What does this really mean?

Whether it be cleaning house, building a barn, installing a computer program for the company or repairing an electrical circuit, we are to do things to His glory.
We hear it all the time. But have you ever stopped to think "what does that really mean?" "How do I clean the house 'to His glory'?" or "how do I play softball... 'to His glory'?"

*a discussion dh and I had recently, just thought I'd throw it out here for y'all :)*

I always thought of it as doing the best I was capable of without grumbling and with a good attitude..

For instance: Washing the dishes. Doing it soon after dinner rather than letting them sit in the sink. Drying and putting them all away right away so the house is in order.

Okay, so I rarely do that, but I figure if I was going to truly do the dishes to God's glory, then I'd need to do them immediately, get them put up and have my kitchen in proper order all the time.

That can be taken to an extreme though. Good topic, Tara. I'm wondering what others think about this subject.

I agree...my take on this has always been that it represents the attitude and heart that you approach and complete the task with....joy, willingness to serve, a good example....etc.

Do all thing to His Glory.

Well the first thought that comes to mind is my dh. My purpose as a wife is to be his help meet. To meet his needs in all area's, spirtitual, intellectual, physical and spiritual. If I am doing all of these things, not only does it show my dh how much I love him, but it glorifies God because I am fulfilling my purpose as a wife.
This includes raising my dd. Teaching her how to glorify God through obedience to her mom and dad and to the Bible.
At Church I am to love everyone and to serve the people of my church. To Love them where they are and not where I wish they would be.

I think in my everyday life if I just live according to the Bible and show others the Love of Jesus then He will be Glorified. I must maintain a happy and joyful spirit. It is about attitude. Being an example for others and being the wife and mother God would have you to be.

For me it means to realise how incapable I am of doing those things well. And to be humble and to know that only by God's grace can I do anything. Therefore He gets all the glory and I get none. Does that make sense? Every gifting I have, He has given me not to bring me glory or for me to be recognized as anything great, but He has given me the gifting to bring Him glory. Everything we do is to be done for His glory, for His name to be praised, for men to look at God and marvel Him, not me. I hope that makes sense :D

I agree with all of these things! I also think doing things for God's glory makes things easier. When I feel like grumbling about dh's work hours or cleaning the house or feeling like things aren't "fair" this statement helps my attitude change. God commands us to obey our husbands and that makes taking care of them easier, KWIM? Without God's grace we couldn't do anything for His glory and I am reminded of that daily, too. Great thought to ponder...I think I have some laundry to fold LOL

But how do you go beyond your 'jobs'...
For instance..my family rides/races BMX, butyou can insert any other sport here..or hobby for that matter..
How do you do that "to His glory"?

Dig deeper girls ;)

Sorry, was interrupted earlier...trying to finish my thought..

We can eat food and have drink..to His glory.
We can ride bikes and play football...to His glory.
We can watch baseball and mow the yard...to His glory.
We can garden and we can scrapbook...to His glory.

But how do you know or how do you really make it be - to.His.glory. ?
How do you acknowledge that it is being done to His glory..I guess is what I'm asking.

I know it is a mind/heart set matter. I clean my house knowing that in fulfilling my duty I am giving Him glory. And when you eat, giving thanks to Him that has given it. That's an easy one.

But I"m talking about those hobbies and sports, for example. How do you be competitive to His glory? How do you scrapbook to His glory?

We have a discussion going on at my blog, if you'd like to join in there.

And I'm going to throw in another thing here..hold onto your seats LOL

Alcohol...

are you still with me?

LOL

Ok, so, if you believe in christian liberty, in which one may partake of an alcoholic beverage so long as 'ye be not drunk' with it. Can you really do that "to His glory"?

The same can go for tobacco usage.

Thoughts?


hehehe

I already have mine, I just wanna hear what y'all have to say. Get you to thinking about these things if you haven't ever done so, or not done so in a while, revisit the idea ;)

Okay...well eating...pray first.....when going into a race....pray for your spirit and the event....do your hobbies with a song in your heart and enjoy the gifts that God gave you.......once again....it goes to your attitude in my book
alcohol.....drink wisely and not to be drunk in celebration and with joy and love....let your words and actions still be honorable.....
my opinion only :wink:

This topic made me think of something Augustine said:

Love God and do as you please.

hehehehe Ain't Augustine great?

Now you got me really thinking......not sure how to respond right now, but think I'll have something later. Must take time to pray about it as I don't want to offend. My foot tends to get shoved into my mouth if I respond right away!

Here goes...
I do feel like most of bringing glory to God lies in the attitude of our heart when we are doing the things we enjoy or even those that we don't.

As far as our daily tasks go, for instance - our jobs, or our lives as SAHM, I feel we should do each task as if Jesus was sitting beside us. Finish it, do a thorough job and not just half way. Clean the house well, do the dishes, make a good meal, etc.

Do we do this? Probably not. I know I don't. I get my work done, but often I am distracted by other things and don't really put myself into it like I should. As far as cleaning my house and things of that nature, well, I get it done, but usually I am grumbling about the lack of running water when it's time to do dishes or mop. So regardless of whether someone is watching, my attitude is not glorifying God.

As far as sports, hobbies, things of that nature. Well, I again believe it has much to do with our attitude. If we are going into a competition and want to bring God glory, then we must strive to do the best we can physically and mentally. And if someone else just happens to be a better athelete or cook than us, well, we should gracefully accept that and give them praise for their accomplishment. Our good sportsmanship brings God glory. As far as photography, scrapbooking, card making, etc. Well, I believe that so often we can use those skills to lift someone up. Make a card for a friend who needs encouragement, snap photos of someones children at play and send them copies that will make them smile...etc.

I think I will leave the alcohol & tobacco subjects alone cause at the moment they are a bit too close to home in regards to situations with my husband. My opinion couldn't truly be nice about these and I don't want to offend any of my sisters.

I think this goes back to the teachings of Jesus that discuss people who worship in the church but who do it so that others may see them and not for the right reasons.

Everything you do should be done for the right reasons. As far as hobbies go I believe that God intended for you to enjoy your life and these things give you a chance to relax and find enjoyment in everything.

For Tara, when your children are riding/racing their BMX bikes are they enjoying the time that they are spending outside in God's creation??? YES!!! Are they exercising their bodies and taking care of the bodies that God gave to them??? YES! Are they bonding with other children and making friends with whom they can share the good news of Christ when/if the time arises...YES! All of these things can be done to the glory of God.

I think giving glory to God is simply enjoying the little things that He has given to us. God doesn't intend for us to be miserable while we are awaiting His coming and He does want us to enjoy our time on earth therefore as long as a person does things with a positive attitude and a pure spirit then I believe that they are doing it to the glory of God.

[soapbox] Sorry, I'll get off now!

Sara

All such good thoughts. :) The way I see it...it is truly a heart matter, as others have said. Man judges the outward appearance, but God judges the heart. :?

I can have a glass of wine with my mother and glorify God if in my heart I know that I truly am not going to over indulge, and I am truly thinking of her needs and how much it means to her, if I realize that I avoid the appearance of passing judgment on her by having one glass, if my motive is to bless my mother and honor her...then I glorify God in drinking a glass of wine.

If I go to the homeless shelter...and serve up meals three days a week, but my motive is to be able to put that volunteer history on a transcript so it looks good, and the whole time I judge the homeless and think ugly thoughts of them, if I am dying to leave and go home and hate every minute and see it as pure torture...then no matter what it looks like on the outside, I do not glorify God.

If I HATE cleaning a toliet, but stop and remember Jesus washing the feet of the disciples and then begin to sing praises while I clean...I glorify God cleaning the toilet even if I still hate it!

If I sit in church and sing praises while my mind wanders about on other things and I all the while I look unkindly on how others are dressed, and if I harbor ill will in my heart toward a brother or sister or unforgiveness...then no matter what it looks like I do not glorify God by attending church and singing praises.


If a cigarette smoker lights up and prays the entire time asking for help to quit his habit, confessing his weakness and addiction and acknowledging that without Christ he is nothing, all the while drawing nearer and nearer to his Lord through his struggle, but cannot at this moment stop smoking he still glorifies God.

Anyway...that's how I see it. :) The crux of the matter is...we don't see the heart. So what may look like sin to another...may actually be that person glorifying God more than a righteous act would appear to be doing. :shock:

Good discussion gals :)
If we are going into a competition and want to bring God glory, then we must strive to do the best we can physically and mentally. And if someone else just happens to be a better athelete or cook than us, well, we should gracefully accept that and give them praise for their accomplishment. Our good sportsmanship brings God glory
That's it...right there...do the best we can....................but..........if someone happens to be 'better', so be it Praise God for *their* accomplishment, lift them up AND...might I add..Praise and thank God for the challenge He brought to you to better yourself and try even harder..trying harder for Him and His glory :)

(and I completely understand about the alcohol/tobacco part, with you staying out of that area of the discussion ;) certainly understandable)

I believe that God intended for you to enjoy your life and these things give you a chance to relax and find enjoyment in everything
Amen!

Sara & Leslie - I agree wholeheartedly with your comments. God wants us to enjoy the time we have on earth and it does matter how are hearts attitude is in all things we do.

And Tara - well, thanks for giving us something thought provoking today. There are lots of things I need to do better at so I can bring him glory...

:oops: :oops: :oops: Less time on here and more diligence with my work schedule would be one!

Okay, back to work!

To me, if I am abiding i.e. walking in the Spirit, then I'm glorifying God no matter what I do. I'm just living and He's living through me. :D

Ok, I don't know if I totally agree with doing things perfectly so that we bring Him glory. Or striving to do things to the best of our ability, bcuz then it justs brings us back to SELF. If we search our hearts, then we will find pride and that we applaud ourselves for doing things well. I don't think I'm making any sense at all :D It makes sense in my head. I think Madre hit the nail on the head. As long as we are abiding in Christ and walking in the Spirit then we are glorifying Him. Not us trying to accomplish things out of SELF. The whole "excellence" teaching is very modern, IMO. It operates out of self and it helps to puff self up. Sometimes I think God wants us to forget the dishes and go out and seek and save that which is lost. There are more pressing matters than doing your dishes excellently. I'm not saying not to do things well, and live like a slob or not put any effort into anything that you do. But it's so easy to get sucked into trying to be excellent, and we will fail everytime. And then if you don't do things excellently, some may beat themselves up about it. Yeah, ok so I rambled and probably didn't make any sense. I've just been down that road of "you must do things excellently in order to bring glory to God" or "you must have the best equipment so that everyone will know you are a child of God", but that is very western world thinking. Maybe our idea of excellence is totally not what God expects of us. It's just what society says. I think it does come down to the heart. If our heart truly wants to glorify God in all we do (and not ourselves), then we will be glorifying Him even if we don't do things excellently. I'll give an example. When I was a kid my dad would have us in all sorts of sports, my main one was softball. Now my dad had huge expectations on us to do things excellently. When we would mess up he would throw a huge fit and be really mad at us. Now I know that God would never get mad at us for not doing things perfectly. But I also don't think that he even holds those expectations on us. Bcuz He knows what we are. We are imperfect humans, incapable of doing anything good. I think God is just happy if we try. Anyway I think I'm done rambling. :D

To me, if I am abiding i.e. walking in the Spirit, then I'm glorifying God no matter what I do. I'm just living and He's living through me. :D

Amen!

Without reading too many other posts, because I wanted to form my own opinion first before agreeing and using someone else's words... here's my very, very, very humble opinion.... [whateww]

I truly think it's not about "doing", but about your spirit. What is your spirit like while you do your daily "grind"? Are you grudging through everything? Are you judging others? Are you griping (inwardly or outwardly) about your responsibilities and duties? Are you thanking God for all those things you "have" to do? Are you living your life with the knowledge that you are living because GOD gave you life?

I think living with pure motives is important... I know many Christians who drink and smoke, and honestly, I don't think less of them... I pity them that they have an addiction to smoking or what have you, but *their* addiction is public... what about *MY* addiction to chocolate/sugar?? God really doesn't care about that... come on. [cheerful]

I mean, truly, we shouldn't worship anything above God, and that's honestly what an "addiction" is but, in the great big grand scheme of things, I doubt God is up there tallying who smokes, who drinks, who spends their time doing this, and who spends their time doing that. I know our judgment will be about our actions in this life, but I think that has more to do with when God was pressing us to do something and we turned our backs on His direction, or when we blatently do something we KNOW we should NOT do. Right?? [whatthink]

Do you love God? Do you praise His holy Name? Do you reach out to others? Do you share The Love Of God with others? [lovebanner]

There is just sooooooo much streaming through my mind right now... it's hard for me to "verbalize" it. God cares about what's going on in our hearts. [heart] We know we can't "earn" getting into Heaven, it's not about actions, it's about Faith... so, Glorifying God is (I think) staying strong in our faith and putting that faith into action in every aspect of our lives.

My dinner came out beautifully... why did it? Nothing happens without a reason... God blessed us by my dinner coming out that way. :oops: That "seems" silly, until you stop and think about it... Glorifying God with every thing you do, is doing things like that, giving Praise where Praise is DUE, and it's due all the time... :)

Now that I've read the other posts more in depth, I agree with so much of what's already been said, and have said similarly above.

I can't tell you all how comforting it is to me to know that so many of us feel similarly. :) Thanks gals. [huddle]

Thanks Tara for the great Thread!!! [hug]

ETA: I'm always so afraid to share my opinion because I'm afraid I might hurt someone's feelings or step over some line... so I at least wanted to add here that I did not say anything trying to be mean or hurt anybody... it's honestly just my own little piddling thoughts... nothing more. [jumping] [cheerful] [dancing] [OKOK]