“To God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ for ever. Amen.” (Romans 16:27, KJV 1900)
One of my most favorite hymns is “To God be the Glory.” This hymn takes me back to the first church that I ever joined. In 1983, the Lord gloriously saved me while reading a Gideon placed Bible in a Minneapolis hotel room. What the Lord did in my life was so dramatic that I can barely express the wonder of it in words.
After my conversion, the pastor had me join him in one of the denominations district conferences to share my story. Actually, it was the story of how the Lord rescued a lost soul. Anyway, this hymn was one that we seemed to sing quite often in our little mission church outside Chicago, in my home town at the time.
I remember on New Year’s Eve that year being invited to a watchnight service at our parent church’s building. There they asked me to share my testimony with the group that was gathered. Sure-enough, we sang this song. The lyrics were written by Fanny Crosby in around 1872 and published in 1875. The melody was written by William Howard Doane. The words and melody still ring in my heart and mind.
I will not write out all the lyrics here. I encourage you to look it up in a hymnal or on the internet. The last part of the refrain or chorus if you prefer, go like this. “O come to the Father, through Jesus the Son and give Him the glory, great things He has done.” The infinitely wise God worked out his masterful plan to provide perfect redemption through the shed blood of Jesus on the cross of Calvary. This salvation that He gave me is infinitely beyond what I deserve, but by His grace, He saved me.
It is fitting that Paul closes this magnificent treatise to the Romans with this statement. “To God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ for ever. Amen.” All of us whom our Lord has saved are a display of God’s glory forever. Thus, we will sing forever, “To God be the glory, great things He has done.”
(Next up: Well we have finished Romans. I feel compelled to take us through the book of Hebrews next.)
Renewing the Heart 