To God Be The Glory

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Illustration: Subject: Wedding Anniversary

Roger was in trouble. He forgot his wedding anniversary.

Patti was really angry. She told him "Tomorrow morning, I

expect to find a gift in the driveway that goes from 0 to 200 in under 6

seconds AND IT BETTER BE THERE".

The next morning Roger got up early and left for work.

When Patti woke up, she looked out the window and sure enough

there was a box gift-wrapped in the middle of the driveway.

Confused, she put on her robe, ran out to the driveway and brought the box back in the house. She opened it and found a brand new bathroom

scale. Funeral services for Roger have been scheduled for Friday.

I am reading a book right now that was given to me by the Klassen’s, and it is entitled “Brothers we are not professionals,” by John Piper. The book is directed at pastors, and is a plea to them to do radical ministry. Now I am not going to rehash the book for you this morning, but I do want to share with you something that I learned as I have been reading it, because I think it fits in well with what Paul is saying in Romans chapter 3 this morning. Now before I do that I want you to know something about who I am. I am a person who loves to learn new things, and I learned something new as I read this book, and what I learned is this, that the reason that you and I and every other person who has ever lived exists, our primary purpose in life, is to glorify God. Now this may not come as much of a surprise to you, after all the Westminster Confession which came into being in 1647 starts out by answering this question, “What is the chief end of man?” or in other words, why do we exist and what are we here for? And the answer that is given is, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy Him forever,” so this is not really all that new a concept. Having said that, I must say that while “glorifying God” may be our purpose in life, most of us struggle in living as if this were so. I think that there are different reasons for this, most of which we are not going to explore this morning, but living our lives this way is as easy as rewording the saying “What would Jesus do?” to “Will this bring Glory to God?” and then asking this question before all that we do in life. Just for fun lets try a few examples, I will ask the question and you give me the answers okay? Here we go. We will start with an easy one,

(1.) Should I wave my fist at the person who just cut me off on the Hart highway? Will this bring glory to God? NO! What would bring glory to God?

(2.) Should I leave the church because someone offended me? Will this bring glory to God? NO! What would bring glory to God?

(3.) Should I use the gifts that God has given me, to help grow His church? Will this bring glory to God? YES!

(4.) Should I grow God’s church at the expense of my family? Will this bring glory to God? NO! What would bring glory to God?

(5.) Should I tithe, or give money to the church, to support its ministries? Will this bring glory to God? YES!

So this is a very simple way to determine what things I should and should not be doing.

Now let me get back to what I learned. Now I already told you that I learned that mankind’s purpose in life is to “glorify God.” But I also learned what God’s purpose in existing is, and I wonder how many of you will be surprised to hear that the reason that God exists is also to “glorify God.” Everything that God does is done to bring glory to Himself. Why? Because He is the One who deserves all the glory. Now this may be hard for some to understand because it sounds as if God must be pretty egotistical. And the reason we think that is because any examples or experiences that we can draw from, show us that this is true. For instance, if I lived my life to bring glory to myself, there are a whole host of people including my wife, my kids, my family here at the church, who would be able to point out reasons why I do not deserve the glory. But God is perfect. He is the embodiment of love, righteousness, holiness, and all that is good, He is faithful, cannot lie, or sin, or act contrary to who He is, like we can, and as a result He deserves all the glory.