Weight of Glory

Yesterday at 12,000 feet, we hiked up to some rock formations.  Everywhere among the rocks spangled brilliant silver flashes of light.  I feel that way about these verses from II Corinthians 1-5: they flash and they glow with the glory of God’s thoughts towards us, and they, unlike the common pebbles that marked our path, are actually priceless treasure never even conceivably to be weighed or compared on the scales of gold and diamond currency we know so well.  And they belong to us, His sons and daughters.  Now, we see only dimly, even so; but one day, unimaginably, face to face!

“For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.”

“For all the promises of God find their Yes in Him.  That is why it is through Him that we utter our Amen to God for His glory.  And it is God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us and given us His Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.”

“But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads the knowledge of Him everywhere.”

“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.  And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.  For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.  Therefore having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart.”

“For God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.  But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.”

“So we do not lose heart.  Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.  For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen.”

I have been going back over the first 6 chapters of II Corinthians several times on this trip, and each time I am struck by the magnificent promises that lie hidden and open, too, in these verses.  The promise that we are comforted by Him in our afflictions—and that in our “light and momentary afflictions” we also are actually “sharing abundantly in Christ’s sufferings”…I had a conversation recently with someone going through an amazingly difficult time and she was saying how she can hardly feel justified in calling her situation suffering as she is so aware of the martyrdoms happening all over the world.  But God has called us to this place and time, and He has indeed given us sometimes sore trials to walk through.  No, indeed, we do not labor in a prison camp as some of our brothers and sisters do in North Korea.  I will rejoice in heaven to see their crowns, cast before their King, and to hear their stories.  But He has pressed in upon us in other ways, not always so easy nor trite; and He gives grace according to our level of suffering as we lean hard into Him, does He not?

I