By Charles Price
How does the finished work of Christ redound to God's glory? It does so because it reveals God's great attributes clearly. We must remember from our earlier study of the word "glory" that to glorify God means to "acknowledge His attributes" or "make them known." It means proclaming His sovereignty, justice, righteousness, wisdom, love, and everything else that may rightly be said about Him. But where are these attributes best known? The answer is: at the cross, for only here is the perfection of God's sovereignty, justice, righteousness, wisdom, and love abundantly and unmistakably displayed. We see God's sovereignty in the way in which the death of Christ was planned, promised, and then executed, without the slightest deviation from the prophecies of the Old Testament. We see God's justice in sin actually being punished. Without the cross God, could have forgiven our sin gratuitously (to speak from a human perspective), but it would not have been just. Only in Christ is that justice satisfied. We see God's righteousness in recognition of the fact that only Jesus, the righteous One, could pay sin's penalty. We see God's wisdom in the planning and ordering of such a great salvation. We see His love, for it is only at the cross that we know beyond doubt that God loves us even as He loves Jesus.
Jesus revealed these attributes of the Father fully by His death. Hence, His obedience to the Father's will in dying, fully glorified Him. No wonder we sing:
To God be the glory--great things He has done!
So loved He the world that He gave us His Son,
Who yielded His life an atonement for sin
And opened the Life-gate that all may go in.
That is God's glory . . . and Christ's glory . . . and our glory too, for we glory in Christ's death, rather than in any works or plans of our devising.
. . . . "It is finished." The work is done.
(The Gospel of John, vol. iv., pp. 1266-1267).
