Missing The Glory

I recently received a report of a young man who claimed to have a vision of Jesus. As he was sharing his experience online, he adamantly stated a disclaimer for people who read his testimony not to "beat him up" per se, based upon his perspective about his vision of Jesus. He went on to say that when he saw Jesus he was not impressed. 

At first I thought it was amusing because he knew once he said that people were going to jump on him. I mean, how can you not be impressed with Jesus? But the Scriptures clearly state in Isaiah 53, "and when we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him." If we be honest, there are a lot of saints that are not "impressed" with Jesus. 

Yes, we love Him because He died for our sins. But in terms of being truly in love with Him, being obsessed with Him, absolutely adoring Him, having our world literally revolve around Him...we're not Impressed. I believe that a large reason why a great portion of the contemporary church is not "impressed" and hopelessly in love with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is because we're missing His Glory. There is a Glory that God possesses that He manifests in His Son that, when you witness It, there's nothing else in this universe that you desire. However, because a lot of the mainstream church has not experienced the Glory of God, at the end of the day, no mater how pious and sanctimonious we come off as being, we're really not that impressed with the Lord.

The Glory of God is the manifest presence of God. There are only two individuals according to Scripture, that inherently possessed and experienced the Glory of God; Adam and Jesus Christ (the Last Adam, 1 Corinthians 15). The Bible says in Romans chapter 3, "all have sinned and come short of the Glory of God." The logical conclusion here is that if you haven't sinned, then you haven't fallen short of God's Glory. 

Adam was created sinless, and of course Jesus was born sinless. So these two men inherently experienced the Glory of God. When Jesus took Peter, James and John up the Mount of Tranfiguration, there He showed them His Glory in a way that none of His disciples had witnessed (Matthew 17). When Jesus performed His first Miracle in the 2nd chapter of the Gospel of John, the scripture says, "this beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth His glory."

If the church is going to be all that God has called and ordained her to be, it is imperative that we get a glimpse of The Glory of God. The only way this will happen is if we learn to press into His presence. We can no longer be satisfied with a superficial, religious association with God that we call Christianity. God wants ALL of our heart, ALL of our soul, ALL of our mind, and ALL of our strength (Luke 10). If we don't make this commitment, then we will have the same witness as John chapter 1, "He came unto His own, and His own received Him not." Let's make sure that we are not guilty of missing The Glory of God.