"These words spake Jesus, and lifted up His eyes to heaven, and said, `Father, the hour is come; glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee." John 17:1

"And great multitudes came unto Him, having with them those that were lame, blind, dumb, maimed, and many others, and cast them down at Jesus' feet; and He healed them: insomuch that the multitude wondered, when they saw the dumb to speak, the maimed to be whole, the lame to walk, and the blind to see: and they glorified the God of Israel." Matthew 15:30-31

Greetings, friends! This day let the glory of Christ's face shine into your life – and that it certainly will if you will open the door to let in that light. Never forget that God has given you a free will: with that He will not interfere. Therefore, you have the power to keep the glory of Christ's face out of your life, or to let it in – to glorify your life. That is why I have written about the Keys to the Kingdom of God for our here and now, to help a great multitude come into better understanding so that their lives may be glorified on this earth and in the present time.

If you have your Bible convenient, I suggest you look up chapter 17 of St. John's Gospel from which I shall quote to you shortly. (In the meanwhile, may I suggest that those of you who have not already sent in for The Kingdom Keys study, should do so without delay. This better understanding of truth has helped a great many people to transform their lives from a funeral dirge to that of a happy wedding march.)

Now, commencing in John 17:1, we read that after Jesus lifted up His eyes to heaven, He said:

"...Father, the hour is come; glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee: as Thou hast given Him power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as Thou hast given Him. And this is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, Whom Thou hast sent. I have glorified Thee on the earth: I have finished the work which Thou gavest Me to do. And now, O Father, glorify Thou Me with Thine Own Self with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was."

Today, I have in mind a message just slightly different from my usual ones: I want to elaborate on that opening statement of our Lord's Prayer unto the Father, on that last night with His beloved disciples after the Passover Supper, and His lengthy talk and discourse with His disciples. In opening His great intercessory prayer, He said, "...Father the hour is come; glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee." Here, I suggest that you observe there are two glorifications referred to: Jesus asked that the Father in heaven glorify the Son, that as a consequence the Son might also glorify the Father.

I am quite sure that you all realize that Jesus was not here praying for His Own soul, but His first and basic request was that the Father glorify the Son. Jesus was a Man of flesh and blood and bones like you and I, and, as at that time, He was still in this world and subject to the conditions of this world just like you and I. And lest you lapse into a daydream about your soul, may I again remind you that during this long and last talk with His disciples, as well as in this great intercessory prayer, Jesus didn't have as much as one word to say about their souls, no, not even a hint thereat throughout the entire evening. In fact, I will go you one better by saying that you may search the entirety of the Gospels covering His three-and-a-half year ministry – from the baptism in Jordan unto Calvary's Cross – and you will fail to find as much as once where He discoursed about the human soul or its salvation. There were only two or three occasions that it was briefly mentioned; the principal one of which was when He three times repeated that they should not be afraid of people here on earth, who could only kill the body, but after that could do nothing more, but rather should stand in awe and trembling before Him Who, after He had killed the body, had the power to cast into the fires of Gehenna to destroy both the soul and body (Lk. 12:4-5). Then there is another passage found in Mark 8:36, which is commonly used by our churches, but very wrongly so.

Write down these references which I will give you shortly, that you may study them at your convenience. They are Matthew 10:39 and John 12:25, in which, if you will read, you will find that Jesus was repeating the identical words, but with more explanation given. As for instance, "hating one's life in this world." And, as I have had occasion to tell you before, when we look into the original and oldest Greek manuscripts in existence, we find identically the same word in all of these passages, including Mark 8:36, which elsewhere has been rendered "life," which He explained by saying "...in this world..." – that is, our life here and now as we know it. While in Mark 8:36 the translators took the same Greek word and rendered it "soul," and did it, I say, without the slightest justification.

Therefore do I repeat and remind you frequently, that you may search the Scripture and you will search it in vain for Jesus ever discoursing about the human soul, neither its future. Jesus the Christ lived as a man in this world, and He spoke to human beings, and He dealt with their earth-life here and now. Although there is plenty of Scripture evidence that people possess a soul, and that there is a future life for this soul of man, yet we have not the faintest justification, Scripturally speaking, to devote time to wishful thinking or sermonizing about pie-in-the-sky for the human soul after one is dead.

"...Father...glorify Thy Son..." (Jn. 17:1). As at that particular moment that Son was manifesting as a human being in flesh on this earth. That was Jesus' prayer: that the entirety of His physical Being, which would include what we sometimes refer to as "the carnal mind," be so glorified by the Father, that He in turn as a human being, would be fully enabled to glorify the Father.

How could Jesus glorify the Father? The Father lived in that glory which human eyes cannot see and still live. That glory could not be affected by any human being, no, not even by Jesus of Nazareth. Therefore we must understand that the only possible glorification of the Father by Jesus the Man, would be a glorification in the sight of other people. In verse 4 we see where He said, "I have glorified You on the earth." How had He glorified the Father on the earth? By opening the eyes of the blind; by restoring to full use paralyzed limbs, so that the helpless could leap and run and shout for joy; by opening the ears of those who could not hear; giving speech to those who had been tongue-tied, and, occasionally bringing the dead back to life. By doing such works He had proven to the people that God in heaven was also a God for our here and now, both capable and willing to deal with any and all conditions in human life, so as to make that life here on earth both normal and full, and consequently filled with glory. That was how He had glorified the Father on earth. That had been the life of Jesus the Son of God, as He had met people and dealt with conditions in their lives for the here and now.

But as at the moment of that prayer, where He asked the Father to glorify the Son, He was only a matter of hours before the most staggering and personal test of His entire life; yes, even as staggering and horrible a test as any human ever faced; and I suspect, far more horrible than any human has met. Maybe men and even women have endured as much suffering as did Jesus on the Cross on Calvary, but bear in mind such people have been powerless to do anything about it: they just had to take it. But that was not the case with Jesus the Christ of God; He had the power to vanquish His enemies, and that in a split moment of time. He had the power to not face the Cross of Calvary. He had the power to not take the scourging, nor the crown of thorns and great humiliation. Even but a few hours previously in the garden He had said to Peter, "Think you not that I could even now pray to My Father that He would presently send Me more than twelve legion of angels?" (Matt. 26:53). But that cup which the Father had given Him He was determined to drink to its bitterest dregs. Therefore, the test that Jesus faced was not merely a matter of physical strength and endurance to bear the unspeakable suffering and hellish torture which fiendish minds could invent, but also the mental, the emotional and spiritual endurance to willingly accept those horrors, while still possessing the power at the tip of His tongue to completely undo His enemies in a split moment of time.

That is what He prayed for unto the Father in heaven: that inner strength and fortitude, lest He use His power to evade the Cross and all the horrors linked therewith. And having received that power to accept and to endure, then would that work which He accomplished become the complete redemption of the entire human race, making it possible for whomsoever will to enter into a glorified life here and now.

Turn back a page or two to the 15th chapter of John's Gospel, where we read how He was talking with His disciples, and in verse 8 He said, "Herein is My Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be My disciples." So soon as we start to reflect on this matter, we understand immediately that the Will of God was and is not merely that the Son should glorify the Father, but that you and I should also glorify the Father. When we study verse 16 of the same chapter, we cannot fail but see that it was and is the Will of God that we should go and bring forth much fruit, by which the Father is glorified.

Now I come back to our basic text in the opening verse of chapter 17 when He said, "...Father, the hour is come; glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son may also glorify Thee." Carefully observe the order of things: the Son had to be glorified first in order that He, as a consequence, could glorify the Father. Therefore, this selfsame basic truth and sequence of events must obtain in your and my life: we must first be glorified by the Christ in order that we may fully glorify Him. That is precisely what I am perpetually trying to hammer home: that we must appropriate the fullness of that redemptive work wrought on Calvary – a work of complete redemption – in order that our earthly lives right here and now might enter into a glorified condition. I have told you before and it bears repeating: so long as we are full of sickness and misery, so long as we are failures and unhappy, going from one disappointment into sorrow, disillusionment and eventual death, just that long are we not glorifying the Father, neither are much of a credit to Christ our Saviour.

I recognize that man has a soul – and that we are told in Scripture – but Christendom has greatly erred through its perpetual harping about the soul and its future after one is dead, instead of being realistic, and, like Jesus the Christ of God, dealing with the present time and one's physical earth-life, to the end that the human body might be strong and healthy, and that the entire span of life might be filled with success and happiness, thus constituting a glorification of God. If you think that you can glorify God through sickness, suffering, misery, and hell here on earth, then you have a mighty peculiar understanding of God's glorification. All of these grim things have come upon man because of sin, as a result of the primitive pair's disobedience. But I have marvelously good and happy news for you: even the same wondrously happy tidings that John the beloved disciple spoke of in his First Epistle, 3rd chapter and 8th verse where it is said, "For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the Devil." Remember that on the Cross He cried out, "It is finished!" (Jn. 19:30). That is, He had succeeded in completing that work of destroying entirely the works of the enemy: our redemption had been achieved! But don't jump to the conclusion that the redemption He wrought was confined to the human soul. I warn you there is no such a teaching to be found in Scripture. Of necessity, man's redemption must include the entirety of his being; and since that Atonement was accomplished by the Son of God as a human being here on earth among men of flesh, therefore it follows that the redemptive work commences with the flesh. When we keep prattling about the human soul and its future glories after one is dead, while here we endure sickness, misery and multiplied hell, we are only admitting our defeat and failure. We are unrealistic and trying to "save face," as they say, for our lamentable failures.

If there is any glory unto God, if there is any satisfaction in heaven, if it is the Will of God Almighty that humans should be sick, full of suffering, misery, sorrow and multiplied tragedies, then why, ten thousand times why, was not Jesus the Son of God a sick cripple, hobbling along on one foot and a crutch, with maybe an arm paralyzed, blind in one eye and seeing little out of the other, half-deaf so that people would have to yell at Him? Is it not written that He was an example unto others (I Pet. 2:21; Jn. 13:15)? My point is well taken and I challenge its refutation: if we are intended for sickness, misery and sorrow throughout our entire life, then similarly should have been the lot of the Son of God here on earth. But since His life was that of health and strength and absolute perfection in body, and His life a glory from beginning until the Cross of Calvary, then so similarly is it intended by God that your life and mine should also be.