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Yesterday I was preaching at South Craven Evangelical Church in Yorkshire; I’ve been there several times before over the years and have always enjoyed my visits. Less than two years after their last pastor Stephen Emmott retired, they have called a new one, and Paul Gamston and his family were in the congregation in the morning. I was glad to meet him, having heard in more than one connection.
My sermons were both based on Romans 3:23: ‘all have sinned’ in the morning (glad I remembered the inverted commas) and ‘fall short of the glory of God’ in the evening. The latter phrase is a difficult one and I think the most likely meaning is to link this with man made in the image of God at the very beginning, and the fact that our first parents were ‘crowned with glory and honour’ (Psalm 8). But this led me on to consider other ways in which it can be said that ‘all… fall short of the glory of God’; all of them very relevant when considering people today. Not only do the unregenerate fall short of the glorious image which humanity bore before the fall. At the beginning Adam and Eve enjoyed full and rich communion with God, which must have involved seeing his glory, though perhaps a glory suited to unsinning humans. Now people do not think of God as glorious, nor do they imagine that to know him is to a rich and glorious experience.
The heavens, and all creation, declare the glory of God but modern man falls far short of seeing and appreciating that. The glorious Son of God came into the world to seek and save lost sinners, but he came into the world, and the world was made by him, but the world did not know him’; rather he was despised and rejected by men. And, tragically, the lost – if they remain lost – fall short of the final glory of God. Believers ‘rejoice in hope of the glory of God’, but unbelievers have no conception of what that means. It is a tragic picture – but there is a remedy to be received and preached.
My sermons were both based on Romans 3:23: ‘all have sinned’ in the morning (glad I remembered the inverted commas) and ‘fall short of the glory of God’ in the evening. The latter phrase is a difficult one and I think the most likely meaning is to link this with man made in the image of God at the very beginning, and the fact that our first parents were ‘crowned with glory and honour’ (Psalm 8). But this led me on to consider other ways in which it can be said that ‘all… fall short of the glory of God’; all of them very relevant when considering people today. Not only do the unregenerate fall short of the glorious image which humanity bore before the fall. At the beginning Adam and Eve enjoyed full and rich communion with God, which must have involved seeing his glory, though perhaps a glory suited to unsinning humans. Now people do not think of God as glorious, nor do they imagine that to know him is to a rich and glorious experience.
The heavens, and all creation, declare the glory of God but modern man falls far short of seeing and appreciating that. The glorious Son of God came into the world to seek and save lost sinners, but he came into the world, and the world was made by him, but the world did not know him’; rather he was despised and rejected by men. And, tragically, the lost – if they remain lost – fall short of the final glory of God. Believers ‘rejoice in hope of the glory of God’, but unbelievers have no conception of what that means. It is a tragic picture – but there is a remedy to be received and preached.
