Part of the reason for the Upper Room Discourse was to prepare the disciples for Jesus’ death. This daily devotional looks at how Jesus explained how His death on the cross glorified both Him and God, comforting the disciples and guiding them to realize He would be leaving.
Nuggets
- Jesus’ obedience to God’s Will both glorified Himself and God.
- Yes, God was glorified in Jesus’ sufferings.
- Jesus was also telling His friends goodbye.
Jesus had to have been looking forward to eating the Passover meal with His disciples. After they had eaten, Jesus covered some really difficult ground that the disciples still hadn’t grasped yet.
One of the topics was Jesus’ and God’s glorification in what was about to happen. It had to have been hard for them to comprehend that They would receive praise and honor for Jesus’ suffering.
But they did. Let’s take a look.
Let's Put It into Context #1
Here is a running list of nuggets for the series.
Let's Put It into Context #2
It seems that every time we run across these words, I have to do a quick review. How does everything fit together?
Glory expresses the splendor and beauty representing the attributes of God resulting from the authority and holiness of God.
Glorification is the process that changes us to possess the attributes of God.
We glorify God when we use what we learn from seeking Him to change our words and actions in order to obey and praise Him.
Glorify: to make glorious by bestowing honor, praise, or admiration
Glorious: possessing or deserving glory
Glory: worshipful praise, honor, and thanksgiving
Glorifying Jesus
“When he had gone out, Jesus said, ‘Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him’” (Jn. 13: 31 ESV)
Jesus’ obedience to God’s Will both glorified Himself and God.
Hmmm. Most people in that day and age would say death on the cross would not bring anybody any glory and honor. It would bring pain and humiliation.
People would also say it now.
But Jesus said differently. And He was the one Who would be going through it.
No, it wasn’t that Jesus didn’t understand what the cross symbolized. He really did.
And it wasn’t that Jesus didn’t know what glory was. Glory and honor had happened to Him two other times.
- Jesus’ baptism (Matt 3.13-17. Mark 1.9-11. Luke 3.21-22.
- On the Mount of Transfiguration (Mt. 17: 1-13; Mk. 9: 2-13; Lk. 9: 28-62)
Jesus understood perfectly. The disciples — not so much.
Brown showed us why Jesus was glorified as the Son of Man.
Jesus was the perfect man. He did not sin, even in His sufferings.
One way Jesus would have sinned is if He had not followed God’s Will. He obeyed perfectly.
We have to keep in mind that this worked only because Jesus, being a Man, was representing us. We could never be perfect, as He was. So, we could never redeem ourselves.
Only because this perfect Man represented us could our sins be washed away. He was our Kinsman Redeemer (Lev. 25: 25-28).
Being a Man like us was only part of it. Jesus also had to be God. No, not like God. He was — and is — God.
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Most importantly, Jesus’ glorification shows us the status of His heart. He wanted to please and obey His Father. He wanted to be like His Father.
Jesus showed us this through His love for us.
Maclaren made an interesting comment. He said that, while Jesus journeyed closer to the cross, the Son of Man was replaced by the Son of God.
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I think it is more than just Jesus performed fewer miracles. The emphasis was taken off of His being a social Savior.
It was out onto Jesus being a spiritual Savior. He was teaching more.
The emphasis of Jesus’ ministry was that He came to save us from our sins. “For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost” (Lk. 19: 10 NIV).
Glorifying God
“If God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself, and glorify him at once” (Jn. 13: 32 ESV)
Yes, God was glorified in Jesus’ sufferings.
I know. That would seem really strange to some people. Why would Someone like it when Someone else was purposefully, cruelly hurt?
God wasn’t totally glorified in the hurt itself. He was glorified in the obedience while the hurting was going on.
But the glorification didn’t stop at the hurting — on the cross.
God was glorified in the triumph over the hurting. He was glorified in the resurrection.
So, the Plan of Salvation needed both. It needed Jesus’s blood to be the sacrifice to pay the penalty for our sins. It needed the resurrection to show that Jesus is God.
I really like what Brown said. He wrote, “Never was sorrow like Christ’s sorrow, but never was God’s grace so abundant.”
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Simeon reminded us that a way Jesus glorified God was that He showed us God’s attributes. Remember, Jesus said, “… Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. …” (Jn. 14: 9 ESV).
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To read a devotion in the Finding Our Center series, click on the button below.
The Plan of Salvation was God’s plan. It could only be accomplished through Jesus, but it was God’s plan from before the beginning of time.
You Can’t Come with Me
“Little children, yet a little while I am with you. You will seek me, and just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you, ‘Where I am going you cannot come’” (Jn. 13: 33 ESV)
Jesus was also telling His friends goodbye.
Jesus had been telling the disciples that He was going to Jerusalem to die. “From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised” (Mt. 16: 21 ESV).
The Jews were told that they couldn’t come with Him. “So he said to them again, ‘I am going away, and you will seek me, and you will die in your sin. Where I am going, you cannot come.’ So the Jews said, ‘Will he kill himself, since he says, “Where I am going, you cannot come”?’ He said to them, ‘You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world’” (Jn. 8: 21-23 ESV).
Now, Jesus was telling His friends that they couldn’t come with Him.
Jesus goes more in depth with His disciples in Chapter 14. (Stay turned for next week’s Sunday Morning Bible Study lesson.)
Thomas said that his purpose right now was to equip His friends to be ready for the crushing agony they would feel. They needed prepared for what was ahead.
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Jesus wanted to make sure they heard His divine purpose before the nailing started.
Look what way Jesus was talking to them. He never stopped caring for them or guiding them to where their relationship with Him needed to be.
Making the Connections
When we think about it, when has a man’s expected birth been written about as much as Jesus’? Never.
Way back in Job’s day, even he wrote, “I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth” (Job 19: 25 NIV). Jesus was written about even as early as 1700 BC.
It is just that Jesus had to go through a lot to be our Savior and Redeemer.
Maclaren made a great observation about that. He wrote, “The New Testament generally represents it as the lowest point of His degradation; John’s Gospel always represents it as the highest point of His glory. And both are true; just as the zenith of our sky is the nadir for these on the other side of the world. The same fact which in one aspect sounds humiliating, in another is glorious.”
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That tells me how we react to Jesus’ sacrifice depends on our perspective — our attitude. We can focus on the suffering and the innocent man being killed. Or we can focus on the fact that Jesus glorified Himself and His Father.
How Do We Apply This?
Think of it this way. We don’t know our strength of faith until it is tested.
That means, when life blows up on us, we need to be obedient and glorify God. We need to worship and praise Him, not only through our words, but also through our lives.
- We can hope in Christ because of what He has done.
- We need to imitate Jesus, glorifying God in the process.
- We need to seek Jesus to know the story of the cross.
- We need to discipline our lives to prepare us for the tasks God has for us.
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Father God. It is hard for us to imagine that You get glory and honor out of pain and suffering. But we do know You got glory and honor from Jesus’ obedience. Lord, help us to obedient so that we can honor You. Amen.
What do you think?
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