SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 8/16/2016 7:23 AM
My Worship Time
Focus: PT-2 Intro. To John 11:1-16
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 11:1-16
Message of the verses: “1 Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus of
Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2 It was the Mary who
anointed the Lord with ointment, and wiped His feet with her hair, whose
brother Lazarus was sick. 3 So the sisters sent word to Him, saying,
"Lord, behold, he whom You love is sick." 4 But when Jesus heard
this, He said, "This sickness is not to end in death, but for the glory of
God, so that the Son of God may be glorified by it." 5 Now Jesus loved
Martha and her sister and Lazarus. 6 So when He heard that he was sick, He then
stayed two days longer in the place where He was. 7 Then after this He *said to
the disciples, "Let us go to Judea again." 8 The disciples said to
Him, "Rabbi, the Jews were just now seeking to stone You, and are You
going there again?" 9 Jesus answered, "Are there not twelve hours in
the day? If anyone walks in the day, he does not stumble, because he sees the
light of this world. 10 “But if anyone walks in the night, he stumbles, because
the light is not in him." 11 This He said, and after that He *said to
them, "Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I go, so that I may
awaken him out of sleep." 12 The disciples then said to Him, "Lord,
if he has fallen asleep, he will recover." 13 Now Jesus had spoken of his
death, but they thought that He was speaking of literal sleep. 14 So Jesus then
said to them plainly, "Lazarus is dead, 15 and I am glad for your sakes
that I was not there, so that you may believe; but let us go to him." 16
Therefore Thomas, who is called Didymus, said to his fellow disciples,
"Let us also go, so that we may die with Him.’”
As we continue
to look at the introduction to these verses in John chapter eleven we are
focusing in on what our Lord says in verse four “But when Jesus heard this, He
said, "This sickness is not to end in death, but for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be
glorified by it.’”
In Psalm 19
we read the following “The heavens are telling of the glory of God; And their
expanse is declaring the work of His hands.”
This speaks of God’s glory being seen through His creation and
sustaining of His creation. In Isaiah
6:3 we read “And one called out to another and said, "Holy, Holy, Holy, is
the LORD of hosts, The whole
earth is full of His glory.’”
Next we look at Romans 1:20 “For since the creation of the world His
invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly
seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without
excuse.” All that God has created gives
Him glory—with the exception of fallen angels and fallen men. MacArthur adds “And even they, in a negative
sense, bring Him glory, since He displays His holiness by judging them (cf. Ex.14:
4, 17-18).” “"Thus I will harden
Pharaoh’s heart, and he will chase after them; and I will be honored through
Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD."
And they did so.” “17 “As for Me,
behold, I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after
them; and I will be honored through Pharaoh and all his army, through his
chariots and his horsemen. 18 “Then the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD,
when I am honored through Pharaoh, through his chariots and his horsemen.’” I want to also add Proverbs 16:4 from the KJV
which says “The LORD hath made all things for Himself; yea, even the wicked for
the day of evil.”
Next we see
that God’s glory is also seen in redemption as He saves sinners “to make known
the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for
glory” as this quote is from Romans 9:23.
There are certainly other section in the NT that speak of God receiving
glory for the redemption of those He saves:
“2 Corinthians 4:4 “in whose case the god of this world has blinded the
minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ,
who is the image of God.” “For
all things are for your sakes, so that the grace which is spreading to more and
more people may cause the giving of thanks to abound to the glory of God (vs. 15).”
John
MacArthur writes “At various times in redemptive history, God visibly
manifested His glory to His people, Moses, overwhelmed with the responsibility
of leading Israel, cried out to God “18
Then Moses said, "I pray You, show me Your glory!" 19 And He said, "I Myself will make all My
goodness pass before you, and will proclaim the name of the LORD before you;
and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show compassion on
whom I will show compassion." 20 But He said, "You cannot see My
face, for no man can see Me and live!" 21
Then the LORD said, "Behold, there is a place by Me, and you shall
stand there on the rock; 22 and it will
come about, while My glory is passing by, that I will put you in the cleft of
the rock and cover you with My hand until I have passed by. 23 “Then I will
take My hand away and you shall see My back, but My face shall not be seen.’” This cry that Moses gave out to the Lord
should be the cry of all believers as we should all desire to see God’s glory,
and by doing this we will see who God truly is through His glorious attributes.
In order to
prepare Isaiah for his ministry, a ministry to the hardened people of Israel
God gave him an overwhelming vision of His majestic, glorious holiness as seen
in Isaiah 6:1-5 “1 In the year of King Uzziah’s death I saw the Lord sitting on
a throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of His robe filling the temple. 2
Seraphim stood above Him, each having six wings: with two he covered his face,
and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one called out to
another and said, "Holy, Holy, Holy, is the LORD of hosts, The whole earth
is full of His glory." 4 And the foundations of the thresholds trembled at
the voice of him who called out, while the temple was filling with smoke. 5 Then I said, "Woe is me, for I am
ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I live among a people of
unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts.’” In the book of Ezekiel God also showed him a
similar vision in the first chapter of his prophecy you can read about it as it
is too lengthy to copy and paste.
All of
these verses we have been looking at were kind of a warm up to the most
gracious and complete manifestation of God’s glory as it came in the person of
the Lord Jesus Christ who is the very “Word” of God as we see in John 1:14 “And
the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from
the Father, full of grace and truth.”
Our Lord’s glory has been seen as we have worked our way through the
book of John, especially in the works that He did beginning with the making
wine out of water in the second chapter of John’s gospel.”
As I was
listening to a sermon on this section yesterday by John MacArthur in
preparation to do the Spiritual Diaries for this section he made a comment that
kind of stuck with me as he spoke of what our modern technology causes us to
look at what Jesus did for Lazarus as not as meaningful as it should was. We see people flying, dying and coming back
to life all of the time among other things like transformers, aliens and things
like this. Jesus brought back from the
dead a man who had been dead for four days, as his body was decaying at a rapid
pace because the Jews did not preserve the bodies and the nation of Israel is a
very warm place. I have to believe that
this is a picture of the coming rapture when all of God’s children from the
church age will have their bodies resurrected on the way up to meet Christ in
the air, along with all who are alive at that time will also be changed on the
way up to meet our Lord in the air.
To see
where we are going in this chapter I will quote from the ending of John
MacArthur’s commentary: “The
resurrection of Lazarus evidenced Christ’s glory in three ways: it pointed unmistakably to His deity
(11:25-27); it strengthened the faith of the disciples (11:15); and it led
directly to the cross (11:53). As the
account unfolds in chapter 11, it may be divided into four sections: the preparation for the miracle 11:1-16); the
arrival of Jesus (11:17-36); the miracle itself (11:37-44); and the aftermath
(11:45-57).
“The first
section provides the background for the miracle by introducing three sets of
characters; the critical man, the concerned sisters, and the cautious
disciples.” That is what we have to look
forward to as we begin to study the 11th chapter of John’s gospel.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I desire to continue to have the Lord show me
His glory as I continue to study His Word.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: Continue to study God’s Word.
Memory verses for the week:
(Romans 6:5-7): “5 For if we have
become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be
in the likeness of His resurrection, 6 knowing this, that our old self was
crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so
that we would no longer be slaves to sin; 7 for he who has died is freed from
sin.”
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “Boldness to speak God’s Word” (Acts 4:29).
Today’s Bible question:
“Who spoke ‘Thou art the Christ, the son of God’?”
Answer in our next SD.
8/16/2016 8:14 AM
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