A Word in Season: Glory to God (Psalm 115:1)

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Everything that we do has some kind of purpose or goal. We may not even be aware of it, it might just be instinctive, it might be very deliberate, but we do act with an aim in mind.

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And so we should ask, when we are dealing with God, what is our aim? With what purpose or goal do we gather together on the first day of the week to worship him?

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With what intent do we go out from his presence among his people to serve him in the world?

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Psalm 115 tells us that there is a danger that we will become the aim, the object, the purpose of our labours, and it once and for all excludes all self -centredness and all boasting in self or in idols.

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Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but to your name give glory, because of your mercy, because of your truth.

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The great barrier to the glory of God is our own seeking of our own glory.

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We do smuggle self into this relationship. We are so prone to bring ourselves to our glory, to our promotion.

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But when we come to serve God, whether it's in the distinct hours of worship on the

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Lord's Day, whether we're coming morning or evening or going out then to serve him in homes, among our families, among our friends, in our places of work, in our business, in the world, it is not unto us but to God that glory must be given, and because of his mercy and because of his truth.

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And the trouble is that we can smuggle in self even while we appear to be glorifying

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God. Do we desire that God would show his mighty works once more?

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Do we want the Lord to make bare his arm in salvation? Do we want God to strengthen his church so that we grow in the grace and the knowledge of Christ, we abound in the fruit of the

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Spirit? Do we want to see preaching with power? Do we want to see the advance of the gospel in the world that God has made?

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These are all good and proper desires, but the problem is that so often we can be at the center of those schemes and aims.

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We can want our names, our reputations, our congregations to get the glory.

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We can do that in the way that we witness to Christ in the world, men and women who just want another notch on the evangelistic belt as it were because of their wisdom.

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Even as we gather to pray, we can be proud of our eloquence in prayer or the length of what we say.

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When we sing, we can be rejoicing in our voice rather than rejoicing in the

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God whose praise should be coming from our hearts. It is not for our sakes, but for God's that we gather.

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It is not for our sakes, but for God's that we go. It is because of his mercy and because of his truth that we desire to see these things.

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When we plead with the Lord, it should not be ultimately for our own comfort, for our own ease, for our own prosperity.

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Now it's not wrong to ask for those things, but why do we ask for those things? Do we want them in order not that we may be seen as great, but that God may be seen as great?

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That on the platform of our great weakness, the strength of our almighty

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Saviour will be manifest before the world. It is his mercy and his truth that we desire, and it is his mercy and his truth that should be honoured in the giving of our praises.

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And so it's not us, and it's not the idols. It is by trusting God and it is by praising

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God that we bring glory to his name. Now that's going to take some work.

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It means we need to be very self -aware in the best sense, aware of how easily we set up the idle self on the throne of our hearts, aware of how quickly we can push the

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Lord God off to the margins. And we need then to declare to ourselves and to make it not just the statement of our lips, but the desire of our hearts, not unto us,

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O Lord, not unto us, but to your name give glory, because of your mercy, because of your truth.

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And when we do that, we want the unbelievers around us no longer to say, where is their

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God, but there is their God. There is his majesty, there is his glory, there is his honour, there is his praise among a people who know him, who trust him, and who speak of him with humble and thankful hearts, because of his mercy, because of his truth.