By Sean S McCallister
Jesus spoke beautiful words to the disciples when He told them to, “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” Matt. 5:16 It is not the opinion of this writer that He was giving the people an option. Glory is defined as: honor, majesty, brightness, splendor, renown. The tenor of the New Testament is to give glory to God.
The Apostle Paul spoke the command like this, “Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be like-minded one toward another according to Christ Jesus: that you may with one mind and one mouth glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Rom. 15:5-6
The act of giving God the glory means that we must put away our self-will and seek the Divine. Our merciful Father has provided a method for this to occur; “And He gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.” Eph. 4:11-13 Does the reader notice the word “edifying” in the above text? Edifying is building or lifting up. Notice what Jesus said, “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me.”
The Christ has been lifted up to the cross and rose to the throne of heaven, now we, the church, must lift Him up in this world that lost souls may see Him, be saved and glorify the Father.
Alas, there is another word we must define, reproach. Reproach means: a disgrace, indignity, or shame; as an action it is to defame, rail, or tease. A modern word for reproach might well be: embarrassment.
Would you willingly embarrass yourself? Your family? God?
When we cease to glorify God, we must be causing embarrassment. Considering the humiliation and degradation that the Son of God suffered as lost listeners, liars, and lunatics laughed at His words, notice how He submitted to the will of God anyway. “For even Christ pleased not Himself: but as it is written, ‘The reproaches of them that reproached Thee fell on Me’.” Rom 15:3
People embarrass the Lord and His church when they refuse His counsel and walk in their own ways. Just as it was done then, it is done now through rejection, substitution, and innovation.
We are to be a peculiar people, but when we do so many things to blend in and not embarrass ourselves, are we pleasing to God? Is this the same “faith which was once delivered unto the saints?” “(For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.)” Phil. 3:18-19 “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth.” Col3:1-2
Let us once again have an open Bible and open hearts in our congregations. Let us have the obedience and submission to God’s holy will that brings salvation, peace, righteousness, and true union. “Let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us.” Let us stop embarrassing ourselves and the Lord with foolishness and “abstain from every appearance of evil” that we might regain our homes, our congregations, and the souls of the lost.
If we must be embarrassed, let it be of the world’s insults of Christianity and not our own. “If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you: on their part He is evil spoken of, but on your part He is glorified. But let none of you suffer as a murderer, or as a thief, or as an evildoer, or as a busybody in other men’s matters. Yet if any man suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed; but let him glorify God on this behalf. For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what
shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?
Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator.” First Peter 4:14-19