“‘For the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed, but My kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of My peace be removed,’ saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee.” (Isaiah 54:10)
That which makes true Christianity a most beautiful thing is the beauty of the Lord. What do we mean by that, or rather, what does Scripture mean in speaking of God’s beauty?
In Psalm 27 verse 4, we find where David makes a most remarkable statement: “One thing have I desired of the Lord, and that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to enquire in His temple.” God gave to David a seeking heart, a desire for God and the things of God. God was his supreme pursuit and objective, to behold Him, to know Him. In that pursuit we find a man who by the Spirit of God, sees something of God that is so wonderful, perfect, and lovely, that the only word that can begin to express what he sees is the word, “beauty.” Why? In the revelation of God to the heart of man, He unveils the perfection of His goodness. There is nothing except perhaps the unveiling of the love of God, that compares with the infinite, holy, pure, and unchanging goodness of God. There is no flaw in it, no fault, no imperfection, no contradition to it. The goodness of God, His love, is the eternal expression of His perfection in His holiness that He desires and wills to reveal to man on earth, but is limited by man’s capacity to receive it, believe it, and live in the reality of it. And so, the Lord takes David by the hand, and leads him to that place of worship, whether in a temple, an open field, the sea, or to a mountain’s summit, there to unveil to him the inexpressible “beauty” of God. Paul would write of this vision of God by saying, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him.” (1 Cor. 2:9) Here he speaks of “things,” the things of God. He reveals the limits of man to truly behold God upon His throne, and the slain Lamb at the Father’s right hand, the sight and beauty of which is inexpressible. In spite of the limits of man, even his sinfulness, God reveals Himself by the Spirit to the worshipful heart, to the one who seeks Him, in order to find Him.
Why is it so very important to become as David, having as our goal to behold the beauty of the Lord in worship, and then to enquire of Him in prayer? The answer lies not in the thought that God needs man, but that man, wounded by sin in a sinful world, needs to behold Him. When there is the true worship of God in Spirit and in truth, there is a work of God that He performs in the heart. It is a work of transformation into the image of Christ. Paul writes: “Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.” (2 Cor. 4:17,18) Here is unveiled the means and method by which God accomplishes His will as expressed by Paul to the Roman believers: “For whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.” (Rom. 8:29) The beauty which David saw, is that which the Christian is called to see, by the Spirit, as he worships Christ in Spirit and in truth. The result of such worship is transformation, Christ’s likeness revealed in all that we are, do, and say.
Dear Father, Show forth Thy lovingkindness. In Jesus’ name, Amen.