A verse that is one of my favorites, and is pretty well-known is Romans 3:23 which says,

“For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”

This verse could not show more truth, because we cannot even begin to compete with God’s glory!  Glory can be defined as very great praise or honor, and can be thought of as a state of great splendor, magnificence or beauty.  God fits this description!  He is so glorious . . . and we are not!

Thankfully, the story does not end there.  The passage goes on to say in verse 24, that we are justified by God’s grace, which was given to us as a gift.  Let me just stop right there, and dwell on that.  GOD, who is more powerful than we can imagine, when WE are simply a speck on this earth, getting caught up in the ways of the world, even being forgotten, thought of us. And He loves us enough to give us this gift of grace!  Saving us from our sins is just the beginning of what He does for us.  He deserves so much more glory than we give Him, yet He is grateful!  But He does more for us than we could ever do for Him, and we are NOT grateful?  It just blows my mind how forgiving, and patient He is.

Moving on to verse 25, it says,

“[Christ Jesus] whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.  This was to show God’s righteousness, because in His divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.”

This verse is telling us what our gift is – Jesus!  He died on the cross for our sins, and the blood that was shed for us, takes our sins away.  We have to receive this gift – and being the stubborn, un-perfect humans that we are, we don’t always want to receive the gift.  So it is my prayer that we, as Christian believers, can tell more people about how amazing this gift of grace is, and how it changes our lives.

Another great verse that I love is Romans 8:18. “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.” This verse gives us an entire different view of God’s glory than Romans 3:23.  It is telling us about the glory of Heaven!  And it’s telling us that no matter what we are going through now, the best is yet to come!  We can’t even begin to imagine how glorious Heaven is going to be.  This verse can give us hope for our future.  Even when we are in Heaven, all glory will be given to God.  Philippians 4:20, “To God be the glory forever and ever, amen.”