Stopping at the Sign

Photo courtesy of agorachurch.org

Earlier this week, I was challenged and convicted by an article written by pastor and author Paul David Tripp about "glory reorientation."  In the article, he describes something that we are hard wired for--experiencing and enjoying glory.  According to Dr. Tripp, we have all sorts of "glory receptors" to experience glory in all sorts of things around us--delicious food, harmonious music, sexual pleasure, artistic creativity, nature's beauty--the list can go on and on.

However, these things, no matter how glorious they are in their own right, always serve to point to God--and this is where Dr. Tripp states that we as humans oftentimes get into trouble:  we stop at the sign.

Please allow him to explain with a very powerful analogy...

"Imagine you and your family are driving to Disney World, and about 100 miles out, you see a sign for the resort complex. Because you see letters that spell Disney World, you pull the car over and have your vacation on the side of the road. What a wasted vacation! You never actually got to experience the true 'glory' of Disney World because you stopped at the sign.

The same is true with us. We're so excited by the sign glories of sex, food, music, color, and nature that we actually miss out on true glory. The tangible sign glories we experience are never meant to be the final destination; they're meant to attract us into intimate relationship with the Creator."

We are so quick to settle for less than true glory, are we not?  We are content with little trinkets and trivialities rather than ardently pursuing the REAL THING--the glory and wonder and satisfaction and pleasure found in God alone.  I especially love Dr. Tripp's Disney World illustration after having visited there with my family numerous times in recent years.  What a travesty that would have been had we pulled over on the side of the road to have our vacation when we merely saw a sign!   But, like Dr. Tripp, I am convinced and convicted that that is precisely what we do in a spiritual sense all throughout our day when we settle for the pleasures of inferior glories rather than that of God Himself!

So, dear friend, let us labor together to see each of these amazing glories here on Earth as what they truly are--simply signs which only serve to point us to the ONLY one deserving of our love, adoration, and worship--the Lord God Almighty!