Declaring God’s Glory!

December 2024

For most of the earth’s 8.2 billion people, Christmas is as familiar as family itself. Some of our earliest memories revolve around where we were and who we were with on December 25th. For many, it feels as though an entire culture shifts during this season—whether American, European, Asian, or African—to become “Christian,” even if only in name, as people honor or celebrate their understanding of what Christmas represents.

Yet, for the 3.4 billion people, or 42% of the population, living in unreached or under-reached people groups, the celebration of Christ’s birth is an unknown phenomenon. There is no talk of angels or wise men. No stories of the star in the East or shepherds in the fields. No knowledge of Mary, Joseph, or the birth of the Christ child. There is no Christmas story. And more importantly, there is no Gospel story.

Psalm 96 calls on the people of the earth to declare the glory of the Lord among the nations—among those who do not know the story of the one true God (v.3). To “declare” His glory means to recount it, to tell it. To do so “among” them requires leaving the comforts of family, friends, and familiarity to go to where these unreached people live in isolation from it. The “glory” of the Lord is the message to be proclaimed. Glory refers to the greatest accomplishments by which someone is known. We know that to be the Christmas story, the Gospel story. A Savior is born who is Christ the Lord; and “he shall save his people from their sins” (Luke 2:11; Matthew 1:21).The Psalmist ends by noting that the urgency of making His story known is due to the fact that the Lord will come and judge the earth with righteousness and truth (v.13)! Can you imagine learning of the First Coming of Christ only at His Second Coming?

Pastor and theologian, Oswald Smith, founder of the People’s Church in Toronto Canada in 1929 is noted to have repeatedly stated that “We talk of the Second Coming; half the world has never heard of the First.” We have a choice to make as the church commissioned to declare God’s glory—the Gospel Story—among the heathen.  Will we go and tell the unknown story or stay and celebrate the knowing it ourselves? 

Declaring His Glory!

 

 

 

GFF General Director