Beholding the Glory of God

[00:00:01] You. [00:00:05] Let's pray. [00:00:08] O Lord, because you preserve us, we have a great, great hope in the things that you are doing here and now and in the future that is to come. As Your Word says, from Your right hand we have we have the gift and even the right, the inheritance of eternal pleasures through the work and life that you have, the work You've done for us and the life that you give to us. Lord. You are our master, our lord, our life. Giver, our King, you are the glorious One, and in you we have life. We ask that you would help us to see and understand these things even more, that we might be bold and have hope in the things that you have promised. [00:01:03] We pray this in Jesus name, our Savior. Amen. [00:01:08] Let's turn to God's Word now, in two Corinthians, chapter three. If you're able to remain standing, please do. [00:01:15] We're going to be reading God's Word from two Corinthians three, verses four through 18. I'll be focusing on verses twelve through 18 in the sermon. [00:01:44] Let's hear God's word. [00:01:47] Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything is coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. [00:02:08] Now, if the ministry of death, carved in letters on stone, came with such glory that the Israelites could not gaze at Moses, moses'face, because of its glory which was being brought to an end, will not the ministry of the Spirit have even more glory? For if there was glory in the ministry of condemnation, the ministry of righteousness must far exceed it in glory. Indeed, in this case, what once had glory has come to have no glory at all because of the glory that surpasses it. For if what was being brought to an end came with glory, much more will what is permanent have glory. [00:02:48] Since we have such a hope, we are very bold. Not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face, so that the Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end. But their minds were hardened. For to this day, when they read the old covenant, that same veil remains unlifted, because only through Christ is it taken away. [00:03:13] Yes, to this day, whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their hearts. But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord is the spirit. And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. [00:03:46] May God bless his word. Please be seated. [00:04:12] In this passage, Paul makes a connection between hope and boldness. [00:04:19] He makes a connection between hope and boldness. In verse twelve, he says, since we have such a hope, we are very bold. [00:04:29] If you think about your own life, think about and try to think for a moment about the connection between hope and boldness. You could think about areas of your life where you don't have hope and therefore you are not bold. [00:04:43] Maybe there are certain skills that you would like to learn that you are just not even coming close to trying. [00:04:50] You're not even going to bother because you have no hope of accomplishing them. Maybe there's places you'd like to go or people you'd like to meet that again, it's not even on your bucket list because why would I do that? There's no hope. So I'm not going to go in boldness and do these things. [00:05:09] But perhaps there are other things in your life where you can see that you exercise maybe an extraordinary boldness because of your experiences, because of your knowledge, because of certain skills. You do things that maybe other people don't even try. [00:05:27] Why? Because you have hope, you have reasons to trust that you will be able to accomplish or experience or whatever it is the thing that you are aiming to do, because you have the skills to do it. You have the experience, the connections, the knowledge, whatever it may be. [00:05:51] Well, here in our passage, Paul connects hope and boldness in particular to his ministry. [00:06:00] In verse four, we read that they have confidence. Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God, because he's made them to be sufficient in him to be ministers of a new covenant. He is going to proclaim the Gospel, which he calls in Romans, the power of God unto salvation. And he's going to proclaim it with boldness and with confidence because he knows something about it, he knows some truths about it that lead him to feel this way, that give him hope, this solid hope that then leads into this kind of boldness. And as we'll see in the future. In chapter four, this is despite the fact that they are suffering a great deal. [00:06:51] He says in verse four, or chapter four, verse one, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart, they do not lose heart. In verse seven of chapter four, he says, we have this treasure in jars of clay. And he's talking about himself. [00:07:10] Even though I myself am like a jar of clay, easily broken, not very glorious. He says in verse eight, afflicted in every way, crushed, but not crushed, perplexed but not driven to despair, persecuted but not forsaken, struck down but not destroyed. [00:07:30] What's going on there? How is he continuing? And how does he have this boldness? Even though he sees himself as weak, he sees in himself a lack of sufficiency and is experiencing all kinds of struggles and troubles from outside, many of which he describes here in two corinthians. Where is that coming from? The answer to that is in our passage and it's been in the previous sections as well. [00:08:01] Last time he described to us one of the reasons for his boldness, one of the reasons for his confidence in proclaiming the Gospel is the greater glory and the permanence of the New Covenant. [00:08:15] Comparing it with that of the Old Covenant, he says, we know the Old Covenant was glorious. Look at Moses's face shining, shining as he came down from the mountain. [00:08:29] If that was true, then how much more the ministry of righteousness, a ministry of glory which would a permanent glory which would surpass that which was temporary before. [00:08:43] This is where I don't preach the sermon I preached last week and we consider now this next section. [00:08:51] So in addition to this permanence and greater glory of the New Covenant, what else does Paul have to say? What else gives him boldness and hope? [00:09:04] Well, one of the things we see is in verse 13 where he describes this boldness, he says it's not like Moses. [00:09:15] Not like Moses. What's the difference between the ministry of Christ that Paul has in Christ and the ministry of Moses? [00:09:26] Well, Moses put a veil over his face. [00:09:31] So this glory, the glory of God that is shining on his face, the glory of the covenant, the glory of the eternal, uncreated triune, god shining on Moses, moses covered that up. [00:09:53] He covered up the glory of God. [00:09:57] Why? [00:09:59] Why did he cover the glory of God? Why did he put a veil over his face? Paul says it's because this so that the Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end, the covenant of Moses, the Mosaic covenant, the Old Covenant, as it's called in these various ways, was being brought to an end. We thought about that last time the covenant was being brought to an end. Well, what was the end of that covenant, the outcome of that covenant? Well, it was glory. It was glory. The glory of God was the outcome of the Old covenant, but it was being brought to an end. [00:10:44] A glory that was unattainable, a glory that was impossible, a glory that filled the people of God even in seeing it on Moses'face with terror, knowing beforehand, by the word of God, that if they even touched that glorious holy Mount Sinai, they would die. [00:11:07] The Law and the glory of the Law was so awesome, so great, and yet it was unattainable. [00:11:19] Their minds could not perceive the glory of God in part because God covered it. We could say even out of mercy, but also out of their own inability. [00:11:36] Psalm 39, or sorry, 36 verse nine, says this for with you is the fountain of life, in your light do we see light. [00:11:52] For with you is the fountain of life in your light. Do we see light? [00:12:01] If you're in a dark room? Perfectly dark, completely dark. Maybe you've been in such a place before, maybe in the bottom of a hospital, right, where no light is getting in and the power goes off or something. Or maybe in a cave, right, where no light is getting in. [00:12:22] How do you get to see light in a place like that? [00:12:26] By pressing the darkness harder somehow. [00:12:32] By straining your eyes really hard to see in the darkness. [00:12:38] No. The only way that you can see light where there is no light is by light. [00:12:47] The only way you could see a matchstick or a flame or a flashlight is by a matchstick or a flame or a flashlight. The only way you can see light is by light. And that is true of the light of the glory of God. [00:13:04] The only way that we can see the light of the glory of God is by the light of the glory of God. And so if it's covered, if it's veiled, you're not getting it. [00:13:22] If the veil is unlifted, as he says, over the glory of God, then we are unable to see it. [00:13:35] And pressing into the requirements of the Old Covenant is not going to work because we have not yet been changed to be able to see it. [00:13:50] Which is why Paul will talk about the Law and the Old Covenant as being glorious, yes, but also slavery and blindness, a ministry of condemnation and death, a ministry of terror and fear, because seeking and trying to achieve the glory of God out of the strength of our own obedience and righteousness to the Law is impossible. [00:14:20] It's vanity. [00:14:22] And those who keep trying to do that, those who keep trying to work to obtain to these great spiritual heights and experiences and life and holiness, will always fail over and over and over again because the glory of God has been veiled even by God himself. [00:14:49] And so Paul says that apart from Christ, when people come and read the Old Covenant, when they read the Mosaic Law, that veil remains. He even says to this day, it's like Moses put a veil over his face. I'm paraphrasing here. Moses put a veil over his face and it never left. [00:15:11] People still are unable to see the glory of God because that veil remains unlifted. He said in Paul's day, he's saying, the Jews, they go to the synagogues, they hear the word of God, they hear about it, but they are unable to attain to the glory of God because the veil remains. [00:15:36] Now, the glory of the New Covenant is greater than the glory of the Old Covenant. He just made that point. But the glory of God to which we hope to attain that glory that is shining on the face of Moses is not a different glory. [00:15:56] It's not a different glory, you might say. How is it that I can see or I can't see the glory of God under the servant or through the servant of God through Moses, but I can see it through the Son of God, Jesus Christ. How's that possible? [00:16:17] How is it that the glory of God is inaccessible in one and totally or totally accessible in the other? Because, as Paul goes on to say, he says that through Christ the veil is taken away. [00:16:34] In verse 16 he says when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. In verse 18 he says we all with unveiled face beholding the glory of God. Right? Nothing in between us and Him or the glory of God are even being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. So not only are we beholding the glory of God, but it's affecting us in such a way that we are becoming more glorious. So instead of dying, instead of turning away, instead of cowering in fear, we're actually becoming more and more like that glory, more and more like God Himself. [00:17:23] How is that right? What is the difference between the old covenant under Moses and the New covenant under Christ? [00:17:34] Well, one of the things that he mentions is freedom. [00:17:41] In verse 17 1st, start with the first phrase of verse 17. He says now the Lord is the Spirit, the Lord is the Spirit. [00:17:57] Now, there's a way to read that correctly and a way to read it incorrectly. To read it incorrectly, we would identify the person of the Son with the person of the Spirit and say that they are the same. [00:18:12] If we do that, then we have not a triunity but a biunity. We would have the Father and then we'd have this second person that is both Son and Spirit. And that's not true according to many, many passages of Scripture, which I won't get into this morning, we'll just take it as true that the Son and the Spirit are distinct persons and one God with the Father. [00:18:44] So we are not denying paul is not denying the personhood of the unique and separate personhood of the Son or of the Spirit when he says the Lord is the Spirit. [00:18:56] So what is he saying? [00:18:59] What is he saying? I think what he is saying is that there is this great unity in work and in effect in the Lord, in the Son and in the Spirit. He is not conflating these two persons of the Trinity, but he is expressing their glorious and unified work in the new covenant. Notice how he this is my proof for this, staying only in this passage. [00:19:29] Notice how he refers to each in verse 17 he talks about the Spirit of the Lord and then at the end of this chapter, he talks about the Lord who is the Spirit. Or another way to translate that which I would take here is the Lord of the Spirit. An equally valid way to translate that if you take those two things, you have in verse 17 the Spirit of the Lord, and then in verse 18, the Lord of the Spirit. [00:20:07] The spirit of the lord and the lord of the spirit. Perhaps he means the Spirit who is of the Lord, and the Lord who is of the Spirit, showing their distinction, right? Two separate persons and yet totally united together in the one Godhead. [00:20:30] What is that unity that he's talking about? What is that work that he has in mind? Well, that first one is freedom. [00:20:38] Notice in Galatians 424, Paul talks about Mount Sinai as bearing forth children for slavery. He compares it to Hagar, one of Abraham's wives and quotation marks. [00:20:52] Bearing forth children for slavery. That's what Mount Sinai does. That's what the old covenant does. In Galatians Five one, Paul says freedom or for freedom, christ has set us free. For freedom, Christ has set us free. Stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery. What is Paul saying there? He's contrasting the old and the new covenants. What is submitting again to the yoke of slavery? He explains in that passage, it's this accepting circumcision and the law of Moses as a general requirement for salvation. [00:21:30] If you go back to the old covenant and you say, I have to abide by this in order to be long to Jesus, he is saying that you are submitting again to the yoke of slavery. As I mentioned last week that Peter says that neither we nor our fathers were able to bear. [00:21:48] And so that's why Paul says, in contrast to that, for freedom, Christ has set us free. [00:21:54] In Galatians 310, Paul says all who rely on the works of the Law are under a curse. [00:22:04] You rely on the quirks of the law for glory. You rely on the works of the law for eternal life, for eternal pleasure, for identity, for safeties, for security. You aren't getting any of that. [00:22:22] All who rely on the works of the law are under a curse. And then he goes on to say, I think it's in verse 14 in Christ Jesus, the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles. Listen to this. So that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith, christ Jesus comes to the Gentiles so that they might receive the Spirit, which is why he is called the Spirit of the Lord. [00:22:53] Remember, as Jesus got closer and closer to his ascension, he talked more and more about the Holy Spirit. In fact, he said the Spirit couldn't even come until he had ascended. And when he did, the Spirit did come with flames of fire, resting on individual people like he rested on Mount Sinai. [00:23:18] We receive the Spirit because he is the Spirit of the Lord, and we have received the Lord. [00:23:25] As I said, the unity of the Son and the Spirit is expressed in this phrase the Lord is the Spirit, not to conflate the two persons of the Trinity, but to express the unity of their work. [00:23:38] Because the Spirit of the Lord is of the Lord, we have freedom. Because the Spirit is of the Lord, we have justification and righteousness. We have the hope of resurrection. We are no longer under the bondage and slavery and slavery, but we can expect transformation and glory and righteousness and sanctification and holiness. [00:24:06] We have freedom. [00:24:08] Freedom not to turn back to sin and unrighteousness, but freedom to live as those who were made in the image of God. Free to be righteous, free to produce righteousness, free to live lives that are transforming and one day will be completely transformed. [00:24:28] The experience of the glory of God was most certainly possible in the Old Testament. [00:24:37] Moses himself is experiencing it. Moses himself is experiencing the glory of God. In a way, the high priest experienced it once a year as he entered into the holy of holies. And there, in the presence of the glory cloud of God, the presence of God, the Holy Spirit in the temple of God, the high priest would atone make atonement for his sins and the sins of the people once a year. [00:25:07] There are other examples we could point to of the glory of God being manifested during the time of the old covenant. Amazing, wonderful ways. [00:25:16] But we cannot deny that when Jesus came, something very dramatic happened. [00:25:23] The outpouring of the Spirit that was predicted in Joel and Ezekiel and other places came in a way the world had never seen. And what happened when Jesus died on the cross to the veil that separated the holy of holies from the rest of the temple? [00:25:41] It tore in half. This big, thick curtain ripped in half. [00:25:48] And the access now was changed in such a way that Paul says that the Holy Spirit who once dwelt on the tabernacle, dwells in each one of us. And he calls us us people, jars of clay. The temple of God, the glory of God in the coming of the Spirit sent by the Son is amazing. [00:26:16] Think about Psalm 104 that we sang earlier. This survey of God's created work in the seas and the skies in the land, and his various activities feeding for animals. [00:26:31] When the Lord gives a similar kind of account of his work in the world to Job, what does Job do? At the end of the day, he puts his hand over his mouth and he says, I'm done. [00:26:46] I can't say anymore. When thinking about the work of God in just general revelation, in the act of in just the created world and everything that he's doing in the world, sometimes we get to a point where we say, I can't even look at this. It's so amazing. [00:27:07] And you've probably experienced that too. Maybe you've been out at night and seen all of the stars when they're so pretty, and you can see so many of them. Or when you've maybe you've been to the Grand Canyon or Zion National Park or some of these places and you just you almost turn away. Like, I can't even look at this. It's so amazing. [00:27:29] And that's just creation. [00:27:33] Now imagine seeing what we might say, the uncreated glorious light of God shining on Moses's face in the giving of the law. No wonder the people were like, put a veil over it, right? [00:27:49] And yet we can go even further now and say that in Christ we behold the glory of God with unveiled face in the face of Jesus Christ. [00:28:06] How can we say that? [00:28:08] Because the Bible says it. Because God says it. Because he tells us this right here, that that's what's happening. And the reason it's happening is because we are not beholding the glory of God, experiencing the glory of God, wondering and praising the glory of God in our own righteousness, but in his. [00:28:34] We do not fear the glory of God and the wrath of God because of our disobedience and our shamefulness and all of these things. But instead, we rejoice and bathe and behold and experience the glory of God because we are people who have freedom. [00:28:55] There's no condemnation for us on Mount Sinai. [00:29:03] The one who touched the Holy Mountain would die because of their sinfulness, because of their hardness of heart, because of their lack of belief, because they had not been changed by the Spirit of God to receive, to be able to see the glory of God. [00:29:25] But under the new covenant and in Jesus Christ, we have access. [00:29:32] We have access to the Holy of holies. We have access to Mount Zion. The Scriptures say that we are citizens of that kingdom, that we stand on this unshakable rock that is Mount Zion, that is Christ. And now the glory of God, as I said before, is present in each one of his people. We are the temple of the Holy Spirit. One corinthians 619 through 20. Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you whom you have from God? You are not your own. You were bought with a price, the price of Jesus. [00:30:09] And so Paul concludes, so glorify God in your body. [00:30:16] You see, the glory of God has this effect on us, effect even on our physical bodies themselves. [00:30:25] I'll mention two ways. [00:30:28] Number one, in our actions, paul is saying in this particular passage, don't unite yourself to prostitutes and commit other sexual immorality. Glorify God in your body. You're a temple for the Holy Spirit. [00:30:44] There's another way that we are glorified and God glorifies us in our body, and that's in the resurrection, our physical bodies benefiting from the glory of God in Christ. Listen to some of two passages. Romans 811 if the Spirit notice the Spirit and Lord language. Unified, unified, unified. [00:31:10] In Romans 811 if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you. [00:31:18] He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you. Lord Spirit, Lord Spirit. Right. [00:31:30] The Spirit who raised from the Jesus from the dead, the Spirit whom the Lord Himself gives, the Spirit who dwells in you, unites you to the Lord. You will be raised from the dead as surely as he was amazing. [00:31:45] Philippians 320 through 21 our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body by the power that enables him even to subject all things to Himself. [00:32:09] Imagine experiencing that kind of power in your bodies, the power that enables Jesus to subject all things to Himself. By that power, he will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body. [00:32:28] Like Paul says in our passage, we behold the glory of God and are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. As he says in another passage, what is sown buried in dishonor is raised in glory. [00:32:47] How else do we experience the glory of God? As we behold the glory of God in Christ, we experience in our call to salvation. [00:32:59] Romans 923 says in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy which he has prepared beforehand, glory is not merely future and not yet. It's already it's here and now. The glorification that is to come with the resurrection of the dead has already begun. [00:33:22] You could think of Glorification in some ways as the bloom of sanctification, right? It starts here now and it grows. And you could think about sanctification right now as the bud of glorification. It's the same thing. It's just happening from one degree of glory to another. There is transformation going on. And this is the final thing I'll mention about the glory of God as we behold it. This glory is not just something that we behold and wow at and praise God for and adore Him. It's something that's affecting us. It's something we're experiencing and we're being changed by one. Thessalonians 212 says we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of the God of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory. [00:34:23] Ephesians 316 says that according to the riches of his glory, he may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being. [00:34:34] That was a headfall. Let me read it again. Ephesians 316 according to the riches of his glory, he may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being. [00:34:51] So in the resurrection of the dead, we can think of about our outer selves wasting away, being sown and dishoner, being raised in glory. But our inner being is already being changed, it's already resurrected and being resurrected. [00:35:07] And how do we experience that? Through the strength of the power of His Spirit, according to the riches of his glory. Colossians 111, being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy. And that brings us back to the beginning. One of the reasons that Paul is talking about this is because we, like him, experience suffering and difficulties in our life, especially those that are in connection with our being called in Christ and for the world. There is sometimes this not sometimes, there is always this disconnect that says you're talking glory. You're saying glory, glory, glory, glory. You're talking the riches of his power and the glory of his might. And yet look at all the problems you have. Look at all the things that you're experiencing. Look at your own Savior who was crucified and hung on a cross. [00:36:05] I'm not seeing the connection, I'm not seeing the glory. [00:36:11] But that's of course, because they're looking at the things of this world as the most glorious, and that's because they're exchanging the glory of the immortal God for creatures and images. And that's because they themselves have fallen short of the glory of God in their sin and don't see and understand. [00:36:35] But we learn to see things differently. [00:36:39] We learn to see that the glory of God that has already been revealed and we are currently beholding in the face of Jesus Christ is transforming us and changing us, and one day will bloom into the glorification that we will experience at the resurrection. [00:36:58] Romans 817 through 18 says that if we are children, then we are heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him. [00:37:12] If we think that the glorious life that we have in Jesus Christ is apart from suffering at this present time, we are badly mistaken, provided we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him. Then Paul continues for I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed in one. Peter 413, Peter says rejoice insofar as you share in Christ's sufferings, why would we rejoice in Christ? Why would rejoice in sufferings? [00:37:54] Why would we rejoice in sufferings? Here's why that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. [00:38:05] If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. [00:38:18] This is an article of faith. [00:38:21] This is something you are going to have to believe and trust. [00:38:26] And that's really, you only have two options here. [00:38:30] You can trust and believe that when you are persecuted for Christ's sake, that you are actually blessed in that persecution because the Spirit of God is resting upon you. [00:38:45] Or you can believe that you're just going through a hard time and. That that's all there is to life. [00:38:53] I encourage you to believe the former. [00:38:56] I encourage you to believe that when you put your faith in Jesus Christ, you have the Spirit of God, that you are beholding the glory of God, and that your suffering will one day lead to glory in life, because the spirit of the glory of God rests upon you here and now. [00:39:17] And what would be our reason for believing something like that? [00:39:22] Jesus is one answer. [00:39:25] The Lord who is of the Spirit, the Lord who came into this world was anointed by the Spirit of God and cast out demons and healed the blind and caused the lame to walk. Jesus, who went to the cross, died taking on the wrath of God for our sins, and then rose again from the dead. [00:39:45] Jesus, who ascended into heaven and then poured out His Holy Spirit in such a way that the people of God were now speaking the Gospel in languages they didn't even know, that spread the Gospel all throughout the world that here today, thousands of years later, we worship God from our spirits in truth and loving Him. [00:40:11] That's why we believe, because God has done this amazing, glorious work in the world. Because so obviously the Spirit of God rests on Christ and on all who believe in Him. [00:40:27] That's why we are so encouraged and are given endurance and patience with joy through the sufferings of this life. And it's why Paul is a minister of God and why all of us who hold the collective ministry of Christ as his people should be so so bold in the world, so bold in telling people the good news. About Jesus because of the glory that has come in him, the glory that surpasses suffering, the glory that even works through suffering and tests the genuineness of our faith so that God would be glorified even in that. [00:41:10] In one Peter five, one Paul says or Peter says that he is a partaker in the glory that is to be revealed. And so are you. [00:41:19] If you call the Lord your Savior, if you put your hope and faith in Him, then inglorious, shameful, awful things like curse and death and Satanic work and all these sort of things, they have no power over you and your glory is assured. As certain as the Lord of glory is Himself risen from the dead, the Spirit of God rests upon you. [00:41:49] So be bold. [00:41:51] Live in freedom, be encouraged, keep on, have endurance and patience with joy. [00:42:00] As we look to Christ, we can look at our sufferings and our trials and we can rejoice, because they don't even compare with the glory that we have begun to see. And that will be fully revealed when he returns at that glorification of ourselves. [00:42:21] The Scriptures even point to the fact that Christ Himself will in some way perhaps be even more glorified than he already is sitting on the right hand of the throne of God. How so? [00:42:36] Because Paul says in his letter, I think it's the second letter of thessalonians that the glory of his work will be manifested in us. [00:42:49] That's what we are looking forward to, and we are beginning to experience even now. Let's pray. [00:42:59] Lord, as we consider your glorious and heavenly work that glorious work of salvation, as we consider the fact that we have the light of the gospel of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, we now know ourselves to be people who are free, no longer people who are enslaved, no longer people who are toiling and striving for our own divinity, our own praise, our own adoration, seeking to be gods unto ourselves. But instead, Lord, we can have freedom in you. [00:43:41] In Your light we see light. [00:43:45] And the light that you have allowed us to see, the unveiled light that you have allowed us to see, is that light of the Lord Jesus Christ. [00:43:55] We thank you that we can look upon Your glory in Him having the curse of the law removed from us, having our hearts set free from bondage to Satan and fear of death, having become people children of the light and inheritors of the kingdom of Heaven. [00:44:17] Lord, we pray and thank you for the work that you have done and Your spirit who now dwells in us. [00:44:27] We ask that as we consider these awesome and glorious truths, that you would help them help us to connect them to our everyday lives, to the challenges and particular sufferings that we're experiencing, the doubts that we have, the fears that we have. Help us to learn to see the glory of God in the face and work of Jesus Christ in the spirit. [00:44:56] Who is the spirit of the Lord? The spirit of glory. [00:45:01] Help us to learn to see everything from this light, so that whatever we eat or whatever we drink or whatever we do, that it would all be done to the glory of God. [00:45:16] So that whether we are getting up or laying down, whether we are living or whether we are dying, whatever season of life we are, in, whatever hopes and desires we have, that all would be viewed in this light. [00:45:34] And finally, Lord, we ask that as we bask in that light, as we abide in that light, as we learn to see, that you would give us patience and endurance and hope and joy and boldness for the sake of Jesus Christ and the glory of his name, and it's in his name we pray. Amen.