Going From Glory to Glory
Oct 27, 2025
Note: This post was originally written for Families on the Frontier.
I went to Kauai this past summer on a family vacation. It was filled with so many of those sweet moments where you just want to freeze time and stay there forever… and also the other kind. The kind where you’re swimming in a jewel-colored waterfall paradise, your kids are fighting, and then you’re fighting your kids, and then you and your spouse are fighting about the way the other handled the kids…
And you look at all the beauty that surrounds you and think to yourself, We have everything. Why are we having to fight for joy right now?
But vacation (and a pricey Hawaiian waterfall excursion) does a beautiful thing to time – it measures out a limited amount, puts it in an hourglass, and sets it right in your face. And watching those tiny, precious granules steadily slip away, refusing to wait for conditions to be perfect in order to move forward, created an urgency in me to do the same.
So instead of sinking into that familiar, paralyzing swamp of negative thoughts and emotions, I found myself asking God, How do we turn this around?How do we make the most of our time here?
And I felt God say to me, you’re not promised days of going from high to high. But you can go from glory to glory.
Go from glory to glory – what does that even mean? And how is that better than going from one high to the next?
A little trip down the Bible Hub rabbit hole later helped unpack this a little more.
2 Corinthians 3:18 says, “And we all, with unveiled face, continually seeing as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are progressively being transformed into His image from [one degree of] glory to [even more] glory, which comes from the Lord, [who is] the Spirit” (Amplified Bible).
Going from glory to glory means we’re transforming to become more like Jesus. We’re becoming more and more the person we were created to be. We’re not stagnant or backsliding, though our circumstances may make us feel that way. We’re progressing, growing in our ability to radiate God’s beauty!
High moments, alone, can’t bring that kind of upgrade. And low or ordinary moments (even seasons of them) can’t disqualify us from it. Because God didn’t design us to find fulfillment in emotional highs. He designed us to find fulfillment in looking like Him (Genesis 1:26). And God is the perfection of beauty (Psalm 50:2).
You can be cleaning out a lovingly crafted lunchbox that has returned to you full at the end of the day… sitting in a room you wish you could leave… or find yourself in a situation that feels hopeless and cyclical…
… while at the same time, moving from glory to glory.
So how do we do that?
1 - Have an “unveiled face.” Remove the barriers between you and God. Whatever you’re hiding from Him, whatever you’re feeling angry about, whatever is keeping you from believing He is good and He loves you – tell Him.
2 - “Contemplate the Lord’s glory.” You become what you behold – so look for the beauty in the moment. What are you thankful for? What is true about God, how He feels about you, how He sees your circumstances?
3 - Rely on the Holy Spirit. Transformation doesn’t happen by willpower. The Spirit is the one who changes us. A simple breath prayer – “Holy Spirit, come” – can shift any moment.
4 - Rejoice in knowing thatyou’re moving from glory to glory.
Now that I’m home – where the hourglass isn’t as visible as on vacation, but time is still as precious and limited – I’ve continued to practice this, especially with my two girls. When we’re waiting. When we’re frustrated. When we’re feeling really, really low.
We tell God what’s blocking us from feeling Him.
We declare truths and thanksgiving.
We ask the Holy Spirit to cover us from head to toe.
Then we move from glory to glory.
Life isn’t made up of constant highs. There are a lot of lows, and even more in-betweens. If we only find joy at the peaks, we’ll spend most of life upset, disappointed, bored. Waiting. Wasting. Missing out. Missing it.
I don’t want to live like that. I want to find the joy between the highs.
Because not every moment is a high… but every moment can be holy.
God, show me how to lead my family from glory to glory today as we navigate all the highs, lows, and in-betweens.
Thank you for being our counselor and comforter, who is with us in every kind of moment and blesses us right where we are.
Thank you that you can turn every moment around, because all we need is your presence to turn a low moment or season into a holy one.
Thank you that you can redeem time, even time that feels wasted, lost, or stolen.
May everything we do and say today reflect your glory. Amen.
