Christ is Glorified by the Church so that the Father is Glorified Through the Son

As the embodiment of the Triune God, Christ the Son is the Father’s glorification, and today it is by the church that Christ is glorified so that God the Father may be glorified through the Son.

Wow, what a wonderful mystery and we are part of it! As we prayerfully consider the matter of glory and glorification as revealed in the Gospel of John, we first need to see what glory is.

Glory is an attribute of God, for glory is the expression of God. When God is expressed in splendour, that is glory.

Intrinsically, the glory of God is related to the economy of God, for it is a communicable attribute which He wants to work into man to obtain a glorious corporate expression.

The Triune God is a God of glory, and His eternal goal is to bring many sons into glory.

For this, He created man in His image so that man may express God in His glory in a corporate way.

But man sinned, that is, man fell short of the glory of God; now man expresses his sinful self instead of expressing God.

So Christ came to accomplish redemption and fulfil the requirements of God’s glory, and through the gospel of the glory of Christ, we are called by and into His eternal glory.

The all-inclusive Christ dwells in us as the hope of glory.

We behold Him and reflect Him, and we’re being transformed into His image.

The goal of God’s salvation is to bring us fully into glory! Praise the Lord!

In the Gospel of John, we see that the glory of God is involved with Christ and His incarnation, human living, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension.

In the whole Bible we see that even the Lord’s coming back and His being the lamp in the New Jerusalem involves God’s glory.

If we read the Gospel of John and trace the glory and glorification of the Lord Jesus, we will see that, while on earth, He was limited in many ways, yet He had the divine glory in Him, ready to release it and impart into those who believe into Him.

While living on the earth, the Lord Jesus never sought His own glory, except the glory of the Father.

So the Father glorified Him in His resurrection, and in the glorification of Christ, the Father is also glorified. Praise the Lord!

The Lord prayed that the Father would glorify Him, for He realize that, through His death and resurrection, He will be glorified, and when He is glorified, the Father is also glorified. Hallelujah!

Even more, as we will see in this article, we are part of the enlarged coinhering oneness, which is the glorification! Hallelujah!

As the Embodiment of the Triune God, Christ the Son is the Father’s Glorification

The Lord Jesus gave a long discourse in John 14-16 where the main point was the Son may be glorified so that the Father may also be glorified in the Son.

As the embodiment of the Triune God, Christ the Son is the Father’s glorification, and when Christ is glorified, the Father is also glorified (John 17:1, 5, 22-23).

Christ is the Son of God; before His incarnation, He was the only begotten Son of God, being with the Father in glory and enjoying this glory with the Father.

From eternity past to eternity future Christ is the Son of God, the second of the Godhead, enjoying the glory of God.

But when Christ stepped out of eternity into time and was incarnated by becoming flesh, this glory of God which was within Him was concealed in His flesh.

He came as the Word becoming flesh to tabernacle among us, full of grace and reality, and those around Him beheld His glory (John 1:14).

However, the divine glory, which is the expression of the divine life and nature, was confined and concealed within the Lord’s humanity.

This was a great suffering to the Lord.

To Him, it was easy to submit to the Father, for He was always one with the Father, and He willingly did the will of the Father and spoke the words of the Father, for He was intrinsically one with the Father.

But He yearned to release the divine life concealed in the shell of His humanity so that He may be glorified!

Glorification means manifestation; to be glorified is to be manifested.

The main point of the Lord’s message from chapter 14 to chapter 16 of John is that the Son may be glorified so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.

In His message, the Lord spoke of glorification, and in His prayer, He prayed for glorification (13:31-32; 14:13; 15:8; 17:1, 5).

Even though His glorification required His death, the Lord knew that, in His resurrection, He would be glorified.

He knew that death would be painful and full of suffering, but death would break the shell of His humanity so that the glory of His divinity would be released.

Christ was glorified by the Father with the divine glory in His resurrection (John 7:37-39).

He was glorified in His resurrection, for His divine life was released and imparted into all His believers, and in the Son’s glorification, the Father was also glorified. Amen!

To be glorified is to be resurrected, and when the Lord was resurrected, He was glorified.

The Lord’s resurrection brought Him into glory (Luke 24:26; 1 Cor. 15:43; Acts 3:13, 15).

Hallelujah, Christ was glorified in His resurrection, and in the Son’s glorification the Father was also glorified!

The Lord Jesus prayed for this and the Father answered His prayer by raising Him from the dead.

In John 17:5 the Lord Jesus asked the Father to glorify Him along with Himself, with the glory that He had with the Father before the world was.

As an answer to this prayer, the Father God raised Christ from the dead, and in His resurrection, Christ was glorified! Praise the Lord!

According to the New Testament thought, resurrection is a release in life, and this release in life is a matter of glorification. Glorification therefore is a synonym of resurrection.

As the embodiment of the Triune God, Christ the Son is the Father’s glorification. Praise the Lord!

Lord Jesus, thank You for being willing to be incarnated to be a man! Thank You for putting upon Yourself the flesh and being willing to be limited, confined, and constricted as a man. We praise You, dear Lord Jesus, for Your wonderful incarnation and human living. Thank You for Your death which has redeemed us and which has released the divine life from within the shell of Your humanity! Hallelujah, God’s life was released from Christ through His death, and this life was imparted and propagated into us in His resurrection! Amen, Lord Jesus, we praise You for Your resurrection, Your glorification! You were glorified in Your resurrection, for Your divine life was expressed, imparted, and manifested! Hallelujah, in Christ’s glorification in His resurrection, the Father was also glorified! Amen, Lord, we praise You! You deserve all the glory! What a glorious Christ we have!

By the Church Christ is Glorified so that the Father is Glorified in and Through the Son

On the one hand, Christ was glorified in His resurrection; on the other hand, we as the church were also glorified with Him.

The Father is glorified in and through the Son, and the Son is glorified in and through the church.

Christ the Son of God is glorified in the oneness of the church, for when we are one in the Father’s life, the sanctifying Word, and in the divine glory, Christ is glorified! Amen!

Today it is by the church that the Son of God will be glorified so that the Father might be glorified in and through the Son (John 17:22; Eph. 3:21).

Glory is the expression of the divine life and the divine nature; when we live by the divine life and the divine nature, there will be glory in the church.

Today we as believers in Christ are joined to the Lord as one spirit (1 Cor. 6:17), and when we live by the divine life and nature, Christ is glorified.

It is by the church that Christ is glorified so that the Father is glorified in and through the Son. Amen!

On the one hand, God is glorified in the individual Christ in His resurrection, which was His glorification.

On the other hand, God is glorified in Christ and in the church in the church age, for the church expresses God!

We need to daily live by the divine life and the divine nature in our spirit, not by our natural life, so that we may express the Lord and not our self.

When we live by the divine life and nature, we will express the divine glory; this will be something spontaneous, not something that we deliberately try to express.

The more we as saints in the church life live by the divine life and the divine nature, the more glorious the church life will be, and the more there will be the divine glory in the church. Amen!

God the Father is glorified through the organic union of the believers in Christ with the Father in the Son in oneness (John 17:23).

The Lord Jesus not only died for us to redeem us; He died for us and resurrected to bring us into an organic union with God.

When He was on the earth, He was in the Father and the Father was in Him; through His death and resurrection and our faith in Him, we were also brought into this divine oneness, this coinhering oneness.

With the Divine Trinity, there is a wonderful coinhering oneness; the Father dwells in the Son, the Son dwells in the Father, and the Spirit is the flowing out of the Triune God.

The Lord Jesus prayed that this coinhering oneness would be enlarged and duplicated with His believers.

This is what happened at the time of His resurrection; in that day we know that Christ is in the Father and we are in Christ and Christ is in us (John 17:20).

Today Christ is in us and we are in Him. The Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father.

When we remain in the organic union with the Lord in our spirit, we are in the wonderful coinhering oneness of the Triune God.

In this way, the Father is glorified in the Son and in the church, and we simply remain in the oneness, which is the glorification. Hallelujah!

As we remain in the organic union with the Lord in our spirit and live by the divine life and the divine nature, we are the one new man (John 16), the branches in Christ the vine (John 15), and the many abodes in the Father’s house (John 14). Hallelujah!

Divinity is mingled with humanity and humanity dwells in divinity for the corporate expression of the Triune God.

God is gaining His glory today in the church and through the church.

When we live by the divine life, we express Him in the divine glory, and the Father is glorified in Christ and in the church.

The Father is glorified through the organic union of Christ’s believers with the Father in the Son in a wonderful coinhering oneness (John 17:23).

When we are one, Christ is glorified, and the Father is also glorified. When we’re really one in the church life, there will be a corporate manifestation and expression of the glory of God.

When we are one, Christ is glorified and the Father is glorified in the Son’s glorification. Amen!

This is what the Lord is gaining today in the church life.

The oneness in John 17 is for the Father’s glorification in the Son; this oneness is actually the divine glorification.

When we are one, when we’re in God and God is in us, when we deny the self and live by the divine life, we are one in His glory, and the Father is glorified in Christ and in the church.

In the divine glorification, the Triune God is glorified in humanity, and humanity is glorified in divinity (Rev. 21:10-11).

Hallelujah, for eternity we will enjoy glorification upon glorification and glorification within glorification, for we will be in God, God will be in us, we will dwell in God, God will dwell in us, we will shine forth God and God will shine through us for eternity! Praise the Lord!

May the Lord unveil us to see a glimpse of glory and glorification in God’s economy and may we cooperate with Him to obtain this among us today.

Lord Jesus, we want to live in our spirit today. We exercise our spirit to live by the divine life and nature in our spirit. We do not want to live in and by our natural man but in and by the divine life. Amen, Lord, may You be expressed in us and through us today. May the Son of God be glorified in the church so that the Father may be glorified in the Son! Amen, Lord Jesus, we want to remain in the organic union with You in our spirit. We want to live in our spirit and by our spirit. May God gain the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus today! Hallelujah, the Father is glorified through our organic union with Father and the Son in a wonderful coinhering oneness! Amen, Lord, thank You for enlarging the divine oneness to include us, the believers in Christ. Thank You for giving us Your life, Your word and Your glory that we may be one. Amen, Lord, may we be one so that Christ may be glorified and therefore the Father may be glorified! Amen, Lord, may the Triune God be glorified in humanity and may humanity be glorified in divinity!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by brother Ron Kangas in the message for this week, and portions from, The Conclusion of the New Testament, pp. 2956-2959, pp. 467-471, by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Experiencing, Enjoying, and Expressing Christ (2024 July Semiannual Training), week 10, Glory and Glorification as Revealed in the Gospel of John.
• Similar articles on this topic:
  – The Universal Spreading of Christ as the True Vine — the Organism of the Triune God in the Economy of God and the Universal Spreading of the Church as the Testimony of Jesus, outline via, GTCA.us.
  – The glorification of the Father in the Son, a portion from, The Fulfillment of the Tabernacle and the Offerings in the Writings of John, Chapter 51, by Witness Lee.
  – What Is God’s Complete Salvation in the Bible? More via, Bibles for America blog.
  – The church as revealed in John 14-16: the incorporation of the Triune God and the believers as the issue of Christ’s glorification, article by David Yoon in, Affirmation and Critique.
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• Hymns on this topic:
  – Within God’s sovereign kingdom / His Christ is magnified; / When Christ in life is reigning, / The Father’s glorified. / When God is in dominion, / All things are truly blessed; / When Christ for God is reigning. / God’s glory is expressed. (Hymns #941 stanza 5)
  – Christ is the hope of glory, He is my history: / His life is my experience, for He is one with me; / He comes to bring me into His glorious liberty, / That one with Him completely I’ll ever be. (Hymns #949 stanza 4)
  – O Lord Jesus, Thy redeemed ones / Are Thy Body and Thy Bride; / As Thy fulness, Thine expression, / In her Thou art glorified. / Thou, her all in all forever, / She Thy riches doth declare; / Thou dost fully saturate her / And Thy glory with her share. (Hymns #976 stanza 1)