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GLORY IN EARTHEN VESSELS

A. Introduction: We are working on a series about glory. This topic doesn’t seem practical since all of us face
challenges, from minor irritations and small difficulties to major tragedies, and talking about glory seems
completely unrelated to any of that.
1. However, not only is glory a major Bible theme, understanding some things about glory is vital to our
well being in this life. In previous lessons, we’ve made reference to Paul the apostle who was able to
deal with the hardships he faced by keeping his focus on the glory that awaited him in the life to come.
a. Paul realized that there is more to life than just this life and, for those who know the Lord, the glory
that is coming will far surpass any hardship we have to endure now.
b. Knowing what is ahead lightened the load of Paul’s very difficult life by giving him hope for the
future. Paul wrote:
1. II Cor 4:17—For our present troubles are quite small and won’t last very long. Yet they
produce for us an immeasurably great glory that will last forever (NLT).
2. Rom 8:18—For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared
with the glory which shall be revealed in us (NKJV).
2. Paul also knew that, not only did future glory await him, he had glory in him to help him deal with this
present life—the same glorious power that raised Christ from the dead. Paul prayed for Christians:
a. Eph 1:19-20—That you will begin to understand the incredible greatness of his power for (and in) us
who believe. This is the same mighty power that raised Christ from the dead (Rom 6:4) (NLT).
b. Col 1:11—That you will be strengthened with his glorious power so that you will have all the
patience and endurance you need (NLT).
c. Eph 4:16—That from his glorious, unlimited resources he will give you mighty inner strength
through his Holy Spirit (NLT).
3. Paul and the first Christians lived with the awareness that they had a glorious treasure in earthen vessels
—Almighty God in them by His Spirit to strengthen them, change them, and restore them to everything
that God intended them to be and to do. Tonight, we’re going to talk about this aspect of glory.
B. Let’s briefly review and add to the main points we have made thus far. The word glory is used in several
ways in the Bible. We have been focusing on how the word glory is used in connection with Almighty God
Himself, as well as how it is used in connection with the salvation that He provides for us through Jesus.
1. Glory is used for the honor and praise that is due to God because of who He is and what He does. Glory
is also used for God Himself. Almighty God is a glorious Being who does glorious things.
a. Glory is the essence of God. God is by nature glorious—splendid, magnificent, beautiful. The
glory of God is God Himself.
b. The glory of God (God’s glory) is God showing Himself, His power or His Person. God’s glory is
a visible manifestation of God’s Person or power in any way that He chooses.
2. The Bible gives numerous examples of God revealing Himself through (by) His visible glory. For
example, when God delivered Israel (the Jewish people) from slavery in Egypt, the visible presence of
God (His glory) descended before their eyes, on to Mount Sinai in Arabia. Ex 19:1-20
a. Several million people witnesses this event as a dense cloud with smoke and fire, accompanied by
thunder, lightning, and a long, loud blast from a trumpet, settled on the mountain. Then their leader
Moses went up the mountain into the cloud and met with God.
b. Among other things, God gave Moses specific instructions for building a Tabernacle (a tent
structure). God said: “I want the people of Israel to build me a sacred residence where I can live
among them” (Ex 25:8, NLT). Once the Tabernacle was completed “The cloud covered the
Tabernacle, and the glorious presence of the Lord filled it” (Ex 40:34, NLT). The Tabernacle was
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later replace by a building, Solomon’s Temple, and God’s glory also filled it (I Kings 8:10-11).
c. These were real events, but as with many events in the Old Testament, they also pictured something
in God’s plan for man. Just as God filled the Tabernacle and the Temple, God desires to indwell
men and women and fill them with Himself, with His glory.
3. God desires relationship with human beings, and He created us for a position of glory—to become His
sons and daughters who are indwelled by Him. We then express or reflect God (His glory) to the world
around us and bring honor and praise back to Him. Gen 1:26; Ps 8:4-6; Matt 5:16; I Pet 2:9; etc.
a. However, because of sin, all men and women are disqualified for God’s family and disqualified for
our created purpose as sons and daughters who glorify God our Father. Rom 3:23
b. Jesus came into this world to die as a sacrifice for sin so that all who believe on Him can be restored
to their created position—restored to glory as sons and daughters of God, indwelled by Him, and
who reflect His glory, sons and daughters who are fully glorifying to Him in every motive, thought,
word, and deed. II Thess 2:12; Heb 2:10; I Cor 2:7; etc.
4. A plan is unfolding—God’s plan to recover and restore what has been damaged by sin, His plan to have
a glorious family. This plan began in eternity past and will be completed in the life to come.
a. Eph 1:4-5—Long ago, even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ…His
unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through
Jesus Christ (NLT).
b. Rom 8:29-30—For God knew his people in advance, and he chose them to become like his Son
(Jesus), so that his Son would be the firstborn, with many brothers and sisters. And having chosen
them, he called them to come to him. And he gave them right standing with himself (justified
them), and he promised them glory (glorified them) (NLT).
1. Jesus is God become fully man without ceasing to be God. He incarnated (took on a human
nature) so that He could die for our sin. Jesus, in His humanity, is the pattern for God’s family.
2. Jesus’ sacrifice at the Cross opened the way for God to forgive our sin, indwell us by His Spirit,
and begin the process of restoring us to sons and daughters who are fully glorifying to Him.
There is a present and a future aspect to the glory that comes with our salvation.
A. Present: We are restored to glory as God’s sons and daughters through faith in Jesus, and
glory is in us now because God is in us to empower us to live a new life and become
increasingly Christ-like in our character and behavior. Rom 6:4; Col 1:11; II Cor 3:18; etc.
B. Future: We now have the hope of glory. In connection with Jesus’ second coming and
resurrection of the dead our body will be glorified—instantly made immortal and
incorruptible like Jesus’ resurrected body. Phil 3:20-21
5. Christianity is more than a moral religion, more than a set of moral teachings. It’s more than simply
trying to be a better person. Christianity is supernatural—it’s Almighty God dwelling in human beings.
a. God created men and women with the capacity to receive Him (His Spirit and uncreated life) into
our being and then reflect Him (His glory) to the world around us. We were created for
relationship with God, a relationship of union—His life, His glory, in us and through us.
b. We were created to be indwelled by God. But sin has cut us off from our created purpose. The
Bible describes human beings who are without God as dead “because of (our) many sins…darkened
in our understanding and alienated from the life in God” (Eph 2:1; Eph 2:5; Eph 4:18, NLT), and
doomed to die physically (Gen 3:19; Rom 5:12).
1. John 10:10—Jesus came to give us life. Through sacrificing Himself Jesus opened the way for
God to indwell us, to put His uncreated life, His uncreated glory, into human nature.
2. God doesn’t replace us with Himself. He infuses us with His life, His glory. It’s like water in
a sponge. The water doesn’t become the sponge. The water infuses the sponge.
c. The night before Jesus went to the Cross, at the Last Supper, He told His apostles that He was soon
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going to leave, but that He would not leave them alone. He would send the Holy Spirit to them.
1. John 14:16-17—I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper (the Holy Spirit), to
be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither
sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you (ESV).
2. Jesus went on to describe the relationship that He would continue to have with His followers
through the Holy Spirit as one of union and shared life: John 14:20—At that time (when I am
raised from the dead) you will recognize that I am in union with the Father, and you with me,
and I with you (20th Cent).
A. A quick side note: The Bible reveals that God is Triune—one Being who simultaneously
manifests as three distinct but not separate Persons—God the Father, God the Son, and
God the Holy Spirit (many lessons for another day).
B. Words fall short when we try to describe how the Triune God who is transcendent (above0
and infinite (without limits) interacts with finite (limited), created beings. But the Bible
uses several word pictures to give us some understanding of God’s relationship with us.
1. Jesus used the example of a vine and a branch to describe His relationship with
believers: John 15:5—I am the Vine, you are the branches. Those who remain in
me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing
(NLT).
2. The point for us now is that God (His glory, His life, His Spirit) is in us to empower us
to produce fruit. Fruit is outward evidence of the life within (lessons for another day).
C. Following Jesus’ resurrection and return to Heaven, His apostles went out to proclaim the message that
because of Jesus’ sacrificial death and resurrection, those who believe in Jesus become partakers of God’s
glory through shared life.
1. Consider what Paul wrote about the message that he preached: Col 1:25-27a—God…gave me this task
…of fully proclaiming his message, which is the secret he hid through all past ages from all mankind, but
has now revealed to his people. God’s plan is this: to make known his secret to his people, this rich
and glorious secret which he has for all peoples…(Good News Bible).
a. When the first man Adam sinned, God began to gradually reveal His plan to recover His family with
the promise that the Seed of the woman would undo the damage done. Gen 3:15
b. At that time only God Himself knew what He meant. The Seed is Jesus and the woman is Mary.
God the Son would incarnate (take on a human nature) and die as a sacrifice for sin.
1. Those are many lessons for another day. But note something else Paul wrote. He said that
this plan was ordained for our glory—to restore fallen men and women to glory.
2. I Cor 2:6—And yet I do speak words of wisdom to those who are ripe for it, not a wisdom
belonging to this passing age, nor to any of its governing powers, which are declining to their
end; I speak God’s hidden wisdom, his secret purpose framed from the very beginning to bring
us to our full glory (NEB).
c. Back to Paul’s statement in his letter to the Colossian church: Col 1:27b—And the secret is this:
Christ is in you, which means that you will share the glory of God (Good News Bible).
d. The full revelation of God’s plan came through Jesus. Through His death He opened the way for
God to do what He always intended—fill us with Himself, fill us with His glory, His Spirit and life.
2. Paul’s concept of the glory of God came from the Old Testament—this glorious Being manifesting
Himself, His radiant presence, in the midst of His people, first in the Tabernacle and then in the Temple.
a. Paul wrote these words to Christians in the city of Corinth (in the context of abstaining from sexual
sin): I Cor 6:19-20—Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in
you, whom you have from God and you are not your own? For you were bought with a price;
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therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s (NKJV).
1. In that same passage Paul wrote: I Cor 6:17-18—The man who is in union with the Lord is
spiritually one with Him. Keep on running from sexual immorality (Williams).
2. Earlier in this same letter Paul wrote: I Cor 1:30-31—But you, by your union with Christ
Jesus, are God’s offspring; and Christ, by God’s will, became not only our Wisdom, but our
Righteousness, our Holiness, our Deliverance, so that—in the words of the Scripture—Let
those who boast, boast about the Lord (20th Cent).
b. Paul understood that Almighty God is in us to empower us, change us, restore us, and return us to
what we were created to be—God’s sons and daughters who glorify Him.
3. Paul lived with the awareness that he had a glorious treasure in him—God in him by His Spirit and life.
We see how this played out in Paul’s life in another letter written to the Christians living in Corinth.
a. The church was being influence by false teachers who were stirring people up against Paul and his
authority. Paul had actually established the church in Corinth and was their father in the faith.
b. Paul wrote to urge those who were being swayed by false teachers to accept his authority as an
apostle of Jesus Christ, and he defended his conduct, character, and commission from Jesus. In
doing so Paul gives us important facts about the glory of God in him and in us. II Cor 4:4-9
1. II Cor 4:4—Those who don’t believe…are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News
that is shining upon them. They don’t understand the message we preach about the glory of
Christ, who is the exact likeness of God” (NLT).
2. II Cor 4:6—God, who said, “Let there be light in the darkness” has made us understand that this
light is the brightness of his glory that is seen in the face of Christ Jesus (NLT)).
c. Remember that Paul preached Christ in us, the hope of glory. Jesus in us is the glory of God in us.
Paul went on to write what the glory of God in him meant to him and his fellow workers.
1. II Cor 4:7—But this precious treasure—this light and power that now shine within us—is held
in perishable containers, that is, our weak bodies. Everyone can see that the glorious power
must be from God and is not our own (TLB).
2. II Cor 4:8-9—We are pressed on every side by troubles, but not crushed and broken. We are
perplexed because we don’t know why things happen as they do, but we don’t give up and
quit. We are hunted down, but God never abandons us. We get knocked down, but we get up
again and keep going (TLB).
d. Paul is the same man who, while in jail awaiting possible execution for preaching Jesus, wrote that
he could do all things through Christ who strengthened him.
1. Phil 4:13—I have strength for all things in Christ Who empowers me—I am ready for anything
and equal to anything through Him Who infuses inner strength (glory) into me (Amp).
2. Paul knew he had a glorious treasure in him (present glory, Christ in him to strengthen him) as
well and future glory (resurrection and full restoration to all that God intended him to be)/
D. Conclusion: We haven’t said all we need to say about the glory of God. Consider these points as we close.
1. If Jesus is your Lord and Savior, then you stand before God in union with Christ. Christ in you is your
hope of glory (Col 1:27), your assurance that the process of restoration to everything that God intends
you to be will be completed. He who has begun a good work in you will complete it (Phil 1:6),
2. Take time to think about these things—the reality that you have a treasure in you—God by His Spirit and
life. Paul lived with this awareness and this perspective enabled him to call life’s troubles momentary
and light. Much more next week!!