Episode Transcript
WEBVTT
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Please remain standing, if you're able, and let's give our attention to God's
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word in Romans nine, versus one
through five, page nine hundred forty five
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in the black bibles, Romans nine, verses one through five. I am
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speaking the truth in Christ. I
am not lying. My conscience bears me
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witness in the Holy Spirit that I
have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my
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heart, for I could wish that
I myself were accursed and cut off from
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Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen. According to the flesh,
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they are Israelites, and to them
belong the adoption, the glory,
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the covenants, the giving of the
law, the worship and the promises.
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To Them Belong the Patriarchs, and
from their race, according to the Flesh,
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is the Christ, who is God
over all, blessed forever. Amen,
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you may be seated. To remind
you again of what we are doing
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here in these first verses of Romans
nine is to take some time going through
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verse four and looking at these individual
gifts that God gave to the Israelites.
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Paul lists them here for us.
He says, to them belong the adoption,
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the glory, the covenants, the
giving of the law, the worship
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and the promises, and then in
Verse Five of the Patriarchs. Last week
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we covered the first of these,
of the adoption, and today we consider
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the glory. Remember what Paul is
doing here, remember what he's saying from
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his heart, deep within his heart. He's sang to the Jews and to
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the gentiles. I love my people, these are my brothers, the Jews,
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the Israelites, there my brothers,
and I love them and God loves
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them. As he says in verse
six, the next verse that I didn't
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read yet, the word of God
has not failed, in God bringing the
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Christ in giving him to the world, in opening up salvation for people like
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me and most, if not all, of you, I don't know.
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But to the gentile world, God
has done something amazing and, as he'll
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go on to say in Romans Ten
and eleven, this is done because,
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partly the Jews rejected God, all
part of his sovereign plan. More on
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that later in the coming months,
but for now Paul wants to impress upon
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our hearts that God has given very
particular and special gifts to this people,
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to the Jewish people. But these
gifts did not just stay with them,
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they became to us as well,
and the one we're discussing today, the
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one that God wants us to understand
today, is the second here the glory.
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Israel was given something special, not
just the adoption, as we covered
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last week, but the glory.
But what is that? What is the
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glory that God gave to Israel and
what does it mean for us today?
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We don't use the word glory very
much. Sometimes we might use it in
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kind of a pretend way when we're
acting. I can't think of the right
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word, but when we when we
say, Oh, it was glorious,
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we sort of like that. We
might say it was divine, it was
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wonderful, it's it's one of the
adjectives we use to describe something that is
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really amazing, maybe really beautiful or
even spectacular. But aside from that,
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I can't think of many times when
I hear people using the word glory today,
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except maybe in scriptural senses or when
speaking about the Bible. But here
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it's thought of as a very special
gift that God gives to his people.
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Well, what is it? Well
to answer that, I'm going to do
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this in three parts. We'll talk
about the glory that God gave, then,
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secondly, the glory that Israel lost
and then finally, the glory that
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God regives. So first the glory
that God gave, and this answers the
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question most directly. What is the
glory? What did God give Israel?
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Well, the first answer to this
question is God. The glory that God
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gave Israel was himself. There is
nothing more glorious than God himself. There
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is no glory that is found apart
from God. Listen to the ways he
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has described the names that God has
given in scripture. For example, in
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Psalm Twenty four, eight, nine
and ten, he is called the King
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of glory. In Psalm Twenty Ninety
three, the God of glory. In
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acts seven to p Stephen says as
in his speech right before he's martyred,
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he says that the God of glory
appeared to Abraham. And then in also,
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we might add, for Samuel Twenty
nine, where he is called the
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glory of Israel. That's particularly telling, isn't it? Where is Israel's glory?
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What is the glory that they received? Well, first, Samuel Twenty
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nine says that the glory of Israel
is God himself. That's a title that
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God is given. And they also
remember his special name, His divine and
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Covenantal name, Yahway or Jehovah,
that he gives to his people, seen
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in your English bibles, in those
small capital letters, as Lord, he
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says Yah Way, this is my
name. And in Deuter yes, Deuteronomy
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Twenty eight, we read that his
name is Glorious and awesome. This name
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that God gives to us is Glorious
and awesome. And throughout the pages of
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scripture we read of him protecting his
name, holding up his reputation, doing
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things because of the glory of his
name. Not Just God, but Yah
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Way, God as he comes to
his people, God as he approaches his
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people, as he protects them.
So what is the glory of Israel?
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Will is, first and foremost God. Glory might be thought of his sort
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of the Sum Excellency of all of
his attributes together. If you think about
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a king, how is a king, an earthly king, glorious? You
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might point to a golden chariot or
the number of soldiers on the streets,
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or the amount of lands that he
has or how many people are subject to
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him. In all of these things
he is seen as glorious, perhaps even
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in his character you might say he
is. He is noble, excellent,
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magnificent. This is how we describe
a king. He is wady in this
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way, glorious, and it's similar
with God, except to an infinite degree.
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Remember that the attributes are of God
are infinite. Glory is predicated of
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God not because it's a part of
who he is, as though it's sort
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of a piece of who he is. It is because the essence of God
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is glorious. God is glory.
And lest you think that this glory is
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quantifiable, like we might with a
human king, remember that in all his
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perfections, God is infinite. His
glory cannot be measured in the weight of
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gold, in the number of marchers
in a parade. In fact, if
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you consider the places where God's glory
is manifested, take one and even there
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you will find an inability to really
quantify it. Consider the stars in the
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sky, for example, which are
described as the glory of God. The
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skies above proclaim the glory of God's
Handiwork these psalms say. Can you quantify
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the glory of the night sky?
Indeed, if the whole sky is dark
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except for one star, you would
call it glorious. Wouldn't you to see
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this point of light coming from so
far away and yet visible to your eye?
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Glorious? But then to see the
night sky a raid in an uncountable
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number of stars, glorious. And
this is just one aspect, one place
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where God has revealed this glory to
us, and this is true anywhere God
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reveals his glory. Now, all
this is important to say because it leads
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us to worship. When we consider
the glory that God gave Israel in His
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giving of himself and then in revealing
that glory in various places, we see
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that we are called to worship him. We don't just think about God right,
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we don't just contemplate God, we
don't just work out God as we
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might work out a proof. We
worship God because of his glory, because
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he is glory. If something is
glorious and magnificent, it is because it
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shows this attribute of God to us. It reminds us of these things.
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Now, I realize that you might
reply to this. If God is all
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glorious and infinitely so, how is
this particularly special to Israel? Indeed,
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anybody can look up at the stars
and see the glory of God, can
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they not? Paul himself says in
the beginnings, in the beginning chapters of
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Romans, that the glory of God
is revealed to all people. And in
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fact he says that though they know
God, in Verse Twenty One of Chapter
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One, men and women did not
honor him as God or give thanks to
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him, but they became feutile in
their thinking and their foolish hearts were darkened,
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claiming to what be wise. They
became fools claiming and exchange. This
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is what they did, Paul says. They exchange the glory of the Immortal
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God for images resembling mortal man and
birds and animals and creeping things. This
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is what humans do, Paul says. They Know Glory. We all know
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glory, and you see it for
the way. They are constantly exchanging the
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glory of God for Stupid Idols,
idols that can't do anything good or bad.
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They can't stand up by themselves except
for you holding them there, idols
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that get knocked off the counter and
all the rest. They know the glory
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of God. This is manifest everywhere. Well, if that's true, then
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how are we to understand Paul when
he says the glory was given to Israel,
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that there was something special there.
The well, the scriptures tell us
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that God has revealed himself not only
in his creation to all people, but
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in these particular works of Judgment and
salvation for his people. He is not
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just king over the world, but
he is King of Israel and for Israel,
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and this is what is meant by
the glory. When Paul says that
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God gave them the glory, he
means that he gave them himself, not
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only in his creative power, but
in his judging and saving power. Consider,
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for example, exodus fourteen. For
here I'm God is speaking of Pharaoh,
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as he is going to bring them
out of Egypt, and he says
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this. I Will Harden Pharaoh's heart
and he will pursue them and I will
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get glory over Pharaoh and all his
hosts, and the Egyptians shall know that
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I am the Lord, that I
am Yahway, that I am Jehovah.
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He says, I am going to
defeat Pharaoh. Pharaoh, of course,
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thinks the opposite. Right. Pharaoh
says, what can your God do?
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What can this Yah way do?
My magicians can do the same things,
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he says, and they try until
they stop working and accredit their power to
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God. Pharaoh stands there in his
palaces with his gold as a great king,
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is an emperor of sorts over peoples
and lands. Nothing will control him,
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nothing will conquer him. But God
says, I will get the glory
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over Egypt. But he does it
because he wants them to know that he
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is God, he is Israels God, he belongs to them. And indeed
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God does that. He does get
the victory over Pharaoh. And then we
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read an exodus, that is,
he brings them out of the promised land.
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He does so in this great pillar
of cloud and fire, in this
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great cloud, and next this one
thousand three hundred and twenty one. We
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read that when Jehovah went before them, by day in a pillar of cloud
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to lead them along the way and
by night in a pillar of fire to
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give them light that they might travel
by day and by night. This pillar
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of cloud is also described as the
glory of the Lord. Here in this
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dark, stormy cloud that was bright
enough to light their way through a desert
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at nighttime, a very impressive thing, a cloud that was able to move
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and block off the Egyptians from chasing
them, a cloud that was moving Israel
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through the wilderness. We read that
this was his glory. This is God
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manifesting himself right, this is God
doing these works of power and judgment and
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salvation. You remember what happens with
this cloud when they get to Mount Sinai?
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It descends down upon the mountain and
there is lightning and thunder and they're
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the whole Clo the whole mountain is
enveloped in this smoky cloud. It's so
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scary, the glory of God is
so frightening that they are afraid. The
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people of God are afraid, and
rightly so. God says if you touch
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the mountain you will die. They
tell Moses, you go. We were
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not going. You go for us. We need a mediator, we need
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someone to approach God on our behalf, because we're not going. We can't
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go, we would die. You
know happen when Moses came down the mountain?
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He's face shone brightly with the glory
of God. He was shining so
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much after spending time in this close
proximity to the glory of God that they
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told him to put something over his
face. He had to cover it up.
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Later God will ask to see the
glory Moses blast to see the glory
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of the Lord, and God puts
him in a cleft of the Rock and
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moves behind him and lets him see
the backside of his glory. God's glory
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is so infinite, so powerful,
so majestic, then it has to be
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hidden from us. We have to
be protected from it. It's shrouded in
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veils and rocks and and clouds.
You remember what happened when prophets like Isaiah
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and Ezeki'll go before the glory of
the Lord in the heavenly places. They
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fall on their face. They're terrified. They seek and need his forgiveness.
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Well, the glory of the Lord
God manifesting himself in these ways. This
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is the glory that God gives to
Israel. He's not doing this for the
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Philistines. It's not doing this for
the AMMONITES, the MOABITES, the Edomites.
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He's doing this for Israel. He's
giving Israel his law, he's giving
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Israel freedom over their enemies. He's
leading Israel through the desert to the promised
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land where temple will be built and, as Solomon Praise, the glory of
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the Lord in Great Cloud descends down
upon the temple. This is the glory
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that God gave to his people.
This didn't happen anywhere else in the world.
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This special rule and government of God's
people in this way happen only for
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them. And, giving them his
glory, he gave them his name,
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his protection, his law, their
sonship. That brings us to number two.
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The amazing gift was lost. In
isekiel ten we read of this rather
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horrifying scene where Ezekiel is given this
vision of seeing the reverse of what happens
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to the temple, with Solomon,
instead of the Lord does the glory of
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the Lord descending down upon the temple
in this great sign of protection and comfort
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and presence and communion. You know
what Ezekiel sees? It moves up and
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the glory of God leaves. And
this happens right before the exile, right
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before all of these nations that God
has been walling off people, or walling
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off his people from. They invade
and they destroy, and you know what?
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They destroy the glory of the Temple. They take its treasures, they
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take its gold, they strip its
doors, they carry it all off,
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and not just the gold and not
just the silver, not just the holy
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instruments, but the people. They
take the people with them. Like Daniel,
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you remember, and others. They
take them into exile, and you
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know what happens to the glorious land
of Canaan that God led them into?
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It becomes desolate again, a place
of Marauders and vines that are being neglected.
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This is not the glorious Kingdom of
God anymore. And all of this
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was no accident to happen, because
the glorious King, the glory of Israel,
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required a glorious people, proper worship, proper sacrifice, proper love and
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devotion. It's the Pagans who were
exchanging the glory of the immortal God for
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images of animals and creeping things,
right, but it was Israel too.
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That's what the prophets say throughout all
the Old Testament. They're saying, what
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are you doing? You have been
given the glory of God and You are
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worshiping not in the temple but in
the high places. You're not worshiping the
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immortal, glorious God, but creeping
things and false gods and dragons and sea
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creatures and weather events. This is
what Israel did, and this is why
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Paul, inspired by the Glorious Holy
Spirit, condemns us all in Romans three
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hundred and twenty three, and says
of Jew and gentile. All have sinned
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and all have fallen shore of the
glory of God. The exile that Israel
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experience, the loss of the glory, was because of their sin and it
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is a picture of the glory that
we have all lost and do lose in
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Adam, when Adam was kicked out
of the Glorious Garden of the heavenly place,
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or the the this kingdom, this
temple of God, when he is
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barred off and refused communion and not
allowed to enter and promised death and corruption
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instead of glory. But this glory
that Israel lost. Number three is regiven.
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God didn't have to do that,
God didn't have to give himself in
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these ways to anyone because of our
sin, because of our corruption, but
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God does. God gives his glory
and he gives it in an even greater
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way. Listen to John One,
John One hundred and fourteen. Maybe you've
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even memorized this verse. The word
became flash and dwelt among us and we
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have seen his glory, glory as
of the only sign from the father full
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of grace and truth. Hebrews says
that Jesus when he comes, he is
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that he is the radiance of the
glory of God. He is the radiance
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of the glory of God. Second
Corinthians, Second Corinthians chapter four, says
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this. It says the God of
the world has blinded the minds of unbelievers
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to keep them from seeing the light
of the Gospel, in the glory of
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Christ, this thing that is revealed
to us, this Jesus who has come
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to reveal the glory of God.
People can't see Paul says, they can't
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see it. The God of this
world, Satan, has blinded their eyes
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so that they cannot see the light
of the Gospel. They cannot see the
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glory of Christ, who is the
image of God, or is, Hebrew
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says, the radiance of the glory
of God. But he goes on to
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say that God, who previously said
let light shine out of darkness when he
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created the world, has shown in
our hearts to give the light of the
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knowledge of the glory of God in
the face of Jesus Christ. What does
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all this mean? This means that
when God left Israel, it wasn't the
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end of the story. That God
would descend again to the earth, but
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this time he wouldn't come in a
cloud, he would come and take on
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the form of a man, he
would take on the form of a servant.
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Philippians, too, tells us that
Jesus Christ did not consider them the
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glory of God, a thing to
be grasped, but humbled himself, taking
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on the form of a servant,
becoming like us, so that he could
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be obedient to God, so that
he could save a people for himself and
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so that God could raise him to
his right hand and us with him.
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God would not want his people constantly
sent off into exile. What's glorious about
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that? To call a people to
yourself, to say here's what I want
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you to do, they fail at
you fail at it and he kicks him
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out again, over and over and
over again. But that's not what he
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does, is it? God doesn't
just keep redoing that again and again.
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He did it one time and he
did it to teach us that our glory,
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the glory that we want, the
glory that we need, the glory
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that we were made for, is
not ours to achieve on our own.
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It's impossible, we cannot do it, but he, the one who can
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save in salvation and judge men,
can and that's what he did. The
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son of God would not be destroyed
when the sins of the world were placed
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on him, when he was separated
from the glorious God, but by his
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infinite power, by his infinite worth, the King of the Jews took on
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the sins of the world and in
doing so, Jesus broke the chains of
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death, he bound the evil enemy
and he set us all free from our
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sins. The glory that was given
to Israel was all pointing us to this.
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It was a good thing they received
it, so that we would all
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know what God is doing for us
in Jesus, so that we wouldn't go
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and worship idols anymore. We wouldn't
go and exchange the glory of God for
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creeping things on the ground, but
we would see the glory of God.
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This time, though, not in
flashes of lightning and thunder bearing down on
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us, saying this you must do
in order to live. We don't stand
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at Mount Sinai in Jesus Christ.
Instead, the glory of God is revealed
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in the Cross, where he says
this I have done for you so that
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you may live for he eternally.
I know I'm reading a lot of verses
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to you today, but I want
you to see how important this is in
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scripture. I want you to be
able to read Romans nine and read the
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glory and not draw a blank.
I want you not to think abstractly about
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some kind of majestic power, but
to think about these specific things that God
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has done, because God has revealed
his glorious self to us in this way.
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And so I'll give you yet one
more John Seventeen versus, verse five,
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we read I glorified you on Earth, having accomplished the work that you
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gave me to do. This is
Jesus speaking to the father, the son
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speaking to the father. He says, I have glorified you, father,
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on Earth, having accomplished the work
that you gave me to do. And
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now, father, glorify me in
your own presence, with the glory that
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I had before you the world existed. Let me read this one more time
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and I want you to really think
about what's going on here. intratrinitarian dialog,
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God the Son Speaking to God,
the father, about the one glory
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that they share. I have glorified
you on Earth, having accomplished the work
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that you gave me to do,
and now, father, glorify me.
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The son asked the father to glorify
him in your own presence, with the
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glory that I had with you before
the world existed. And now listen to
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verse twenty two, a few more
down. The glory that you have given
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me I have given to them that
they may be one, even as we
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are one. This means that if
you find yourself waiste, high in paperwork
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and house work and filing reports and
drudgeries at work, and you say this
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ain't all that glorious, and you
see your life moving away, or maybe
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you even find yourself suffering and you
say here I am under the weight of
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persecution, I am struggling. Here, we are given something to remember,
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something which frames and changes everything that
we do, every aspect of our lives.
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God is not only given Israel the
glory he did in very special way
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and very particular ways for a time, but now we read Paul says that
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glory has come to us all in
Jesus Christ, those who have faith in
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him. It means that, for
example, in Second Corinthians, for seventeen
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light momentary afflictions that we endure now, which include death, suffering and heartache,
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those light momentary afflictions are not,
Paul says, are not worth comparing.
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He says these light, momentary afflictions
are preparing us for an external weight
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of glory beyond comparison. Don't even
try. It's way beyond what you can
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even imagine. And he's not even
talking about the glory that is internal to
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God himself, that you will never
know, that you will never see,
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that you will never come into contact
with, as it is in itself,
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the glory of God is as internal
to himself is in Ternal to himself.
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The External Weight of glory that is
beyond comparison that you are being prepared for,
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that's the glory that you will come
in contact with. It is the
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glory that God is revealing even now, has revealed in Jesus Christ and will
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reveal on the last day when the
sun comes again, to judge everyone and
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to raise up his sons and daughters
into the heavenly places, into a new
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heavens and a new earth that is
more magnificent than you could ever imagine.
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Read the descriptions of it in revelation. Jewels and shining things and choirs and
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the glory of God is something that
is given to us. The Glory of
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God is not just revealed to us, but it's given to us and it's
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something that we can participate in.
Now, when I say we, and
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I'll conclude with this point, this
very important point, when I say we,
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I do not mean everyone, because
Paul says in Second Thessalonians one nine,
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there are those who will suffer eternal
punishment or destruction away from the presence
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of the Lord and the glory of
his might. They will be the ones
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who are separated from the glory of
God in all of its blessing and all
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of its protection, and instead they
will feel the weight of glory as it
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crushes them eternally forever. These people
will not experience the saving glory of God.
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People who remain in their sins,
people who exchange the glory of God
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for idols, people who make a
practice of sinning and say I want to
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live the way I want to lay
I live, who don't care about the
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glory of God, but in care
about their own glory and build towers of
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Babel up to the heaven saying we
will make a name for ourselves. These
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people will suffer eternal destruction away from
the presence of the Lord and the glory
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of his might. When I say
we, I mean those of us who
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have received Jesus Christ. This is
how we enjoy communion with God, this
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is how we come to know his
glory, not by confidently walking up Mount
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Sinai saying I can do this,
I can do the law, but by
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seeing Jesus on the Cross and saying
he has done it for me, and
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he who is ascended into the heavenly
places because he did it, because he
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accomplished it, he who has received
the glory from the father because he did
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the law, because he did the
things that we were failed to do.
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Jesus, the one who prays for
us, to the father and says,
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May this glory that you have been
given to me be given to them.
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That Jesus. That is how we
receive the glory of God. If you
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do not know the all glorious God, if you are subject to sin and
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death, if you find yourselves overwhelmed
by the things of this world, even
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though they may seem to be of
benefit to you, look up to Christ,
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see him seated in the heavenly places
and see what is being offered to
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you while there is still time before
he comes again in his glory, not
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to save the world, but to
judge the world. Find your salvation in
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him, where he gives you his
glory, His grace, forgiveness from sins.
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Maybe we all do. So let
us all learn to take hold of
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this throne of glory by faith and
live in light of that glory, shining
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in the world like thousands and millions
of little mirrors everywhere, the one son
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shining down on us and us all
reflecting back the glory of God to him,
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bridinging up, shining in the world
in a way that brings him pleasure
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and praise. Let us pray our
glory is God. We praise you that,
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in your greatness, you have revealed
yourself to us. You have allowed
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us even to see something of who
you are, and indeed we don't merely
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see it, but we feel it
in our bones, for we are creatures
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who are made in your image.
We are have been designed as mears to
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reflect back your glory, and we
praise you for this. We thank you
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for this. We confess our sins
to you, that we have soulied ourselves,
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we have dirtied ourselves, we have
cracked the thing that was meant to
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reflect and we've turned it in ourselves, on ourselves. There is no beauty
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in us, in sin, in
corruption, in idolatry and evil and hatred,
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but in you, the glories of
your holiness and love are so perfectly
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manifest. Oh Lord, we beg
that you would help us to see them,
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not only in the power of them
and the great a judgment and convicting
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power of them, but help us
to see them unblind our eyes, so
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that we may see the lie them
in the light of the Gospel, in
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the glory of Christ. We asked, Lord, that you would help us
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to see by faith, that we
might live by faith, that we might
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live as the glorious ones, as
people who have been made into a Holy
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Temple in which your glorious spirit has
descended, sent from the Sun, that
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we might that you might dwell in
us and live in us and with us
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forever. We ask, Lord,
that you would bless us, as you
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have and as you promise to do, all according to the goodness of your
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grace and Jesus Christ. And so
we pray this in his name, knowing
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that he is interceding for us even
now, praying that this glory might be
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ours at your right hand, answer
his prayers. Oh Lord, in Jesus
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name, we pray am in
