To Whom is the Glory?

DEVOTION

HEBREWS

TO WHOM IS THE GLORY?

Heb 13:20-21

20 May the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, 21 equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

NIV

Here it is, right up and in our face. A blessing from the author of this letter who by God’s very word declares this is God’s breathed words, tells us that God will equip us with everything good for doing his will and not only that but He will work in us what is pleasing to him. Now if any of us think for one minute that we can spend any of God’s blessings on our own selfish ambitions we are sadly mistaken. Those tooth filled smiling preachers who surround themselves with television cameras and large crowds proclaiming God what to shower you with wealth are simply false teachers who will get their due. Yes God will provide for us. Yes he will meet our needs and protect us from the evil one. But it is clear that above all else God desires for us to do his will and that we allow him to work in us that which is pleasing to him, which by the way may not be pleasing to us, unless of course it is also our desire to please him. Contrary to the belief of some, God is not our genie in a bottle, but rather we are his children, who need to see our place in the family of God. He is the Father and he knows what is best for us. The concept of that old television program of the 50’s “Father knows best” may have been replaced with “Self knows best”. We need to see that God will equip us, he will give us all the necessary skill sets, and abilities to accomplish his will for our life, which is doing his will. All our knowledge, all our abilities, all our strength and all our determination has been given to us by God so that we can accomplish his will, not ours. We need to be focused on what he desires us to be doing rather than what we desire to do. We need to see all we are is because of him and all we do should be about him. We cannot be so introspective that most of our life we think about our own desires, and our own goals, our own lifestyle, our own self, our security, even our own family, but we need to be thinking about what does God what to do in my life so that I will be a benefit to his kingdom. The questions we have to ask is are we bringing glory to our self, or to Jesus Christ. To whom is the Glory for ever and ever?