Transcript
Ben Fallon: Paul, in a “Wednesday's Word” series over the summer, you spent several weeks reflecting on “The Glory of God.” The go-to verse that we probably all know is 1 Corinthians 10:31, “So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.” But then you took us back to the beginning, Genesis 1 and 2, and helped us see the different types of glory that we were made for: God-glory, stewardship-glory, community-glory, and truth-glory.
Now this is a massive topic to try to unpack in a 600-word email devotional, so it made sense that Amy had some follow-up questions. Essentially, she is struggling to apply these big picture concepts in the 10,000 little moments of everyday life and would love some further explanation.
Paul Tripp: So probably the briefest way to talk about living for the glory of God means: “He is the reason I do the things I do, and he is the goal. He's the reason and the goal for everything that I do.” I love Romans 11:36. I've never been a person who has chosen a life verse, but if I did, it may be this one, “For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen.” If I would remember that verse every moment of my life, it would help me so much in my struggle with sin; “For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever and ever.” And I've sort of delineated this in four ways.
First, God-glory. I live with God's plan, God's purpose, God's presence, and God's honor, always in my mind, in everything I choose, everything I decide, everything I desire, everything I think, everything I say, everything I do. I'll be on my iPad looking at the next thing I'd like to purchase, and Luella will just say, “You know, is that the way God wants you to spend your money?” It's a good question. “Do all of my thoughts, all of my desires, all of my choices, all of my decisions, all of my actions, and all the things I say, are they lived with God's plans, God's purposes, God's presence and God's honor in mind? I would have to say, “No, they're not!” There are sometimes I'm very conscious of my Lord, and there are sometimes where I'm very intentional, but I'm often God-forgetful.
There's stewardship-glory. This means I live understanding that nothing I am or have belongs to me. Everything in my life belongs to my Lord and has been entrusted to me for his purpose. I've said this many times, and I will continue to say it, “There are only two ways to live: you live as a steward, or you live as an owner.” Sin is about ownership. My life, and I will do what I want with it. And so, do I give God glory because I remember the stewardship lifestyle that He's called me to? I am not the owner!
Third is community-glory. That, in my relationships, I live aware that these relationships weren't primarily given for my pleasure and comfort so that I live working to get what I want out of the people around me. That's often the nature of human relationships. “I love you and I have a wonderful plan for your life, and it is that you will make me happy, and if you don't, I'm out of here.” Rather, I want that everything I do and say, in these relationships, would point to the honor and glory of God and advance his purpose in us through this relationship. The best example of this is Ephesians 4:29, “Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.” Wow! Paul is saying in your talk, may your words be part of God's agenda of grace in the life of that person. “Let no corrupt talk come out of your mouth.” He doesn't mean four letter words. He means anything that isn't good for building up, that doesn't properly fit the occasion, and doesn't give grace to the person who hears. The people in my life don't belong to me; they belong to my Lord. And Luella isn't my possession; my children are not my possession–they belong to the Lord for His purpose.
And then there's finally truth-glory. I'm committed to live and speak in light of the truth. There's a passage in Ephesians 4 that says, “speaking the truth in love.” People think that that means being truthful. That's not what it means. It means ‘the truth,’ God's truth. So when I talk about being committed to speak in light of ‘the truth,’ I'm saying something that's deeper than telling the truth. It means ‘God's truth,’ that everything I say is structured and shaped by God's truth. In all of my situations, all of my relations, all of my locations of my everyday life, it's God's truth that provides the moral guardrails for me. And so, I want my life structured, shaped, directed, guarded by God's truth.
So there's God-glory, recognition of Him in everything; Stewardship-glory, I don't own, I'm a steward; Community-glory, my relationships don't belong to me; they belong to the Lord; Truth-glory, I want everything shaped by the glory of God's truth. Living for God's glory means everything in my life, instead of being shaped by inward focus, my wants, my needs, my feelings, I live with a Godward focus. God-glory, Stewardship-glory, Community-glory, Truth-glory!
BF: Paul practically applies living for the glory of God differently in all of his various books, but perhaps the most foundational book upon which everything else is built is his book titled, A Quest for More: Living for Something Bigger Than You. In these chapters, he helps us understand what it means and how it looks to live for the kingdom of God instead of our own little kingdom. It's actually the book that the Lord used to save my life. This is Ben Fallon, the executive director of Paul Tripp Ministries, speaking. The Lord used this to bring me to salvation when I was a teenager in high school. So naturally, it's probably my favorite of Paul's books, and I couldn't recommend it enough. You can learn more about A Quest for More at paultripp.com/Quest.
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