THE GLORY OF GOD IN THE FACE OF JESUS CHRIST – Charles Spurgeon
THE GLORY OF GOD IN THE FACE OF JESUS CHRIST
“For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the Glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” 2 Corinthians 4:6.
The Apostle is explaining the reason for his preaching Christ with so much earnestness—he had received Divine light and he felt bound to spread it. One great motive power of a true ministry is trusteeship. The Lord has put us in trust with the Gospel; He has filled us with a treasure with which we are to enrich the world. The text explains in full what it is with which the Lord has entrusted us—He has bestowed upon us the light of the knowledge of the Glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ and it is ours to reflect the light, to impart the knowledge, to manifest the Glory, to point to the Savior’s face and to proclaim the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Having such a work before us, we faint not, but press onward with our whole heart.
I. The Subject of Knowledge in Which Paul Delighted
With no other preface than this we shall ask your attention this morning, first, to the subject of that knowledge in which Paul delighted so much. What was this knowledge which, to his mind, was the chief of all and the most worthy to be spread? It was the knowledge of God—truly a most necessary and proper knowledge for all God’s creatures! For a man not to know his Maker and Ruler is deplorable ignorance, indeed! The proper study of mankind is God. Paul not only knew that there is a God, for he had known that before his conversion—none could have more surely believed in the Godhead than did Paul as a Jew. Nor does he merely intend that he had learned somewhat of the character of God, for that, also, he had known from the Old Testament Scriptures before he was met with on the way to Damascus. Now he had come to know God in a closer, clearer and surer way, for he had seen Him, Incarnate, in the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Apostle had also received the knowledge of “the Glory of God.” Never had the God of Abraham appeared so glorious as now! God in Christ Jesus had won the adoring wonder of the Apostle’s instructed mind. He had known Jehovah’s Glory as the One and only God. He had seen that Glory in creation, declared by the heavens and displayed upon the earth. He had beheld that Glory in the Law which blazed from Sinai and shed its insufferable light upon the face of Moses. But now, beyond all else, he had come to perceive the Glory of God in the face, or Person, of Jesus Christ and this had won his soul! This special knowledge had been communicated to him at his conversion when Jesus spoke to him out of Heaven. In this knowledge he had made great advances by experience and by new Revelations—but he had not yet learned it to the fullest, for he was still seeking to know it perfectly by the teaching of the Divine Spirit and we find him saying, “That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death.” Paul knew not merely God, but God in Christ Jesus! Not merely “the Glory of God,” but “the Glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” The knowledge dealt with God, but it was Christward knowledge! He pined not for a Christless Theism, but for God in Christ! This, Beloved, is the one thing which you and I should aim to know. There are parts of the Divine Glory which will never be seen by us in this life, speculate as we may. Mysticism would desire to pry into the unknowable—you and I may leave dreamers and their dreams—and follow the clear light which shines from the face of Jesus. What of God it is necessary and beneficial for us to know, He has revealed in Christ! And whatever is not there, we may rest assured it is unfit and unnecessary for us to know. Truly the Revelation is by no means scant, for there is vastly more revealed in the Person of Christ than we shall be likely to learn in this mortal life—and even eternity will not be too long for the discovery of all the Glory of God which shines forth in the Person of the Word made flesh. Those who would supplement Christianity had better first add to the brilliance of the sun or the fullness of the sea! As for us, we are more than satisfied with the Revelation of God in the Person of our Lord Jesus and we are persuaded of the truth of His Words, “he that has seen Me has seen the Father.” Hope not, my Brothers and Sisters, that the preacher can grapple with such a subject! I am overcome by it! In my meditations I have felt lost in its lengths and breadths. My joy is great in my theme and yet I am conscious of a pressure upon brain and heart, for I am as a little child wandering among the mountains, or as a lone spirit which has lost its way among the stars. I stumble among sublimities. I sink with amazement. I can only point with my finger to that which I see, but cannot describe it. May the Holy Spirit, Himself, take of the things of Christ and show them to you!
II. The Glory of God in the Life of Jesus Christ
We will, for a minute or two, consider this glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ historically. In every incident of the life of Jesus of Nazareth, the Lord’s Anointed, there is much of God to be seen. What volumes upon volumes might be written to show God as revealed in every act of Christ from His birth to His death! I see Him as a Baby at Bethlehem lying in a manger and there I perceive a choice Glory in the mind of God, for He evidently despises the pomp and glory of the world which little minds esteem so highly. He might have been born in marble halls and wrapped in imperial purple, but He scorns these things and, in the manger among the oxen, we see a Glory which is independent of the trifles of luxury and parade. The Glory of God in the Person of Jesus asks no aid from the splendor of courts and palaces. Yet even as a Baby, He reigns and rules! Mark how the shepherds hasten to salute the new-born King, while the magi from the far-off East bring gold, frankincense and myrrh and bow at His feet. When the Lord condescends to show Himself in little things, He is still right royal and commands the homage of mankind. He is as majestic in the minute as in the magnificent; as royal in the Baby at Bethlehem as in later days in the Man who rode through Jerusalem with hosannas! See the holy Child Jesus in the Temple when He is but 12 years old, sitting in the midst of the doctors, astonishing them with His questions! What wisdom there was in that Child! Do you not see there an exhibition of the Truth of God that “the foolishness of God is wiser than men”? Even when God reserves His wisdom and gives forth utterances fit for a child, He baffles the wisdom of age and thought. Watch that youth in the carpenter’s shop. See Him planing and sawing, cutting and squaring, working according to His parent’s commands, till he is 30 years of age. What do we learn here when we see the Incarnate God tarrying at the workman’s bench? See we not how God can wait? Is not this a masterly display of the leisure of the Eternal? The Infinite is never driven out of His restful pace of conscious strength. Had it been you and I, we would have hastened to begin our lifework long before! We could not have refrained from preaching and teaching for so long a period! But God can wait and, in Christ, we see how prudence tempered zeal and made Him share in that eternal leisure which arises out of confidence that His end is sure. The Godhead was concealed at Bethlehem and Nazareth from the eyes of carnal men, but it is revealed to those who have spiritual sight with which to behold the Lord. Even in those early days of our Lord, while He was yet preparing for His great mission, we behold the Glory of God in His youthful face and we adore.
As for His public ministry, how clearly the Godhead is there! Behold Him, Brothers and Sisters, while He feeds 5,000 with a few loaves and fishes and you cannot fail to perceive therein the Glory of God in the commissariat of the universe, for the Lord God opens His hands and supplies the need of every living thing! See Him cast out devils and you learn of the Divine power over evil! Hear Him raise the dead and you must reverence the Divine prerogative to kill and to make alive! See Him cure the sick and you think you hear Jehovah say, “I wound, I heal.”
Hear how He speaks and Infallibly reveals the Truth of God and you will perceive the God of knowledge to whom the wise-hearted owe their instruction! Set over against each other are these two sentences—“Behold, God exalts by His power; who teaches like He?” and “Never man spoke like this Man.” It is always the Lord’s way to make His Truth known to those of humble and truthful hearts and so did Jesus teach the sincere and lowly among men. Observe how Jesus dwelt among men, wearing the common smock-frock of the peasant, entering their cottages and sharing their poverty! Mark how He even washed His disciples’ feet! Herein we see the condescension of God who must stoop to view the skies and bow to see what angels do—and yet He does not disdain to visit the sons of men! In wondrous Grace He thinks of us and has pity upon our low estate. See, too, the Christ of God, my Brothers and Sisters, bearing every day with the taunts of the ungodly—enduring “such contradiction of sinners against Himself”—and you have a fair picture of the infinite patience and the marvelous longsuffering of God! And this is no small part of His Glory. Note well how Jesus loved His own which were in the world, yes, loved them to the end! And with what tenderness and gentleness He bore with them, as a nurse with her child, for here you see the tenderness and gentleness of God and the love of the great Father towards His erring children. You read of Jesus receiving sinners and eating with them and what is this but the Lord God, merciful and gracious, passing by transgression, iniquity and sin? You see Jesus living as a physician among those diseased by sin, with the one aim of healing their sicknesses—and here you see the pardoning mercy of our God, His delight in salvation and the joy which He has in mercy.
III. The Nature of this Knowledge
I cannot go through the whole life of Jesus Christ—it is impossible, for time would fail us—but if you will, yourselves, select any single incident in which Jesus appears, whether in the chamber of sickness or at the grave, whether in weakness or in power, you shall, in each case, behold the Glory of God! Throughout His ministry, which was mainly a period of humiliation, there gleams forth in the character, acts and person of Jesus, the Glory of the everlasting Father. His acts compel us not only to admire but to adore! He is not merely a Man whom God favors, He is God Himself!
What shall I say of His death? Oh never did the love of God reveal itself so clearly as when He laid down His life for His sheep, nor did the justice of God ever flame forth so conspicuously as when He would suffer in Himself the curse for sin rather than sin should go unpunished and the Law should be dishonored! Every attribute of God was focused at the Cross and he that has eyes to look through his tears and see the wounds of Jesus shall behold more of God there than a whole eternity of Providence or an infinity of creation shall ever be able to reveal to Him. Well might the trembling centurion, as he watched the Cross, exclaim, “Truly, this was the Son of God.” Do I need to remind you, too, of the Glory of God in the Person of Christ Jesus in His Resurrection, when He spoiled principalities and powers, led Death captive and rifled the tomb? That is, indeed, a godlike speech, “I am He that lives and was dead, and behold I am alive forevermore and have the keys of Hell and of death.” His power, His immortality, His eternal majesty all shone forth as He left the shades of death!
I will not linger over His Ascension when He returned to His own again. Then His Godhead was conspicuous, for He again put on the Glory which He had with the Father before the world was. There, amid the acclamations of angels and redeemed spirits, the Glory of the conquering Lord was seen. By His descent He had destroyed the powers of darkness and then He ascended that He might fill all things as only God can do. I would only hint at His session at the right hand of God, for there you know how—
“Adoring saints around Him stand,
And thrones and powers before Him fall.
The God shines gracious through the Man,
And sheds sweet glories on them all.”
In Heaven they never conceive of Jesus apart from the Divine Glory which perpetually surrounds Him. No one in Heaven doubts His Deity, for all fall prostrate before Him, or now and then all seize their harps and wake their strings to the praise of God and the Lamb!
IV. The Responsibilities of This Knowledge
The Glory of God will most abundantly be seen in the second advent of our Lord. Whatever of splendor we may expect at the advent, whatever of Glory shall surround that reign of a thousand years, or the end when He shall deliver up the kingdom to God, even the Father—in every transaction which prophecy leads us to expect—God in Christ Jesus will be conspicuous and angelic eyes shall look on with adoring admiration as they see the eternal Father glorious in the Person of His Son! These are great themes—we do but mention them and leave them to your quiet thought. It is enough to point to a table if men have appetites for food. But now I will ask you to think of the Glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, in the same line of thought, only putting it in another fashion. Treat it by way of observation.
When you look upon the material universe you can see, if your eyes are opened, somewhat of the Glory of God. The reverent mind perceives enough to constrain the heart to worship and yet, after awhile, it pines for more. I have often heard the earth spoken of as the mirror of God’s image. But when I was traveling among the Alps and saw many of the grandest phenomena of creation such as glaciers, avalanches and tempests, I was so impressed with the narrowness of visible things in comparison with God that I wrote such lines as these—
“The mirror of the creatures lacks space
To bear the image of the Infinite.
’Tis true the Lord has fairly writ
His name,
And set His seal upon creation’s brow,
But as the skillful potter much excels
The vessel which he fashions on the wheel,
E’en so, but in proportion greater far,
Jehovah’s self transcends His noblest works.
Earth’s ponderous wheels would break, her axles snap,
If freighted with the load of Deity.
Space is too narrow for the Eternal’s rest,
And time too short a footstool for His Throne.”
If your mind has ever entered into communion with God, you will become conscious of the dwarfing of all visible things in His Presence. Even when your thought sweeps round the stars and circumnavigates space, you feel that Heaven, even the Heaven of heavens, cannot contain Him. Everything conceivable falls short of the inconceivable Glory of God!
When you come, however, to gaze upon the face of Christ Jesus, how different is the feeling! Now you have a mirror equal to the reflection of the eternal Face, for, “In Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” His name is “Wonderful, Counselor, The Mighty God.” He is the Image of God, “the brightness of His Glory and the express Image of His Person.” If your conception of Christ is truthful, it will coincide with the true idea of God and you will exclaim, “This is the true God and eternal life.” Like Thomas, you will salute the wounded Savior with the cry, “My Lord and my God.” Truly, “God was manifest in the flesh”—not a part of Him, but God in perfection. In the visible creation we see God’s works, but in Christ Jesus we have God Himself, Emmanuel, “God with us.” The Glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ is most sweetly conspicuous because you are conscious that not only are God’s attributes there, but God Himself is there!
V. The Means of This Knowledge
In the Person of Jesus we see the Glory of God in the veiling of His splendor. The Lord is not eager to display Himself—“Verily You are a God that hides Yourself,” said the Prophet of old. The world seems to be created rather to hide God than to manifest Him, at least it is certain that even in the grandest displays of His power we may say with Job, “There was the hiding of His power.” Though His light is brightness itself, yet it is only the robe which conceals Him. “Who covers Yourself with light as with a garment.”
If thus God’s Glory is seen in the field of creation as a light veiled and shaded to suit the human eye, we certainly see the same in the face of Jesus Christ. Where everything is mild and gentle—full of Grace as well as Truth. How softly breaks the Divine Glory through the human life of Jesus—a babe in Grace may gaze upon this brightness without fear! When Moses’ face shone, the people could not look at him, but when Jesus came from His transfiguration the people ran to Him and saluted Him! Everything is attractive in God in Christ Jesus! In Him we see God to the fullest, but the Deity so mildly beams through the medium of human flesh that mortal man may draw near and look and live. This Glory in the face of Jesus Christ is assuredly the Glory of God, even though veiled, for thus in every other instance does God, in measure, shine forth.
VI. The Responsibilities of This Knowledge
We, at one time, did not perceive the Glory of God in Christ because we were blind, by nature, and were darkened by the Evil One. As only the pure in heart can see God, we, being impure in heart, could not see God in Christ. What, then, has happened to us? To eternal Grace be endless praise! God Himself has shined into our hearts—that same God who said, “Light be,” and light was, has shined into our hearts! You know creation’s story, how all things lay in black darkness? God might have gone on to make a world in darkness if He had pleased, but if He had done so, it would have been to us as though it had never been, for we could not have perceived it. Therefore He early said, “Let there be light.” Now, God’s Glory in the face of Jesus Christ might have been all there and we should never have discerned it—and as far as we are concerned it would have been as though it had never been if the Lord had not entered into us and the thick darkness and said, “Let there be light.” Then burst in the everlasting morning, the light shined in the darkness and the darkness fled before it.