God Will Not Share His Glory

David says two things about the young lions. They do lack, and they suffer hunger. He does not tell me why he chose young ones, and he does not say they failed on a hunt. Now here is my reading of it, and I put the reading first so you know what it is. A young lion is the picture I carry for strength at its best, and David has it going hungry.

And David is not reaching for a picture here, he had met one. Standing before Saul he says it plainly.

Psalm 34 does not point back to that day, and David does not say it is the same lion. But it is worth knowing about the man writing it. He had met one, and the bringing of the two together is mine.

David is contrasting natural strength with dependence upon God. David does not tell me what the lion trusts. He tells me the young lions lack and suffer hunger, and that they that seek the LORD shall not want any good thing. That I hear the lion standing for a man who leans on his own strength is my reading. David does not say believers never experience hardship, waiting or lack. He says they shall not want any good thing. And what I take from that is that God knows what is good and holds it for His own.

I have not seen the righteous forsaken. That is what the old man says he has watched, and he does not attach a condition to it. And God says this about His glory Himself.

He Will Not Share His Glory

My glory will I not give to another. That is His own sentence, and it is where the title of this study comes from. Now note what He sets it against in the same breath. Graven images. Isaiah is speaking of idols there, and I am the one carrying it over to a man glorying in himself. Paul will give me the verse for that before this study is over. And human beings do naturally glory in visible strength, power, influence, wealth and ability, because these things can be seen. And Paul asks the question that settles it, and I will bring it in full further down. What hast thou that thou didst not receive. Even the young lion can still suffer hunger.

And that is what I am after in this one verse. Psalm 34 carries a great deal more than this, praise and deliverance and the fear of the LORD, and I am not summing up the whole psalm here.

And what I have found is that my own strength deceives me the moment I start leaning on it apart from Him. Isaiah has already said it. He will not give His glory to another. The flesh loves what it can see.

They Talked Themselves Into Courage

I am reminded of 1 Samuel, chapter 4, when the Philistines stirred one another and told themselves to stand up like men and fight.

And look what they were talking themselves into courage against. Read the verse before it.

God is come into the camp. They said it themselves. And then they told each other to be men. Now the chapter does not tell me what their confidence finally rested in, and I am not going to say. What it does show me is men who were afraid, speaking courage to one another.

And I have to tell you the rest of it, because it does not go the way I would want. The Philistines won that day. Israel lost thirty thousand footmen and the ark was taken.

That it may save us. Israel is the one in this chapter treating a thing as though it were the arm of God. So I am not going to hand you the Philistines as my example of self confidence and Israel as my example of faith, because the chapter will not carry it.

What I keep from it is only what is on the page. Men talking themselves into courage. It is the talking that I recognise. And David entered his battle differently, and he said so out loud.

I come to thee in the name of the LORD of hosts. That is David naming where his confidence sat, in his own words.

And here is my exhortation, and I own it as one. When a person is truly stayed upon God, I do not know the limit of what God may do through that life. A shepherd boy with a sling is standing right here in this study, and that is one man on one day, and I am not turning it into a rule.

A Current Matter of My Own

I have a current matter, and it is also a long standing issue. I brought it before God and said that I have been praying from time to time concerning it. But immediately I had to walk back on those words, because a question came to me, and I believe it was the Lord asking it.

Yes, you have prayed, but how have you prayed? Have you waited?

That caused me to examine myself more deeply, I could say from self examination that I am at fault in certain areas, and I am willing to own that honestly.

At the same time, everything is not absolute, I cannot always charge God, nor can I always charge myself with failure. Scripture also teaches that God works through timing, process, delay, preparation, and purposes beyond our understanding. Therefore, self examination must remain balanced with trust in God’s wisdom and faithfulness.

Dependence upon God is not merely asking once and measuring Him by the speed of the answer. Dependence also includes waiting, trusting, remaining before Him, and refusing to abandon confidence in Him even when the answer is delayed.

David already grounds us earlier in the Psalm with the posture of true dependence when he says in Psalm 34:2,

David’s life was not making its boast in David, but in God. That becomes important when we arrive at verse 10.

As long as our minds, praise, thanksgiving, reverence, worship, and dependence remain stayed upon Him, it keeps our feet on the ground and protects us from becoming intoxicated with our own strength, ability, achievements, or importance. Paul asks in 1 Corinthians 4:7,

What Hast Thou That Thou Didst Not Receive

That question strikes at the very heart of human pride. We glory over this and that as though it is our own ability and not God’s. Yet everything we possess, every gift, every measure of strength, wisdom, endurance, opportunity, and ability has been received from Him.

Sometimes we can even fall into the hypocrisy of giving God glory with our mouths while secretly patting ourselves on the back within our hearts. That is dangerous, because pride does not always speak openly. Sometimes it hides quietly beneath religious language while the heart still exalts itself.

This is why I hold dependence upon God so tightly. I want to stay grounded in the understanding that apart from Him we are sustained by nothing of ourselves.

The Posture of a Child

Jesus pointed toward the posture of a child, and He gives His own reason. Read both verses.

Become as little children. And He gives His own reason in the next breath.

HUMBLE HIMSELF. That is the word Jesus reaches for. Not dependence. Humility.

And a little child does depend on the one caring for him in the plainest ways, and that is my addition to what He said and not His explanation of the child. And note who He was saying it to. Grown men. He does not put adults out of the kingdom, He tells them what to become.

And if we are truthful, our salvation speaks the loudest concerning our dependence. We could not save ourselves, sustain ourselves, cleanse ourselves, or redeem ourselves. From beginning to end, our lives stand only by the grace, mercy, strength, and sustaining power of God.

Our confidence is found in the God who sustains us. When all boasting is removed, and all our self dependence is laid down, what remains is a life that can truly say, my soul shall make her boast in the LORD.