Shine the glory of God

I invite you to open your Bibles to the book of Second Corinthians, Chapter 3. How many of you like to make New Year's resolutions? And how many can keep them? I am a very big fan of what New Year's resolutions are. It's a good discipline to be able to take time to look at our lives and assess how I'm doing and how I can grow and change. And I understand that it is also not just doing it once a year, but also on a regular basis.

I have a friend who takes the first Monday of every month to evaluate his life, evaluate himself and see how he is doing. So I consider myself a very big fan of healthy, wholesome introspection. But there is a little problem if we rely only on our own resolutions.

Anyone who works out in a gym knows that the month of January is the busiest month. The place is packed with people and they're busy for a whole month, but when Valentine's Day rolls around, everything goes back to normal. Because all those resolutions usually do not become a lifestyle that the person carries out.

The biblical concept is not necessarily a resolution but rather a revolution. It is not just by our own willpower but by the power of the Holy Spirit. So read with me Second Corinthians Chapter 3 and you can read from verse 1 onwards.

Do you realize that a word that is being repeated well here? the word glory I'm going to read that last verse in Spanish:

“…Because the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. Therefore, we all beholding with unveiled face as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, we are transformed from glory to glory into the same image, as by the Spirit of the Lord..."

Father, we thank you for the reality of this promise of freedom, of transformation in the power of the Holy Spirit. I thank you, Lord, for this great project of shining your glory through our lights. Father, what a great thought. I ask that today this be more than a thought, but that you inspire a sense of faith that you can transform and make a revolution in our hearts, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

There's a key word used in verse 18, and it's a tremendous verse if you really pay attention to it. It says that we are looking towards the glory of God without any veil on our face. The comparison is with Moses, like when he saw the shekinah, the glory of God when he was on Mount Sinai, and the glory sort of clung to him. It was something contagious and it was so majestic that the people of Israel were afraid to look at Moses and that is why he covered himself with a veil.

And God says, that was the old covenant, the new covenant is a thousand times better and the glory is greater than that of the old covenant. And when we turn our lives to the Lord there is a veil that is removed from us.

Have you experienced that at some point? That when one turns to Jesus and one believes in him and confesses his sins and one looks at him, it is as if a veil were lifted from your eyes. It's like the hymn says, oh, amazing grace, how sweet it is, and at the end the verse says, I was blind but now I can see.

I remember when I was 16 years old that I accepted the Lord into my heart, and I looked around and I said, who has turned the colors of nature into their most intense color. Why suddenly the world was like in HD, high definition. And why the Bible suddenly became three-dimensional. When I was in church before I used to listen to some songs that seemed a bit strange to me, but when I turned to Jesus those same songs brought tears to my eyes.

It is because there is a veil that is removed from us. And the Bible says that we look at the glory of the Lord and as it says in the Spanish version in verse 18, looking at the glory of the Lord with our uncovered face as in a mirror.

Now, for us, looking in a mirror is that we are seeing something that reflects an image back to us, and it is something quite clear. But in this case, in this biblical time, a mirror was like a misty, cloudy metal, the image it transmitted was an image that was not very clear. That is why, as he also says, when we see through a mirror we see things as a little cloudy, but when we are in heaven we can see things as they are, face to face.

The point I want to make is that when that veil is removed from us we can see the glory of God but it's still kind of hazy, it's not totally clear. But what we see transforms us. What we see stays there with us. That's why people still look different after a time of praise and worship. There is something about the glory of God, as people open their hearts and the spirit of God comes into them, there is a freedom and there is something the Bible also calls a metamorphosis.

It says that we are being transformed. The Greek says metamorphumae. It is that the word metamorphosis is very interesting. As you will see, a metamorphosis is not making a small change to something, it is a radical transformation, it is a caterpillar that becomes a butterfly. That is the kind of transformation that God is talking about here.

Often when we think about our Christian life and making resolutions, we think about doing it with our own strength, when what God wants to do is revolutionize our lives through his power. The Bible says that if we are in Christ we are a new creature. Old things have passed away and everything is made new. It is a revolution where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

I want to talk to you about a revolutionary transformation in our lives. And the first thing I want to say is that a revolution brings a holistic transformation to a society. It's not just changing one or two laws, it's taking that statue of Saddam Hussein, or Lenin, or the dictator that was there before, and knocking it completely to the ground. It is like taking an old constitution and burning it completely, it has to do with a total change of government, there is a new ruler, there are new laws, there is a new constitution.

Now, history often taught us that human revolutions did not end in the best way we say. But God's revolutions do work in our lives. It's not your average change, but rather a total transformation of how we see ourselves as people. And it has to do with freedom.

I have a friend that I met while I was in Puerto Rico and he was born on one of Puerto Rico's neighboring islands, ruled by a fairly powerful dictator with a very long beard. And let's just say that my friend didn't like the way this person led. this friend of mine was more gringo than me in many ways. and i always remember the day he got his credit card, it's like i had a baby. He was enjoying what capitalism was back then. and I told him, “Look, you have to be careful because a credit card can get you into a lot of debt and trouble too.” and he said something very profound to me, "You know, Greg, I can use this card to ruin my life, but that has to be a decision that I have to make."

And I was able to realize that there was something much bigger than the mere fact of the card in this. It is the concept of being able to feel free. Human beings are not meant to be trapped in a box, and when a person feels trapped or enslaved, there is something in them that wishes they could be free. And that's where revolutions come from.

The Bible says that everyone who sins is a slave to sin. We are caught up in it, we think we are doing what we want to do, but we are really doing what sin tells us to do. The devil is the one in charge and not us.

But the Bible also says that anyone who is and lives in the presence of God there is freedom, because being free does not mean that one has someone ruling over one, but rather it means having the right ruler over oneself. It means having that king that sets you free. It is having the King of Kings, and Lord of Lords, it means having the God who created you in charge of your life.

The Bible says that if the Son sets you free you will be truly free. There is nothing that compares to that freedom. And one has to taste it, and one has to experience it, before I used to feel trapped and now I can breathe. I see many times people here kneeling at the altar, raising their hands, people who used to be trapped in an inferiority complex, and now they are dancing in the presence of the Lord, because they are free and that feels good.

That does not mean that I am in charge of my life, but that God is in charge of my life, and now I can breathe the fresh air that surrounds me. This also means a change in my personal constitution, it does not mean that I am going to adjust my previous beliefs a little bit, but it means that I am going to burn them.

You know, as a new believer when I was 16 years old, I tried to do the following, I wrote down all the sins that I did that I reminded myself of. And it took me quite a while. One thing led to another, and the other to another. So, I closed the bathroom door and I got some matches and I had a little fire there in the bathroom. My parents were at the door asking, "what are you doing in there?" "I'm burning my sins, dad:" "Let's call the child psychologist with you now."

I have another friend who has shared his testimony in a very open and public way in which he had a very deep atheism belief. He knew there was no God and he had a philosophy to prove it. And he had a physical experience with the presence of God. was visible, he saw how a cloud passed through him and he felt the sensation of that cloud moving through him, and in the middle of that cloud, this thought came to his head: everything that I have believed until This moment is complete garbage.

That is the kind of revolution that God wants to make. There are some religions that just want to add Jesus to their repertoire, so to speak, something else to believe in. And they want to treat God like a mascot in their lives or a good luck charm. And God says, I'm not your good luck charm, I'm not your pet. I am your King and you cannot be free until you know me as your King. And it means taking your entire belief system that is rounding out your own life and using it as kindling.

God is not necessarily in the business of improving people but rather transforming them. And you know, yeah, I've put a good connection in there for good New Year's resolutions and that's fine, but that's not going to make you a better person, God wants a new person in you, a new person in me, yeah someone is in Christ new creature you are. The old has passed away, behold, all things are made new.

God changes lives and has been doing it all through Scripture. What was it that he said to Abran? He told Abraham, you know, until today you have been called Abraham, but from now on I am going to call you Abraham, Father of many nations. And to Sara he said, you are not going to be called Saraí, but you are going to be Sara. To Jacob he said, you are not going to be Jacob anymore but you are going to be called Israel, because you have wrestled with God. To Hosea, you are not going to be Hosea, but you are going to be Joshua, because it means God saves. He said to Simon, you will no longer be called Simon but Peter. And on this rock I will build my church. No more Saul but Paul.

You have a name. In Jesus you are a new person, you have a new identity, a new reason to live and God can make that change in your life.

I would like you to go with me to Romans, Chapter 6 and it is a text that has to do with baptism. How many here have been baptized? If you haven't, this is your year, we look forward to seeing you. What we do here is we open up this platform and there's a tub in there and people go down the side and we dunk them in the water and the person gets wet. And the person has to let go and let someone else put them in the water, and this can be a little scary. And then it comes out completely soaked through here, on the other side and they come out. It is an experience that is not forgotten.

Why do we plunge people? What is the symbolism behind this? We often talk about this as a cleanse. I had a mother who asked me to leave her daughter under water for a long time. And he told me, put some chlorine in there as well. She needs a good bath.

In the Old Testament there is a very rich story about these purification rites. So baptism contains part of that symbolism and that meaning. But look at the meaning according to Romans Chapter 6, it says:

“…So what shall we say? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? In no way, because those of us who have died to sin, how will we still live in it? Or don't you know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into his death? For we are buried together with him into death by baptism so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in new life.

The symbolism, more than anything, is a burial of your own person, this death, if you are a believer, when that time comes for you to really die, that will be your second death, but in baptism it is the first time that we died in our life.

I remember this story, I don't know if it's true, but I like it, of a man who, when he was baptized, came out of the water, stood on the shore and picked up a very large rock and threw it into the water, and when he fell into the water people asked him, why did you do that? That's the tombstone, there's a dead man in there, and now I'm a new person.

Baptism means being buried with Christ, being connected to his death so that we can also be united to his resurrection. It is somewhat revolutionary in nature. That old person of yours has already died, and now there is a new person.

But how many of us know that that dead man or woman is there, that old Greg, that old Omar, even though theologically and spiritually we know that that person is already dead and crucified, that that old person doesn't give up like that easily. In me is that new man, that new me in the spirit of God but also, as the Bible says, there is my sinful flesh that fights one with the other. And that's when we enter a process of change as believers.

This revolution does not happen overnight, it is a process. But God calls us to have a revolutionary passion for that personal change. Revolutionaries are impatient by nature, there is an urgency for that change they want to see. There is a group of people who wrote the declaration of independence and mailed it to the king.

And when they first did this in Philadelphia, the declaration of independence, I don't remember who said it, whether it was Thomas Jefferson or John Adams, but they said, well, congratulations my brothers, we've already written our death warrant. See you at the slaughterhouse, as they say.

So that is the mentality that dominated those people, they did not want a partial change of things, but they wanted to renew the entire system completely. And it requires a level of intensity and we might say, even a kind of courage concerning the course of how things are today. It's like saying, I'm sick of it, sick of this and I'm not going to deal with it anymore. It's like Rosa Park, this African-American woman who, after a long day of work, tired, got on the bus and sat down and this young white guy came in and says, ma'am, I think you have to get up because a white man just get on this bus. And that was the law back then, she had to get up and stand and give this white boy his seat. And she in a very quiet way said, No thanks, I'm tired and I'm going to sit here. Ma'am, if you don't get up, we're going to arrest you. She told him, They're going to have to arrest me because I'm tired of my day at work, and I'm tired of this law too. that urgency for revolution and for change was the spark that started the whole movement.

Jesus uses revolutionary language concerning the attitude that we too must have against sin. And obviously we don't just talk about sin in society in general but also sin in our own lives. Jesus said, if your right eye causes you to sin, well, tear it out and throw it away. It is better to go to heaven with one eye than to hell with both.

If a preacher had come here and preaches that from this pulpit, what would we do? It's getting a little off the line. But this is what Jesus said afterwards just in case they weren't offended enough, if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and tear it from your body. It is better that you go to heaven with one hand than go to hell with both.

Now, lest anyone think we're getting a little crazy, we understand that Jesus was using somewhat hyperbolic language, but if he hadn't wanted to make that kind of impact, he wouldn't have spoken like that.

Do we hate sin that way? Are we desperate for a change? We can say, God, I'm already tired of my life, I want a change, I want to be more like Jesus. It's like Simon when Jesus made this miraculous catch, Simon got out of his boat and dropped to his knee to Jesus, and said, please get away from me, I can't handle this. This has to do with already being jaded with a peaceful existence with your own sin.

You cannot have any kind of agreement with them, but in the name of Jesus we declare an independence, and we say, we are a new creature in Christ. I have a new heart, I have a new spirit and I can live a new life. And we declare that independence.

The Bible says that God is going to remove that heart of stone and put a heart of flesh. Have you had that experience? Before you were totally hard and insensitive and now you have a soft and sensitive heart for God. God doesn't necessarily want to adjust your heart, he wants to give you a brand new one.

What is the state of your heart? Have you been hit a bit recently? Maybe it's full of scars and marks? Or perhaps your heart has developed calluses around itself, like the hands of a carpenter or the fingertips of a guitar player, that it no longer feels.

I know people who say that they haven't cried for years and that they don't even remember how to cry. People who say, I have to look out for myself because no one else is going to. And God says, I am ready to give you a new heart, the heart of a child, if you let me do it, where the spirit of the Lord is there is freedom.

But this has nothing to do with our own resolutions or our own efforts. Have you ever tried to break a habit that is very hard, very strong? Maybe try to give up smoking, or lose weight, or stop gossiping? Isn't it difficult?

Look what happens to the Apostle Paul when he tries to change by his own effort, Romans Chapter 7, the Apostle Paul for a time was trying to change himself, he says in verse 14;

“…Because we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin. Because what I do I don't understand because I don't do what I want, but rather what I hate, that's what I do. And if I do what I do not want, I approve that the law is good, so that it is no longer I who do that, but the sin that dwells in me. And I who in me, this is in my flesh, does not dwell the good, because wanting the good is in me but not doing it. Because I don't do the good that I want, but the evil that I don't want, that's what I do. And if I do what I don't want, I no longer do it but the sin that dwells in me.

And I read it this way because the text, the intention, is like seeing that cycle in which one gets entangled. Thank God it hasn't snowed these days but when it snows and your car gets stuck on the ice, in the snow, you press the accelerator, and what happens to the tires? Does the car move? What does one do, press the accelerator more and I press it more to see if the car moves. And it's there circling, circling, and what about one? You stay stuck.

That is what happens when we try to change by our own strength. In Old Testament times there was a self-help movement that were those who wanted to be like Jews, Judaizers, is the term. These people used to find new believers in churches or synagogues. How are the new believers? How is that type of character, of person? you have your honeymoon with Jesus.

People at school thought I was drunk. They would say, Greg, what are you wearing? I am God now. My parents wanted to send me to the child psychologist, there is something wrong with my son. So these Judaizers wanted to get new believers with all that flair, that honeymoon, they wanted to get them. And they would come and say, okay, the party is over, children. It's time to get to work. Now is the time to become Jews. You have to circumcise them, you have to obey the laws of nutrition, diet, and they had a list of laws so they could follow them.

And the Apostle Paul told the Galatian church, which was one of the churches that fell under the influence of these Judaizers. And he tells them, what happened to that joy of yours? You know you are trying to be a Christian without Christ when you lose that joy, when you are trying too hard to obey many laws, and suddenly your Christian life becomes more work than a living, effective relationship with God.

The Bible promises a better way. And in Romans, Chapter 8, verse 1 it says:

"...There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus..."

The thought is, I have to change to become a better person so that God will love me more. and God says, I can't love you more than I already love you. And so even when you change and mature and grow, I will continue to love you in the same way that I loved you when you were in the ugliest or worst case of your life. The thing is, Jesus did it all for you.

I remember when I was 16 years old, about a year after I converted, I lost all that joy, because I was thinking, no, I have to do something to become a better person. I was a pretty intense guy, you can tell.

I remember that I had a summer job and my boss told me, what's wrong with you, boy? Go home, you're under a lot of stress. And I am there praying and fasting and it is as if I had a vision of Jesus on the cross and I felt the Lord say to me, hey, I love you. And the only thing I could say is, I don't deserve it.

And that is the point. We don't deserve God's love. we cannot change ourselves, but there is a medicine that changes the human heart. And it is the blood of Jesus Christ. It is Jesus who took the penalties of sin for us. And from that moment that person who believes in Jesus you are forgiven, your sins are thrown as far as the east is from the west. But that old you is still there.

That's why God gives you something to transform you. Is it a list of rules? Is it a book about how you can improve your own life? No, he gives you a revolutionary power called the Holy Spirit. It's like, for example, recently my life has been revolutionized because my dad gave me a GPS. I no longer have to figure out how to get from one place to another with a map, I already put my destination, and it tells me where to go and which doors to take, each step.

The Holy Spirit in our hearts is like a divine GPS. It is something within you that shows you the path in which you should walk. That is why Jesus calls him the paracletos, because he goes with you, your counselor who goes with you at all times, teaching you where to go. I don't know if this has happened to you when you converted to the Lord, that you went to a place where you used to go and do things that you used to do, and something inside of you said, no. no one had to tell you, no one had to give you a list of rules, there is something inside of you that felt sad, and not necessarily because you felt guilty, although guilt may be a bit of a good thing at the time, but rather because you were disappointing a person you love. There is something in you that changes.

Someone provokes you to anger, and before your reaction would have been that you would say one, two or three hurtful things. And suddenly you say, what's wrong with me? I am not cutting off this person's head. I'm changing, there's a new spirit in me.

The Bible says that those who live according to sin have their minds occupied with what sin demands, but those who live according to the spirit have their minds occupied with what the spirit demands of them. It is that divine Gps that is going to guide you and change your life.

And I would like to use an illustration that I have used many times with the ministry but it is New Years so I know that I understand a little. It is the story of a wife who had a bad and oppressive husband, he was bad with her, he was rude and sometimes he was even abusive too. and he had a list of rules about what she had with him, how she cooks, how she cleans. And she was more like a slave, cleaning, working, working for him, but it was never enough. Finally this man dies, and she says, no more marriage, no more men, I'm better alone than in bad company.

But suddenly, a good man came and he wanted her love, and finally she said, okay, okay, I'm going to take a new chance, I'm going to marry him. And this man was so good to her, so kind, and she couldn't find anything else to do than make him happy. And one day when his birthday came around she said, I'm going to clean the whole house, I'm going to fix everything, I'm going to cook him something beautiful, tremendous, delicious for him, and she's cleaning behind the sofa and she finds one of those old lists that she she used to have to stick with her former husband. And she cried when she realized that she was doing all the things that were on that list and even more, but this time it was out of love and because she was happy and content.

And this is something that the Holy Spirit produces in us. There is a new husband, and his name is Jesus and he loved us even when we were sinners. He cleansed us with his blood, he gave us his Holy Spirit and we are revolutionized by that spirit.

God has a project in your life. And he wants to make you just like Jesus. As we contemplate the glory of the Lord in worship, in the word, in the fellowship of other believers, he wants us to be transformed to reflect the glory of Jesus himself.

And I want to close with this verse from Romans 8:28 and it says;

“…We know that all things work together for good to all who love God, that is, to those who are called according to his purposes, because he also predestined those whom he foreknew to be made according to the image of your son…"

God can take anything, the good times and the bad times, even our own failures, and use them to shape us, transform us into people who more reflect the glory of Christ. May we be people who reflect that glory, because the spirit of God is flowing in us.

The Bible usually doesn't really define what the spirit is, but provides images for us to understand who it is. The spirit is like living waters that flow through us. The spirit is like a fire that purifies and burns us like gold is purified. The spirit is like a dove that rests on us and gives us peace when we feel anxious.

The Holy Spirit transforms us. I want to challenge you in this new year 2012, that you can get to experience that living water inside you, that you can be touched by that fire, and that León de Judá is a place that when people are here they can smell the presence of the Lord, that when someone meets you they can say, there is something different about that person, there is something that feels like Jesus in them, there is a look in their eyes, there is a tone in their voice, and it is Jesus giving birth to through them. That should be our goal for 2012.

And we are going to put that in our GPS, let's put more like Jesus in our GPS, we are going to put, I want to love God with all my heart, my mind and my strength, and I want to love my neighbor as I love myself. And just let it guide you. Get to that power of the Holy Spirit, and you will see what is going to happen. Because where the presence of the Lord is, there is freedom. Amen.