How Will You Respond To The Riches Of God's Glory? Series

How Will You Respond to the Riches of God's Glory?

The Gospel of John

John 11:1-16

Sermon by Rick Crandall

Grayson Baptist Church - April 5, 2017

(Revised November 24, 2019)

BACKGROUND:

*Please open your Bibles to John 11 as we continue to study one of the Lord's great miracles. It's Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead. Our main focus tonight is the Lord's supreme goal for this miracle, and that is the glory of God.

*In vs. 3-4, the sisters sent to Jesus, saying, "Lord, behold, he whom You love is sick.'' And when Jesus heard that, He said, "This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified through it.''

*God's Word speaks of His glory around 300 times, about half in the Old Testament and half in the New. The first time we see God's glory is in Exodus, the second book if the Bible, and the last time we see His glory is in Revelation 21:23, where the new city of Jerusalem was described. There the Bible tells us that "the city had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God illuminated it, and the Lamb is its light."

*God's Word speaks of His glory almost from cover to cover. One of our favorite examples was at the birth of Christ. Just after Jesus was born, Luke 2:8-14 says:

8. Now there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night.

9. And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were greatly afraid.

10. Then the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people.

11. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.

12. And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger.''

13. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying:

14. "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men!''

*"The glory of the Lord shone around them," but what is God's glory? The Old Testament word picture for "glory" is a weight -- something heavy. And God's glory is heavy indeed. It's something we should never take lightly. That's especially true since God's glory is the standard of perfection by which He measures us. We know this is true because Romans 3:23 says, "All have sinned and fall short of the GLORY OF GOD."

*But what is the glory of God? John Piper tells us that "glory is a very hard thing to define. It is like the word "beauty." We all can use it and communicate with it but to try to reduce it to words is very frustrating. It is easier to point to examples."

*A beautiful sunset seen from the tallest building in Monroe, that's a taste of nature's glory. A hole-in-one, pitching a no-hitter, a grand-slam home run, LSU winning the National Football Championship, and the Saints winning the Super Bowl, these are all examples of athletic glory.

*And John Piper said that God's glory "is the beauty and excellence of His manifold perfections. It refers to His infinite and overflowing fullness of all that is good. God's glory is the perfect harmony of all His attributes in one infinitely beautiful and personal being." (1)

*Church, we also need to get a sense of the mind-boggling, overpowering awesomeness of the glory of God. In Exodus 24, Moses went up on Mount Sinai to meet with God for 40 days and 40 nights. And in vs. 16-17, God's Word says:

16. Now the glory of the Lord rested on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days. And on the seventh day He called to Moses out of the midst of the cloud.

17. The sight of the glory of the Lord was like a raging, consuming, devouring fire on the top of the mountain in the eyes of the children of Israel.

*Thinking about these verses and the overwhelming power of God's glory, Robert Crilley said: "Speaking with the Almighty is one thing. Actually seeing His face is quite another. -- Like trying to drink from Niagara Falls, the unveiled glory of God would simply overwhelm us." (2)

*Think of Peter, James and John trembling on the mountain when Jesus was transfigured before them and His face shined like the sun. Speaking of Jesus, in John 1:14, the Apostle would later write: "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Think of the Apostle Paul, struck to the ground and blinded by the glory of the Risen Savior. Paul would later testify, "Since I could not see for the GLORY of that light, being led by the hand of those who were with me, I came into Damascus." (Acts 22:11)