Faith glorifies God because it shows he is trustworthy.
Prayer and faith can be self-centered or God-centered. Self-centered faith is not wrong. The Bible is replete with stories of people who prayed that God would do things they needed and wanted, as in most of the psalms as well as the Gospel accounts of people coming to Jesus for healing and deliverance from demons. Jesus does not require people to explain and justify their motives in asking him for help.
But as we grow in the Lord, we become increasingly concerned about how our words and actions affect God. More and more we want to please him. We grow in a desire to glorify him by giving him praise and thanksgiving, by telling others about the great things he has done in our lives and in the world, and by offering our lives to him to use as a display of his manifold greatness.
My point in this post is, if pleasing and glorifying God matters to you, then you should be highly motivated to have great faith.
George Muller showed how faith glorifies God
This was the motivation of George Muller, the celebrated man of faith and prayer. He started an orphanage in England in the 1800s, and his main purpose was to show others they could completely depend on God for their needs, that he answers prayer and faith.
To prove that, he made it his policy not to announce the financial needs of the orphanage, even though the orphanage depended completely on donations to function. He only prayed about the needs. He kept a meticulous journal to publish the details of how God worked in remarkable ways to provide for the growing number of orphans living at the home. The account brings God glory and, I assume, great pleasure.
You can read abridged versions of Muller’s story and journal (which I recommend) or the full version. Search on The Autobiography of George Muller. I also liked the biography on Muller by Arthur Pierson.
Four reasons why faith glorifies God
Why does prayer and faith please and glorify God?
1. Answers to prayer and faith display God’s power and sovereignty over the created world.
When Lazarus died and his body lay in the tomb, his sister Martha had enough faith to say to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you.” (John 11:21–22)
Martha had enough hope and faith to ask Jesus indirectly to raise her brother from the dead. Even so, when Jesus went to the tomb and told those present to remove the stone, she objected, “Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days” (John 11:39).
Notice Jesus’s important reply: “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?” (v. 40)
If we believe, we can see the glory of God in his sovereign power over our material world. And that is what Martha saw, as Jesus proceeded to raise Lazarus from the dead.
And this display of God’s power in Jesus affected many others. One chapter later in John, “The chief priests made plans to put Lazarus to death as well, because on account of him many of the Jews were going away and believing in Jesus.” (John 12:10–11)
2. Answers to prayer and faith show his Word is trustworthy.
Notice how Simeon overflows with praise when the Lord fulfills his promise to him that he would see the Christ before he died.
“Now there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ. And he came in the Spirit into the temple, and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him according to the custom of the Law, he took him up in his arms and blessed God and said, ‘Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation.’” (Luke 2:25–30)
Simeon connected the dots between God’s word and the answer given and praised God.
3. Answers to prayer and faith display God’s salvation.
Notice in the following testimony Paul’s motivation to see God receive thanksgiving as a result of his deliverance.
“For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many.” (2 Corinthians 1:8–11)
Paul knew from experience that answered prayer leads to the thanksgiving that pleases God.
4. When God does what is humanly impossible to do, he reveals his greatness.
The Lord shows his power in situations where man is weak.
Notice in the following psalm how the writer glorifies God rather than human power for taking Israel out of Egypt and establishing them in the Promised Land. And the result is that the writer boasts in the Lord and gives thanks to him.
“O God, we have heard with our ears, our fathers have told us, what deeds you performed in their days, in the days of old: you with your own hand drove out the nations, but them you planted; you afflicted the peoples, but them you set free; for not by their own sword did they win the land, nor did their own arm save them, but your right hand and your arm, and the light of your face, for you delighted in them. You are my King, O God; ordain salvation for Jacob! Through you we push down our foes; through your name we tread down those who rise up against us. For not in my bow do I trust, nor can my sword save me. But you have saved us from our foes and have put to shame those who hate us. In God we have boasted continually, and we will give thanks to your name forever. (Psalm 44:1–8)
Takeaway
In the full scope of the Bible, the stories of people failing to pray and believe in God are stories of failure and sadness, while the accounts of people who prayed and believed result in joy, praise, and thanksgiving.
God is pleased and glorified when we lay before him in prayer our needs and desires. He is pleased and glorified when we trust him. And he is pleased and glorified to answer when he wants, how he wants, and according to his will.
And in the end, if God does not do as we wish, he is glorified as the one who has the right of the potter over his clay, working for a higher good than we could ever imagine.
Jeremiah 9:23–24: “Thus says the LORD: ‘Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.’” (ESV)