"Not unto us, O LORD, not unto us, but unto thy name give glory, for thy mercy, and for thy truth's sake." Psalm 115:1 (KJV)
A lot of us miss the point of scriptures like these, myself included at times. What I mean is that we sometimes try to bring glory to ourselves, instead of to the Lord. You can always tell when a preacher or someone is trying to bring glory to themselves instead of the Lord... When they talk, they use the words "I'm," "I" or "me" a lot. They refer to themselves more than they do the Lord. With sentences like, "I'm going to teach you this," or "I taught that," etc, etc. When someone is teaching the scriptures, you don't want their doctrines or their teachings you want the teachings of the Bible, the teachings of Jesus. I know it doesn't seem like a big deal when people refer to themselves a lot while teaching the scriptures, but it has to make you wonder: Are they teaching God's Word, or their own opinion of God's Word?
Also, it should make you question if the person talking is full of the Spirit or full of pride. When dealing with God's Word you should want a humble teacher, one that believes there's always something new that they can learn too. A prideful person has learned all that they can learn, but a humble man is never done learning and also a humble man has His sights on bringing glory to God and not to himself. I don't know about anyone else, but I want a humble Minister that fears God and is always open to learning more. It doesn't matter if you've been in ministry for 20 years, there's still more that you can learn. The Bible is a huge book and everytime we read through it, we learn something new. We don't catch it all at once. The Holy Spirit will open your eyes so that you learn what He wants you to each time you go through. It's really amazing, this time around of reading the Bible I've saw some things and I would think, "Wow, I never noticed this part before!" I've gotten way off topic, but the main point is that we should be trying to bring glory to God and not to ourselves. A lot of Christians are too consumed with themselves, and not consumed enough with God. Have you ever gone to a Christian concert? Do you see the way some act at these things? They sing along with the music, that's fine... But some of them are still singing real loud when the song is long over, trying to draw attention to how "spiritual" they are. When I see people trying to draw so much attention to themselves, I can't help but to think that these are probably the same kind of people that would feed a homeless man and then have it printed in the newspaper. Can anyone do something good even if it means no glory for themselves? Stop trying to draw attention to yourself, and try to draw attention to the Lord. After all, Jesus is the one that paid for our sins... He's the one that deserves all the attention and glory.
Prayer: Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for this message and for all things. Please forgive us of all our sins as we forgive all those who've sinned against us. Help us to bring you glory and not to be self-centered or prideful. In Jesus name. A-men!
