God’s Glory and the World’s Approval
“I have glorified it and will glorify it again.” What is this glory?
We are not meant to obtain from this world a glory we do not
yet have. The world cannot give us what we want. We are meant to glorify God
with the glory he has already given us, so that we may then receive further glory,
not from the world, but from Him. We go from the glory we have to the glory we
do not yet have, as St. Paul says, “And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect
the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into His image from glory to glory,
which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit” (1 Corinthians 3:18).
Modern society, with its own standards and values, exercises
a certain pressure on Christians. It is peer pressure sometimes, it is also
felt like an attraction other times, or like the threat of failure if we do not
comply. The world offers us its own “salvation” from the evils of life; the
world offers its own “redemption” from our sense of failure and worthlessness;
the world offers its own glory in the approval of people, in the applause of
the crowd or in the fleeting popularity of social media. We want salvation, we
need redemption, we are meant for glory. Jesus, today, is rejecting the world’s
glory and fully embracing the glory coming from God the Father. Jesus faces his
enemies and goes to the cross.
The world cannot give true glory. The glory of the world is
based on a lie. The lie that you are not worth it unless the world says so.
But, in fact, the glory of the world depends on you believing that lie. When
you surrender to the world’s pressure and say, “here I am, world, tell me what
to do or what to think”, then, and only then, the world receives glory and
power from you. When you surrender to the world’s lie, then the world, the
crowd, the dominant class, etc., receive from you one more vote to keep
exercising a fake authority.
There is a glory which has already been given to us. We have
been redeemed, we have been considered by God worth the blood of his Son. For
those of us who have already been baptized, we have been created anew in Jesus
Christ: we “reflect the glory of the Lord.” Saint Paul says, “For we are God’s
handiwork, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared
beforehand so that we would walk in them.” We do not work to obtain our own worldly
glory, we glorify God by blossoming in the good works which God Himself has
already placed into our hearts to do. God has already placed into our hearts a
treasure, his sanctifying grace, which is meant to fructify in good works with
our cooperation. We do not need the world’s approval because we have been
already made good by God: God has considered us worth the life of his Son and
through baptism has already given us a share in his divine nature and made us
His children. Now, from that initial glory, the glory of being now called His
children, we are meant to obtain eternal glory: the true salvation from death
and pain, the complete redemption from every evil, the glory of the
resurrection with Jesus in Heaven.
The world cannot give you that. The world promises you
happiness and cannot fulfil its promise: the world’s happiness is false,
because it’s fleeting, limited and lower than ourselves. Jesus does not lie. He
tells you that in the world you will have to suffer but that you will not be
alone. Jesus promises you that He will always help you to do what he has asked
you to do. But you have to do it: this is your glory. Your glory on
earth is to perform the good works He has already given you to do, the good
works which are already in your heart, like a seed, and are meant to blossom
for other human beings to see. You are meant to glorify God with your works. It
is not the world who tells you what to do or what to think. You do not need the
world to tell you that you are good or worth it. God has already loved you and
nobody can take this away from you, except yourself...
God has already glorified His own Name, by redeeming you and
making you His true child in Jesus Christ: this is the marvelous work of
redemption. The people of God is His glory, something that manifests in the
world God’s power and mercy, something which shows God’s goodness and
greatness. God will glorify again His own Name, when he will come back and show
His power and mercy by taking us to Heaven with Him. But in order to obtain the
second glory, we must glorify God with the first glory we have received. The
path from glory to glory passes through the way of the cross. We glorify God,
we show the fruits of redemption, first of all, when we die to our personal
sins and do penance for our past sins. We glorify God also when we are strong
in virtue and sacrifice ourselves to do the right thing, no matter how
difficult it might be. God’s name is glorified in us when people can see in us a
reflection of His goodness, when they can see in us an image of Jesus’ mercy
and justice.
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