“ALL Worship, ALL Glory to God!”

Sometimes the truth is so close we can’t see it.  Paul says in Romans 10:8 that,

 ” ‘The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,’ that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming.” (From Deut. 30:14)

Sometimes the truth is found in our hearts and mouths at the very same time we are denying it with our minds. How is it that we can proclaim that ALL glory and ALL worship belong to God while at the same time believe in doctrines that completely contradict that truth? We sang last Sunday,

“ALL glory and honor and praise belong to God.”

It’s a common line within worship songs for obvious reasons but this time the word ALL jumped out at me and hit me like a lightening bolt!  “ALL glory belongs to God.”  If it belongs to Him then it must be that He will have it…all of it.  I would assume every believer would agree that this is true and that it shall be true forever. 

The problem lies with the traditional teaching that says many if not most of God’s image-bearers will not give him glory forever but will in fact rebel against Him in a place where everything but Him will be “glorified.”  In the location of an eternal hell sin, death, hatred and rebellion against Him will continue in a never-ending cycle (D. A. Carson).  In this version of the Story of God where sin and death will reign forever God will obviously not receive ALL the glory.

You may respond, “But His justice for sin is being meted out in an eternal hell and therefore His glory is displayed.”  First we must ask what is the true nature of justice.  Is it someone getting justice as in “giving another their due” or “an eye for an eye; tooth for a tooth”?  Is this the outworking of true Biblical justice?  With all the examples we have of “restorative justice” done by Christians throughout the world in prisons and inner cities (Colson, Keller) I would contend that it is not.  The Biblical model for justice is the idea of doing justice rather than getting justice.  The meaning of the word justice is actually righteousness or “right-useness.”  In other words, returning something back to its right-useness or original intention is actually at the heart of the idea behind true Biblical justice.

Therefore to allow even one sinner to continue in his destructive and non-God-glorifying ways is to allow sin to roll on and not true justice.  This glorifies sin and death and not Christ’s all sufficient and glorious work on the cross! God is glorified when “all things are made new” and He is “all in all” and “all are reconciled back to Him.”

God is glorified when we help to return things and others to their right-useness because that is His idea of ultimate justice.  Only when things are returned to their original intent will He be satisfied and truly glorified. When God sees His intention to “make man in our image” as finished then His glory will be complete.

He will be fully glorified when every stray piece of worship, praise and glory in the universe is collected and redirected to Him, the only true Source of life, light, love and glory.

The meaning of the verse, “For everything is from Him, through Him and back to Him” is understood now as it should:  that the glory that came from God will return back to Him and Him alone.  He will not leave it to rot in an eternal pit to be overshadowed and overcome by evil.

Interestingly the meaning of the word “glory” carries with it the idea of “weight.”  If something is truly glorious to you it is because it has weight in your life.  It draws your attention and awe.  For sin and death to be kept alive forever in human form without the possibility of healing or abolishment would hold the universe in awe of its tremendous power to defy God forever.  This would be in direct contradiction to the entire word of God which says that only God will ultimately hold our awe and worship. In reality it is pagan dualism.

Prior to my understanding that God will indeed conquer every person with His love and power I possessed a fear, an awe, (a worship) of those who had the apparent power to exercise their “free-will” to the astonishing end of damning themselves into an eternal state of sin and death.  I knew that, “my frame was weak and I was made of mere dust.”  Therefore I was in constant awe of people who seemed to be headed into a terminal state of rebellion against God on account of their own “free-will” and didn’t seem to care. Now that pulled some weight with me and stole much reverence meant for God.

What a glorious thing to finally align my head with my heart in worship!  I now believe that ALL glory indeed will be given to Christ and it will be sincere, heart-felt and perfect!  Nothing in the entire universe will be more weighty, more powerful or more glorious than our omnipotent and loving Creator.  Now I can look into the eyes of the most hardened and rebellious sinner and say to myself, “not forever.  Not forever will you be able to prevail against God.  God is more glorious than your sin.  God is stronger than your rebellion.  The Father has His ways and you WILL come home.  As the prodigal son, you will come to your senses and  you will come home.”  This Father is the One before Whom “every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father…” (Phil 2:8-9)

Finally this will be the only way for our own glory to be realized.  Often as fallen creatures our God-given glory is misdirected, misaligned and misinterpreted.  We fail to see His glory and therefore our own.  The mind-blowing thing that occurs when we give God ALL the glory:  He gives it back.  He gives it back in order to show His love to the world.  Just like His glory, our glory is for others.  John 17:22-23 says,

“The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one;  I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.”

Hallelujah that He has revealed His glory at the cross and even magnified it!  His glory is magnified through His humble submission to the cross revealing that His glory and our restoration are one goal.  “The glory of God is man fully alive,”  said Saint Irenaeus.  All glory WILL go to God but until we desire for Him to be glorified in ALL things we will not experience the weight of our own glory.  May we all bring Him the glory that will for certain be His and therefore experience in ourselves that glory He died to share.

3/13 Here is a powerful song by Mar’s Hill Music that proclaims the desire we all have that God receive ALL the glory!

“All GLory Be to Christ” by King’s Kaleidoscope, Mar’s Hill Music