The Glory of God

[ViaCrucis]

More important than His glory?

Our Lord did not regard His Divine Glory something to cleave to or exploit, but emptied Himself, poured Himself out into humility, humiliation, and shame for our sake.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[ViaCrucis]

Love. God's love--the love which He pours out freely and without holding back. For the Father does not insist upon His own glory, but rather gives all to His own beloved Son, "This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased", "All things were made by Him and for Him", "Therefore God has highly exalted Him, giving Him the name that is above every other name". And the Son, does He insist upon His own glory, or rather does He always make loving appeal back to His Eternal Source and Origin, to His Father? And does the Spirit insist upon His own glory, or does the Spirit not insist upon the glory of the Father and the Son?

It is God's own Self-Giving of Himself, One to Another, in the Trinity. The Love which the Father has for the Son, and the Son for the Father, and the Spirit for Father and Son and Father and Son for the Spirit, that there is perfect giving, perfect humility, perfect loving and offering.

The glory of God is not in a divine selfishness, but in the divine humility, of love pouring-forth.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Grip Docility]

Building off of my last thread...

The glory of God is the most important thing.

True or false?

I say true, and if you think it’s false, hopefully I’ll be able to convince you otherwise.

If the Glory Of God isn’t the most important thing, then our priorities are wrong. Not that God needs the Glory Of man, but it is that man only finds ultimate purpose in Glorying God.

God’s Infinite Love deserves Glory! He doesn’t need worship, but He is infinitely worthy of it,

The Glory Of God can bring peace to us in our most difficult moments! The Glory Of God is the conclusion of our every joy, and can be the conclusion of our every success, trial and failure.

 

[Monk Brendan]

Building off of my last thread...

The glory of God is the most important thing.

True or false?

I say true, and if you think it’s false, hopefully I’ll be able to convince you otherwise.

God doesn't live in the physical universe.

You didn't think He did, did you?

 

[Hammster]

Hi Hammster. I agree that God is far more than just love. I would even go so far to say that His holiness surpasses His love in His nature since angels express His holiness three times (Isaiah 6:3; Revelation 4:8), while His love is only expressed once when it is mentioned in Scripture (1 John 4:8, 16). But I believe His holiness is primarily demonstrated by His love, and in truth, love is holiness (Matthew 22:37-40; Luke 10:27). God's glory is important, but after some consideration, I believe His love and His holiness surpass His glory in importance, and if I had to choose between the two, I would have to go with love.

I would say His glory is the result of all His attributes. It’s His “weight”. But I’ll have to ponder it more.

 

[Hammster]

Our Lord did not regard His Divine Glory something to cleave to or exploit, but emptied Himself, poured Himself out into humility, humiliation, and shame for our sake.

-CryptoLutheran

During the incarnation He didn’t exploit it.

But there’s this:

Now, Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.
— John 17:5

 

[Hammster]

God doesn't live in the physical universe.

You didn't think He did, did you?

???

 

[food4thought]

I would say His glory is the result of all His attributes. It’s His “weight”. But I’ll have to ponder it more.

I'll have to do some more pondering, as well. Is any one attribute of God the most important thing? Does God's glory even exist as a thing in this universe? ~mind explodes~

 

[food4thought]

God doesn't live in the physical universe.

You didn't think He did, did you?

God does live in this universe, but He also lives outside of space-time in eternity... God is transcendent; or, put another way, He is omnipresent.

 

[Hammster]

I'll have to do some more pondering, as well. Is any one attribute of God the most important thing? Does God's glory even exist as a thing in this universe? ~mind explodes~

I don’t think glory is necessarily an attribute. But I’m building a deck right now, and will have to look further later.

 

[Wordkeeper]

??? People glorify, praise and love themselves all the time. It's the Big Problem between God and Man.

Also, God is Triune.



This is to think from your own frame of reference to God. Doing so always necessarily makes God smaller, or less, than He is.



God cannot be "hurt" by what we do or do not do. He is perfect and so cannot be diminished or improved in any way. Really, if we don't appreciate God, He is no more affected by our lack of appreciation than I would be affected by knowing a bacterium on the bottom of my shoe does not appreciate me. To think that He can be negatively affected by me (or you) is, again, to think in too-human terms about God.



Are you thinking that God did not know joy before He created the universe? Why could He not have experienced love and joy within the Trinity prior to Creation?

In order to have a version of glory in the human domain, God emptied Himself. In this domain, many human attributes began to apply to God. His will is to have what applies in heaven to apply on earth.

Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

The Self-Emptying God

 

[ViaCrucis]

During the incarnation He didn’t exploit it.

But there’s this:

Now, Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.
— John 17:5

But it is not the Son glorifying Himself, but the Father glorifying His Son.

Question: Is the Incarnation an aberration?

-CryptoLutheran

 

[sunlover1]

And this is life eternal, that they might know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.

'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets."

 

[zoidar]

Our Lord did not regard His Divine Glory something to cleave to or exploit, but emptied Himself, poured Himself out into humility, humiliation, and shame for our sake.

-CryptoLutheran

Love. God's love--the love which He pours out freely and without holding back. For the Father does not insist upon His own glory, but rather gives all to His own beloved Son, "This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased", "All things were made by Him and for Him", "Therefore God has highly exalted Him, giving Him the name that is above every other name". And the Son, does He insist upon His own glory, or rather does He always make loving appeal back to His Eternal Source and Origin, to His Father? And does the Spirit insist upon His own glory, or does the Spirit not insist upon the glory of the Father and the Son?

It is God's own Self-Giving of Himself, One to Another, in the Trinity. The Love which the Father has for the Son, and the Son for the Father, and the Spirit for Father and Son and Father and Son for the Spirit, that there is perfect giving, perfect humility, perfect loving and offering.

The glory of God is not in a divine selfishness, but in the divine humility, of love pouring-forth.

-CryptoLutheran

Beautifully put!

 

[Hammster]

But it is not the Son glorifying Himself, but the Father glorifying His Son.

Question: Is the Incarnation an aberration?

-CryptoLutheran

He obviously thought He was worthy of being glorified since He asked His Father.

And yes.

 

[Hammster]

And this is life eternal, that they might know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.

'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets."

What should we love about God?

 

[zoidar]

What should we love about God?

That God loves us so dearly that He sent His own Son down to die for us. That Jesus set aside the glory He had in heaven next to the Father, for us!

 

[Wordkeeper]

That’s bordering on heresy.

God gave His Son not because He needed glory, but to save Humanity. That's saying something about the importance of Humanity, if it's worthy of that valuable an offering.

God created Man so that the appreciation He received in the spiritual realm would be mirrored in the material. His will would done, on earth, as it is in heaven. That love would exist, as it existed in heaven. There are many phenomena in existence, but the greatest of them all is love. Even God is love.

1 John 4
8The one not loving has not known God, because God is love.

Giving glory to God is a manifestation of loving our fellow human beings, because only by glorifying God does a human begin the process of knowing Him, which in turn leads to his fulfillment.

Numbers 20
9So Moses took the staff from the LORD’s presence, just as He had commanded. 10Then Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly in front of the rock, and Moses said to them, “Listen now, you rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock?” 11Then Moses raised his hand and struck the rock twice with his staff, so that a great amount of water gushed out, and the congregation and their livestock were able to drink.

12But the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust Me to show My holiness in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this assembly into the land I have given them.”

Deuteronomy 32
51For at the waters of Meribah-kadesh in the Wilderness of Zin, both of you broke faith with Me among the Israelites by failing to treat Me as holy in their presence

 

[Hammster]

That God loves us so dearly that He sent His own Son down to die for us. That Jesus set aside the glory He had in heaven next to the Father, for us!

So not for who He is, but for what He’s done for us?

 

[Hammster]

God gave His Son not because He needed glory, but to save Humanity. That's saying something about the importance of Humanity, if it's worthy of that valuable an offering.

God created Man so that the appreciation He received in the spiritual realm would be mirrored in the material. His will would done, on earth, as it is in heaven. That love would exist, as it existed in heaven. There are many phenomena in existence, but the greatest of them all is love. Even God is love.

Everyone who is called by My name,
And whom I have created for My glory,
Whom I have formed, even whom I have made.”
— Isaiah 43:7

At least we know why we were created.