I invite you to pray with me before we begin the message.

Well, Lord, our rock and our Redeemer,

my heart's desire now that beyond all human possibility and expectation,

you would use this message to make hundreds of churches beautiful,

glorious.

Beyond all what these pastors think is possible for the kind of people they're serving,

make them beautiful people.

And may they know how to preach to that end, I pray.

And may all of it, Father, redound to your glory through Jesus Christ.

We pray, amen.

There's a double strand running through John MacArthur's teaching

concerning the glory of the church, especially in his commentary

and sermons on Ephesians. One strand is to insist that the church exists to glorify God.

The glory of the church is to show that God is supremely glorious above all human created glory.

The other strand is to insist that the church is being made glorious with the glory of God.

So there's this twofold way of talking about the glory of the church.

Her glory is that she is glorious, and her glory is that her gloriousness exists for the

glory of another, her maker, her redeemer.

So when the book of Romans reaches its great climax at the end of chapter 11,

verse 36, and says, from him and through him and to him are all things, the all things includes the glory of the church.

The glory of the church in all of its dimensions

is from God, through God, and to God.

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