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GOD'S GLORY




A few years ago I watched a program on Day of Discovery. It was about a twenty year old girl named Lygon Stevens who was a mountain climber and had died in an avalanche while climbing with her brother. Lygon did not sound like your typical twenty year old. We get a glimpse into her walk with the Lord through her journal that her brother salvaged during the accident. She seemed to have found all the things that young girls are looking for in her Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. But after her death, her family was left to deal with their huge heart rending loss. Their suffering was horrific. More of the story can be found on the website http://www.timetoliveisnow.org/.

The takeaway in this story for me is an illustration that came from Lygon's mother. She had been asked to speak somewhere and had gone to a place of solitude to gather her thoughts. It was still very hard to carry this whole thing around with her...the loss of her daughter, but the story of a love affair that Lygon had had with her Savior. She had fallen asleep briefly, and when she woke up, there were five elk with huge racks of antlers. She noticed how cumbersome and weighty the antlers seemed to be. She heard God telling her that this was a picture of us carrying around His glory. It's not always easy. In fact, rarely is. But His glory is what it's all about.

Sometimes in life we must suffer. We don't and can't understand why. Many people think Job is a book about why people suffer. But that question is not answered in Job. We can't always know why. We just know Who. Our sufferings may seem senseless or a waste of time, but there's an element we usually miss – His glory.

The Hebrew word for glory is kabowd, pronounced kä·vōde'.  Blue Letter Bible Outline of Biblical Usage gives this definition:

1) glory, honor, glorious, abundance
   a) abundance, riches
   b) honor, splendor, glory
   c) honor, dignity
   d) honor, reputation
   e) honor, reverence, glory
   f) glory

We don't get to choose if we suffer or not. We do have a choice in how we respond to suffering. We can run from it, rebel against it and refuse to let Him use it, or we can move toward the suffering in surrender to Him in trust that He has a plan, not just for me, but a greater plan to display His glory. Those antlers were like a badge of honor to the elk. And they were very abundant. They gave the elk splendor and dignity, but they were heavy.

God's glory is heavy, weighty.

Kabowd is from the root word kabad, pronounced kä·vad'....

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