The Good, the Bad and the Glory.

Finally, had my convocation ceremony this past Monday. I had never really considered myself "graduated" until I had walked across the stage. It was a great day. I especially appreciated seeing most of my classmates again, before parting ways for what will probably be a good long while.

I honestly cannot believe how far I've come in this life. I remember the days when I was transitioning from elementary school to middle school, middle school to high school, and high school to university. At each transition point I was terrified. Scared to make the change, wishing Jesus would come back so I wouldn't have to live through such drastic change and unknown. When I think back, through it all, God took care of me. He provided me with all the friends, and circumstances necessary to grow me and to make it through these periods of life. I owe so much to Him, the good but especially the bad. 

The Christian I am today is because of God's provisions and the personal decisions I had to make. It's a combo. With every mistake and circumstance, I have learned a bit more about who God is, and what it means for Him to be glorified. 

I spent a long time not really getting what it meant to "glorify God". It's just one of those Christianese sayings that gets worked into your vocabulary, and you say it because that's just what you say. "Glorifying God" is what all Christians should do, it's what we're supposed to say and do, you know? I think it comes to a point where we say it so habitually that it starts to mean less and less to us.

Glorifying God is not solely about God getting the credit for something. God is not obsessed about credit and getting all the "good feels". The glory of God spoken about in the Bible is more about His character. The glorification of God is, from what I have come to understand, the revealing and display of His true, great knowledge or control. 

When God is glorified, it's like His character bleeds out of us. When God is glorified, it's as if His character is so evident and unrestrained and displayed, it is so undeniably Holy, and righteous, loving, that it is so undeniably God. All God has ever desired is that people come to know Him, and come to be reconciled to Him through this. What better way to do it than for people who love and serve Him, to put His very character on display in their lives through all circumstances? 

In another boat, while we find God so "easily glorified" in all the good, while He gets "credit" for all the good He has done, is He not also responsible for all the bad? In human error, we can only blame ourselves, evidently. God allows people to make mistakes, an individual's choices will always be up to him/herself. Crime happens, hurts happen, disasters happen. What is committed by humans, humans have to own up to, but that does not mean God is no less in control. People often forget that just because humans have the power to make poor choices, that does not mean God has made a mistake. Circumstances are always within His control:

5 I am the Lord, and there is no other,
    besides me there is no God;
    I equip you, though you do not know me,
6 that people may know, from the rising of the sun
    and from the west, that there is none besides me;
    I am the Lord, and there is no other.
7 I form light and create darkness,
    I make well-being and create calamity,
    I am the Lord, who does all these things. (Isaiah 45:5-7)

The point being made here is that the LORD is the Lord. He's in charge, He allows or does not allow troubles or disasters, and He brings good, as He desires. Everything according to plan, nothing beyond His knowledge. 

He is Lord, and I am thankful He has more than one role and occupation, as He is also a Redeemer. In the midst of evil, and calamity, God can redeem anything. He has the ability and power to turn the bad to good. All He does, He does with great love and understanding, He's seen and done it all. 

God has done so much for you and I. I cannot deny that He is good. Even in the midst of the pain and suffering I have endured in my own life, I cannot deny that everything He intended was for good. The way things happen to us are the ways that will always work best. It's individualized and unique. Through it all, it's in us to just glorify Him; it's a deep seated desire that God be known, that His real character be shown. I almost want to say that I like it when times get rough, and when things seem impossibly bad, because in the end, you come out of it only saying, "I could not have survived this, or seen the end of the tunnel, had it not been for Him." 

The glory of God is important, it is vital in the process of knowing Him, and becoming more and more like Him. God cares about people, He cares about a relationship to be restored. The Glory of God is all about that; that He be known, in order that reconciliation would happen. That's a big deal.