The Glorious Beauty of the Blessed God

Beauty is captivating to many. The beauty of the Lord is so to all by whom it is seen. Zechariah, struck with the display thereof, exclaimed, ‘How great is his goodness, and how great is his beauty!’ To behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple, was the one thing which David desired and sought after. I wish it may be the same with the writer and every reader of this paper.

The beauty of the Lord cannot be expressed. The eloquence of men and angels is utterly inadequate to the task. To set it forth no metaphor is, or ever can be found, no, not among the brightest glories, nor the greatest beauties of this transitory dying world. Everything in God is the perfection of beauty. There is, saith an apostle, one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; to which I may add, there are many other glories and beauties in the wide creation; but let it be remembered, they are not originals, they are all derived, and have no beauty but what God has given them. Let us then for a few moments turn aside from the fading beauties of this lower world to behold the transcendent and eternal beauties of our God.

What a glorious beauty do we behold in his infinite knowledge and wisdom! The Lord is a God of knowledge, by whom actions are weighed. His understanding is infinite. His eyes are in every place, beholding the evil and the good. He sees not as man sees: man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart. He searcheth all hearts. We may say with the Psalmist, ‘Lord, thou hast searched us and known us; our down-sitting and uprising, and our thoughts afar off. Such knowledge is too wonderful for us; it is high, we cannot attain unto it.’ Let us then, with the revering Apostle, cry out with wonder and adoration, ‘O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!’

Not only all past events, but likewise all future ones, are present with the Lord. All future things are naked and open before the eyes of him with whom we have to do. In a dream he revealed to Joseph his future advancement in Egypt. He called Cyrus by name, a century before he was born. Nothing can ever take him by surprise. But he can and will take the wise in their own craftiness, whenever they are scheming to counteract his purposes. ‘Why,’ saith the Psalmist, ‘do the kings of the earth and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his Anointed? The Lord shall have them in derision.’ Let it ever be remembered, that in the death of Jesus Christ, the deep policy of earth and hell was utterly confounded; and so shall it be, with all their future projects to overthrow the church of God.

It is worthy of notice, that the beauty of God’s wisdom is equal to that of his knowledge. Among men this is not always the case: some are knowing; but at the same time are destitute of that wisdom which consists in using knowledge to accomplish noble and good designs. In God, this wisdom shines with infinite splendour. It is stamped upon all his works; its vestiges are obvious in all his ways. Could we survey the heavens and the earth, with the great and wide seas; and also the variety of animals, plants, and minerals with which they are stored, surely, with the sweet finger of Israel, we should say, ‘O Lord, how manifold are thy works! In wisdom hast thou made them all.’

But the display of divine wisdom in the works of creation is greatly exceeded by the astonishing brightness with which it shines in the superlative works of grace and redemption. With what transports of joy may the saints admire these beauties of wisdom and omniscience in their God! Particularly so, when they come before him with desires too big for utterance; when all manner of evil is said of them falsely; and when all things are dark around them, so that were it not for their glimpse of these beauties they might be ready to say with Jacob, all these things are against us.

Among the beauties of the Lord we admire his eternity and immutability. We are but of yesterday, but God is from eternity. His name is Jehovah. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever the earth and the world were formed, even from everlasting to everlasting he is God. The God of Jeshurun is the eternal God, and his arms are everlasting arms. He inhabiteth eternity, and everything in him is eternal. We read of his eternal power, his everlasting love, and that his mercy endureth for ever. He is that king eternal, immortal, in whose sight a thousand years are as one day, and one day is as a thousand years.

The eternal God is always in one mind. He is not given to change. With him is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. He says himself, ‘I am the Lord, I change not.’ He is of one mind, and all his gifts and callings are without repentance. Among men some are naturally fickle and wavering; others change their purposes from unexpected occurrences; others have not power to accomplish their designs, or are hindered by their superiors; but no such circumstances can ever happen with the omniscient, omnipotent, and eternal God.

Let me then admire these beauties of my Maker, and in them see as in a mirror the vanity and emptiness of every terrestrial enjoyment. What is my life but a vapour? What my flourishing, but as a flower of the field? In transitory things let me never place my confidence; but trust for ever in the Lord Jehovah, in whom is everlasting strength. In beholding this glorious beauty of the blessed God, and in the lively hopes of him as my everlasting portion, how light and momentary are present afflictions, and how unworthy to be compared with the glory hereafter to be revealed!

Another admirable beauty in the Lord our God is the greatness of his power – he is omnipotent. Nature taught some of the Heathens, and is capable of teaching others, the eternal power and godhead of her Author. The holy Scriptures abundantly express the omnipotence of God; it is asserted therein more than sixty times. The abundant repetition thereof in the sacred writings may at once convince us both of its truth and importance; but often as we read of it in the Scriptures, we may still see the displays of it more frequently in the world and in the church.

By his great power he created all things out of nothing; he said, Let them be, and they were; he spake, and it was done. By the word of his power he upholdeth all things. How strong must that arm be by which the universe was created, and is still supported! But his power is evident, not only in his giving and maintaining the laws of Nature, but also, at his pleasure, in causing her to act contrary thereto. Hence, in the lofty style of the prophet Isaiah, we read that he dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep, and made the depths of the sea a way for the ransomed to pass over. At his command the obedient sun stood still upon Gibeon, and the moon in the valley of Ajalon, for a whole day; by the same power the same sun went back ten degrees upon Ahaz’ dial, to strengthen the faith of Hezekiah. By Jehovah’s power Nebuchadnezzar’s burning fiery furnace was not suffered so much as to singe a hair of the heads of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, when they were cast into it for the sake of their religion. His power stopped the voracious mouths of the lions from devouring Daniel, when, for conscience sake, he was cast into their den. It was the same power by which the whale brought Jonah safe on dry land, by which the ravens brought food to Elijah, and by which a dumb ass was made to speak, and forbid the madness of the prophet.

But, above all, this beauty of the Lord is displayed in the redemption and salvation of immortal souls. Here we see the eyes of the blind opened, the ears of the deaf unstopped, and the dead in trespasses and sins raised to newness of life. Satan too, that strong man armed, is bound, and his goods are spoiled; all his strongholds are utterly demolished, and every sin is effectually subdued. Beholding this beauty of Jehovah’s power, we rest assured of the performance of all his promises, as Abraham did. Mountains of difficulties may stand in the way of the promise, but omnipotence can easily remove them; in the view of which we may enter upon the most arduous duties, take up the most weighty cross, and bid defiance to our worst and greatest enemies.

There is another beauty in our God which cannot fail to strike our eyes every time we look unto him, and that is, his infinite goodness and mercy. There are beauties which some affect to admire, while in fact they know very little of their nature; hence with the beauties of goodness and mercy they obscure, if they do not destroy, those of justice and sovereignty. In the face of our God, as exhibited in the person and work of Jesus Christ, we see at once the glorious beauties of universal goodness and inflexible justice. That supreme goodness belongs to God, is plain both from reason and revelation; reason taught the ancient philosophers that God was maximus et optimus, the greatest and the best. Goodness in God is not, as in the best of men, derived, imperfect, and mutable, but it is original, supreme, and eternally the same; it adds lustre to all his other beauties, which, viewed apart from this, might fill us with dread. God accounts his goodness his glory; and therefore when he showed his glory to Moses, he made his goodness pass before him. His goodness appears in everything he does, in everything he gives, and, in the end, it will appear to his saints, in everything which to them he denies. How great is the beauty of his goodness, as it appears in the gift of Christ, the Scriptures, the Sabbaths, and all divine ordinances; but particularly in the regeneration, pardon, peace, justification, adoption, sanctification and salvation of some of the vilest of Adam’s sinful race!

Finally, God is glorious in holiness. Infinite purity is not only a perfection and beauty in God, but it is the harmony and beauty of all his other perfections and beauties. Were the Lord destitute of holiness, we might dread, but not love him; for, in that case, his mercy would be weakness, his power would be tyranny, his justice cruelty, and his wisdom craft. God swears by his holiness. The seraphim above continually do cry, ‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Hosts.’ Everything in God, and belonging to him, is holy. His holiness appears in all his works and ways, but, above all, in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Let us then behold these glories of the Lord till we be changed into the same image. If we be delighted with a faint glimpse of them now, how shall we be transported with the full vision of them by and by in the heaven of heavens! the enjoyment of which is the writer’s fervent wish for himself, and every reader of these lines.

(Written by someone who called himself S.B in The Evangelical Magazine, published in 1795)