Guest Speaker | Dr. Shane Parker

Sunday, June 4th | Dr. Shane Parker

"But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed." — Isaiah 53:5

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Guest

Dr. Shane Parker

What is Willow Ridge Sermons?

Sermon audio from Sunday services at Willow Ridge Church.

Welcome to the Willow Ridge Sermons podcast.

This is where you can find audio from Sunday morning messages and more.

Make sure you're subscribed so that you don't miss future episodes.

And thanks for listening.

We're glad to be here with you.

My family and I are a part of Willow Ridge, and we're grateful to be here, especially days like this.

We get to celebrate baptism and the Lord's Supper here in a few minutes together.

I'm grateful to be able to sing praises to the Lord, thankful for Joel and the team helping us to do that.

And I'm grateful to be at a church that week in, week out takes us through the Scripture.

So I want to say publicly, I'm grateful for Pastor Beau and Dave as they preach week in, week out and care for us in that way.

And so it means a lot to me.

It means a lot to my family.

We're only nine chapters in, nine tennis chapters into Genesis, so we're nine chapters in to a book that's 1189 chapters.

So we're at the beginning.

All right, we're definitely at the beginning of this journey through Genesis.

And anytime I'm reading anything, I kind of want to know, what's the end game like?

What is all this for?

And we could go to the end of the Bible and we could read some of the culmination of what God's going to do.

But there's a question, I think, deeper there as we read every single one of those over a thousand chapters.

Why?

Why is God doing this?

Why does he want to do this?

Honestly, I mean, nine chapters in?

I mean, it's not exactly a rosy picture.

There's been gross evil.

There's been the unleashing of wrath on the whole human race except for one family.

And when I look at that picture, it then gets a little bit difficult for some of us that have said this to people when we're trying to grasp, what's this book for?

What's God doing?

And we say things like this, well, this is God's love letter to you.

That's strange to me when we say that.

And I've said it.

Maybe you've said it because it's misleading.

Here's why we know it's misleading.

When you read the scores of nameless, faceless soldiers that wrote from a battlefield, love letters to their spouse to their girlfriend, when you read historical records that we have of love letters we just think are interesting.

Ronald Reagan to Nancy.

For example, on Air Force One, Johnny Cash to June Carter Cash calling her princess on her birthday, jimmy Hendrix to whatever girl that was.

And it's half poetry, half we don't know what it is in true Hendrix style.

Beethoven to his immortal beloved.

And we think we got an heir to one to two women, but we don't actually know who that was.

Maybe it was both of them.

That's one theory.

Do you know what all those love letters, all of them.

And anyone you've ever written has in common.

When you sit down to pour out your heart onto the page, it's very clear, every word, every phrase.

The party of honor, the party that's focused, the party that is the reason for the letter, is the recipient is the person you're writing to.

Or if guys, if you didn't know that that was just a quick crash course, all right?

It's about her.

It's about her beauty, her greatness, her characteristics that you're enamored with.

But there's no way we can read the Bible and think that God wrote the Bible to put us at the center.

Again, nine chapters in, and it's already very clear he's at the center.

This book is about its author, and the love that exudes from Him is a love that's unmatched because he's actually God, and he actually wants us to know the love that he will not hesitate to pour on us, not just now, but if we hope in Him through all eternity.

And so because that's true, it can't be a love letter in the sense that we usually think about it, although it unhesitatingly, speaks of his love for us.

So I come back to why do all of this God?

Why make people?

Why interact with them?

Why stay committed to them?

Why interact with them in this way?

And why record it for us?

And there are a number of passages that we could go to to try to uncover that what is God doing and why does he do it?

But we're just going to look at, at least at the outset, isaiah 48.

And so just a note about Isaiah, and particularly Isaiah 48.

Isaiah's prophesying and telling the people of Judah, he said, here's the situation.

There is exile for you.

They understand their history.

Enslaved in Egypt, they understand now they're in exile.

They're not in their home.

They're pushed out from there.

And God is going to communicate how he's going to deliver them and bring them back home.

Man what welcome news.

I mean, some of us never left our home.

Some of you, like me, you've moved multiple places away from your home.

And maybe now I'm back home where I'm originally from.

But regardless of that, there's something about being brought home all the more when you're pushed out and held in subjection to a ruler and to a kingdom that you don't honor, you don't respect, and you really shouldn't even be there.

And God's going to deliver them and rescue them, because that's what he does consistently for his people.

He rescues them.

He loves them, he cares for them, and he's going to be very specific about why he does that.

Isaiah 48, verse nine.

For my name's sake, I defer my anger.

For the sake of my praise, I restrain it for you that I may not cut you off.

Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver.

I've tried you in the furnace of affliction.

For my own sake.

For my own sake, I do it.

For how should my name be profaned my glory I will not give to another.

Here's the punchline.

God does everything that he does ultimately for his own glory.

That's his ultimate purpose.

That's very clear from this text.

It's very clear in the reading of the entirety of scripture.

I mean, you'd be at pains to try to find another understanding of this.

God, you're going to rescue us.

You love us lavishly.

You're committed to us no matter what.

We are going to be yours forever as your people.

Why do you do that, God?

I do it for my sake.

I do it for my glory.

And immediately, if we're not careful, we go, what does all that mean?

What do those words even mean?

And could it be that God's a narcissist?

Right?

Because now, especially in 2023, we love to throw around clinical terms.

We don't even know what they mean, but they show up on social media all the time.

So if we just took a clinical diagnostic narcissistic personality disorder, the key indicator that you have that disorder is that you have an improper notion of your value or station.

You have an inflated view of who you are.

God, who fashioned all reality and is holding every molecule in the cosmos together, including every fiber of your body right now, including your beating heart.

And my beating heart.

I'm not really sure he could have an overinflated view of himself.

I don't think that's possible to do that.

I think he estimates himself, rightly?

And so because of that, he cares about the fact that his people have not been faithful to him before all these other nations.

His people have not honored him with who they are, and so he's going to rescue them even after an exile and a period of refinement.

But he's doing it because who he is is inextricably connected to who they are, and he loves them with all he is, and he wants to maintain the person of who he is, not just in front of them, but before all the nations and all the world for all time.

And so what does he mean by all these statements of his own sake, his own name?

Think about it like this his own sake.

If you say this is for me, it means exactly that.

It's for you yourself.

You're referring to yourself.

It's for my sake.

It gets a little bit more murky when we start talking about name.

You do this for your name.

That's odd to us in particular because I know your mom and daddy just like maybe you did.

If you have kids painstakingly, right?

You had the, like, 3 million book names, book boom, right?

We got to go through every name to make sure we get the right one.

And what does it mean, right?

And I want to make sure it has good meaning and you and I but nobody cares what your name means, right?

In our culture, your name is a way to tell each other apart.

Oh, yes.

Steve.

Steve who?

Steve Phillips.

Not Steve Brown.

Oh, okay, good.

I wonder what Steve means.

What does Steven mean?

Nobody cares.

We don't care about that now.

I just know you're not the same guy as this other guy.

That's the way we use it.

The idea of God's name is much more like a superhero, right?

When you hear about Superman, it's very clear from his name what's distinct about him.

He's a superman, right?

He's greater than men.

He can do things that other men aren't capable of.

That's why he's superhuman, or in this case, Superman, because he's from Krypton.

Batman, he dresses up like a bat.

That's not a good example.

But Aquaman aquaman lives in the water.

He's from the water.

He can actually navigate the water.

I don't understand why he has a submarine in some of the Super Friends episodes.

Because he's Aquaman, but he does.

Okay, so he's Aquaman, my personal favorite because we have the same last name, spiderman.

Right?

So Peter Parker.

I mean, when you're a little kid he's got my last name.

That's my favorite superhero now.

He still is.

He still is.

Why is he called Spiderman?

He acts like a spider.

His name indicates something that only he is able to do, because only he is like that.

His name is a designation in the case of God that speaks to his uniqueness in his holiness.

That's why the Jewish people, even to this day, are fearful of and refrain from speaking the proper name of God for fear they might mispronounce it and in some way profane or dishonor it.

And because that's true, they don't want to in any way violate who he is because they know that name describes his perfection, his holiness.

It's a way, a title to depict that.

Okay, well, he's passionate for his own sake.

He's worried about his name being profaned.

And he's also saying, this is for my own glory.

So what does glory mean?

I think glory is a way to display all those perfections of who he is.

It's a way to show you, to show the world, to show me.

This is how great he is.

This is how we should be enamored.

Because look who he is.

Look what he's done.

Look who he continues to be, not just right now, but without end.

And he's always been that way, with no beginning.

That's who God is.

How glorious.

And so what are we to do?

He's concerned about the praise of his name.

We praise we just did that in singing.

The whole idea behind worship is that God has revealed himself to us, shown who he is.

We respond in worship.

That's what praise is.

It's a response to the greatness of the glory of God that's depicted in his name.

Because of who he is in his essence, and God is not a narcissist, and he's also not an idolater, because for some of us, some of this is hard to hear.

You're telling me God is chiefly concerned with his glory, his greatness, his grandeur, but that sounds like his off base a little bit.

That doesn't sound like the God of the Bible.

Actually, in Exodus 20, he's pretty explicit that no human being is to have any other god before him, and that's not a numerical list.

That does not mean make sure that he's the top number one God, and then all the other gods are listed afterwards.

That's much in the way any king would say, don't bring evil before me, in front of me anywhere.

There are no other gods at this point.

And if that's his standard for humanity to be right and good and virtuous, is he not right and good and virtuous?

If he is, then there are no other gods before him but him.

He's central.

If that's not true, then he commits sin, and the second he commits sin, he ceases to be God, and you and I have no hope ever again, ever.

He has to be central, but he's not a narcissist because God is not selfish in his desire to be glorified and to be honored.

I think this passage actually teaches us that because God is ultimately concerned with his own glory.

That is the proof, in fact, beyond argument, that he loves us completely.

The reason I say that is when you look at how he's dealing with the people here.

For my name's sake, I defer my anger.

For the sake of my praise, I restrain it for you, that I may not cut you off, but I have refined you, but not a silver.

I've tried you in the furnace of affliction.

For my own sake, for my own sake I do it.

How should my name be profane?

My glory I won't give to another.

How does this passage communicate love to us?

God is angry with them.

Why is he angry?

Isaiah 43 is very clear.

The reason that God created everything and every human being is for his own glory.

Isaiah 49.

The reason why, out of all that creation, he put his blessing on Abraham and his descendants and the promise that would come to Messiah through Abraham.

The reason he did that explicitly for my own glory.

In the Exodus, in chapter 14, for example, pharaoh is actually going to come in and try to overtake the Israelites.

They've come out and through the Red Sea.

Why is God going to wash over and drown Pharaoh and his army?

So that he would have glory over Pharaoh.

That's why he does it.

Why is it that he brings them out of exile here?

Why is he doing Ezekiel 36?

I'm doing it to demonstrate my name, he says explicitly, for my glory to be seen and beheld.

He's made them.

He's rescued them and put his compassionate, covenant love on them and never left them.

Through all the twists and turns, he's there.

There's no question, because like Numbers 23 says, he's not like a man who lies or who changes his mind.

He is stuck with them.

And he has ensured that they have lived and survived and ultimately that they will thrive and a savior will come that he promised.

In the garden, Adam and Eve, what have they done in response to that?

For his own sake, for his name?

For his glory?

Praise?

No, they have not praised him.

They have profaned his name.

The text says another way you can translate that term is they have prostituted his name.

And that, connotation, is what's intended.

You carry my name because you're my people.

Every other nation, even you, one to another, you're looking at each other and going, we're gods.

We belong to him.

We're his people.

You know what you've been doing?

You've been going and in idolatrous fashion, giving yourself to everything else other than me.

And then when times get hard, things are a little thin, you're not sure which end is up.

You're confused.

You run back to me, you plead with me, you call on my name, you sing praises to me, and then you drift again and then back and forth.

You use me for improper things.

I'm not to be used that way.

I'm not to be prostituted.

And that's what they've done.

So then I'm going to ask the obvious question.

Is it right for him to be angry with them?

He's given them life.

He's given them divine relationship with himself.

He sustained them and rescued them repeatedly.

He's upheld them and brought them through the most dire of trials, secured them over and over again.

I'm a guess if you're sitting at dinner with your buddies or girlfriends, whichever friend group you're in, and somebody says, I've given my whole life to this guy.

I've loved him, I've devoted myself to him.

I provided for him as he's provided for me financially.

We've made a home together.

We said, to death do us part.

And you know what he's doing?

He's running around everywhere and he's been doing it.

Somebody at that table is going to be sitting across the table and go, man, this is three years of you saying, this, lady.

Three years.

Somebody's going to get it in their head, well, enough is enough.

You want to keep doing that?

You keep putting up with that.

Yes, he's right to be angry.

I think we would all agree with that.

That's worth being angry about.

Not sinfully angry, but certainly angry about, because it's not right.

It's not appropriate for his people to treat him in that way, just like it would not be right for your spouse to treat you in that way.

So if he's right to be angry at them, and so anger requires consequence.

It requires justice be done.

That's right.

We all agree with that.

Fundamentally, as human beings, we agree with that.

Is God really doing the right thing?

Because he's just been very clear in his lavish love for them.

I'm holding back.

I'm not going to do it.

I'm not going to cut you off.

I'm not going to leave you.

I'm going to maintain my promise.

Is that right for Him to do that?

It's only right for Him to do that.

If judgment falls somewhere, if that judgment for that Heinous life that they are living, if that judgment and that punishment doesn't fall on them, it's got to fall somewhere for God to be right.

And just as God isaiah 53, verse four, surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted.

But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities.

Upon Him was the punishment that brought us peace.

And with his stripes we are healed.

All we, like sheep, have gone astray.

We have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all, and that's where the judgment falls.

God will do what is right and just, and he will have mercy on his people in ways that we can't even imagine.

He does it right here, and he does that to demonstrate that he loves us enough to not be an idolater, but truly be God.

He loves us enough to actually be central in everything, in creation and in eternity.

Because he's actually God.

And he loves us enough to be rooted in who he is and maintain his person to us because that is the only way he can give His Son in our place if he truly is God.

Because only God can do that.

And the New Testament is very clear.

He didn't spare his son.

He spared them.

Restrain it.

Hold back.

I'm not going to cut you off.

I'm not going to exact judgment on you.

I'm going to deliver you out of the exile.

I'm going to do all that.

I'm holding back, holding back, holding back.

But I am going to, in your place, send a rescuer who will bear the brunt of all of that on your behalf, if you will hope in Him and trust in Him, which, by the way, if it troubles you that he's held back held back, that's exactly what Romans 325 says, that he held off.

He overlooked the former sins to bring about judgment on the person of the Son, that the Son might be glorified, we might hope in Him.

It's exactly what it says.

So God, pursuant to his own glory, actually proves that he loves us enough to be God, and he bears this out in the giving of His Son, Jesus.

Now, in case you think I'm making things up, in case you think that with the exception of my comment about romans Three we're only looking at the Old Testament like John Twelve jesus explicitly says, I'm troubled coming to this hour.

I'm troubled in my spirit that I have to confront suffering and death.

That is my mission.

What am I going to say?

I'm not going to do it.

Absolutely not.

I've come for this purpose.

I pray that the Father would be glorified in it and through it.

And the audible voice of God says, I have glorified my name and I will glorify it.

That's Jesus understanding of why he's doing this, so that he could extend love and grace.

It's interesting, even his fundamental understanding of what he's doing.

John.

Seven.

What am I doing?

The only things I'm doing are the things that are going to bring glory to the Father.

That's why I'm doing all this.

So any earthly ministry that you and I see, miracles, teaching, compassion, he's doing that for the glory of God.

It's interesting even beyond that, that when you look at a verse that probably we hear most of the time at funerals, I preach this verse, multiple funerals, mostly family members, when Jesus is gone from Bethany and he waits to come back.

He waits to come back, and Lazarus, his friend, the brother of his other two friends, Mary and Martha, dies.

And it actually says that he loved them deeply.

Really, you loved them deeply, you could have come back and probably done something about the fact that he was going to meet his demise, but you didn't.

You waited.

So he comes and arrived and he's mournful.

He's sad that Lazarus has died as well.

And he says, Move the stone.

And Martha says, Lord, listen, it's been four days, there'll be an odor, right?

And part of it is she's unsettled by the fact that we're going to open a grave which is unclean and is bad, and you just don't do that.

You know what Jesus says out of his love and commitment to her, to her sister and to Lazarus, did I not tell you, if you will believe, you will see the glory of God?

Now, was that an exhibition of love?

There is no question it was.

That is a unique way only he could have loved, because Lazarus comes forth when Jesus says to, and he's resurrected from the dead, but he's resurrected from the dead so that everyone would behold the glory of God in this act of unceasing love toward them.

And no, god really is God.

We really do have to deal with Him and recognize that he's in control and we need to look to Him.

And the reason in part that he emphasizes that is in his high priestly prayer.

John 17 few chapters later jesus actually praying for disciples.

He's praying for those who are going to come to know Him.

And in that prayer, he actually asked that he'd be glorified together with the Father.

That's how he starts the prayer.

I don't think we want to say that Jesus is selfish.

He's never been selfish.

But that's how he starts the prayer.

Why is that important?

Because of what he says next.

Father, I'm praying that they would have eternal life, and eternal life is not heaven, period.

He defines eternal life as eternal life is knowing you, the one true God, and Jesus Christ whom you've sent, that's eternal life.

And the only way to give you that eternal life is God.

What's interesting is, you know, what Jesus says is his reason for us knowing Him and then existing with Him in eternity.

Father, I pray that they would believe in me so that they might be with me to behold my glory.

That's his bottom line.

Prayer at the end of the day.

So there must be something incredibly loving, incredibly gracious, incredibly caring and compassionate for us to see Him as he is forever.

If that's his focus, if that's his purpose in doing everything that he has done, in suffering and dying for us, it's actually because of what Jesus has done.

The fact that he prays in this way, he actually says that, that's why I've welcomed you to be a part of my heavenly family.

Romans 15 so he's welcomed us, and we should welcome each other because this is to glorify God.

The sad reality is, by the time that Paul writes at least the second letter to the Corinthian Church that we have, he says, I'm going to tell you the truth about people who don't know Jesus, and this ought to sober all of us up as to their predicament.

The issue that they're encountering is not just that they have a slightly incomplete life, or you do you and then add Jesus to your life, which is a notion some people have it's that the enemy has blinded them to see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

That's what he thinks their problem is they don't have eyes to see you.

And I, if we're not believing, we don't have eyes to see the glory of God in the face of Christ.

We don't have the knowledge to see it.

And so what does God have to do?

Paul says in that letter you remember a few chapters ago in Genesis when he said, Let there be light, and there was.

Paul actually says that God has to say, let light shine out of darkness so that he can shine in our hearts and give the light of the knowledge of God's glory in the face of Jesus Christ.

That's what people need, because, again, that's what Jesus prayed for.

You'd actually see me and all my worth and all my value for who I am, because that's love to you, that you actually might know me, who I really am, and I'm God in all my glory if they don't ever see and believe in Jesus Christ.

If you and I don't ever believe in jesus Christ.

Some people are of the mindset that we'll just party in h*** with all our other rowdy friends that didn't know Jesus, and that's how it will be.

Philippians Two goes great pains in Paul's writing to show how God the Son, Jesus person I just read about in Isaiah 53, how he lowered himself, he humbled himself to actually move from where he was with the Father, to live in this place with us.

And there's great stuff I love so much about our life, but there's so much that we mourn, is there not?

He lived here with us, took on flesh, fully God, fully man.

And what did he do?

He laid down his life that ultimately he'd be exalted to the right hand of the Father, where he is right now.

Why does he do that?

So that ultimately, every knee should bow and every tongue should confess, both on the earth and under the earth, that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

That's the purpose.

Every human being that you've ever met, however you picture yourself, everybody is going to get on their knee and say, he's Lord.

Everybody the most arrogant, prideful, idolatrous person you can think of.

If you're anything like me, that might be me.

I know how idolatrous I can be.

I know how tempted I can be to wander away from the Lord.

And the only hope I have is that God might be gracious to grant me hope in Him, and he has in Christ.

He would do that for you.

He would do that for anyone who will hope in Jesus and not themselves.

But whether you do that or you don't do that, you will bow.

Why?

Because he really is God.

He's not a fictional construct that we've made up to make this time legitimate and make us feel better about life, which is hard.

He's reigning and ruling, and he always will.

And he's not distant and he's not far off.

And he does care deeply.

He cares that you would actually know Him.

Not a caricature of him.

You'd actually know him?

Not a sentimental, concocted version of Him, but the one who actually loved in the shedding of the blood of his own son.

So he'll love you forever, you love Him in return forever and ever and ever.

And that, ultimately, is our hope.

When you look at the new creation in Revelation, the last three chapters of Revelation, the people dwelling there with God in that new place that he's going to make, where he still declares, I'm their God and they're my people, it actually says the conclusion of Revelation 21.

In that place, there's no need for the sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light.

Why has he made you and I to look at glory and be drawn to it?

So when someone displays their greatness, somebody's great athletically, you got my attention.

All right.

I want to watch you play a game if you're not great athletically, I wish you were.

I wish I was.

All right.

But I'm still going to watch the people that are really good at it.

I'm going to watch someone and actually go into an art museum and see things that are rendered that actually look like a three year old didn't draw them.

And there's a whole lot of stuff in art museums if you've been to one.

I'm pretty sure my three year olds, when there were three, could draw better than that.

All right.

I'm not really sure how that's art, but it is in some people's estimation, I guess.

I'm a listen to music, most of which is produced between 1967 and 1987.

Those were the two decades where all good music was produced and recorded except for our band.

They're good.

They're really good.

I just mean original music.

Okay.

I just mean original music.

Yes, I showed my age a little bit.

Like, did you start playing Almond Brothers Band?

I will wander off the stage into the battle, like looking for it.

All right.

I'm very scattered in that way.

The amazing thing is when God draws us in to behold his greatness and his glory, there are never any questions.

Is he really that great?

Is he really going to come through?

Is it really all he says he is, or is this some kind of game we're playing?

God is at great pains from COVID to cover in the Bible because it's his revelation of Himself to us and the revelation of His Son to us that we might believe in hope in Jesus so that we would actually give Him glory with our whole lives, the decisions we make, the things we think.

But if we don't have a good notion of how passionate he is to be glorified so that we might know Him and know genuine love from Him, we will misread things.

We will misunderstand life circumstances, and we'll fail to recognize how he's working in every single movement of our lives to uphold his name, his glory, so that we might praise Him.

I like Bo, am really hopeful that the South Carolina Gamecocks will win the regional championship at Founders Park today.

And Bo, I appreciate your sentiment about Clemson fans.

I didn't know you could like a Clemson fan.

So that's actually he's helping me in my spiritual walk is what I'm saying.

I'm joking.

Guys, calm down.

The room got real cold.

I'm sorry.

I can mention the gospel all day long and we're good.

I say Carolina, Clemson, we about to fight each other with knives.

Like, I don't know why that just happened.

I did that.

I apologize.

I apologize.

I hope they win that and I hope they hoist the trophy.

I really do.

And I don't know if you have memories.

Like, I'm getting older, so I got lots of memories now about sports events different events.

Lots of Oscars best picture goes to Gladiator.

Elizabeth Taylor does that weird inebriated speech.

That was really weird, where she just said gladiator exuberantly over and over again.

You have NBA championships where the greatest of all time, jordan Hoist the trophy and had that emblematically seared in my mind.

My favorite trophy ever.

It's going to tell you a little bit about me.

My favorite trophy is the Winston Cup.

That's my favorite trophy itself.

And my favorite driver all time, Dalenhardt Senior.

He got to lift that thing seven times.

All right, so I'll see your Kyle bush and raise you a Dale lernhardt.

All right?

So the whole idea is when you see him raise that up, I always was like, how do you pick that up, man?

Because this is seventy s and eighty s we're talking about.

He won the first one in 80s.

It looks like somebody saw a desk in half and just put, like, another trophy on top of it.

He's holding it, trying to push it up like that.

So I love that trophy because it's so weighty.

But you know what?

No matter what the trophy is, those more famous ones I just mentioned, or a trophy you've won at some point in time, athletics, academics, whatever it is, nobody ever holds a trophy they're about to give you and says, okay, once I hand this to you, you will actually have achieved this.

That's weird that I even said that to you, right?

You're like, what are you even talking about right now?

We intuitively say, this is because you are the champion.

This is because you have won.

This is because you have excelled.

This is because you are elite.

When God calls on us with our very lives to put our faith and hope in Jesus and bring glory to Him, give Him glory.

He doesn't have a puzzle piece missing.

He's God.

We're not giving Him something that he's needy.

The Bible's.

Very explicit.

He's not served by human hands.

If he needs anything because he doesn't, it pleases him to share his life with you and to give you life where you wouldn't have it otherwise.

And giving glory is like giving that trophy.

God, you are great.

You are incredible.

You are beyond what we can even understand or know fully.

And yet you have called us your own by faith in Christ that we can know you.

We give you glory.

We give it to you because you're deserving of it.

We're recognizing how great you already are.

The temptation in all of life, which will continue to be the temptation is we want to take that trophy and rip it out of his hands and give it to ourselves.

This is mine.

I'm going to do what I want to do.

I'm going to self determine what's right and appropriate.

I'm not going to submit myself to God.

I'm not going to understand that he actually is who he says he is.

As we journey through Scripture, my prayer is that we'll see that he really is who he says he is.

And ultimately, he's determined to see glory come to Him, because he does love us.

That's the basis of his love for us.

And he secured that forever.

Because he didn't spare his son.

Jesus.

He actually gave him so that all the punishment we deserve might go to Him.

And all the belonging as sons and daughters might come to us, and we might be included with Him, not just for a few moments or for a day or for a season of life.

For all eternity.

Let's pray together.

God, we want to praise you.

Even in looking at this text and these texts of Scripture today, we want to recognize that you're a great and glorious.

We utter words, we try to communicate that.

We try to reflect that back to you because you revealed Yourself to us.

Or we want to do that.

We want to do that in words.

We want to do that in actions.

We want to do that in the way we live our lives.

And God, we recognize that many times we can be self centered.

I certainly can be self centered, God, far more than I want to be.

And I thank you that in Your mercy, in Your compassion, you undo that self centeredness, that you actually give us the mind of Christ who humbled Himself and took on flesh and dwelled among us to rescue us and bring us to You, Father.

And so I would pray for everybody in this room, everybody online, everybody we interact with in the balance of our lives, God, that we would plead for them to know your greatness and your glory in the gospel of jesus Christ that no one we know would not have opportunity to believe in Jesus.

That you might let light shine out of darkness and that they might see the knowledge of the glory of Christ that you might be glorified in all of that and all that we do, we thank you, Lord, for Your faithfulness and Your mercy, even in giving us Your word and Your truth, giving us Your son.

We pray these things in his name.

Amen.

You.

Thanks again for listening, and be sure to check back next week for another episode.

In the meantime, you can visit [e-mail] or by searching for Willow Ridgechurch on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.