glory

Love For God And One Another

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This morning I was studying John 17:20-26 and I was struck by an interesting chain of logic in this section of Jesus’ prayer.

The logic runs like this:

  1. Jesus and the Father are one- one heart, one mind, one purpose
  2. His desire is that His followers will be one with Him in that same way
  3. Then they will be one with each other- one heart, one mind, one purpose
  4. Then the world will know Jesus and the Father

A similar thread runs around the word glory. In John’s gospel it is on the cross that Jesus is glorified, and this is happening right before the crucifixion.

  1. The Father gave His glory to Jesus
  2. Jesus has passed this glory to His followers
  3. The result is that they will be one
  4. Jesus then prays that they will see His glory

When christians argue and refuse to love one another it is a sign that they don’t love God enough and have not seen His glory. If you do a search on almost any well-known Christian leader you will quickly find a thousand or more pages about why that person is a heretic or not even saved.

Those pages betray a problem with their authors- they don’t love God enough.

The positive side of this is that if we pursue God with pure passion, then He will give us a greater love for His people. I have seen that in my own life. Each morning as I pray for the people in my church, the Lord gives me a deeper appreciation and love for each one. Lately He has directed me to pray for the other pastors in the town and I am finding the same process at work. I actually like these men and women!

If we want to see our town and our nation turn to Christ we first must learn to love one another more. But to do that we must love God more. The starting place has to be worship, both personal and corporate, reading the Scriptures and praying for our brothers and sisters in the Lord. As we do these things, He will show us people to pray for and give us the love to serve them.

In the midst of all these things, if I read John 17 correctly, we will start to see the glory of God released and flowing out from us to the world.

That is how revival starts.

Fading Glory

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The excitement is over, the Bunnies won their first premiership in a hundred years  (I exaggerate a tad) and NRL goes on holidays for a couple of months.

As I was listening to the news this morning and the soundtrack of “Glory glory to South Sydney”, the commentators waxed lyrical about the glorious victory and how the team had been redeemed after years in the wilderness. (That sounds sort of familiar).

So, after school goes back tomorrow and the cricket season starts, who is going to care about this? By Christmas who will even remember the score? And by the start of next footy season we will have to stop and think about who won the competition in 2014.

If you think I’m overstating the case, ask yourself what was the score in the last State of Origin? Only the die hard fans remember just a few months later.

Sporting glory is a fading glory. The crowds are entertained for a night and people have something to talk about at work the next day, but the accolades dim quickly. What excites us and seems so important right now soon loses its lustre after the event.

There is a reason for this.

Human beings are created for an eternal glory, an immortal honour that goes way beyond the sporting arena.

We were created to worship God, the ultimate glory, and to share in His nature. We get so easily distracted by the immediate things we see in front of us. We settle for a pretend glory and think that’s all there is.

Jesus came to bridge the gap between the human and the divine. He has prepared a place in eternity for His followers, and a glorious destiny we can only imagine.

Don’t settle for anything less.