"Glory To God ..."

“Glory to God in the Highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men,” said the multitude of the heavenly host to the shepherds at Jesus Christ’s birth. OR DID THEY? (Luke 2:14)

Did they really say that? Sure they did. It’s in the King James Bible in just those words.

We hear this beautiful message during the Christmas season and we take it at face value in the English translation. We see it as: “Praise God who is able to give men on earth peace and good will.”

But it is fun to take a well known scripture and look up the root derivations of the original language in the well recognized Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance. This is a very hefty reference book which takes every word of the original Hebrew and Greek and gives its basic meaning and usage.

Doing this with Luke 2:14 gives quite a different twist in the message. Let’s examine the derivation of the key words in this scripture.

The word GLORY is from the Greek word doxa, Strong’s #1391 which gives the meaning “dignity, honor, praise, worship”. That is pretty much the way we see its meaning now. But it comes from the root base of the Greek word doko, Strong’ s #1380 which means to THINK. The root meaning of GLORY is to THINK right.

So giving praise and worship to God really comes about by THINKING about what God has revealed concerning Himself - His love, His mercy, His justice, and above all His desires toward men.

How could you translate that section of the message of the heavenly host? Let’s see. “THINK about the characteristics of the Most High God . . .“ That alone is a great idea at Christmas.

Now let’s talk about GOOD WILL as in “good will toward men”. GOOD WILL is the King Jame’s translation for the Greek word eudokia, Strong’s #2107 which comes from the root base of doko, Strong’s #1380. You were just informed the word GLORY is from the same root base. That means GLORY and GOOD WILL are from the same base, or root word, commanding us TO THINK.

So is the message of the heavenly host seen on a lot of Christmas cards really a message about HOW TO THINK?

Look at the word “IN” as in “Glory to God IN the Highest.” This is the Greek word en, Strong’s #1722. What can possibly be wrong with that?
Nothing, but now look at the word TOWARD in the Greek. That word TOWARD is exactly the same Greek word as the word IN. The translators agreed that GLORY is IN God, and so do we. But when they came to the next half of the message, they couldn’t believe that GOOD WILL is IN men, so they changed it to TOWARD men.
The old familiar translation has a good, happy, and poetic ring to it - “GLORY TO GOD IN THE HIGHEST, AND ON EARTH PEACE, GOOD WILL TOWARD MEN.” We’ve memorized it. We’re inspired by it. Nothing wrong with that!

But just consider the deeper, root meaning of the message:

THINK ABOUT THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE MOST HIGH GOD … AND THINK ABOUT THE GOOD POTENTIAL IN MEN … AND THOSE THOUGHTS WILL BRING PEACE TO YOU.

There IS a “good” which is present in all human beings from birth. That “good” is the potential within the human spirit to contain the nature of God through the indwelling union with Christ. The worst sinner on earth still has that “good” potential.
The more we, as Christians, THINK about these things, the more we will stay in awareness of our position as a child in God’s Family. And the greater will be our desire to see the potential of the new birth fulfilled in unbelievers around us.

The words to a familiar Christian song seem appropriate:

Think about His love,
Think about His goodness,
Think about His grace
That‘s brought us through.
For as High as the heavens above,
So great is the measure of our Father’s love -
Great is the measure of our Father’s LOVE!

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