"...Do all to the glory of God" -- What does that mean?

I grew up attending a Christian summer camp that before every mealtime would recite 1 Corinthians 10:31 which says this: "So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God."

This verse just might be one of the most well-known verses in Christianity, especially those of the Piperian persuasion. However, it is a curious thing; while one is hard-pressed to find a Christian that will not give mental assent to our responsibility to give glory to God, it is quite another thing to find a Christian who actively pursues such proclamation of God's glory.

Another curious thing about the conversation of "God's glory" is that those words themselves are quite vague. Until recently, I would have been very hesitant to define what the "glory of God" is and what "giving God glory" actually means.

Here is my quick explanation: proclaiming the glory of God is the act of showing how much better and more important God is in every word we say and every action we do. The difficulty in this discussion of trying to glorify God is that it is impossible to display the awesomeness of Jesus if He isn't awesome to you.

One might say, "But David, I'm a Christian, and I do want to glorify God." To which I would respond, "Good for you." But here's the deal: because it's nice and easy to talk about this conceptual "glory of God", all Christians fall into patterns of simply forgetting about Jesus and not recognizing Him as the only all and only-satisfying fountain that He is.

Volumes are written in discussion of what the glory of God actually is, so I hope this post simply gets the cognitive juices flowing in your mind in attempt to understand what we mean when we say that we want to "glorify God" or "do all to the glory of God."

If it means that we want everything that we do to point to how special Jesus is, then consider these two things:

1) Is He actually special to you?
2) If He is special to you, what steps do you take to communicate that to others?

I am not saying that merely doing lists of things will show that Jesus is more important. Not having tattoos, not drinking alcohol, not smoking cigarettes, not saying bad words, not listening to "bad music," and not going to "R" rated movies are not ways to put the importance of Jesus on display. Any good Catholic or Mormon can conform to a regimen of externals and hate the Gospel as much as any anti-theist.

I also do not want to say that we should simply go around saying "Jesus is the most important thing in my life" (I actually know someone who said that). As I always tend to say, the things that you love the most will make themselves evident whenever you do anything. If it is important for you to be well-liked, you will probably not say too many controversial things or get into too many arguments. If it is important that you become an elite in sports, you will spend a lot of time in the gym or on the field. If it is important that you are able to get an attractive boyfriend or girlfriend, you will look and act in a certain way. If you are about letting people know about how awesome Jesus is, you will talk about Him all the time; and if you don't talk about Him all the time, your manner of communicating will be one that points to His love and ultimate supremacy at all times.

Consider these things and be honest with yourself. Don't make excuses. If you see room for improvement, praise God that you aren't too proud to be blinded to weak spots.

My suggestion: Ask Him RIGHT NOW to make Himself so important to you that you can't help but share His awesomeness with family, friends, co-workers, and anyone that will listen.

If God changes and moves your heart towards that end, you won't be able to stop His name from coming off of your lips.

He is our glory, our satisfaction, and our hope.

.DSN.

Stop Fighting and Start Fighting

I saw that I wrote most of this over this past Christmas vacation. With some edits and the last few paragraphs added more recently, here it is:

"Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:29-30 ESV)

Everything we do is for our own happiness, pleasure, and joy. There is no motivation that affects us greater than the motivation for the maximizing of our own comfort and happiness. Think about where you are sitting right now. I'm in my bed. I am sitting here because it is one of the quietest places and most comfortable seats in the house, and my room affords me the ability to spend time reflecting and gaining a clarity of thought that is no other place can. Why do I value all these things to thereby choose my bed as my writing spot? In the end, I aim to have more peace, more lucidity in my own thinking, and really, I hope to mitigate my discomfort as much as I can.

This same principle applies to every area of life. The pursuit of my own joy, happiness, and fulfillment realizes itself in the most mundane tasks of daily living: eating, sleeping, playing music, doing dishes, even blogging. These are all avenues through which every living person pursues his or her own sense of meaning and fulfillment, even at the minuscule level.

This is a fact of life.

But here's the problem:

We fight for fulfillment, meaning, and joy in all the wrong places.

I'm not saying that there's a problem with doing mundane things throughout the day to make us feel better. I am firmly convinced that my sense of fulfillment as I clean the toilet in my house is a well-justified one. What I'm saying is that our pursuit of learning, our pursuit of skills and abilities, and especially our pursuit of different inter-personal relationships are all ways in which we chase our hunger for fulfillment. I drove home today after spending some time with friends, and I came across a song that referenced the verse with which I introduced this post. I started to choking up as I realized how much harder my life is than it has to be. Jesus said that His yoke is easy and his burden is light. What a contrast to the burden that I feel right now. Life as a believer shouldn't be so, for lack of a better word, burdensome. It's a really crummy feeling when we try so hard to be happy and fulfilled through so many things and end grasping at the wind and punching the air. I'm becoming increasingly aware that the solution is to stop trying so hard to be so happy. It never works. This kind of fight for our own joy is miserable and it is a battle that we will lose 100 percent of the time.

While we need to stop striving for peace outside of the rest that Jesus brings, we need to strive for the peace inside of the rest that Jesus brings. Paul says in Philippians 1:27:

"Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel"

Striving for faith does not mean forcing yourself to pray harder, read the Word more, and talk about theology more profoundly. It means that we strive for faith in the Gospel by preaching it to ourselves again and again. We must look to more accurately see our sin in light of our salvation and praise God for His salvation. You might say, "But David, I'm saved. I already believe the Gospel." To which I would respond that if we really believed all of the Gospel all of the time, we would never sin, because belief in the Gospel affirms that Jesus, the only perfectly beautiful being in existence, died to ransom His people from the eternal destruction that we all deserve. In the end, Gospel-belief should affirm that Jesus is better every single time. If we believe that this is true, we should never look to anything else to give us the rest that our spirits need.

Paul also gives us this command in Philippians 2:12-13:

Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

This may seem like we do need to fight for our own peace. Not only does it seem like we need to fight for our own peace, but it seems like we should do so out of fear. The problem with this reading of that passage is that it is the conclusion of one of the most glorious explanations of the Gospel in verses 1-11! Paul expounds on how humble Jesus was to lower himself to our level and die at the hands of his own creation so that we might be saved! Paul then concludes that because those things are true and because it is God Himself who is actually working, we should respond! We should not respond out of mere obligation, but we should respond because of the great love with which he loved us!

This whole subject of "working out our own salvation" can be tricky and confusing. While I by no means understand all the ins and outs of it, what I will say is that the times I have been in love with Jesus the most is when I ask God to show me my own sick and depraved heart and then minister the good news of the Gospel to me, yet again.

Rest in God's love. He LOVES you. He loves you more than you love the thing you love the most. He loves you more than you love you. Rest in that, and seek His face all the more often, asking that He will enable you to have faith in the Gospel more deeply and fully.

God is our hope.

.DSN.

Embracing Accusation - Thanks to Shane and Shane

I just heard this song for the first time this week. I just read the lyrics while listening to it and I started to cry. Listen and be blessed.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FI1sSZ1zTEs


The father of lies
Coming to steal
Kill and destroy
All my hopes of being good enough
I hear him saying cursed are the ones
Who can't abide
He's right
Alleluia he's right!

The devil is preaching
The song of the redeemed
That I am cursed and gone astray
I cannot gain salvation
Embracing accusation 

Could the father of lies
Be telling the truth
Of God to me tonight?
If the penalty of sin is death
Then death is mine
I hear him saying cursed are the ones
Who can't abide
He's right
Alleluia he's right!

Oh the devil's singing over me
An age old song
That I am cursed and gone astray
Singing the first verse so conveniently
He's forgotten the refrain
Jesus saves!

He redeemed us from the curse of the law


Satan is right about our miserable state. That is why God is our only hope.


.DSN.

Dating and Relationships: Flirting For Fun Finishes In Farcical Failure

We all know flirts. Flirts have a certain distinctive stereotype; and unfortunately for them, it isn't positive. When I was in high school, I had little respect but a twisted admiration for one football player in particular who would always hang out with the most attractive girls at school, seeming to always have the cutest and popular one on his arm all the time. Thankfully, being a few years removed from that insanity, God has given a little more perspective so that I now no longer envy this guy; I see his ability to “get girls” is just a manifestation of his own insecurity. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The Oxford American Dictionary defines "flirting" in the following way: to behave as though attracted to or trying to attract someone, but for amusement rather than with serious intentions.

Flirtation can take a few different forms. It may take the form of the too-interested guy or girl who gives a lot of superficial compliments and is just a little too touchy; this person may also make winsome and light-hearted jokes at the expense of the flirtee. While this kind of playful fun-making could be perceived as harmless, there is no intention for a meaningful relationship, and therefore these actions will inevitably lead to confusion and hurt for at least one of the parties involved. Overt flirting is a manifestation of insecurity, in that the flirter is attempting to lure the flirtee into letting down his or her emotional defenses and reciprocating similarly false affirmation.

Flirting can also manifest itself discreetly. When Person "X" (who I will refer to as "Pat") is aware of the dangers that false affection brings but still wants the attention and heightened self-esteem that flirting promises, "Pat" will make subtle and abnormally kind advances to evoke these warmly uncommitted feelings in an attempt to satisfy that desire. In many Christian circles, this form of flirting is more common and harder to spot. Having grown up in mainstream Christian culture and thusly kissing dating goodbye, I am aware that the popular teaching forbids casually romantic relationships. To circumvent this stipulation, Christian flirting often takes the turn of a tactful and covert operation by avoiding the superficial compliments and engaging on a deeper/more emotional or even spiritual level, but still, covert flirting is just as deceptive and hurtful.

So here's the problem: Flirting/false displays of affection does two things: 1) It lies to the one who is being flirted with by giving them an impression of interest that, while possibly present, will not be followed up on in any responsible way. This attitude is dishonest and disrespectful towards others; nobody who is flirted with and left out to dry comes away from the experience saying, "I'm glad that just happened to me." 2) The second but fundamental aspect of flirting reveals a heart that is looking for something other than Jesus to make it happy. It is so hard not to flirt with someone of whom you are desirous of his or her affection and approval, and the reason for this is because our hearts are wicked and sinful. It's too easy to look for the quick fix. For those who are good at flirting and are thereby skilled at getting his or her desired response (getting that girl or having that guy) unfortunately means that it takes less work for them to be satisfied with that which is other than Jesus. 

What is interesting to me is that the healthiest relationships I have observed (ones that lead to and continue in marriage) are not make-me-feel-good relationships. There is a seriousness that is unique to two people who genuinely love each other for who they are not what they provide. With that mutual love and self-sacrifice comes real joy; the typical high-school love story that says "I think you're cute and you think I'm cute... let's date" has been long forgotten.

An insatiable desire for attention from the opposite gender cannot be cured when you find "the one." The reason for this is because a heart that participates in deceptive, flirtatious behavior is a heart that believes that it needs more than what has already been provided through Christ's perfect life, death, and resurrection on our behalf. This is not merely a situational problem, it’s a heart sickness problem... as always.

If we understood the glorious truth of having everything provided for us in Christ and funneled every single decision through it, we would not see the need to flirt for fun. We would seek other's interests above our own and hold the emotional and spiritual lives of our brothers and sisters in a far higher regard. 

Without Him, no part of this solution is remotely possible. 

He is our hope.

.DSN.