"Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven."--Matthew 5:16. Jesus, telling His listeners to let their light shine so that others may see their good works. But this is not to make a show of it but it is so the glory goes to God.
Glory to God. Have you ever wanted to brag about something you accomplished? But then you realize the credit really belongs to someone else? Well I can definitely say I have accomplished a lot in order to get to where I am today. However, the majority of what I have accomplished, if not all of it, has not been without the assistance of others. Ultimately, everything I have accomplished in my life has not been without the grace of God. I can honestly look back on my 27 years of life and it still amazes me that God has allowed me to come this far. And now as I look forward in to my future, quite frankly I am excited to see what else God has in store for me. I am also aware that many people have been witness to what I have accomplished and what I am accomplishing. At the end of the day though, all I can say is glory to God because without Him, none of this would be possible.
Glory to God. Take some time and reflect on what has happened in your life since you became a Christian for the better. How many lives have been impacted simply because you chose to obey God rather than men? But furthermore take some time to reflect on to why you do what you do in obedience to God. Are you doing what you do simply to look good or to bring glory to to God?
Glory to God. When Jesus spoke these words, there was no doubt people of the sect of the Pharisees in the audience. The Pharisees were notorious were showing what "godly" people they were. But it was just that, a show. They were more interested in bringing glory to themselves than to God. In fact, Jesus would say in Matthew 5:20 that if the people's righteousness did not surpass that of the Pharisees, they would not enter the kingdom of heaven. This is a passage we will look at in a later blog. The point is whatever was done, it was to bring glory to God, not to self.
So how does this concept of bringing glory to God apply to us? Well Matthew 5:16 tells us to let our light shine before men in such a way that they may see our good works. Good works here refer to deeds exhibiting a consistent moral character (BDAG 390). Jesus tells us that we are to let our light shine "in such a way" that others might see our good works. Digging into this verse we see that there is a certain way we ought to shine our light as we move through this verse we see that when people see our "good works," they should be seeing God, not us. This is how we bring glory to God. When we consider the definition of good works here, we know that we live in a world whose works exhibit anything but a moral character. This among other things should be our motivating factor to be different. When people see Christ's light shining through us, it is Christ they will see in us if it is God we are trying to glorify. Although this has only happened once, I have never forgotten it. One person a long time ago once said to me that she knew I was a Christian even before I mentioned the fact that I was. This was all because of my good works. I say this not to brag but to bring glory to God. What I am trying to say is that if we stay focused on carrying out God's will as found in the pages of the New Testament, people will see that we are different and many times they will begin to wonder why. This is where our opportunity to share the gospel message is at our fingertips.
All this being said, my encouragement to you is simply this. Focus on carrying out God's will in your life by returning to the pages of Scripture. Take some time for your own personal study and then apply what you learn in your personal study to your life. In this way, your light will shine before men in such a way that they will see your good works and ultimately glorify YOUR Father who is in heaven. If we focus on letting our light shine, I can speak from experience that God will open doors of opportunity you never even knew were there.
DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! PRAY ABOUT IT! LOVE Y'ALL! GOD BLESS!
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