Smith, Daniel H: CMML Conference-1991-01 ~ Biblical Priorities

In the southeastern states, and it's called tubing. Using inflated inner tubes, a group of friends will spend an afternoon floating or drifting down river with the current. And someone described it as an afternoon of pleasurable diversion from our responsibilities and cares. And that's a good, uh, description of drift, a diversion from our responsibilities. And we see many evidences of drift around us today in the United States. There's a drift in morality, a drift in family responsibilities, a drift from civil disobedience, adrift from the principles upon which this nation was established. And we see drift in evangelical Christianity generally, and sad to say, we see drift among assemblies also. An elderly evangelist once told me, a live fish swims against the current. You know, a fish that swim, that floats or swims downstream will drown. And we need to take a good, hard look at ourselves in the light of God's word. Are we drifting? It is time to reassess our priorities and guard against drift from our obligations to our Lord and to his word, from our responsibilities to our local assemblies. We need to guard against drift into anything that weakens our testimony or dilutes our effectiveness and corrupts new Testament principles. Our first speaker this morning is our brother Dan Smith. Dan Smith has taught at Emmaus Bible College for nearly thirty years. He has served on the faculty and has held several administrative offices, including his current position as president of Emmaus Bible College. He and his wife Martha live, of course, in Dubuque, Iowa, and they have three grown children. And in addition to his responsibilities at Emmaus, he has an extensive ministry in counseling and camp and conference speaking. We're very happy to have our dear brother Dan Smith with us this morning. We'll ask him to come to the platform now and speak to us. Brother Dan. Gentlemen, good morning. I trust that you're as encouraged with a bright day like this as I am, to think that perhaps our winter season will indeed come to a conclusion in not too many days. It's nice to see the bright sunshine and see that you all resisted the temptation to be out working in your gardens or lawns or wherever else that may be, and that you made your way here. I trust it'll be a very profitable day for us together as we seek to honor our Lord Jesus. You know, when we talk about the matter of priorities, we're dealing with one of the fundamental issues of the human experience. Remember the ancient Greek philosophers toyed with the issues of being and becoming. Why am I here? Where am I headed? Uh, will my presence on Earth make any difference? Uh, what is the purpose of my existence? And all of these very basic kind of questions that they toyed with for the centuries and never really found an answer to outside of revelation. All of these very basic questions force us to look at the issue of priorities. Another thing I think we ought to remember from the outset of our time together today is this, that as the conveners have weighed this and have set our minds at thinking about the matter of priorities, it is very evident that this is a subject which deserves a lot more attention than we are able to give it in one day. We could deal with a lot of things profitably in talking about priorities, but I believe with the wisdom that God gave, we're starting at the top today, without a doubt. And I am convinced that however a Christian man or woman may structure their life before God or view priorities in this life, the subjects we're dealing with today are at the top of the list. What is the highest good? What is the greatest motive for human behavior? Now, what is the ultimate goal of human life? Uh, what is the ultimate purpose of all of the workings of God, the decree of God in history, what is it? Well, with wisdom given from God and an understanding of the scriptures, there were those sages of centuries past that coined those very familiar words in answer to the question, what is man's chief end? The answer to the question many of us learned in our youth was, man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. I hope you agree with that, because that is biblical. Let's read today from Ephesians chapter three. Not that we're going to deal with this in an expository way, but to get our thoughts going in this direction, Ephesians chapter three, we're going to read this rather striking statement, one sentence, by the way, as the apostle penned it, from verses three to fourteen. Ephesians one— I'm sorry, did I say three? Ephesians one, beginning in verse three: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to himself, according to the kind intention of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace, which he freely bestowed on us in the beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight. He made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his kind intention, which he purposed in him, with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in heaven, things upon earth. In him also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to his purpose, who works all things after the counsel of his will, to the end that we, who were the first to hope in Christ should be to the praise of his glory. In him you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, having also believed you were sealed in him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who has given us as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God's own possession, to the praise of his glory. Let's pause again and seek God's blessing. Father, we thank you today now that as we turn our attention to the scriptures, we can seek your blessing and pray that you will demonstrate afresh to us today that your word is indeed living and powerful, and that you will glorify our Lord Jesus in our hearts and minds in this hour. We ask in the Savior's name. Amen. Now you'll notice in the passage we read together that the Apostle Paul has given us three great stanzas, three great dimensions of this expression, to the praise of the glory of our God. Beginning in verse three right down through verse six, he focuses upon the Father and concludes with that stanza, to the praise of the glory of his grace. And then he introduces us to his beloved one, in whom we have redemption, the Son, and focuses upon him in the stanza that runs from verse six through twelve and concludes there to the praise of his glory, that is Christ. And then we are introduced in the final stanza, in verses thirteen through fourteen to the work of the Spirit of God, and that concludes again with the expression, to the praise of His glory. We find here the working of the Triune God, and we find that the Triune God is working to the praise of His glory. Now, we as human beings need to adjust our thinking in this for several reasons. First of all, of course, because we live in a humanistic society, and we tend not to think in biblical ways. We tend to think humanistically. Not only that, as human beings, the whole history of mankind is replete with the evidence that our thinking is bent wrong. One of the expressions of our Adamic nature is that we tend to put ourselves first. We realize, however, as we turn to the scriptures, that our God is God, and in the beauties of his perfection, he is bound by his perfection to do all that he does for the highest good. A perfect being cannot function with less than perfect motives. What is the highest good? The scriptures make it very, very clear that the highest good in the universe is the glory of God. God is bound by his own perfection to do everything that he does for his own glory. Now, for you and me to do things for our glory is sin. But for God to do what he does for his own glory is necessary in the light of his own perfection. Our humanistic society, however, teaches us to think of man as the apex of reality. Oh, not so. Not so. There is a creator God, a redeemer God, who is infinitely above us, and who has determined that all things eventually should be to the praise of his glory. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Now, there are a number of things in the outline material you have before you. I think they're in the salmon-colored pages there, that I'd like to hurry through very quickly because we want to get to the last part and spend most of our time in this session indeed on that. And I hope you will realize as we do this that we're not skipping some of these things lightly because they're not important, but rather because, uh, I think that we'll just refer to these and hope that it is really a review for you, that you've done some careful thinking about the issue of the glory of God, and that in this, it will not only be a review, but there will be enough references here to give you some direction for refreshed studies on your own, as you will have occasion, I hope, to do that. This is not intended to be exhaustive. At any point along the way, other passages may be added to this, and as you study, you may wish to add more passages to these points along the way. But just to review by way of background and foundation, before we get to the more specific issues that Ross and I will be dealing with today in our sessions. First of all, let's take just a moment to refresh our minds in the fact that there are three primary words in the Old Testament and two primary words in the New Testament that are translated glory, glory. And you can see here a lexical spell out of these words in a, a transliterated way, and you can see, by looking at the, the, uh, synonyms following, something of the nature of the terminology in the scripture. When we read of the glory of God, or God manifesting his glory, or that which is done for the glory of God, uh, you see words that have to do with greatness, with magnifying, with making great and, and, and swelling up, having to do with that which embellishes or causes to, to shine. The New Testament words, to be very apparent, to manifest dignity, and of course, to radiate with splendor. Uh, the idea of glory is a very, very simple one, and yet a very awesome one. And our God is a glorious God. In fact, the scriptures speak of our God as the God of glory. Glory originates with God. I revel in passages like in Stephen's message in the book of Acts. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham. The God of glory. It's marvelous when human beings find themselves in awe at the glory of God. And there have been indeed a number of times in the history of God's dealing with mankind as recorded in the scriptures, when God has manifested his glory. I've given you just a few here, but let's think through them very quickly. There are times when the glory of God has been manifested in such things as a bright cloud, sometimes called shekinah, or a fire that burns, or brilliant whiteness, or intense light. These descriptive statements are found in a number of scriptures that remind us of the fact that all through the history of God's dealing with mankind, he has been pleased on occasion to manifest his glory, that is, to cause his glory to impact the physical senses of the human being. You will remember, for example, that, as we said, he p- he, Stephen reminds us that the God of glory appeared to our father Abraham. And by the way, Abraham was never the same after that. Never the same. Uh, you want to see a contrast? Uh, one of the things I love to do in the scripture is study the contrasts that are given to us. They're not only found in the parallelisms of Hebrew poetry, but they're found in the context of the scripture. Uh, frequently, for example, the contrast of lives that God presents to us side by side in the scripture. There's a David and a Saul, there is an Elijah and an Ahab, and there is an Abraham and a Lot. Men who lived in the same period of history, spoke the same language, often slept in the same tent, no doubt, had the same cultural orientation, faced the same issues in life, and we're going to see them both in heaven. But their lives, in spite of all of these similarities in their experience, their lives ended up poles apart, poles apart. And I think one of the reasons was that the God of glory appeared to Abraham, and he was never the same thereafter. Alot, though a believer, was sort of a second generation, a secondhand believer. There's no evidence that Lot ever came to realize our the awe, the majesty, the splendor of the living God. Oh, a believer, yes. But Abraham knew the glory of God, and the outcome of his life was measurably different. We read in Genesis chapter fifteen that in sealing the covenant, the living God appeal- revealed to Abraham as a smoking oven and as a flaming torch. You remember that event, the sacrifices cut in two and the glory presence of God appearing in that scene. The God of glory appearing to Moses, the burning bush. You read that account again, you will find that it wasn't the fire that impressed Moses. It was the fact that the fire did not consume. Ah, Moses had seen a lot of fire. No doubt there were many, many, many nights in the cold winter nights when he warmed himself at a fire, but this fire was different. And he drew near to see why such brilliant fire, but the bush was not consumed. Moses! The voice of God. Ha ha. Take your shoes off your feet, Moses. You stand on holy ground. The God of glory was there. We read in Exodus chapter thirteen of the cloud that came over the nation of Israel. By day, a beautiful white cloud to shelter them from the heat of the sun and to guide them through the wilderness. By night, that cloud was a glowing fire to light the camp and to warm them from the desert cold. What was that cloud? The visible manifestation of the glory presence of God. You remember when the tabernacle was dedicated, that there was lightning and smoke, first of all in the mountain, and then at the dedication of the tent. The smoke, the manifest presence of the glory of God, so much so that the writer of the Hebrews reminds us that even Moses said, I am full of fear and trembling. I want to tell you, brethren, there is no substitute for coming aware of the glory of God. And I am convinced that every Christian needs to spend time in the presence of God, the kind of time that gives the living God an opportunity to make us aware of the fact that he is the God of glory. And that we will not treat his presence in our lives lightly. And that we will not flippantly deal with the issues of biblical and eternal truth. Our God is a God of glory. You remember when the temple was dedicated, of Solomon's temple, the glory of God like smoke filled the house, and even the holy priests had to get out. They couldn't stand it. Such was the awesome presence of the manifest glory of God. And then, of course, there's the account of Ezekiel. I've given you the ver- passages here. You remember that sad, sad account of Ezekiel near the end of God's dealings with his ancient earthly people. Ezekiel, in a prophetic vision, saw the glory cloud lift up off the mercy seat and then go to the doorway of the holiest of all, hovering as though reluctant to leave. And then, in the next chapter, you see that glory cloud out in the holy place where the altar of incense and the candelabra and the table of showbread were, and again it lingered as though reluctant to leave. And then Ezekiel, in a prophetic vision, saw that cloud of glory go into the outer court and again linger. And then in his prophetic vision, he saw it go to the top of the Mount of Olives and linger reluctantly again, and then it was gone. Gone. You ever wondered why, when the Babylonians rushed into the city of Jerusalem, they were able to take all of those vessels of gold out of the temple and carry them away? Why weren't they struck dead? Ah, the glory presence had left. And all down through the ages is voiced in the later Psalms, the cry of those Hebrew faithful, oh, to see thy glory. Because Ezekiel prophesied, you will find it in chapter forty three, that someday in the millennial government of Messiah, the glory would return to the house. And down through the years, the faithful cried, oh, to see thy glory, to see thy glory. And then one day, it happened. And there were shepherds out in a field watching their flocks. And Luke tells us, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them, and they were terrified. The people of God hadn't seen that for centuries. The glory of the Lord. Why? God was moving in this tree. He was sending his son that night, in his humility, a babe born in a stable not far away, not far away. The manifest glory of God. And once in his earthly sojourn, the disciples saw it. We see the account of the in- of of the transfiguration in the synoptics, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and Peter reminds us later on in his aged life, we were eyewitnesses of his majesty, and they saw the glory. They saw him shine, and they tried to describe the glistening whiteness, the radiance, and then they described the cloud that engulfed them. It was there. I like what Schaefer said about that. You remember Peter's blundering words, Lord, let's build. Let's house this. You see, Peter had an Old Testament frame of mind. Let's build, let's house the glory. Let's keep it here. But as Doctor Schaefer said, he had the right interpretation, but he had the wrong application. He knew what he was seeing. He was seeing glory, the brightness, the clouds, the effulgence of our Lord Jesus in all of his glory. But through most of his sojourn, it was not so, as we shall see. But Stephen saw it. Stephen saw his glory just before he died as a martyr. Remember, he lifted up his face to heaven, and he saw the glory of God. Paul saw it. Let's interview Paul for a moment. Paul, what on earth happened to you on the Damascus Road? Well, I tell you, I was an old clay pot full of darkness, on my way to carry out my spiteful hatred against people of the way. And then there was the light. Oh, the light, brighter than the unveiled noonday sun in the country of Syria. Have you ever been in the Middle East? The intensity of the noonday sun? Paul said it made the sun look like darkness, the brightness of that light. Really, Paul? What was that light? It was the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, and it shone in my dark heart. Paul, what was the source of that light? The face of Jesus Christ. Glory. And he was never the same. Never the same. And then, of course, years later, there was the old Apostle John. I loved that Revelation chapter one when John tries to describe what he saw when he saw the glorified Christ. Oh, he uses expressions like the whiteness of his appearance, his eyes like flames of fire, his face shining as the sun in its strength. He, he just tries his best to describe. It's all descriptive language. Why? He was seeing glory. Glory. But the point is, that while our Lord Jesus is described in the scripture as the radiance of the glory of God, he is the manifestation of the eternal God. He is God. Yet, characteristically, even though there were these manifestations of his glory, particularly at the Transfiguration, most of the references to the glory of God in the incarnation of Christ, the glory is veiled. And people did not see brightness. They did not see fire. They did not see smoke. Yes, the prophet had said, Luke chapter two, that he would come as a light to the Gentiles and a glory to the people of Israel. We read in the scriptures, as the scriptures unfold his earthly sojourn, that, uh, he he was, you know, in even in his humility, in his miracle at Mer- uh, at at Cana, John chapter two, In that miracle, John says he manifested his glory. But most people didn't see that. Uh, we read in, in chapter eight, he reminds the people, I am not here to seek my own glory. His glory was veiled, characteristically. When he stood at the grave of Lazarus, he had said, this sickness is not permanent, it's for the manifestation of the glory of God, and he reminded these grieving sisters if they believed they would see the glory of God. And there was miracle, to be sure, but not brightness, not fire, not bright light. And then, of course, that statement, which we will hear much more about later on in John seventeen, where our Lord, anticipating the cross, said, Father, glorify me. I hope you've seen something glorious in Calvary, but the world didn't. The world didn't. Characteristically, in his sojourn, the glory was veiled. Now, that's a significant point I'd like to make later on. We'll come back to that. But first of all, to just mention, as in point four, that there are prophetic references to the glory of God manifested. By the way, the C shouldn't be there. Just mark that out, please. It was a misprint in the material I presented to John. It got picked up some way. Just remove it. Prophetic manifestations. There are glory statements regarding the advent, the Son of Man coming in power and great glory. There is glory returning related to the heavenly temple, and there's a manifestation of glory in the New Jerusalem. You will find a number of references that speak of the manifestation of glory yet to come. But we want to come back now to the specific point, and that is, first of all, to remind ourselves that in the earthly sojourn of our Lord Jesus, there were, to be sure, those occasions when his glory was manifest, when the brightness, the cloud, the splendor of his radiance, of his person impacted the senses of his disciples. But for the most part, in the incarnation, that was not so. The woman at the well just saw him as another Jewish man. Strange that you, being a Jew, asked me to give you a drink. Just another Jewish man. She'd seen them all. Oh, after she talked to him, she rushed into the city, testifying to his messiahship. Oh, it was different then, but not because she saw brightness, not because of something that impacted her physical sense, but rather because of the work of the Christ by his spirit in her heart. And we need to recognize that because characteristically in the church, the glory of God is not visibly manifested. I've been in a number of dedication services of a new building, a new chapel, a new hall. I've never seen Shekinah. Have you? I haven't. I've never stood at a burning bush. I have never seen a mountain tremble and quake with fire and smoke. Characteristically, in the church, the glory is not visibly manifested. And I think that's a significant point, because the scriptures teach us, however, that the purpose of God is that there would be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus. And the scriptures tell us that the glory of God is, in fact, manifested in the church. But it is not manifested in the physically visible sense. Therefore, we have to turn to the scriptures to find out how it is in fact manifested. Visible manifestation of glory. For example, when I stepped up here to speak today, if suddenly smoke and fire would pour out of this po- podium, out of holes in the floor or something, and fire would radiate and flash. Boy, you'd know the glory of God was being manifested. I don't have any matches. But that's not the way it is in the church. Oh, the rock groups like to produce their smoke, bright lights. They love it. But you see, that's not the way the glory of God is manifested in the church, and it's certainly not trumped up through smoke machines. People of all ages have known that. By the way, you know that's why old Elijah poured all that water on that sacrifice, don't you? To make sure that everybody realized that what was going to happen there was not something that he kindled up subtly from underneath, but rather something that came down from above. And to be sure, it did. It did. But you see, in the church, typically, glory is not physically manifested, and therefore we have to turn to the scriptures to find out what really does bring glory to God in the church, because we cannot detect this by our physical senses. Therefore, we're dependent upon the revelation of the scriptures to tell us what does manifest the glory or bring glory to Christ in the church. We can't depend on our senses. We must depend upon revelation. Now, as I reminded you here, we have been called unto his glory. It's a part of the calling of the Christian, not only to live for his glory here and to do that which brings glory to our Lord here, but eventually to see his glory and to share his glory eternally. That's our calling. Not only that, you find in the scripture that there are many, many times when we are reminded that we ascribe glory to God. That is, we speak of his glory. We tell about his glory. We, as you find replete in the scriptures, these are only a few of the verses, the New Testament writers bursting out with their terminology, to the praise of his glory. See. They were aware of the fact that man's chief end is to glorify God, and one of the ways to do that is to verbally ascribe glory to God. Because, you see, our world doesn't see this. Our world doesn't see it. God has chosen in this age that his glory is going to be manifested in ways other than that which impacts the physical senses. Oh, if he pleased, he could choose on occasion to use fire and smoke and... But the pattern of the scriptures indicates that characteristically in this age, the glory of God in the church is going to be manifested in other ways than physical and visible to our senses. How then will it be? And this is a specific point I would like to emphasize in our thoughts together today. Now, this is not exhaustive, point number six, but I've given you just a few, first of all, some negative references. That is, references which speak of the conduct of human beings which detract from or rob God of his glory. Paul, for example, in Romans chapter one and two, talks about the propensity of the human heart to exchange the glory of the incorruptible God for an image of corruptible man, or of birds, or of four-footed creatures, or of creepy crawly things. Look at the idols of the pagans. Corruptible things that have been substituted for the glory of the incorruptible God. By the way, if you go on to chapter two, Paul tells us that there is yet a darker idolatry than the creepy crawly things and the birds and the four-footed creatures, and that is the dark idolatry of self in the human experience. Humanism, I am convinced, is the ultimately darkest form of idolatry. And that is the idolatry of our culture and of our age. Little children, says the New Testament, keep yourselves from idols. The glory of God negatively, Spene in chapter three. Why? Paul says all sin and come short of the glory. Think of the tense there. The first verb is eros, all sin, pointing to the past when Adam sinned. When Adam sinned, we all sinned. And we are continually, as a result, coming short of the glory of God. As a result of that sin of Adam, when all sinned, the hi- re- the history of the race is that we continually come short of the glory of God. Now, you know that the word for sin literally means to miss the mark. To miss the mark. What is the mark? To fall short of the target. What is the target? I take it from this passage in Romans three that the target is the glory of God. And anything that falls short of that is sin. We don't think that way. We don't have a high enough view of sin. How's that for strange language? Now, let me illustrate this. I come from farm country, and I go out in the spring. I love to see farmers plow. The only thing better than that is if I'm on the tractor. You know, you say you can take a boy off the farm, can't take the farm out of a boy. But we watch two farmers plow. They're Iowa farms, and, uh, I know these people, and so I say, you see that man? What he's doing is sin. Is he? And the scripture says the plowing of the wicked is sin. See that man? What he's doing is not sin. And you look, and this man's plowing straight furrows. He's covering the trash. So he's doing as good a job as this man. How can you say this man's plowing his sin? Because he's not doing it for the glory of God, that's why. That's why. You see, our concept of sin isn't high enough. Anything that falls short, any want of conformity to the glory of God is sin. That's the mark that we miss in our sin. The glory of God. And there are others that you could see here in terms of these references that are negatively speaking, but let's hurry on to some of the positive perspectives. What are the things that we as the people of God can do functionally that bring glory to God? And we say we've got to turn to the scriptures here because the glory in the church is not visibly manifest. We are not seeing Shekinah in our chapels, not even at the breaking of bread. We're not seeing fire burning that does not consume. We're not seeing dazzling brightness. God is not characteristically manifesting his glory in visible ways, in these physical impacting of our senses. And so we must turn to the scriptures to find out what brings glory to God. We can't determine this with our senses. It's only known through revelation. Now, we're not going to be able to cover all of these. I want to make a reference to a few of them here and, uh, suggest for your study not only the rest of these listed, but others in addition to this. This is not an exhaustive list, but there are a few here I want to point out rather specifically. First of all, number two. I love the statement in Romans fifteen where Paul is talking about a reception policy. He tells us not only that we should receive one another, but he tells us what the basis of church reception, assembly reception should be. Romans fifteen and verse seven. Therefore, he says, receive one another just as Christ also received us to the glory of God. When we in the fellowship of the local church receive fellow believers on the same basis as Christ has received them, we do that to the glory of God. Now, there's no smoke or fire. I've never seen it, but the scriptures tell us that that brings glory to God. You see, in our human propensities, we can draw all kinds of lines and dare people to cross. We can set up all kinds of shibboleths. We can engineer all kinds of standards to exclude the people that we're not comfortable with, and only a few people that really hit it off really nice with us. But that's not New Testament church reception. New Testament church reception is not exclusive, it is inclusive. And it includes all who have been received by Christ. And Paul says, when we do that, that is to the glory of God. No smoke, no fire, but when we do that, it's to the glory of God. Not only that, notice First Corinthians ten. There's a very interesting one, which the Apostle Paul is talking about doubtful things, disputed things, uh, meat that was offered to idols, and all these problems they were struggling through in that first century context. And then he reminds them in this summary statement in verse thirty one that whatever they do, uh, they do to the glory of God, even eating or drinking. I assume he's talking about taking a common meal. Do you realize that even in such an ordinary everyday thing as sitting down and eating a common meal, you can do that to the glory of God. This is the privilege of the believer, to do everything that we do to his glory. Now, you see, the world doesn't have this option. I feel sorry for men and women in the world. You know, they think they're broad-minded. Ha, they've got tunnel vision. They think they're free. Let's face it, folks, they're slaves. Uh, just take a statement like Galatians six. The Galatians six gives us options as a Christian. I can sow, unfortunately, to my own flesh, and from the flesh reap corruption, but I have the option of sowing to the Spirit, and from the Spirit reaping life everlasting. Now, the unbeliever doesn't have that option. They are in the flesh. They cannot please God, Paul says. They don't have the option, but I do. You do as a believer. Oh, unfortunately, I may sow to my own flesh too, and we're warned against that, but the believer has the option. I remember once in a graduate school, University of Missouri, the head of the department said to me on one occasion, he said, Dan, you know, as a Bible believer, you have something that, he said, I, I'm a humanist, I thought I was broad-minded. He said, you make me feel like I've got tunnel vision. I never thought this way, but he came up with this. So I sat there silently, not knowing what he was going to say. And he said, you know, for example, your view of man. He said, you talk about depravity. He said, I can't go that low. My humanism won't let me go that low. Sometimes I suspect you're right, he said, but I can't go that low. My humanism won't let me. He said, you talk about man as potentially elevated to the family of God, heirs of God, joint heirs with Christ. Man, he said, my humanism can't go that high. He said, I thought I was broad-minded as a humanist. You make me feel like I've got tunnel vision. That's true. That's true. Don't apologize for your, the, the privileges of the faith in Christ. If the Son makes you free, you're free, indeed, truly. You're free to glorify God. That's why Paul appeals in Romans chapter six. Look, once you were a slave to sin, just like the unsaved world out there, and you had no choice but to live as slaves to sin, but now you've got the choice. So glorify God in your body and your spirit. That's our privilege. Even, Paul says, in taking a common meal. Even the everyday things in life we can do to the glory of God. What a privilege. Look at the passage of First Corinthians eleven. I wish we had time for this. We dabbled around on a little bit a few years ago when we dealt with the issue of biblical manhood. I think we need to review this from time to time because it's a very striking statement that very, very few people are willing to even look at, much less talk about these days. But there is a contrast in First Corinthians eleven and verse seven. and the contrast is between men and women. And Paul says that the man, that is the godly man, the purpose of the godly man in God's purpose is that he ought not to cover his head since he is the image and glory of God. But the woman is the glory of man. Now, please, I'm not trying to emphasize here that the woman can't do, the Christian woman can't do anything to the glory of God. No, no, that's not the point. She can. She can live to the glory of God just like the man can. What Paul is saying here, gentlemen, is that the Christian man who understands his Bible and who understands the unique purposes of God for a Christian man, an adult male person, has unique ways in which his life is to the glory of God. And in manifesting the uniqueness of Christian godly manhood, there is a unique dimension in which that life is to the glory of God. What a privilege. And we, by and large, lost it because we're even afraid to think in these terms. But my Bible tells me, I don't know, check yours, see if it's still there. Verse seven still there in your Bible? Read it once in a while. Ponder it. For us as godly men, at least in our desire, to live in godly manhood, there is a unique sense, Paul says, in which the Christian man, living as he should, brings glory to God. A very unique sense. A very unique sense. I wish we had time to explore this, a very significant element of the subject. How can we bring glory to God? I want to tell you, Christian men, there are unique ways in which a Christian man enlightened by the scripture has some unique opportunities to bring glory to God that our saved children and our godly wives do not share. We hurry on. Look at number seven. Second Corinthians eight nineteen, Paul refers to the glory of God there. What's happening? Well, there's a famine over in Judea, and Christians are hungry there, and so believers over in those newer assemblies over in Achaia and Macedonia are taking up a collection to send relief to hungry Christians over in Judea. And Paul has set this up very carefully. Each assembly that they come to that contributes, a very re- respectable and mature and trustworthy man joins them. It's a group project, everything is being handled carefully. What's going on there? They are handling the Lord's money with great care and open integrity. Do you get that? That's the context. They're handling the Lord's money ethically, carefully. They're administering this matter of the collection and the distribution of it with great, great care. And you see there in verse nineteen that this is for the glory of the Lord himself. Now we know what it's like to see the name of Christ dragged in the dust when finances are not handled well among the people of God. We even see this tragic thing at the national level sometimes. But what Paul says is, and there may not be any smoke or fire, and it may never get in the news, but when the people of God handle the Lord's money with integrity and with open ethical honesty, Paul says, that is for the glory of our Lord himself. So let us make sure that we handle the Lord's money with great integrity and with open fairness and honesty. That is to the glory of our Lord. Just a couple of more in the time we have here. I love second Corinthians eight. You see, a number of assemblies were participating in this. By the way, I must admit, when we talk about drift, one of the things I see in drift among our assemblies is that we're losing our historic sense of inter-assembly fellowship. That concerns me very deeply. As I read my New Testament, I see a lot of evidence that while each local assembly in the New Testament was autonomous, they were nevertheless very warmly in fellowship with each other and did a lot of things together and cooperated in effort. This very effort that was going on to take funds over to the needy saints over in, in Judea, this was a, a group project of a number of assemblies. Think of your camp ministry. Think of the Emmaus Correspondence Ministry. No single assembly could ever accomplish things like that. And without violating the biblical teaching of the autonomy of the New Testament assembly, we can have those fellowship efforts that bring glory to God because they impact more lives than any single assembly could do. And that's precisely what's happening here in second Corinthians chapter eight verse twenty three where Paul says, uh, notice he says, for Titus, he's my partner, fellow worker among you. As for our brethren, who's this? This group of men representing a number of assemblies who were involved in the proper handling of these funds. As for our brethren, they are messengers of the churches, a glory to Christ. What's happening here? A number of local churches are in fellowship in this project, and representatives from those local churches are assisting in the integrity of its handling. And in this inter-assembly fellowship, Paul says, a glory to Christ. Let's not lose it, fellow believers. We need the integrity of New Testament teaching concerning the autonomy of the local church. We also need the strength and the beauty of inter-assembly fellowship of a New Testament sort. One more. Notice, now which one shall we look at? James chapter two and verse one. This is an interesting one, and you need to exegete this very, very carefully. But in James chapter two, really he's appealing that we don't let favoritism spoil the life of the New Testament church. You've seen the passage often. You probably taught this passage. My brethren, do not hold your faith in the glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism. James says, wait a minute, folks, he is the glorious Christ. Do you see the implication of the passage? Personal favoritism in the life of the assembly robs our Lord of his glory. And when we relate to each other, not with personal favoritism, but with the openness that ought to express, be expressed among the believers. It is our glorious Christ who is manifested in that. See, we like to draw, our humanists, you know, we draw into little groups. You watch after the meetings in your assembly. These people always get together, and this little group gets together, and this little... It's easy for us to do that. And certain people can walk in and out, and nobody ever even say hi to them. And they go out feeling like they have leprosy or something. James says, uh-uh, uh-uh. Not with favoritism. Why? We have a glorious Christ. We have a glorious Christ. We must stop. But let me remind you that as the ancient philosophers struggled with the meaning of life, and they sought to find out what really is a worthy goal for human experience, they lived and died without the answer because they did not realize that man's chief end is not to become a philosopher, nor a great military leader, but man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. The glory is not visible in the church. We don't see Shekinah in our assemblies. But the scriptures say that our God would be glorified in the church. Our Savior would be glorified in his church. And for that to be so, we must turn to the scriptures. We can't see it with our physical eyes. We're not generating smoke. We're living in obedience to the revealed word of God, and that obedient pattern of life is to the glory of God, even in everyday things like taking a common meal. May God sensitize our hearts to that which is uppermost in the mind of God, that which our is our highest calling, to glorify our God, and then to enjoy him forever.