear,
• He will be with you in all the tribulations, and
• He will bring you to glory.

He promised that He is going to be there as a friend sticking closer than a brother! Every resource of heaven is at your disposal, including the angels, which are sent to minister to the saints.

Hebrews 1:14, Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for those who will inherit salvation? All the promises of God are ours because they are all yes in Jesus Christ who is ours.

2 Corinthians 1:20, For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us.

We greatly dishonour God when we claim to believe in Him, and yet we can’t cope with life, and we can’t solve our problems, and we can’t rest confidently and assuredly in His wisdom and His power.

In fact, we are stealing His glory. Sure, life is full of troubles, but our God is beyond all of those. There’s no sense in fearing. Book of Daniel. The three young men who were thrown into the fiery furnace known as Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. That, of course, was their Chaldean names. Their Hebrew names were Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah.

But the Chaldeans, part of the brainwashing process gave them names that were Chaldeans names, which bore as a part of the name the name of the Chaldean gods, false gods, to try to lure them into idolatry. Everybody was required to bow down to the king, and anybody who didn’t bow down to the king was going to have to pay with his life. Exactly that is what happened.

Daniel 3:15, Now if you are ready at the time you hear the sound of the horn, flute, harp, lyre, and psaltery, in symphony with all kinds of music, and you fall down and worship the image which I have made, good! But if you do not worship, you shall be cast immediately into the midst of a burning fiery furnace. And who is the god who will deliver you from my hands?”

Nebuchadnezzar thought himself to be more powerful than the Hebrew God. It is understandable since the Babylonians had managed to conquer the Hebrews. They ascribed their conquering powers to their own deity and assumed that if the Hebrews’ God couldn’t defend them against the gods of the Babylonians that therefore the gods of the Babylonians were more powerful.

Nebuchadnezzar was perhaps the most powerful of all. Even though he was a man, he saw himself as some kind of deity.

Daniel 3:16-17, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego answered and said to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. 17 If that is the case, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us from your hand, O king. Tremendous faith. If somebody asks you in a simple question in the normal course of life if you believe God could deliver you out of any situation, you will probably say yes. But it might be a little different if you were standing on the edge of a fiery furnace, feeling the heat and breathing the smoke and the flames.

But it never caused their faith to waver one bit.

Daniel 3:18, But if not, let it be known to you, O king, that we do not serve your gods, nor will we worship the gold image which you have set up.”

They were so confident in God’s power and God’s promise that whether it was in life or death, they knew God would deliver them. Nebuchadnezzar was so enraged!

Daniel 3:19-25, Then Nebuchadnezzar was full of fury, and the expression on his face changed toward Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego. He spoke and commanded that they heat the furnace seven times more than it was usually heated. 20 And he commanded certain mighty men of valour who were in his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed- Nego, and cast them into the burning fiery furnace. 21 Then these men were bound in their coats, their trousers, their turbans, and their other garments, and were cast into the midst of the burning fiery furnace. 22 Therefore, because the king’s command was urgent, and the furnace exceedingly hot, the flame of the fire killed those men who took up Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego. 23 And these three men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego, fell down bound into the midst of the burning fiery furnace. 24 Then King Nebuchadnezzar was astonished; and he rose in haste and spoke, saying to his counsellors, “Did we not cast three men bound into the

midst of the fire?” They answered and said to the king, “True, O king.” 25 “Look!” he answered, “I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire; and they are not hurt, and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God.”

Bible commentators would believe that the Lord Jesus Christ, the second member of the Trinity in a pre-incarnate appearance came and attended to these three wonderfully faithful men.

Daniel 3:26, Then Nebuchadnezzar went near the mouth of the burning fiery furnace and spoke, saying, “Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego, servants of the Most High God, come out, and come here.” Then Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego came from the midst of the fire.

Their faith was vindicated.

Daniel 3:27, And the satraps, administrators, governors, and the king’s counsellors gathered together, and they saw these men on whose bodies the fire had no power; the hair of their head was not singed nor were their garments affected, and the smell of fire was not on them.

Their faith was vindicated. They believed God on the edge of the fiery furnace.

This is the kind of faith that honours God. That is a tremendous honour to Him when you can stand on the edge of the fiery furnace and say, “I trust God,” when you can face a tragedy in your family, whatever it might be, and say, “I trust God. God is too wise to make a mistake, too loving to be unnecessarily unkind, and too powerful to have anything beyond His control.”

Faith glorifies God.