"Glory" or "How I Make the Mistake of Glorifying the Wrong Things, and In Doing So, Miss the Point."

I have recently become addicted to the show called Gangland on the History Channel. It's really good. It's really informative. It's depressing. It's interesting. It's dark. It's...

...it's missing the point.

Gang culture is interesting to me, how these tribes of people who are beyond my perspective move & operate. In fact, one of my favorite books from the past five years is this one. It an honest and open look from an outsiders perspective.

I think the point of the show Gangland (or the other really good show Marked) is to teach and tell the stories. I think it misses the point because it kind of glamorizes gangs. I think it is really unintentional, but it is still happening.

It has caused me to think a lot about glory.

Glory is a hard concept, because it tends to become self motivated. We do things that will earn us glory in some form of the other.

I think the other reason I have been thinking about glory is because of this song (but not the video), which is a cover of this song.

Whenever I hear the word 'glory' it immediately brings to mind this lyric:

"Unaware of Afflictions eclipsed by glory"

This line is speaking volumes to my soul right now. I think its so easy to get caught up in our afflictions. In our guilt. In our shortcomings. And the glory of grace is misplaced, it is not where we intended it to be, kinda like Gangland.

But the truth is I am more unaware of the fact that Glory has fully eclipsed all my afflictions, my guilt, my shortcomings.

I constantly need to be reminded of the fact that my afflictions have been eclipsed.

May we all recall the hope of glory, and may we live out of a place where we can no longer see our afflictions because the have been obscured by the grace, love and peace of Jesus Christ.