‘No one may boast before him.’1 Corinthians 1:29 NIV
God says: ‘I am the Lord. That is my name. I will not give my glory to another’ (Isaiah 42:8 NCV). Everything we do should give glory to God. But that can sometimes be challenging for us. We can be tempted to think that we deserve the credit and glory for the things we’ve done, especially when we’ve put a lot of effort into them. Paul writes that ‘No one may boast before him.’ We can’t boast about our salvation; it’s all by God’s grace. The Bible says: ‘You have been saved by grace through believing. You did not save yourselves; it was a gift from God. It was not the result of your own efforts, so you cannot brag about it’ (Ephesians 2:8-9 NCV). We also can’t boast about what we do for God before we go to heaven, because it’s God who has called us and equipped us to be able to do it. God’s given us the gifts, skills, and strength to do the things we do, and therefore we need to give all the glory to Him. We’re not wired to be humble, so we need to learn how to lay down our desire for approval and glory, and instead hand it all over to God. When we remember to give God the credit for our success, He’ll keep using and blessing us. The Bible says: ‘Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above’ (James 1:17 NKJV). Every good thing we enjoy today, and every good thing tomorrow, is a gift from God. We need to be thanking God for those gifts, and giving Him the glory as provider in our lives.
