Acts 12:23: “Immediately, because Herod did not give praise to God, an angel of the Lord struck him down, and he was eaten by worms and died.”
While this sounds tough, the glory of God is so powerful it topples people over!
Herod was struck by God’s glory and he died. Paul too was struck by His glory but Paul responded to God and he lived! When Paul was walking on the road to Damascus in Acts 9:1-15, he was overpowered and struck by Light which knocked him to the ground and struck him with blindness. We see the glory of God striking people in the Bible, Ananias and Saphira and others. No matter how high we climb, if our hearts darkened by evil deeds, God does have a day to strike us down! We need it. Paul needed it! God knew Paul would respond to His call of striking Him. God could have struck Hitler with the same glory light bullet, but he knew Hitler would have ranted and raved against Him. God knows the responders and gives them a chance. Sadhu Sundar Singh of India in the 1900s tore the Bible and hated Christians. After he tore the Bible, he was struck with depression and went on the way to kill himself. However, at 3 a.m., a bright light filled his courtyard and he saw a vision of Jesus. He experienced the love flowing out of Jesus and worshiped Him, becoming a Christian on the spot. Struck by His glory, Sundar’s life changed forever.
When we are on a roller-coaster ride of some maddened feat, God stops us on our tracks. He grabs our attention. We hear the Voice of Jesus and receive the Divine Light of God, which enables us to understand the Kingdom of Heaven. We may need those glory strikes from God to wake us up from deception, coldness, spiritual numbness, hardness, indifference etc. If we don’t have the Light of God in us, we are in darkness. This glory opens spiritual pathways and give us new direction. As the children of Israel were directed by the pillar of cloud and the pillar of fire which took them out of bondage to their blessed land, we too need that direction to deliver us out of bondage. We need that Light of Jesus to show us the way! (Numbers 14:14). When angels said that all the Earth is full of God’s glory, it means that they manifest His light and life, being revelations of who He is.
We need the greater glory to shine on Earth today. May we start to pray for the Light of Glory to manifest to save the lost, set the captives free and allow us to worship Him in deeper degrees and fervency. Rita
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