Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.
Matthew 5:16
Integrity is the result of individuals acting in agreement with their inner convictions. When those actions are based on the revealed word of God and recognized as sincere, God is magnified.
When Mary understood she was to be the mother of the Messiah, she could not contain the joy and wisdom from God’s Spirit that flooded her soul.
“Oh, how my soul magnifies the Lord. How my spirit rejoices in God my Savior! For he took notice of his lowly servant girl, and from now on all generations will call me blessed. For the Mighty One is holy, and he has done great things for me.
Luke 1:46-49
The word for magnifying God in the Greek means to “make great” or “to increase, extol, or show as great.” This is what a magnifying glass does: it increases something that appears small to make it larger and more easily viewable. To magnify God is a work of integrity in the life of the believer.
For they heard them speak with other languages, and magnify God.
Acts 10:46
As the companions of Cornelius’ household heard and believed the good news from Peter about new life in Messiah, they were filled with God’s Spirit and began ecstatic praise in various languages as a sign to the Jews present that God was at work in their hearts.
When the Spirit of God is at work in the life of a believer, God is magnified. There is a some sort of shift that takes place in the spiritual realm that compels and emboldens believers to magnify him. Paul uses the analogy of a new creation, a new being that sees things differently than it did before.
So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. At one time we thought of Messiah merely from a human point of view. How differently we know him now! This means that anyone who belongs to Messiah has become a newly created being. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
2 Corinthians 5:16-17
Quite honestly, this is the principle purpose of man in this world, to magnify God. We have been created in his image and as his image-bearers, we should be faithfully representing him in all that we do and say. When we do, we are letting our “light shine before men,” as Yeshua said. This is how we magnify God in this world.
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