SERMON OUTLINE

The Glory of God           Romans 11.36

What is the Glory of God?

Introduction

God’s highest priority in the entire universe and in all of time is His own Glory. Because the Glory of God is God’s highest priority the Glory of God must be the highest priority of mankind and of all of creation. God is both worthy of His Glory and jealous of His Glory. Isaiah 42.8; Romans 11.33-36; 1 Timothy 1.17

The Attributes of God

-Those qualities which are unique to God and make Him Glorious and worthy of Glory.

-Eternal. No beginning or end and always existed.

-All-knowing. Knows all, never learns, all wise

-All-present. Everywhere at once. Psalm 139.7-10

-All-powerful. Sovereign and almighty

Moral Character of God

-God is Love. Jesus on the cross is supreme example.

-God is Holy. Just. Incorruptible. Romans 1.23

-His Name = His Character. Exodus 33.18-34.7

Manifestation of God

-The visible manifestation of God’s presence through His goodness and power and wrath is also His Glory.

-Mt Sinai; Tabernacle; Transformed Christians. Exodus 20.18; 40.34-35; Ephesians 1.12

Conclusion        

God is the Glory of God – His eternal Being, His Holy and Loving Character, the Manifestation of His Presence, Being and Character to mankind. To God be the Glory, because He is Glorious and deserves all glory.

SERMON NOTES

The Glory of God

What is the Glory of God?

-Last Communion Sunday I shared with you that God’s highest priority in the entire universe and in all of time is His own Glory. Because the Glory of God is God’s highest priority, the Glory of God must be the highest priority of mankind and of all of creation. God is both worthy of His Glory and jealous of His Glory. In Isaiah 42.8 God says, “I am the Lord; that is my name! I will not give my glory to another or my praise to idols.” In Romans 11.33-36 we read, “Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor? Who has ever given to God, that God should repay him? For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever! Amen.” God is to be given Glory both now and for ever and ever. “Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory for ever and ever.” (1 Timothy 1.17)

-This morning I want to try and answer the question, “What is the Glory of God?” A general answer to the question what is the Glory of God is that the Glory of God is primarily who God is, and then secondarily how God reveals Himself to mankind. God is a God of Glory, in other words God is full of splendor, brightness, magnificence, excellence, preeminence, majesty, light, power, intelligence. God is exalted above all others, has no comparison and no equal. Because God is Glorious we give Him glory in worship, praise, honor, adoration, service, sacrifice, obedience, and even physical life. The Glory of God is who God is and we give Him glory because of who He is.

-I want to try to describe the Glory of God under three headings – The Attributes of God; The Character of God; and The Manifestation of God.

1) The Attributes of God are those qualities which are unique to God and make Him Glorious and worthy of Glory. God is eternal. God has no beginning and no end. God has always existed and will always exist. No one and nothing is eternal, only God. This alone makes God worthy of Glory. God is also all-knowing. God has all knowledge and does not learn any new things. God never forgets what He knows. God knows all the thoughts of people, every hair on every head, when sparrows die and fall to earth, everywhere in the world. Nothing takes God by surprise. No situation is unexpected. God knows all possibilities and all future events. God is also all wise. Man prides himself in his discovery of knowledge and yet we are babes in our knowledge. The God who knows all things is worthy of Glory. God is all-present. God is everywhere all at once. No where can we hide from God’s presence. David asks God, “Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.” (Psalm 139.7-10) Here David is comforted with the knowledge that God is ever present. He goes on to describe how God even knew him in his mother’s womb and how God knew even then how his days would be worked out before one of them even came to pass. When we sin in secret, God knows all those things as well. You live your life before God who is always present with you. God is all-powerful. The infinite power of God is evident from the very first pages of the Bible in the creation of the heavens and the earth and in the universal flood. We see the power of God in His deliverance of Israel from the slavery of Egypt. (Exodus 14.17-18) We see the greatest manifestation of the power of God in the resurrection of Christ from the dead. Connected to the all-powerful quality of God is His Sovereignty over all of creation.

-The Glory of God is Who He is in His eternal, all-knowing, all-wise, ever present, almighty Being. There is no other God but the God of the Bible and the God of the Bible is full of splendor, brightness, magnificence, excellence, preeminence, majesty, light, power, intelligence, and a thousand thins more. Our God is a God of great Glory.

2) God’s moral character also makes Him Glorious and worthy of Glory. God is Love. God is the absolute essence of sacrificial love at all times. God’s Love is the Glory of God. The fullest expression of the love of God is the sending of Jesus Christ to die as a sacrifice for our sin. God demonstrates His love to us in the offer of grace, mercy, and forgiveness. Our salvation in Christ is all of grace and not merited or earned by us. That is the Glory of God. God is also Holy. Over and over in the Bible we came face to face with the holy character of God. God is a God of justice and will punish all sin.  Apart from salvation in Jesus Christ the holiness of God would mean eternal separation from God for all of us. But because of the righteousness of Jesus Christ that we can have by faith in Jesus Christ, we are invited to stand with confidence before a holy God. God is called the “incorruptible God”, (Romans 1.23) the God of truth, the God of light.

-One day Moses said to God, “Show me your glory”. God replied to Moses, “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence.” Before we actually look at how this event took place and what God said, notice that God is going to proclaim His name to Moses. When God speaks about His name in the OT and in the NT, He is speaking about His character. God’s name represents Who God is just as God’s Glory represents Who He is.

-We read that “the Lord came down in the cloud and stood there with Moses and proclaimed his name, the Lord. And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, ‘The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generations.” (Exodus 33.18-34.7)

-Who God is in His Being and in His Character is the Glory of God.

3) Not only is God’s Being and God’s Character His Glory but the visible manifestation of God’s presence through His goodness and power and wrath is also His Glory. Throughout the Bible we see God stepping into time and history and revealing Himself in His goodness to His people, in His power for or against His people, and in His just wrath against evil and sin, disobedience and rebellion against Him. God’s Glory was dramatically revealed at Mount Sinai. “When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear.” (Exodus 20.18) After the Tabernacle was built and set up we are told, “Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Moses could not enter the Tent of Meeting because the cloud had settled upon it, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.” (Exodus 40.34-35) The same thing happened after Solomon built the Temple in Jerusalem. The Glory of God was manifested in the miracles and healings and the casting out of demons by Jesus, in the transfiguration, and in the resurrection of Jesus. Today the Glory of God is evident in the spiritual transformation of sinners into saints. Ephesians 1.12 says, “in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the praise of His Glory.”

-One of the things I long to see is more of the manifestation of the Glory of God in our services. I have prayed that through the Holy Spirit, God might manifest His Glory even today as we participate together in the Lord’s Supper.

–Our God is a God of Glory, who regularly makes His Glory known to men, and to Whom we should give glory.

-What is the Glory of God? The eternal Being of God, the Holy and Loving Character of God, the visible manifestation of His Being and Character to mankind – that is the Glory of God. Because of the Glory of God we glorify Him. To God be the Glory, because He is Glorious and deserves all glory. “For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever!”

Communion: Romans 9.22-26; Romans 1.21-25; Ephesians 1.6,12,14