2 Corinthians chapter 4, I want
to look at the first six verses. The title of the message is this, Would you see the glory
of God today? Would you see God's glory? Would you have God
to show you his way?" That's what Moses said. He asked, he
said, show me thy way. Show me thy glory. Let me see
it. When you want to see a person's
glory, you want to see the greatest thing about that person. That's what you want to see.
Maybe they've built something, if they're an architect, and
you want to see their greatest design, the greatest thing they've
built. Maybe it's an author. You want
to read the greatest book they've written, their greatest works.
What you want to see is their glory. That's what God, that's
what Moses asked God. And you know what the Lord replied
to that was, I read it to you. I'll make all my goodness pass
before you, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord. Who he
is, is his glory. You might want to see my glory,
and I say, I built this house. Isn't that beautiful? That's
something. I might have written a book,
and you say, that's the greatest book I've ever read. It was outstanding. But God, when He reveals His
glory, He reveals who He is. And the only place you're going
to see that is in the face of His Son, Jesus Christ. That's
where God's glory is revealed. Christ is the express image of
God. But let's look at some of these
verses preceding verse 6, and we'll get down to verse 6. In
verse 1 and 2, We have the characteristics of a true minister of the gospel. We have his right motive. Paul
says, as we have received this ministry, that's so humbling. I look out at your faces. I look
at this crowd. And for God to entrust me with
his gospel and his sheep. The weight of that is tremendous. I'm telling you the truth. It's
tremendous. The ministry is something we receive from the Lord, not
some seminary. We receive it from the Lord,
and our ability to continue in it is of the Lord. As we have received mercy, we
faint not. It is by His mercy and grace
that we are able to continue under the load of the responsibility
of tending to the Lord's sheep. And the way we can do that is
by His grace and mercy continually enabling us to do it. No man,
Paul said in one place, is sufficient for these things. No man is sufficient
to handle life and death, eternal matters, the gospel the gospel
of God's glory. No man is by himself, of himself,
is sufficient to handle that. That's of God. God, Paul said,
is our sufficiency. He's the one who gives us the
ability to minister. He's the one who gives us the
ability to wrestle, not against flesh and blood, but against
principalities and powers. Now Satan will use flesh and
blood. God allows him to use it. One time the Lord looked
at Peter and he said to Peter, get thee behind me, Satan. Peter didn't realize he was under
the influence of Satan, but the Lord did. You're not wrestling
against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers
in high places. God is our sufficiency to handle
the ministry, and no man can minister to sinners until he
himself has tasted that the Lord is gracious. Until he has been
broken, he has tasted of the Lord's mercy and the Lord's grace. Then he's able to minister to
sinners, to the Lord's sheep. And then he has a right conduct,
renouncing the hidden things of dishonesty. Renouncing those
things that will not bear light. But Paul's also saying this,
that he's the same in private as he is in public. Renouncing
the hidden things of dishonesty. Not walking in craftiness that
is pleasing men in order to get their approval. Not walking in
subtlety like Satan did in the garden. And not handling the
word of God deceitfully. And then he has this, right doctrine. Setting forth the truth as it
is revealed in Christ. Preaching the truth. Telling
men the truth. Tell me the truth. That's what
I want to know. I don't care. It matters not how much it hurts.
Tell me the truth. Tell me the truth on God. Tell
me the truth on Christ. Tell me the truth about myself.
setting forth the truth as it is revealed in Christ, and pressing
it upon men's conscience while waiting for the Holy Spirit to
apply it in power to the souls of men. I pray that God will enable me
to preach the gospel and the power of His Spirit, but it is
His Spirit, it's the Holy Spirit, who must apply it in power to
your heart. I do not have the power to make
it effectual." He does. He does. However, we are to press
it upon the hearts of men and women to take heed to what they
hear. Our Lord said, take heed how
you hear. With what measure you meet it
with, it shall be measured to you again. Serious business here this morning.
Nothing more serious than what we're doing this morning. Take
heed of how you hear. It'll be magic to you again.
And then in verse 3 and 4, he gives us the state of the unbeliever. He says, if our gospel, and he
calls it our gospel because God gave it to him, if our gospel
be hid, Veiled, it's hid, it's veiled to them that aren't lost.
The problem's not in the gospel. It's in the hearer. As you said earlier, Frank, dead. Dead, you said you'd like to,
you know, you'd like to wake them out of sleep. Well, if they
were asleep, you could. They're dead. Scripture says dead in trespasses
and sins. And the gospel is veiled, it's
hidden to the unbeliever. He cannot discern the truth.
He has no spiritual discernment. He has no spiritual senses. You
know, I have eyes, I can see. Nose, I can smell. I can hear,
I can touch. Because all my physical senses
are at work. But if I'm dead, I can't hear
you no more. I can't see you no more. I can't
touch and feel you no more because I'm dead. That's the way it is
spiritually with all men and women by nature. You cannot hear
the Word of God until He gives an ear to hear, until He opens
the deaf ear. You cannot see His glory until
He gives your eyes to see. You have no taste for the Gospel.
It's like I have no taste for beef liver. I hate it. I hate it. And the natural man has no taste
for Christ because he hates Him by nature. There's a natural
enmity that we are naturally born with that is against God
right from the bat. It's not something we just grow
into. No, we're born with it. You know, we don't wait to a
certain age and then we become rebels. We're born rebels. The
Scripture says we come into this world speaking lies. That's the
way we come into this world. The mind is cluttered up with
the things of this world. It's cluttered up with the things
of self. God is not in the natural man's
thoughts. That's what the Scripture says.
He's not in their thoughts. And Satan uses these things. to blind
the mind. He uses it, all this clutter. He uses it to blind the minds
of them which believe not. If our gospel, if this good news,
if the glory of God is hid, it's hid to them that are lost, and
whom the God, and that's a little g, That's a little J. The God
of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not,
lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the
image of God, should shine unto them. That's how evil Satan is. Then verse 5 and 6, Paul gives
the sum and substance of his ministry. In verse 5 he said, We preach
not ourselves. We are not the message. I am
not the subject this morning. I know you came here this morning
to hear the gospel preached. I pray that God enables me to
preach it and pray that He enables you to hear it. We came to hear
from God. We came here this morning to
hear a word from our Heavenly Father. Speak, Lord, thy servant
heareth. That's what we want. We preach
not ourselves. There was one time Paul did.
One time Paul was the very subject of his ministry. He was a Pharisee
of the Pharisees. I mean, he had the whole ball
of wax. But when the Lord struck him
down on that road to Damascus, Paul counted everything as lost
for the excellency of the knowledge of Jesus Christ. When a sinner
sees himself in the light of Christ, in the light of the cross,
for the first time, for the first time, he sees his own weakness. he sees his own violence. When
I see Christ hanging on that cross, when I view the cross,
and I see what had to happen to him for God to save me, for
God to have anything to do with me, I say, how vile I am. How vile I am. was so marred, it says, more
than any man. He was so beaten. He was so mutilated. And he had to suffer the wrath
of God because of a wretch like me. Now what does that say about
me? If people truly understood what
it is to be a Christian, most of them would exit. Because they'd
say, I'm not that bad. I'm not that bad. If you look
what it took to save You have saved me. How vital I must be. When we see Christ, we look and see
Him in the light of the cross, we realize that Christ is all
and in all, and He's the only message that we have He is the glory of God. And we don't preach ourselves.
Until a man sees that, he has absolutely no business standing
in the pulpit. Paul said we preach not ourselves,
we preach Christ Jesus the Lord. When we see Him, we see the chief
glory of God. He said, I'll make all my goodness
pass before you. How many times did our Lord walk
through the streets of Jerusalem? How many times did the goodness
of God pass right before them? How many times? How many times
have we come to this room, have we stood and sat in these chairs,
and God's goodness has passed before us in the Gospel of the
Lord Jesus Christ? How many times has that happened?
He said, I'll make my goodness pass before you. When we see Him, we see the chief
glory of God. Would you see God's glory today?
Then look to Christ. Turn to the Lord Jesus Christ
there in the person of God's Son is the chief glory of God
displayed. Creation. Creation shows us something of
God's creative power And glory. Someone sent me, the other day, the guy that strings
my rackets, he sent me a picture of some stunning, I mean just
stunning scenery. Amazing. And I tell you what, there's
some glory in that. There's some real glory in creation and the
universe. The vastness of it. You can see
something of God's glory, of His creative power. And the law
shows us the glory of His justice. God is a just God. However, only in the person of Christ,
only in the person of God's Son, God and man in one person, do
we see the full glory of God's goodness. God's grace, God's
mercy, God's redemptive glory. How God
can be a just God and justify a wretch like me. You're not going to see that
standing on top of a hill. You're not going to see that in the woods.
You're going to see it hanging on a cross. What will make a sinner? Like
Paul, who was a Pharisee of the Pharisees, had everything going
for him. Had everything going for him. What will make a sinner
forsake all? What will make a sinner count
everything in his or her life as done? What will do that? You know what human nature is.
I mean, you know, it's going to take a lot to do that. What will make a sinner just
drop everything, stand in awe of God. For God, who commanded the light
to shine out of darkness in creation, hath shined in our hearts. This illumination in the heart, new birth. Christ in you is what
will make you leave all, count all as done, and follow Him, and follow Him. You know, like in the first creation,
darkness was upon the face of the deep, even so spiritual darkness
is upon every man and woman's evil heart. As that world, back in Genesis,
lay in darkness, so does our hearts by nature. And that darkness
can only be removed by God commanding the light to shine in your heart. Who's the light? Christ said,
I'm the light of the world. I'm the light. When He shines
in your heart, when you are illuminated by Him, when you are illuminated by Him,
that this darkness is removed. It's removed. And note what happens when God
commands the light of the gospel to shine in a sinner's heart,
to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face,
in the person. I looked that word up. It means
person of Jesus Christ. This knowledge, when God commands
light, when He illuminates, He gives knowledge. All thy children
shall be taught of God. It is not mere intellectual knowledge
of some facts. It's truly not just accepting
some facts. It is a real experience of knowing
God in Christ. It is a real experience, a real
relationship, a real union between God and the sinner and his son. It's real now. Tell it. It's
real. It's real. is knowing in your
heart how God can be a just God and
save you, and save you. The glory of God in Christ has
to do with the gospel, the gospel of redemption, God's goodness, and that is only seen in the
person of Christ. You know, faith is not born of
ignorance, but of light, knowledge, knowledge of God. Nowhere can
this glory be seen except in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, let me wind this down by giving us a glimpse. I'm telling you, that's all it
is right now, it's a glimpse. It's like seeing him through
the lattice of his glory. First of all, think about his
birth. Now think about the birth of
the Lord Jesus Christ. He was born of a virgin. That's
never happened before or since. The body of Christ, the human
nature of Christ, and the body of Christ was formed in the womb
of Mary by the Holy Spirit. Not one thing of this world of
Adam entered into his birth. He knew no sin. This man, this
man literally, truly knew no sin. That's amazing. There in that
manger, born of a virgin, lay the God
of creation. Henry said one time, the ancient
of days became an infant of days. What glory. There lay the very expressed
image of God. When the wise men looked for
him, they asked, saying, Where is he that is born King of the
Jews? He reigned in his birth. Here
is one laying in a manger and at the same time ruling the universe. What a glorious person. When
he was twelve years old, His mom and dad had come up to
a feast, brought him up, you know, Joseph and Mary. And they
brought him up to this feast. And they went back home and they
were gone for three days. Could you be gone for three days
and not know where your kid is? That's how much they trusted
him. You don't trust your kid for three days. I'm telling you,
you don't. You're not going to go three
days. You're not going to go probably An hour, and you're going to say,
where are they at? I know they're up to something. But our Lord
was so obedient. They went for three days before
they noticed she was gone. They had so much confidence in Him.
At twelve years of age. Twelve years of age. And they
came back looking for Him. You know where they found Him? Seated in the temple, baffling
the doctors and the lawyers. absolutely baffling them. They
were stunned at this 12-year-old speaking to them. They didn't
realize they were talking to the wisdom of God. His public ministry. We see His glorious God. The disciples on the boat. I
preached from this a week or two ago. A storm comes up. The wind and the waves and the
stillness of the boat. They are afraid. And they said,
Karestan, not when we perish? And he stood up! And he said,
Peace! Be still. And that wind and those
waves lay down at his feet. And there was a great, it says,
a great calm. It didn't just, you know, say,
okay, yeah. No, it was a great calm. God spoke to his creation and
told it to be still. Be still. He raises the dead. He walks up to the tomb of Lazarus
and Martha says, by now, Lord, he stinks. He's been buried for
four days and he stinks. That's a good description of
us. We stink. He walks up to that grave and
he calls out Lazarus' name and he tells him to come forth. And
this man, now this actually happened, this is not a fairy tale. That
man walked out of that grave alive and well. He looked over a crowd, 5,000
men, I'm counting the women and children, followed following
him. And he looks over that crowd
and he says, he has compassion on them. And he looks at his
disciples and he says, do you have anything here? And they
said, well, we just got, there's this lad's lunch. You know, he's
got some fish and some loaves, some bread. Well, what's that
among so many? Well, in my hands, there's nothing. If all you hear this morning
is me, then you're not going to be fed at all. But if the
master, if the master takes the bread and the loaves, you're
going to leave here full. You're going to leave full. I
promise you, you will. If he takes it and he feeds you,
and they took up, what, 12 baskets of fragments? Didn't leave a
man around. Didn't leave a mess. God never
leaves a mess. And he fed the hungry. He heals
the sick. He gives sight to the blind,
hearing to the deaf, speech to the dumb. He takes money from the mouth
of a fish and pays their taxes. There's a reason to go fishing. Because he says, you go down
there, the first one you catch, and this one has money in his
mouth. And you take that money and you pay our taxes. Does our Lord not provide? Does
he not take care of his own? He cast out demons with just
a word. Come out of him! And they come
out. No arguing, they come out. But
the greatest display of God's glory is seen hanging on a cross. Never has God's justice and mercy,
love and grace been displayed at the same time in the same
place until Calvary. Mercy and truth met together,
righteousness and peace kissed each other at Calvary. There hanging on that cross is
God incarnate suffering His own justice against sin. For a multitude
of sinners that He loved before the foundation of the world.
There is Isaac's ram caught in the thicket. There's the substitute hanging on that cross. There
it is. There we see the Passover lamb
slain so that God's people might go free from bondage. There we
see all the scriptures fulfilled, all the types fulfilled, sinners
redeemed, the law magnified and honored. Now I ask you, would
you see God's glory today? Would you? Then look to the Lord
Jesus Christ and say as Moses said, Lord show me thy glory,
show me thy way.