The Wave of Vain Glory

Well I must start this blog off by saying that my husband had to have his laptop serviced and the technician cleaned out everything so there went my Power Point presentation on the nine gifts of the Spirit. I will conjure up another soon. I just finished my finals this week in CJA/384 so my weekend is gone and I won't be starting a new power point tonight. However, the thing that I did want to talk about is the wave of vain glory that I'm seeing more and more of lately. The question is, what is vain glory? Vain glory is what Apostle Paul mentions in Galatians 5:26 that says "Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another". This is the very thing that is taking place where people, especially those in leadership, are seeking approval, promotion, and praise from man and tooting their own horn for works done in the church or for the kingdom of God. This kind of behavior goes against Proverbs 27:2-Let another man praise thee and not thine own mouth; a stranger and not thine own lips. The same principle applies when pastors or other ministerial authoritative figures make some type of pact with the congregation to say Amen only when"they" are speaking but they are not allowed to say Amen to another minister. I've seen it where members who visit another assembly with their pastors literally look at the pastor for the signal of when to say Amen and when not to during another preacher's message. It's like they have made themselves a little god and the people esteem in higher honor and recognition than God himself. This, my friend, is nothing short of idolatry. Other forms of vain glory is this religious hype that many Christians are caught up in. What I mean by religious hype is that certain Christians only attend certain services or certain parts of a service. For instance, they pack out the church during the song and praise part of the service, but leave before the sermon or do not attend Sunday School or bible study. They only want the entertainment from the music and singers singing songs with a worldly hip hop beat but just added gospel lyrics to it. Why is this vain glory? Because there is no real glory being given to God because the flesh is not coming under subjection to the Word but it's only a tickling of the ears and plays on people's emotionalism through music and songs that sound good and makes the flesh feel good. Another type of vain glory is that Christians only want to hear certain preachers or gospel artists, usually those with big titles, big congregations, big followings, big money,etc. But they don't even pay attention to leaders who are not in the spotlight with such notoriety. People want to"feel big", so they attach themselves to ministers who act, look, and talk big. There's nothing wrong with being open minded and thinking big rather than thinking small, but the vain glory stems from the person wanting more and more attention and recognition and money for what they do in church or just for the kingdom of God. This attitude and behavior is against the example that Jesus left when after he healed someone or cast out evil spirits from them, he told them"not to tell anyone". The people who were healed and delivered took it upon themselves to testify of the miracles that Jesus wrought in their life but Jesus himself didn't go around broadcasting what he did. Now days if you go to just about any minister's profile on social media, they have a page full of stories about what"I" did or how the Lord used "me". What they're really doing is speaking for the works instead of letting the works speak for them. Another thing is people who get blessed by the Word constantly giving the credit (or glory) to the man or woman of God. There's nothing wrong with letting someone know how they touched your heart through their ministry but when they make it a repetitious habit of pointing out the person and not the Lord who enabled the person then it's vain glory. Another form of vain glory is when people get about 12 members in their congregation and start bragging about how many folks they got. This temptation attacks small ministries just as much as large and mega ministries. Churches get in competition over who has the most members. You see videos that people have posted turning the camera to show how many people are in the sanctuary. The problem with this is that they will not even shoot a video if there's only a few people in attendance because they want to look.....Big.....there's that word again. It's all for vain glory though. When statements are made like: How many people showed up or Did they have a good turn out? Then that tells you that people love crowds even if what they are in isn't the real deal. To be honest, the real deal folks who are living holy, sacrificing their time to the Lord in prayer and fasting, and seeking the things that are above and not on the earth, do not have a whole lot of people following them. But the fake ones do because they have found ways to compromise and give people what they want at a lesser cost than what is really required in the Word of God. That's why true, Holiness Apostolic Pentecostal churches do not find a platform in other denominations because we preach too tough on sin and the true plan of salvation. However, there are many people who started out as original Apostolics but have gotten caught up in this wave of vain glory and are now in it just for the money and glamour. But we who have the Spirit and discernment are not fooled. We know they have been deceived and their level of comfort in the church has become their heaven on earth. God has had me in training against the spirit of vain glory all my life and because of that I have NEVER been in the pools of popularity but rather have more people vote against me because they know my motives are pure and I don't do what I do to the seen, recognized, receive money, or trying to get.....Big......that's the Word. My main mission is for men, women, boys, and girls to get to know Jesus Christ in the pardon of their sins, repenting of their sins, having their sins washed away through water baptism in Jesus name and receive the baptism of the Holy Ghost with the evidence of speaking in tongues and living holy before God daily. Therefore, I have no room for vain glory because the majority already do not want to hear my message but I know God got somebody who will hear, believe, receive, and obey the Word of truth and it's not for my glory but all for the glory of God!!!!