God's Glory
I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple. Above it stood seraphim; each one had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one cried to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory!” And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke. Isaiah 6:1-4
God is infinitely glorious.
God is so glorious that simply the train of his robe fills the temple with glory. He is so glorious that the seraphim angels cover their unclothed body parts, head and feet, from the radiance of his glory. God has so much glory that as it radiates out from Him, it fills everything else. The whole earth is filled with His glory because glory spills out from who God is. Among the created things that God poured his glory into are the seraphim who make the posts of the temple shake by their voice as they return glory to the Glorious One. As Isaiah looks at God’s glory through the veil of the smoke filled room, he declares, “Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.” (5). We cannot behold God’s glory with any uncleanness and live.
Even death cannot rob God of his glory.
Since God is infinitely glorious He loses nothing by giving His glory away, just as a tree loses nothing by giving away its fruit. Even though Satan knew who God is (James 2:19) he sought to rob God of His glory by getting mankind to pursue an abundance of trading to gain more glory for himself as he did (Ezekiel 28). Mankind did gain the glory of wisdom—just as Solomon gained glory by trading for wisdom—but he traded for it at the cost of his life. Yet, even though death robbed man of the glory of life, death cannot rob God of His glory. As Jesus gave away His glory to become a man, to walk among us, and to die on a cross, but He lost none of His glory by giving it away. We cannot trade God’s glory to gain glory for ourselves. We gain glory for ourselves by giving away everything for God’s glory.
You rob yourself of your own glory.
We often like to blame anyone other than ourselves for robbing us of our glory—the woman, the snake, the situation, etc. “But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed.” (James 1:14). When we desire anything other than God and His glory, we wind up exchanging the very things that give us glory for death. “But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.” (Matthew 6:33). When we seek God’s glory first, all the other glories of life are added to us. The additional glories can distract us from seeking God’s glory, but if we keep God’s glory as our primary focus, the additional glories augment our limited experience of glory.
You cannot rob God of His glory.
Even when we rob ourselves of our glory by exchanging glory for glory, we do not rob God of His glory. Our voice will harmonize with the 24 elders, proclaiming,“You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power; for You created all things, and by Your will they exist and were created.” (Revelation 4:11). Everything that exists receives life and glory from God, and everything will give glory to God for His work of creating and His ongoing work of sustaining. How are you giving glory to God today?