 Okay, good morning everyone it is a pleasure to see everyone it Compared to how it's been the last few weeks. This looks like a full house to me Feel like we've become a megachurch all of a sudden Let's uh, let's let's pray and thank the Lord for our fellowship together and let's get started Father in heaven. It is a privilege to be with your people It's a privilege to be able to speak about your glory together Lord, I'm very thankful to see all of the faces of your people my brothers and sisters my friends my family Lord It feels like it's just been too long and It's a real treat Lord we pray that you please bless our worship today, please bless this time of teaching. I pray That just like fine Lehman Was a refreshment to the brethren I pray that this this less lesson would be a refreshment to my brethren. I pray that it would be understandable That they would look in your word and that they would see your glory That the Lord Jesus Christ would be honored in it That we would all be encouraged to reflect his glory in our lives So Lord, thank you once again We ask these things and in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ who has redeemed us Saved us and has given us this access to you father in Jesus name. We pray amen Okay So today's lesson is the glory of God and the acts of the apostles So Up to this point we've we've had an introduction from Pastor Michael on the glory of God We've also had a few lessons from our brother Noel about the glory of God in the Old Testament He looked in at the word Kuboad Old the meaning old heavy, but usually used for glory in the Old Testament We also had a few lessons from our brother Ryan about the glory of God and the synoptic in the synoptic Gospels and in the gospel of John We saw the transfigure we saw the glory of God in the transfiguration and in the birth narrative We saw that the glory of God in Christ and his death and resurrection and This morning we get to the book of Acts the acts of the apostles So for the sake of review when we speak about God's glory, what are we speaking of? What are we speaking of can anyone answer that for me? And for the lack of us not having a mic to pass around if you if you mentioned something I'll just mention what you say On the mic here Oh, we had do we do have a mic so Can someone can someone briefly define what is God's glory? Thank you, brother. So God's glory could be described in a number of different ways We could say that God's glory is God's self-revelation God's glory is Who God is in and of himself The manifestation of his attributes Yeah, yeah, thank you brother. Yeah, it's it's one of the hardest terms To define in the Bible. It's used so many different ways There's so many aspects to it And an easy definition is to say yes that the self-revelation of God But you can't say that that's exactly it like that's exactly what the with the word glory is When we talk about the glory of God But it is a nice broad definition It's a good start and it may and it may be good to let that be your first thought when you think of the word Glory to think of God's glory is God's self-revelation of himself so When you see references to God's glory in the Bible you are generally seeing God revealing himself in some way or ways and He's making his perfections Who he is known to us And he's he's choosing to give us a sense of his powerful presence Giving us some knowledge of who he is and We have no knowledge of who God is apart from himself Apart from him revealing himself to us if God chose not to reveal himself to us We would not know anything of God. We would not even know of the concept of God The only way that we can know anything of him is by him revealing himself to us Another helpful way to think of the glory of God is to think of it as both intrinsic and Extrinsic so intrinsic meaning that it belongs naturally to him. That's within him It being on liquid past marks a who he is God is glorious or rather. God is glory God's glory isn't only talked about as something that is seen or experienced by men It's it's it is it is who he is In many places it's talked about as an attribute or our summary of his attributes in Psalm 24 He's referred to as the king of glory In Ephesians 1 he is referred the father is referred to as the father of glory and James 2 Jesus is called the Lord of glory Even in our in the book that we'll be looking through today in Acts in Acts chapter 7 Stephen and Recounting the history of Israel. He's he he mentions how God the God of glory Appears to Abraham. He's not talking necessarily About the revealing of God in all of those cases in those in those cases. It's not necessarily talking Specifically about God's being revealed. It's talking about glory being intrinsic to him something within himself and many many describe this as The infinite fullness of his perfections when you think of God's glory It is all the goodness that is in God all all that is God and himself and And that's a good way to describe God's intrinsic glory Because when we see when he does display his glory It's generally displayed highlighting his other perfections So for example in Isaiah 6 which Noel went over some weeks ago. We saw how God's glory is tied to his holiness You have the seraphim and Isaiah chapter 6 saying holy, holy, holy The whole earth is full of his glory. They're tying his glory his holiness to his glory And Ephesians 1 you have that beautiful Description of the work of the Trinity and our redemption And you see you see God's glory tied to a number of attributes there and God's election Predestination you see you see it tied to So I should say tied to his attribute of his sovereignty you see it tied to His grace and his mercy upon sinners in that case so So these displays of his glory Those are his Extrinsic displays of glory when he shows himself When the extrinsic meaning that which is coming out of him that which he decides to let you see of him That is his extrinsic glory So God is intrinsically glorious He's infinite from eternity. He is the fullness of perfection And he has no need to display his glory. He doesn't he is he is glorious before there was anyone to display glory to But for his own purposes he chooses to reveal himself to us extrinsically And it gives us a very Infantesimal miniscule view of Who God is it's not even a It's not even a half of a spoonful of a taste of The goodness that is in God that we can see So the reason I explain what Intrinsic and extrinsic to you is to sort of give you a feel For when we go through when we go through any book of the Bible or you go through the Bible as a whole and you're trying to see What is this about God? What is this glory of God? And you can see that it's a daunting task to try to Take God's glory, you know, put it in a nice outline and present it For what it is. It's an it's almost indescribable if you try to explain God's glory to someone and And and you can see even what is displayed to you extrinsically is not even close to what he is Intrinsically so the extrinsic what's outside what is shown to you is always going to be smaller Than what is intrinsic which is what is in God who he is his glory within himself So so it's a daunting task, but we're gonna do our best It would be foolish, right to say well, you know, we can't know everything of God's glory So we'll we won't attempt to know anything of God's glory, right? Because the Lord has spoken and he has given us a picture of his glory So we have a duty to find out What it is that we can see of his glory in the scripture? At the same time it would also be foolish for us to say well, yeah, you know I read that Bible front to back. I've read it front to back a hundred times I think I got a good grasp on who God is All right, that's foolish also You don't know God like that and you will never know God like that even for eternity in heaven Even even in your glorified body with your glorified mind being completely free from sin You will never ever know all of the fullness that is within your God So it humbles us to and we understand that this is a this is an exercise in Futility, but it's a beautiful futility So let's let's let's let's engage in this very arduous task of looking into God's glory so so we have this wonderful book the book of Acts and The book of Acts is a narrative of the beginnings of the spread of the gospel and the Establishment of the church after the resurrection and ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ So you you've already had the gospels you have the account of Jesus Jesus life of his death of his resurrection Now we see what comes next what comes next and what's next comes the church and In chapter one We'll just to give you a little rough over very oversimplified outline of the book of Acts in chapter one We have the resurrected Christ Explaining to his disciple his disciples of how he will send the Holy Spirit and how they will be witnesses In Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth. He says that in verse 8 This is the Lord Jesus Christ before he ascends into heaven Start in verse 7 he says it is not for you to know times or seasons that the father has fixed by his own authority But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth and This this verse verse 8 is sort of an overall theme to the book of Acts when you trace from the beginning to the end of the Book of Acts which you see is You see Jesus he ascends into heaven The spirit that he has promised comes the Holy Spirit comes He alights on God's people and then from that point on this this promise of God's people receiving power and being becoming his witnesses From Judea to Samaria and to the ends of the earth Happened actually in that order throughout the book of Acts and this is a tracing of that So so this is I've heard some people mention that they like to this is called the Acts of the Apostles this book You could also think of it as the Acts of the Holy Spirit and in the resurrected power of Jesus Christ So in chapter 2 we have the day of Pentecost where the Holy Spirit comes to rest on the disciples of Christ and dwelling on God's people and From chapter 2 on the gospel spreads rapidly very rapidly by the thousands And it starts in Jerusalem going into going to the ends of the earth In chapter 7 we have our first We have our first witness who is killed our first martyr in Stephen a great a great example My I love Stephen This I Remember being first converted and this this being one of the most encouraging accounts in the Bible to me So in chapter 7 we have Stephen the first martyr We're introduced to Saul On the very heels of the death of Stephen the people who Stoned Stephen they laid their garments at Saul's feet Saul who later becomes Paul and we end up seeing Paul's conversion And in chapter 9 of Acts and You also see That starting in around chapter 10 you see the Gentiles start to hear the gospel preach to them and by chapter 13 Paul is sent off on his first missionary journey And from there Paul is the primary one followed in this book here He ends up returning back to Jerusalem in chapter 15. He goes out again Only to come back to Jerusalem again in chapter 21 where he's arrested He ends up appealing he ends up In his arrest giving multiple chances to preach the gospel again He is he appeals to Caesar And by God's will he ends up in Rome and that's where that's where the book ends. So The book of Acts is a very beautiful book. You see you see how the lord has decided to start and and build his church So so how are we going to tackle this book today? This is a big book This is a big book to try to tackle the glory of God in um, so we're going to um I'm going to take a similar approach to to what my brothers took in previous weeks Um, we're going to take a quick look at each of the direct references to the glory of God in the book of Acts Um, and and to be fair and to and to be understanding we that's not an exhaustive look at glory in the book of Acts, but it's a good starting point So you don't want to think that because um The word that we're going to be introduced to is doxa. Um, this is the noun for glory Or doxazo the verb for glorify You don't want to think that every time you see that word You know it It it specifically means um Glory in this way Um, it can mean it has other meanings to it um brightness majesty splendor Also, too, you don't want to assume that if you're reading another portion Of the text that and it doesn't have either of these words that is not talking about God's glory God's glory Is implied in many respects you might even be able to make an argument that is implied in many and more times Then you would see that word But it's a good place to start for us. Um, and that's what we're going to start So we're going to look um We're going to look at these references and then we're going to pull three themes Three themes of glory out of this book Um, the first theme that we're going to pull out is God's glory and the holy spirit's powerful witness of christ We're going to look at God's glory and the holy spirit's worldwide witness of christ And we're also going to look at God's glory jealously guarded so um So starting with these references um to dox and we're not going to go to each passage At this point, we're going to go to the passage as we go through the themes But I want to give you a Look in the book of acts of how glory is set the these words for glory are set out. So In we have nine total references To of glory and five of those references are are are nouns the word I'm sorry four of those references are nouns Two of them are direct references to God's glory The first one being steven Mentioning the god of glory appearing to abraham and acts chapter seven verse two The second one is when steven very clearly sees the glory of god. This is the most explicit view of glory in the book of acts Um Where where glory is called out and where it is seen for what it is Um Then you have of somewhat indirect references um to glory The noun doxa you have uh uh sol later paul who encounters the risen christ You first see that in acts nine um verse three, but the actual word isn't used there But paul does use the word glory in acts chapter 22 verse 11 when he gives a recounting of what has happened to him When he was converted and he he refers to the the light of the the glory of the light And it could be translated the brightness of the light, but we can we'll talk a little bit more about that when we get to it also Herod We have another indirect reference to to god's glory We have herod in acts chapter 12 Herod one of the persecutors of the church herod who killed james and Herod um He preaches uh to the folks of tyron siden And he refuses to give god the glory and we'll see what god does to him um, we also have Five references to um the verb for glorify So you have jesus You have peter mentioning how jesus is glorified In the healing of the lame beggar in acts chapter three you have an act chapter 4 21 How the people glorified god For the fact that the lame beggar was healed They had just heard they saw the lame beggar healed. They heard the preaching of the gospel and they glorified god The people glorified god on peter's report of gentiles conversions in acts chapter 11 18 You have the gentiles antiach in pasidia They glorify the word of the lord in acts 13 48 And this is a this is a major theme in the second half of the book of acts how the gent how god is being glorified by the people because Of his work in the gentiles You also see that too with james and the other elders glorifying god for saving the gentiles when paul meets them in jerusalem and they hear of how god saves the gentiles and it says that they glorify god So um, let's take a look at our first Our first text here in acts chapter 6 I'm sorry not acts chapter 6 acts chapter 3 And we're going to look at god's glory And the powerful witness of christ and what i'm going to do is i'm just going to walk through these texts And we'll talk about them. We'll we'll and explain them as we go along here So i'm gonna start reading at verse 1 in acts chapter 3 Says now peter and john We're going up to the temple at the hour of prayer the ninth hour And a man lame from birth was being carried Whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple that is called the beautiful gate to ask alms of those entering the temple Seeing peter and john about to go into the temple. He asked to receive alms And peter directed his gaze at him As did john and said look at us and he fixed his attention on them Expecting to receive something from them But peter said I have no silver and gold But what I do have I give to you In the name of jesus christ of nazareth rise up and walk So you have peter and john here um The day of pentecost is past they are They're at they're at the beautiful gate and They they heal this lame beggar and they do this in the name of jesus christ of nazareth. It's very important And he took him up and in verse 7 and he took him up by the right hand and raised him up And immediately his feet and ankles were made strong And leaping up he stood and began to walk And entered the temple with him walking and leaping and praising god And all the people saw him walking and praising god And recognized him as the one who sat at the beautiful gate of the temple Asking for alms and they were filled with wonder And amazement at what had happened to him So Um without even mentioning glory yet. You see some of god's glory being revealed here And the healing of this lame beggar and you see the response of the people They're filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him That's a proper response when coming across god's glory Now look at verse 11 While he clung to peter and john All the people utterly astounded ran together to them in the portico called solomons And when peter saw it he addressed the people men of israel Why do you wonder at this? Or why do you stare at us as though by our own power or piety? We have made him walk. So they're very clear This isn't by their own power that this has happened and it's not even by their own piety So they're not saying this happened because we're so holy or this happened because we're so powerful Who do you think he's going to point to? He's going to point to the power of god Though he's going to point to the holiness of god not his own It says the god of abraham The god of isek and the god of jacob the god of our fathers He's saying to these israelites. This is your god. This is the god of the old testament This is the god that you've been taught about from a child Now what did this god do he glorified he glorified his servant jesus That's one of those verb references to glory doxazo glorified his servant jesus Whom you delivered over and denied in the presence of pilot When he had decided to release him So they're saying here look what you see isn't our own glory This This healing that you saw isn't a manifestation of my power my piety. You're not looking at my attributes on display You're seeing god on display this wonder and amazement that you have This is a response to god's power. This is a response to god's piety This is and this is jesus christ specifically who has been glorified in this healing It's it's a far cry from what you see with these fake faith healers now, right? Who gets the glory with these fake faith healers? They glorify themselves, you know you walk up on stage with a big, you know shiny white suit And uh, you you make a bunch of faith heal fake healings and they receive glory for themselves They write books. They put their face on the front. It's all about them But in this case it is jesus christ who is glorified so um, and he also In jesus being glorified. He's making it very clear You see how god's glory shows them their sin here you see how God jesus is being glorified But he also connects this peter with the fact that this is the jesus who they have rejected Who that they who they gave over? They rejected the promised one the one who their god the one who they have been claiming to follow Has given them they have rejected them another prophet the last and final prophet and the string of prophets. They've rejected him But you denied the holy and righteous one And asked for a murderer to be granted to you And you killed the author of life whom god raised from the dead So now he's proclaiming not just that they've rejected jesus. He calls him the author of life here He's he's showing jesus's deity that jesus is god To this we are witnesses And his name By faith in his name has made this man strong Whom you see and know and the faith that is through jesus has given the man this perfect health And the presence of you all So you see the you see the purpose here too behind god revealing his glory here and the healing of this man um, he's he's doing it to um bring these israelites to repentance He has a purpose here to call them to faith in the lord jesus christ whom they have rejected And he says in verse 17 going on and now brothers i know that you acted in ignorance As did also your rulers But where god foretold by the mouth of all the prophets that his christ would suffer He thus fulfilled repent therefore And turn back that your sins may be blotted out That times of refreshing may come from the presence of the lord And that he may send the christ appointed for you jesus Whom heaven must receive Until the time for restoring all the things about which god spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets long ago moses said The lord will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brothers You shall listen to him and whatever he tells you this jesus that you That you rejected that um was risen. This is the one who moses promised to you back in deuteronomy 18 This is the prophet that moses said this. This is the prophet like me that god will send you And it shall be that every soul who does not listen to that prophet Shall be destroyed from the people And all the prophets who have spoken from samuel and those who came after him also proclaimed these days You are the sons of the prophets and of the covenant that god made with your father sank to abraham And in your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed God having raised up his servant sent him to you first to bless you by turning every one of you from your wickedness Do you see here the connection between god's glory and the preaching of his gospel? You see you see Connection we got the god the purpose of him revealing his glory to these people Was to call them to repentance to call them to faith in christ And it's very beautiful here to offer them After rejecting the prophet that was promised to them He is still offering a lifeline to them by faith in him And he's even explained to them their privileged position Um god having made a covenant with their father abraham So this um god here is being glorified not Just in the fact that this lame beggar was healed physically Um, but it points to a greater reality a greater reality So, um, I wanted to also show you a little bit here Listen ax chapter 4 So, you know peter and john are immediately after they're being persecuted for their testimony An ax chapter 4 verse 13 They're getting you know after giving their defense Oh, I'll start at verse 11 says This jesus is the stone that was rejected by you the builders which has become the cornerstone And there is salvation and no one else For there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved And look at verse 13 here Now when they saw the boldness of peter and john And perceived that they were uneducated common men They were astonished And they recognized that they had been with jesus Um look at um see peter and john Knew of god's glory And it was obvious that they had been with the glorious one um You see um when someone Knows the god of glory it's evident and others can see it and it's a testimony to the god of glory also, um Take a look at I think I lost my place in my notes here Yeah, take a look at verse 21 And when they had further threatened them They let them go Finding no way to punish them because of the people For all were praising and if you have a new king james glorifying right Glorifying god for what had happened For the man on whom this sign of healing was performed Was more than 40 years old So when people come into contact with god's glory When they are and they see rightly the holy spirit gives them eyes to see rightly. What do they do? They reflect that glory and they glorify god themselves This is not to mean that they can add to god's glory in any way God you can't add to god's glory You can't add to infinity Um infinity plus one is infinity but um what they are doing Is they are reflecting the glory? That was shown to them and they um they Show it back in their praises and glorifying god Let's go to our next text In ax chapter six So we saw there on the holy spirit's powerful witness of christ earlier, right? So the um you had the holy spirit Peter and john having the holy spirit You see the power of the holy spirit on the power of jesus christ In the the healing of that lame beggar you see You see the holy spirit glorifying god You see the father glorifying god through that power of the holy spirit and that healing You see um the the preaching of the gospel You see the purposes behind god's glory behind god's glory being revealed there So now we're going to move on to steven's account in ax chapter six And we'll look at god's glory and the holy spirit's worldwide witness of the lord jesus christ And starting at verse eight And steven full of grace and power Was doing great wonders and signs among the people Then this looks a lot like peter and john doesn't it? He has he has he this this man has the holy spirit And um he's showing the power The glory of god is is emanating from this man Then some of those who belong to the synagogue of the freedmen as it was called and of the sirenians And of the alexandrians and of those from salicia and asia rose up and disputed with steven But they could not withstand the wisdom and the spirit with which he was speaking So the holy spirit is using um our brother steven here To preach the gospel and to and to preach it very boldly and convincingly I I was trying to imagine What it would be like to try to argue with steven in this regard It had to be frustrating not being able to withstand His arguments it reminds you it's a it's a small picture of jesus speaking to the Pharisees Now jesus has multiple drop the mic moments in the gospels You know, he'll say something that has to walk away shake their heads come back another day eventually They just don't come back right just just just kill them is what they would rather do, you know, so Then it says in verse 11 then they secretly instigated men Who said we have heard him speaking we have heard him speak blasphemous words against moses and god And they stirred up the people and the elders and the scribes and they came upon him and seized him And brought him before the council and this looks a lot like what happened to christ, doesn't it? False witnesses bringing him up in fact christ promised that this would happen to his people in matthew 10 And they set up false witnesses who said this man never ceases to speak words against this holy place to talk about the temple and the law For we have heard him say That this jesus of nazareth will destroy this place and will change the customs that moses delivered to us They're referring Stephen is likely referring to jesus saying that he will destroy this temple talking about his body And in three days it will be built back up again They these people Typical Self Typical self in their typical self righteousness They worship their customs rather than god They worship their rituals rather than the god behind their rituals and some of their rituals weren't even commanded Especially those of the Pharisees um, so They're they're charging steven for blaspheming the temple and the law um, and particularly their ritualistic The rituals Engaging at him all who sat in the yeah pay very close attention here the verse 15 and gazing at him All who sat in the council Saw that his face was like the face of an angel That reminds you a little bit of uh, moses and exodus 34 Where he was with with god and his face shown he came down from mount sinai and he had to put the veil over his face Because the people were too afraid you could tell that he was with god. Well, now you're starting to see god Glorify himself and our brother steven And when god glorifies himself you're going to see this is the longest sermon in the book of acts. It's a very beautiful sermon um And i'm not going to read through the whole sermon. I wish I could But um, there are two there are two themes running through his sermon. There's a theme of location running through his sermon and there's also um a theme of Of Of the fathers rejecting the prophets a theme of location and the fathers rejecting the prophets Now for location they believed that Jerusalem is where god is the temple is where god is These rituals that I perform here. This is where god is god is nowhere else Not they probably wouldn't say it that openly, but that's what they were really charging him for um, this is not um They didn't see god as bigger than um, they're the the rituals of their worship And at the same time even within their rituals They rejected all of the prophets from history starting with moses And all the way through to the lord jesus christ So even in their keeping of the rituals, they were hypocrites the whole time They didn't they didn't glorify god They were glorifying themselves in their rituals And you have and then by this point in history here you had major corruption in the temple Jesus he uh overthrew the tables of the money changes for a reason It was it was a horrible a horrible corruption and so Stephen he rails he rails against them and he does this by giving an account Of the history of israel in the sermon and he's very clever the way he does this He starts with abraham and he shows That when god met abraham, he wasn't in israel abraham was outside of israel When god met abraham um joseph where was joseph when he was blessed by the lord egypt moses moses was rejected by his people in egypt Went out to midian Where did he saw the lord and he the burning bush in midian? He wasn't in israel so God didn't need he was and this was all before there even was a temple This is all before they even was a tabernacle So god isn't limited by location and then even even then starting with moses moses was rejected And the prophets from then on there's a long string of prophets who are rejected down to the lord jesus christ And he shows them that they were acting just like their fathers who rejected the prophets so Look here i'm gonna start at verse one and chapter seven And It says this and he makes a very clear reference to glory here speaking of god and i remember too By this point his face is shining with god's glory And the high priest said are these things so And steven said Brothers and fathers hear me The god of glory Appeared to our father abraham when he was in mesopotamia Before he lived in haran so abraham in mesopotamia outside But notice how also he refers to god as the god of glory remember how i mentioned intrinsic glory When we started right this is this is speaking of god's intrinsic glory the glory that is within god And and said to him go out from your land And from your kindred and go into the land that i will show you Then he went out from the land of the chaldeans and lived in haran and after his father died God removed him from there into this land in which you are now living Now uh, so again, we saw god's intrinsic glory there We see that um, he's he's starting this theme of location throughout his sermon Let's move on to verse 23 Um, and this is this is speaking of moses here. So he's he's moved on to moses at this point He's passed up. He's gone through joseph now. He's on to moses When he was 40 years old It came into his heart to visit his brothers the children of israel And seeing one of them being wronged He defended the oppressed man And avenged him by striking down the egyptian So moses showed his love for his brother He supposed that his brothers will understand that god was giving them salvation by his hand But they did not understand And on the following day He appeared to them as they were quarreling And tried to reconcile them saying Men you are brothers Why do you wrong each other? But the man who was wrong wronging his neighbor thrust him aside saying Who made you a ruler and a judge over us? Do you want to kill me as you killed the egyptian yesterday? At this retort moses fled And became an exile in the land of midian where he became the father of two sons So moses in a foreign land His people also in a foreign land And they reject him in egypt moses Showing his moses Trained as an egyptian educated as an egyptian holding privileges as an egyptian rejects Who he is as an egyptian And embraces who he is as an israelite serving his brothers Defending his brother against an egyptian soldier And and and and what what is what is his service get he gets rejection? And he's he's out in midian And and god meets him out in midian in the burning bush So outside of the temple so same theme of location, but now you're starting to see the theme of rejection So now Let's look at verse 44 Our fathers had the tent of witness in the wilderness Just as he who spoke to moses directed him to make it according to the pattern that he had seen Our fathers in turn brought it in with joshua when they dispossessed the nations that god drove out before our fathers It was until the days of david So it was until the days of david who found favor in the sight of god and asked to find a dwelling place for the god of jacob But it was salomon who built the house for him Yet the most high Does not dwell in houses made by hands as the prophet said salomon even said that same thing when the the temple was an of instance was was I forget the word I forget Huh dedicated. Thank you brother when the temple was dedicated Um says in here in verse 49 heaven is my throne And the earth is my footstool What kind of house will you build for me says the lord or what is the place of my rest? Did not my hand make all these things? So he now he's being very explicit this temple that they speak of him blaspheming. It's not um God is not limited to this temple Says you stiff neck people uncircumcised in heart and ears You always resist the holy spirit as your fathers did so do you Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the righteous one whom you have now betrayed and murdered You have received the law as delivered by angels and did not keep it Now when they heard these things they were enraged and they ground their teeth at him So up until this point, right? Stephen his face shown like an angel. He the glory of the lord is upon him And um and and and reflecting God's glory similar to what we saw earlier The gospel is being preached and it's being preached with boldness and authority And in this case is making the people angry. They're not responding in repentance But but now we're going to see a real show of glory In verse 55, but he full of the holy spirit gazed into heaven And saw the glory of God and Jesus Standing at the right hand of God Think think of that. Let's break that down just a little bit. So he he's full of the holy spirit Right, it's the holy spirit that has given him eyes to see that The glory of the lord is everywhere, but does everyone has have eyes to see God reveals himself to who he wishes The glory is God's self-revelation But not everyone sees that revelation as they should But steven sees it very well here. He sees a very special glory And and who's who's along with this glory is Jesus Jesus the god man And he's um and what is Jesus normally doing in heaven? He's what at the right hand of God He's sitting at the right hand of God. But what is Jesus doing here? He's standing at the right hand of God Jesus is receiving Our brother steven to himself You see god you so you see god being glorified in steven He's full of the holy spirit. You see god being glorified in the gospel that he preached um And now you see um You see the mercy of our lord jesus christ to our brother steven The love that our lord jesus christ has for our brother steven that he would stand and salute And receive our brother steven into heaven Like would it be wrong if he stayed sitting? Not at all But it's it's an extra special um gesture from jesus towards steven And and and you see also too in this glory that jesus is at the right hand of god So jesus he is glorified too as king and judge here His glory has seen in multiple ways in this passage And and steven said and he said behold i see the heavens opened and the son of man standing at the right hand of god But they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and rushed together at him Then they cast him out of the city and stoned him And the witnesses laid down their garments at the feet of a young man named sol And as they were stoning steven. He called out lord jesus received my spirit And falling to his knees he cried out with a loud voice Lord do not hold this sin against them And when he had said this he fell asleep steven seeing god's glory um Even reflects god's glory And the mercy that he shows to the the ones who are persecuting him He sees god jesus standing to receive him and how does steven responds steven responds With a heart of forgiveness to the ones who are persecuting him um a heart that um that cares for their souls um also like think about um think about the The um how this shows how jesus you know, he's glorified in being the god of truth Remember the promise from matthew 10 that jesus um that jesus gives his disciples That um those who acknowledge him he will acknowledge before the father in heaven those who deny him he will deny You see jesus clearly acknowledging our brother steven um Remember the promise um in the great commission that he will he will be with us always right you see steven he is um He is doing he is he is performing the great commission in front of our faces here And and who is with him the lord jesus the lord jesus. He's the god of truth Um, he he keeps his word Um, that's that's a great encouragement for our preaching of the gospel, isn't it? What better way to glorify god than to be faithful and preaching his gospel That's a theme that you see throughout the book of acts You see multiple preachings of the gospel and all of it god is glorified Um One thing i meant to mention too when we were actually going through the the healing of the lame beggar right when you see when you see One of the good things about looking at these direct references to glory Is the fact that you may not see a direct reference to glory in all spots in the book of acts But you see let's say we take the healing right if jesus is glorified in that healing Then what does it say about all the other healings? He's glorified in that So every miracle that you see God has been glorified If god has been glorified in the preaching of the gospel here What does it say about the preaching of the gospel and acts two and acts three and then you know Acts 17 and acts 21 and acts 22 right god has been glorified in all of that Uh, so you can uh, you see how far reaching god's glory is Now lastly and we'll go very quickly as i'm running out of time and there's more here I would like to have gone through. Um, I mentioned the holy spirit's worldwide witness one of the points I wanted to make here is that in steven making this argument that God's uh god is not limited to location In this sermon Well after act seven Who begins to be converted right you see the you see the gospel being preached in samaria by philip and acts chapter eight And then the other ends of the earth you see the gentile starting to be saved So you see a running theme there and you see steven's the first one to start to hit on that argument And you see and in many of those cases Like we've mentioned before and some of those direct references to the words glory and glorify Um, and some of those cases the Gentiles are being saved and what do the people do they glorify god? They say wow god saves Gentiles God has given the gospel to the Gentiles and now they're being converted in droves All right, we see that even here god has been glorified in the salvation of of us Um of his people here we Gentiles So, uh, lastly, I want to look at god's glory Jealousy guarded and let's go to acts chapter 12 Oh, thanks, brother. Yeah, I think I'll get I'll get through the rest of it. I appreciate it, bro so Now in acts chapter 12 Um starting in verse 20 here So you have herit right you have herit And herit He's he's killed James the brother of john the son of zebedee And um herit and he does it to please the juice Herit's uh Herit's out for himself, you know, he'll he'll kill who he needs to kill to get what he wants He'll take he's herit is in in things for his own glory And we'll see when we're going to see here an example of herit Taking attempting to take glory for himself Says here in verse 20 Now herit was angry with the people of tyre and siden And they came to him with one accord And having persuaded blast us the king's chamberlain They asked for peace because their country depended on the king's country for food On an appointed day Herit put on his royal robes Took his seat upon the throne And delivered an oration to them And the people were shouting The voice of a god and not of a man Immediately an angel of the lord struck him down Because he did not give the glory And he was eaten by worms. He did not give god the glory and he was eaten by worms and breathed his last But the word of god increased and multiplied You see how god views his glory It's a glory that is not To be shared Now i want to be very careful with that. Does god glorify his people? Yes, he does. He glorifies his people But his people are glorified in christ. The glory of his people is in effect. It's god's glory It is the glory of god and his people. So he shares his glory with us But it at the same time it doesn't come from us Herit wanted to make it look as if he had some intrinsic glory in himself And um and he let the people call him god And that's totally outside of the pattern that you see from the apostles, isn't it? So you had paul he refused to steal god's glory and acts 14 when they They tried to confuse him for zeus You have peter and john back in the passage that we read earlier in acts chapter three Where they were like hey, it wasn't by our power or piety that this healing happened. This is Jesus is glorified in this But in this case herit was very happy to receive the glory And for us this should be this should be a terrifying text Because think about how many times you wanted glory How many times you wanted to look as if you have something you have intrinsic glory about you It may not be your first thought especially as a christian but um You see how god how god is jealous for his glory. He's very jealous for his glory And you see that too with ananias and sapphira. They wanted glory from god, didn't they? To the point where they would they would lie About their giving god struck them down too You have simon magus. He wanted glory. He wanted to buy He wanted he he wanted to buy the holy spirit basically wanted to buy this power that he saw In the apostles And and he was rebuked roundly for it So we we ought to see god's glory for what it is God's glory in this book you see it in the powerful witness of the holy spirit Glorifying our lord, jesus christ You see it in the worldwide witness of the holy spirit showing jesus christ to the nations And you also see that god's glory is is um, it's an exclusive glory god Um, it is god's glory and god's alone. It's not for it's not um for us to to keep and hoard Or any or to have If we have any glory, it's a glory that is shared with us by god to reflect to show to show him So let's remember that let's let god's glory humble us Let's let it motivate us to preach his gospel boldly to see god for who he is This is a very encouraging book. Um, if you go through the week, I I encourage you to take your hand out Take a look at some of the texts in your in your spare time. Maybe during your devotional time Go through some of the questions Think through how in your life you must reflect god's glory And may you may you be sanctified by and I pray to be a blessing to you. Let's pray Father in heaven, um, it is a privilege to look into your word and and to see What is true of your glory what is true of the glory of your your beloved son our lord jesus christ Lord, I pray um that we would be a people who reflect your glory A people who um would revel in your glory Help us not to be a people Who seek to attain a glory for ourselves that is outside of you Instead lord May we may we seek All of the purposes of your glory being revealed may we seek all of those purposes to come to pass And play our part as you have commanded us Particularly in the great commission Lord, thank you for this time I pray that your people are refreshed by your word today I pray that they will be refreshed by our worship corporately together today And may the name of our lord jesus christ be praised and glorified in jesus's name. We pray amen