Address—Don Rule
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
Good afternoon.
We're going to sing about the theme of what's going to be before us, so if you.
Pay attention to what you're singing. Maybe you can guess what we're going to.
Have before us this afternoon #105.
So we'll definitely need a starter.
Pretty sure you can come back on.
Your.
Raise the state.
Ment.
Turn with me to Job chapter one.
I'm sure that we all have some sense in US, whether we've ever seen the word in a dictionary or not.
Of the word glory.
Glory has to do with multiple aspects to it.
But it is generally.
Something that is excellent.
Something that is favored.
Something that expresses majesty or honor.
And God is pleased to use that word over 400 times.
In the book in your hands and gives it applies it.
To people like you and I. He applies it to governments.
He applies it to himself.
And he applies it to his son.
The Lord Jesus.
Very often glory is something that is distinct.
Lee given or identified with someone, and when it is, we often think about it in comparison to others who don't have it.
00:05:01
In order to.
Perhaps understand it a little.
And how God uses it for our blessing and benefit. We're going to start with ourselves.
As seen in A Man called Job.
It's.
A job represents your heart and mine.
It's important in the sense that we believe that it's the very first book of the Bible that is.
Was written because it talks about something and it takes up something that involves glory. And so we're going to look at it from the perspective that God gives to it. I trust as we find it illustrated the subject of glory in the life of the man Job.
And then we'll go on to look at it as it is presented to us.
In the more perfect, not more perfect, but be perfect life of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And various glories of the Lord Jesus.
That are presented to us.
And we will hopefully end.
With a few encouragements for us to seek.
To understand it, the hymn we sang. Human thoughts are here confounded, tis too fast to comprehend.
And that's certainly true of the subject of glory as it applies to God in the Lord Jesus. So Job chapter one, verse one, there was a man in the land of Oz whose name was Job. That man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God and essewed evil. And there was born unto him seven sons and three daughters.
His substance also was 7000 sheep.
And 3000 camels, and 500 yoke of oxen, and 500 chiases, and a great household, so that this man was the greatest of all the men.
Of the East.
We learn as we read through his life.
And the record, or at least actually I say his life. While it gives us an overview of it, the book itself takes only a few months in his life in detail.
But as we see Job, he was a man.
Of glory.
He was a distinct among the people.
It records here that he was the greatest.
And everyone else, when they looked at themselves and they looked at him.
They can say this man is greater than I am. This man has things that I don't have.
I dare say I can speak with confidence as to earthly glory. It was greater than any buddy in this room was ever been. I'm not speaking spiritually. I'm speaking as Scripture speaks about this man and what distinguished him among men.
It was the greatest of all the men of the East.
It was morally commendable.
Upright.
Perfect among men, his outward life was without complaint.
He had blessing from God, ten children that were his own. He was wealthy with all the things that he had.
But.
God cared about him.
And he wanted to give him more.
Than he had.
And in the book he has twice as much, except for children that he started the book with. But in order for God to bless him, he had to put his hand on his life.
To teach him some lessons, and we'll see how some of those lessons connect themselves with glory.
00:10:06
And so God begins to work.
You sit here this afternoon and you're an unfinished work of God. He's working on you.
And he wants you to enter in, and he wants me to enter in more fully, more completely.
Into His glory.
Than you now or I now experience this afternoon and so.
He starts to work on job.
Does he get more prosperous? Is that how the work is going to be accomplished?
No, we're not going to. We don't have the time and I don't think I need to for your most of your benefit at least.
In the reread the verses that follow in, the first step of God working in his life is to take everything away, or almost everything.
He loses all his wealth that day.
He loses all his children.
In one day.
And.
How does he handle it?
How would you handle it?
If when this day end, you've lost all your family and you lost everything that was your property in possession.
Would you say it was a hard day?
I think most of us would be more than ready to admit we'd had a day unlike any other day of our life. So how does he handle it? Verse 22 and all this job sin not.
Nor charge God foolishly.
He's a remarkable man.
When we see how he handles adversity and sorrow and pain and difficulty in his life at this point, this is day one.
So in chapter 2, which we're not going to read.
We find.
The problem hasn't been he's got a problem, but losing everything doesn't make it known. It's not seen and in fact it's recorded. He doesn't sin. So in chapter 2 we find that while his life it can't be taken, if it was, he wouldn't get the blessing, he wouldn't profit.
From what God wanted to do for him, but God allows him.
Through Satan.
To put his hand on his body.
And he?
Is really physically miserable.
Pretty hard day.
How does he handle it?
Well, I don't know. Well, I do know. Scripture tells me, tells you. I know his wife didn't take it real well. That helped me that he had.
His helper in life. How did she handle it? She says curse God and die.
That's not being a great help, is it?
It says of him he sinned not.
With his lips.
Inside, he did. Outside, it still looked good.
Nobody else could have looked at him or seen what he had to say.
And said he wasn't handling the trials of life adequately well.
And very often when there's a work that God has to do in our souls.
People don't always see it. Very often the deepest needs that we have are not seen.
They're inside us in a way that God sees, but man doesn't see, and yet God is the one who is able because he sees everything perfectly.
To work for blessing in us, even when we may outwardly.
Perhaps put on a mask that doesn't truly represent.
What's there in our soul? OK, well, we don't. We're not going to go over all the details here.
00:15:02
Since we don't have 10 days to do it, but let's turn over and keeping with the point of glory, let's turn turn over to chapter 19.
And.
We'll read the 1St 9 verses.
Whoops, I went too many steps and got into psalms and it didn't look right.
Job 19 and verse one.
Here's Job talking, and he's talking about what's happening to him. He's having a conversation with his friends and he's sharing with them some of his feelings and his thoughts. And if you watch carefully, you're going to find the word glory come into what he has to say.
Job answered and said, How long will you vex my soul and break me in pieces with words?
His wife wasn't a whole lot of comfort to him, and his friends weren't either because they didn't understand what God was doing.
And they made some wrong conclusions.
In their attempt to help him. And in fact they make some conclusions in their judgment that were actually sinful. So Job answered and said, How long will you vex my soul, my friends? I'll add that and break me in pieces with your words these 10 times have you reproached me? Are you not ashamed?
That ye make yourselves strange to me, and be it indeed that I have heard.
My error remaineth with myself.
You haven't explained anything I've done wrong to me.
If indeed you will magnify yourselves against me and plead against me my reproach.
No now.
That God hath overthrown me.
He's talking about how he feels God's treated him in his life. God hath overthrown me and hath compassed me about with his net. Behold, I cry out of wrong.
But I am not heard. I cry aloud, but there is no judgment.
He hath fenced me up my way that I cannot pass.
He hath set darkness in my paths. He hath stripped me of my glory and taken the crown from my head.
He's not feeling too happy.
He knew, he recognized he was a man of honor.
He was a man that properly could be said that he was a man of glory.
And now he's looking at himself.
And he's looking at God.
And he recognizes that God has a power to do things that he doesn't have. And he says to his friends, you haven't been a help.
And God. God has just stripped me of everything.
He stripped me of my glory.
He's taken away that place that I hired among men.
And.
It's gone.
I don't have my wealth.
And the glory of it. I don't have my family and the glory of my family.
It was quite a as described in chapter one, a commendable family.
A worthy family to be recognized, to give honor to the father. You know, sometimes children shame their parents, but his family apparently was a family that was shown to be.
To enhance, if you will.
The Excellency of the man. But he looks at it and he says God's just stripped me.
00:20:03
Of my glory.
Now he goes on. Let's go on to Chapter 29. Get a little more of how Job sees himself.
We all have some view of ourselves.
Can't escape it. You sit here this afternoon, you have some view of yourself.
So do I.
Which do.
We may make words.
We may say, oh, I'm nothing.
That may be true.
But God alone knows the full truth of it. Joe didn't know the full truth about himself.
He had his view of himself. This wasn't a very accurate one from God's perspective. That is his view and God's didn't line up very well. Sometimes we have a view of ourselves and the view we have of ourselves and of God don't align very well. And so here in chapter 29 we'll read the 1St 5 verses. Moreover, Job continued his parable and said.
Oh, that I were as in months past.
When chapter one starts as in the days when God preserved me.
When His candle shined upon my head, When by His light I walked through darkness as I was in the days of my youth, When the secret of God was upon my Tabernacle, When the Almighty was yet with me, When my children were about me.
Verse 20 My glory was fresh in me, and my bow was renewed in my hand.
Unto me men gave ear, and waited, and kept silence at my counsel.
Verse 30.
Here's the contrast. Here's how he feels it.
That's what it used to be.
Verse 30 and verse one. But now they that are younger than I have me in derision.
Whose fathers I would have disdained, or have set with the dogs of my flock, and so on.
It's pretty miserable, man.
He's looked at himself, he's looked at God, he's compared himself and he basically tells God, you haven't treated me right. You haven't been fair to me.
I've been righteous.
I have been not treated right.
Pretty He went through a pretty difficult test as to whether he thought God was treating him right. And so would you or I if we lost everything he lost, which we haven't.
What we need to learn the lesson that God's giving us from His life. So let's turn over to chapter 40.
Verse one. Moreover, the Lord answered Job and said.
The book starts out with his three friend, well, actually his wife.
Talking to him about the matter and then his three friends.
And.
Elijah is a wonderful example.
I'm talking to you this afternoon. I'd sure like to be like you. Like you and heart, I trust. Elihu starts talking to Joe about the matter.
And he's telling him some pretty searching right things. But you know the wonderful thing when Elihu talks, and you and I can covet to be like Elihu when he talks for a while. Pretty soon.
Job's talking to the Lord.
Lie here drops out of it isn't that nice that if there's really something that's from God.
It may seem at first to be coming from a person and might be the person speaking, but if the message is really getting to the heart and the soul, after a while we can forget the person. And it's God speaking to me. And that's wonderful here. And it is with Eli, who is now dropped out of the picture and now the Lord's talking to Job and he says.
In verses one and two more over, the Lord answered Job and said.
00:25:00
Shall he that contendeth, Job, that's you contendeth with the Almighty, instruct him? Job, you're not agreeing with me on this subject. Are you going to teach me God something about it?
He that reprove God, you've been reproving me and the way I've been interacting with you and with your life. Verse 6 then answered the Lord unto Job out of a whirlwind.
He said gird up the loins now like a man. I'm going to demand of you, Joe, answer me, declare to me. You know, sometimes when we get into a dialogue with God, even though it's not out loud, God is sometimes puts his hand on us and puts his hand on our life in which he's I'm going to use the word he demands of us.
That we respond to him.
He says to us, Listen, here's what you've said.
Now listen.
The Word of God sometimes has that strength.
It always has that power, but sometimes God uses it in a way that.
We are, I'm going to use the word, forced to recognize that God is speaking to us.
And we have to answer them and so here job.
And when I say we have to answer them, yes, there's unbelief of an unbeliever, but I'm not talking to you as an unbeliever. I'm talking to you as a child of God. And as a child of God, he has every right to speak to you as his child in a way that you must answer. If you're a parent, you've done that with your children. You've at times said something to your child and it doesn't want to respond to you, but you made it.
Face it and respond. And so Jehovah, the Lord is doing that with job here. And so he says, gird up your loins. Will you now dissent all, or put aside my judgment? Will you condemn me so that you, as you say you are, may be righteous?
Enforcing him.
To respond here in verse 10 he says, deck now thyself, hast thou an arm like God?
Can you Thunder with a voice like him?
OK job. Deck yourself now with majesty and Excellency. Array yourself with glory.
And beauty.
As I said, very often the subject there's contrasts.
When we talk about glory in scripture, we see contrast very often, and here was Job contrasted with fellow men.
Now God is going to use the same mechanism with Job, and he's going to say and he says to Job, now Job.
Put on your glory.
And as it were, God says I'm going to put mine on and we're going to contrast them.
We're going to look at your glory job, and we're going to look at mine, and we're going to see whether my glory is valid or whether yours is.
Whether the view you have of yourself is correct or not.
From my eyes and my perspective. And so he says to him, he challenges it and he says to him.
Again in verse 10, deck yourself now with Majesty and Excellency.
And array yourself with glory and beauty.
Cast abroad the rage of thy wrath, and behold, he's challenging Job. He says Job.
Cast your deck yourself, cast abroad the rage of your wrath, and behold everyone that's proud and abasive. OK, Joe, if you have glory.
I want you to take proud people and put them down.
A Basil.
I'll comment a little bit of a secret and sort of in it because Job was proud God was going to obey him, but before he gets to the recognition of that fact about himself, which he hasn't quite gotten to yet, but he's close, God says now, Job, you see proud people.
00:30:14
I want you to use your honor, your power.
To obey some.
Look on everyone that's proud and verse 12 bring him low.
Tread down the wicked in their place.
Oh, there's wicked people around. I want you to put them down, put them in their place.
Hide them in the dust together and bind their faces in secret.
And if you can, Joe verse 14, then I will confess unto thee that.
Thine own right hand can save thee. If you can do that job, you can save yourself.
You have that power.
Then he turns to what almost seemed like a strange thing at first, but he turns and he uses an example with Job. He says, behold, now Behemoth.
Which I made.
With thee he eateth the wrath like an ox, and he describes this creature. It has a lot of characteristics to an alligator, and he's comparing.
He's saying job. If you have the right to take the place that you take before me, then you should be able to do what I do. You should be able to bring the proud down.
You should be able and then he describes this animal the.
Behemoth, which a lot of description, we would call him an alligator I think and he says.
Can you?
Manage it. Can you change its behavior?
Umm, if you have the right to judge, then you have. If you have the glory that you see yourself to have, then you should be able to deal with such matters.
I'm going to stop for a couple of minutes and.
Apply this.
As an example.
To myself.
My own experiences in life.
When I was the age of some of you young people.
Umm, I had finished. I was just finishing up my schooling.
And I was.
Job hunting. And so in order to job hunt, it's pretty common. I be, at least in my day it was. I'm not always sure what's common anymore in other people's day, but in my day it was common that if you were out looking for a job, you wrote a resume and your resume described yourself in a way that you were saying how you were qualified.
For somebodies to hire you to work for them, who needed the type of qualifications that you had, and then you presented yourself to companies that you thought needed what you had to offer.
So out went the resumes.
You know, I didn't realize it until the some of the responses came back.
Thank you, but no thank you.
That wasn't easy to take.
I didn't appreciate at that point in my life someone saying that I had something to offer and they weren't interested. They didn't think I had to offer something that was of benefit to them.
What was it pricking on? My glory? My pride?
Is a good way to find out. Not too painful away, but still it was.
Are they too proud? I'm going to have to tell them why they're wrong or something.
OK, first example.
Second example has to do with Behemoth.
00:35:06
I don't recommend it for moms and dads in the room, but when I was a kid my mother and father allowed us to have an alligator as a pet.
We got our alligator Alley as he became known. He was about this long.
And we played with Ali, our pet, and he started to grow and we created a pen for him both outdoors and indoors for our pet alley and we really had a we enjoyed them.
He grew.
And he grew.
And one day we were playing with Ali and he was in his pen and we took a broomstick and we were poking him with our broomstick and he opened his jaws and he snapped it in half.
Mom found out and that was the end of alley for us.
If your pet starts breaking chewing broomsticks in half, he's not considered by some parents to be the greatest pet. And so it went to the local zoo and the local zoo accepted it and they put it in its pen at the zoo. What's the purpose of the story?
We had no power.
To change Ali's nature.
None.
We could, by our strength, put him in a pen. We could restrain him.
But we couldn't change him.
He was still an alligator and he was just according to the nature.
That God allowed him to have and control.
Job uses God uses that example with Job. He says Job, if you're who you think you are, well, let's let's see you. And in fact, I we don't have time for it, but.
He, he's, you know, you can, he's not like a bird. Can you give him the nice gentle characteristics that a bird might have so that you can pet him and you can play with them? And so he, he says no.
OK, Chapter 41.
Is more about Ali, I guess the alligator verse three. Well, he makes applications unto thee. Will he speak soft words unto thee? No, he doesn't so on so much for the time we have on Job. Job learned his lesson. He said I've heard of you God. Now when God gives him examples, he says now I see you and he repents and he gets twice.
The blessing.
Now let's go on to the Lord Jesus.
Turn to Psalm 2.
Psalm 2 presents to us gives us a little idea of the glory that God establishes for the man Christ Jesus as Son of David.
This is gives us a little of his glories. We will see the excellencies of his glories increase versus Son of David and then his Son of man and as Son of God and each one of them gives us a higher elevated view of the greatness of the glory of the person of the Lord Jesus. And so here in Psalm 2 it says.
Why did the heathen rage and the people imagine a vain thing the kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel against?
Together against the Lord, and against his anointed and the Lord, how does he respond to that? He that sitteth in the heavens, verse four shall laugh. Lord shall have him in derision.
And you'll speak to them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure, and say to them, Yet have I set my king upon the holy hill, my holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree. The Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my son. This day have I begotten thee that is as a man ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth.
00:40:03
For thy possession. And he shall break them with a rod of iron, and so on. Need to go quickly.
Here's the son of David, and God says to his son, I'm going to give you glory in the earth. I'm going to give you an elevated place of Excellency and power and majesty, and it's going to be displayed.
To all men on the earth.
And anybody who opposes, that's it.
Down they go.
You and I would say verse 12, kiss the sun.
And rejoice to look forward to that day when we see him in that exalted place as a man, as son of David, who?
Will reign over Israel.
And will reign over all the other kingdoms of the earth.
He will be the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He will be supreme.
You will have the most exalted place over every other person that lives on the earth.
And we're thankful.
Now let's go on to see him as Son of Man and Psalm 8.
Psalm 8, verse one. Oh Lord our Lord, how excellent is all thy name and all the earth, who has set thy glory above the heavens. Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength because of thine enemies, and that thou mightest be the enemy still, the enemy and the avenger.
When I consider thy heavens and the work of thy fingers, the moon, the stars which thou hast ordained, what is man?
That thou art mindful of him.
And the Son of man, that thou visitest him, for thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour.
Thou madeest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands. Thou hast put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, yay, and the beasts of the field, the foul of the air, and the fish of the Seas, and whatsoever passes through the passages of the Seas. Oh Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth.
What is man?
The dollar mindful of him.
Glory is seen often by contrast.
Oh, there's an Ant.
An Ant.
Took care of that, right?
I just compared myself to an Ant.
What's an Ant to me?
I just took care of it.
That's a comparison.
Of what I am to what a creature is.
Often we don't.
Think a lot of some animals.
And because our glory and the way we're created greatly exceeds their own, we treat them sometimes that way. Compare man to God.
Can man create anything?
Is there a single person in this room who has ever brought something into existence that didn't exist before? Yes, I know. We we talk about things that people do.
As if they were creation, but they're not.
Some may have the ability to design things, some may be have excellent ability and art or design or many other things, but none of that activity creates anything.
But here what is man?
Compared to God, the Creator, compared to the power and majesty and strength.
That God is.
By comparison, man is really nothing.
Until you come to this man.
And God has his own Son, the Son of man.
00:45:04
Who has become a man, and in him what is man?
Something wonderful.
Something excellent.
He says to him, all the rest of creation is yours to manage.
We manage Ally, No. Does the Son of Man manage the alleys of the world? Absolutely everyone.
Can we say to man in his pride you're nothing this man does?
He puts down everything that would oppose.
The glory of God.
And.
God elevates him because as man, he.
Doesn't do anything except it be the will of God.
It takes that place that he had entered into as a man.
Well, lest we run out of time too quick, let's go on to John.
It's gospel.
Turn to Chapter 17.
Where we see this? This man is Son of God.
I have to get a tiny bit of context here. If you go back up a few chapters to Chapter 11, Lazarus dies and the Lord is very pained to see what sin had brought into the creation, knowing the death of a beloved friend, Lazarus and.
He says to those he said you this is necessary for him to die, that you might see the glory of God.
And so when they come, the glory of God is seen in the power of resurrection. That He had to bring life to a dead soul. No other man has ever done that or could do that. That's His glory, that He can take what's dead and bring it to life. None other is worthy in that way and can do that.
And so he's preparing them for his time to leave them.
And in chapter 13 I think it is.
They're together and Judas is in the room, and Judas leaves to go betray him. And there's an important little expression at that point. And it says, and it was night.
That expression in John's Gospel and connection with what takes place here was a statement that this world was now completely dark.
And in order for him to do what was necessary at that point.
To glorify God, He himself, in a world that was now treated by God, is totally dark and condemned.
Has to die.
And in his death.
The Majesty.
The honor, the glory of God.
Is.
Seen in that death.
And God is glorified as to His Holiness, His righteousness.
God is on display as the greatest expression of love.
In his giving that son to die, that you and I.
Might be brought into blessing.
And so here in the 17th chapter, he's anticipating his return to glory. And he says, he lifted up his eyes to heaven and said, Father, the hour is come, glorify thy Son, but thy Son also may glorify thee, and thou hast given him power.
That's part of his glory.
Over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. We marvel at this person who not only had power in creation to give natural life.
00:50:01
But he now.
Expresses the greatness of himself in even as a man of God to give eternal.
Life he doesn't give it in that character until he himself he says, glorify thou me because he died.
And he rises from the dead.
In resurrection life.
He returns to glory in the place of glory, where glory is seen in all its greatness.
And as from that position.
That.
Being glorified by God, he doesn't as a man take it for himself, but he is elevated by God as man to that wonderful place, and he says, As thou hast given him power.
That what is it that life eternal brings to us verse three, that they may know thee.
The only true God and Jesus Christ to our sin.
The true appreciation and knowledge of.
Understanding of glory requires knowledge and light. We won't be able to develop that thought much, but it does.
God said there, you did take a jewel.
Take a diamond, take a Ruby. Can you appreciate its beauty, its grandeur, its glory without light?
No, you can't. There has to be light. And if you study out the subject of glory in Scripture, you'll see it's very generally connected with light because it's light. The God who dwells in unapproachable light expresses himself in light, and that which is seen in that light.
Reflects.
The majesty of the source.
Of it and God. And in that way here he's saying, OK Father.
Glorify thou me in verse 5, which the glory I had before the world was. And then he says.
Elsewhere, when you do, I'm going to share it.
With all those I love, that's your destiny.
You are to because of his love for you. He wants to raise you up.
And put you at His side, that you may share in all the glory that's shareable. Not all glory is shareable. Not all His glory can be shared, but that which He can share with you. And when people on the earth look at you in the Millennium, they're going to see you in a most elegant, elevated place of honor at His side.
And in participation with him in his work.
With others. OK, well let's go on to 2nd Corinthians chapter 4.
Read a couple of verses here. Second Corinthians, chapter 4, verse 6.
But God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts.
Why did God shine the light here out of darkness into your heart?
To give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God.
In the face of Jesus Christ.
God has shined light into you, into not outward, but into your heart.
So that you can see.
And have the knowledge.
Of the glory of God.
And you see it.
In the face of Jesus Christ.
It's connected with chapter 3, verse 18. We all with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord or in a glass isn't clear translation. It's without a veil. We all without a veil can look directly on the glory of the Lord.
And then we see something wonderful.
00:55:00
What's the consequence of looking, as we've been seeking to do this afternoon, at the glory of the Lord?
As we see it, every time we read our Bibles and read about the Lord Jesus, we see his glory as a man while it's hidden from its official display morally, we see him in perfection, and that's part of his glory, His moral perfection.
Oh, then it says.
We're changed.
How does that happen?
The Spirit of God.
As we look upon the glory of the Lord Jesus.
Takes the word of God and changes us.
This living Word of God, the Spirit takes it, and as we look upon the Lord Jesus, it's not our work, it's God's work.
It says change from glory to glory. That's a sense that it's a little by little process.
Every day when you look upon the glory of the Lord Jesus.
God is doing his work.
Talk about your work. Your work might be in chapter 5, whatever, but this is God's work in your life and he's very patient in how he works and he's working on you and he's working on me because.
He's changing us.
To be like his son.
Then when he's finished, we'll be just like him.
One last.
Verse or passage I guess, or two quickly. Jeremiah 9.
Jeremiah, Chapter 9.
But I can get there.
And verse 23.
Thus saith the Lord, Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches, but let him that glorious glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me, that I am the Lord, which exercise loving kindness, judgment, righteousness in the earth.
And in these things I delight, saith the Lord. Just a quick comment here.
Don't seek your own glory if you're young.
Don't seek the glory of your natural youthful strength. If you're a little bit farther on then and get some accumulated wealth, don't seek it. If you think you've reached the point where you know a little bit and have a little bit of wisdom. Don't identify it as a glory for yourself. Why? Because it hinders you from seeing true glory.
When you look at yourself, you're a hindrance to yourself.
To your own blessing if you glory in those kinds of things, he says.
Glory in that he knoweth.
That's what you want.
You want to know God?
Lord, Apostle Paul had reached that point in his life, He says. Everything else I'll put aside that I might know him.
And if I know him, you know if you know God.
You'll know everything in its right order and its right perspective.
Job. Job was fuzzy minded because they didn't know it and so he drew a long conclusions if you don't have God's perspective.
We talked about going up on a mountain this morning, but also John had to go all the way up to heaven.
To get a right perspective of what was on Earth, it was told. Come up, hit her.
So he could see earth from heaven's perspective and get a right view of it. You have to have God's view to have really a right view of everything. And finally, and we'll finish with seeing a prayer in Ephesians chapter one here was Paul's prayer for the Ephesians.
01:00:05
Almost want to read it as a prayer and stop.
I think that's exactly what I'm going to do.
Treat this as our final prayer.
Even though it's Paul's words.
Ephesians, chapter one, verse 16.
I cease not to give thanks for you and mention you in my prayers.
The God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory.
May give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him.
The eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that ye may know.
What is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory?
Of His inheritance in the Saints. And what is the exceeding greatness of his power toward us, who believe, according to the working of His mighty power, which he wrought in Christ, when He raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places?
Above all, principality and power and might.
And Dominion, and every name that is named not only in this world, but also in that which is to come.
And have put all things under his feet, and given him to be the head over all things to the Church, which is his body, the fullness of him that filleth All in all.
Father, Amen.