Opening:
Behold Oh Earth! His Majesty, the King of all kings and the only Potentate: The LORD, the LORD God, Merciful and Gracious, Longsuffering and Abundant in Goodness and Truth (Ex 34: 6); He is crowned with Glory and Honour; He is clothed with Honour and Majesty, dwelling in the Light which no man can approach unto. He walketh upon the wings of the wind and maketh the clouds his chariot. The heavens declare His glory and His righteousness and the firmament showeth His wondrous works. His Name is Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father and the Prince of Peace. He is awesome and sublime. How Great Is Our God!
Beauty is widely understood to be the attractive facial and bodily features of a person; this concurs with the saying ‘beauty is in the eyes of the beholder’. God however, values the inner beauty of character above their physical beauty. Indeed He defines holiness as beautiful.
So let’s behold the LORD in all of His awe, splendour and the beauty of His holiness. His holy love, grace, mercy, justice and majesty all define His beauty. He is righteous in all His ways and holy in all his works: He is the perfection of beauty. Oh Come! Let us bow down and worship the LORD in the beauty of His Holiness.
The patriarchs and prophets of old had an intimate relationship with the LORD but they did not see His face; Indeed Moses asked God to show him His glory but the LORD put him in a clift of the rock and covered him with His hand as His glory passed by, revealing only His back parts (Ex 33:20-23).
The LORD was Israel’s God and they were his people. He kept them forty long years in the wilderness and was a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. He revealed Himself to them in various ways and made known His acts to them, yet they did not see His face. Notwithstanding, the LORD’s beauty shone forth in His loving kindness, His tender mercies and His everlasting love and compassion toward them.
Behold! The LORD Omnipotent: His voice is powerful and full of majesty; He is the Almighty God who after the counsel of own sovereign will spoke His creation into existence and now upholds it all by the Word of His power. He is also a man of war that shows himself strong on behalf of all whose heart is perfect toward Him. Yet he tenderly gathers the lambs with his arm, carries them in His bosom and gently leads those that are with young. The LORD of Hosts is his name.
Behold! The LORD Omniscient: He is the only wise God; He knows all our ways and the intents of our hearts; he understands our thoughts afar off: He declares the end from the beginning: Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it (Ps 139:6).
Behold! The LORD is Omnipresent: The heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain Him. Heaven is His throne and earth is his footstool. His eyes run to and fro throughout the whole earth.
Behold! The LORD is Merciful: He is full of compassion, slow to anger and of great mercy (Ps 145:8). He forgiveth all our iniquities and healeth all our diseases. If the LORD should mark iniquities, who shall stand? Indeed He is the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort. (2 Cor 1:3). It is of the LORD’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not; yes, they are new every morning.
Behold! The LORD is Faithful: The patriarchs trusted Him, believed in Him, instinctively obeyed His voice and followed Him where-ever He lead them. He made known his ways unto Moses, and spoke with him face to face, as a friend. Indeed He called Abraham His ‘friend’. His providential care was past finding out; He was their shield, their buckler and their exceeding great reward (Gen 15:1); He never failed to keep His promises to them. As He was with the faithful men of old, so will he be with you as promised: “I will never leave you nor forsake you…I will never leave you comfortless”. Great is the LORD’s Faithfulness to us who believe in Him; they are steadfast and sure.
Behold! God is Love: He created Adam and Eve in his own image because He wanted a relationship with them: Yes, God created humankind for His own pleasure; He foreordained His joy to be in them and for their joy to be full.
When Adam and Eve sinned against the LORD, His wrath came upon them and all humankind, severing their relationship with Him. The wages of sin is indeed death but by means of a substitutionary sacrifice, God spared their physical life but they and all humankind were alienated from His presence, became captive to sin and made subject to death.
Israel was God’s covenant people and the apple of His eye, yet they forsook Him and served other gods: But He loved them with an everlasting love and with His loving kindness He drew them. Humankind in general grieved the LORD in his heart but He so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, Jesus, to be a ransom for whosoever believeth in Him, to redeem them from the bondage of sin and to reconcile them back to Himself.
So when the fullness of time was come, God tabernacled Himself in human flesh and came to Earth to die in our stead. Jesus was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death, in our stead. He had no form or comeliness and his visage was marred: there was no beauty that we should desire him; Indeed He was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. Yet God crowned Him with glory and honour. He was indeed the brightness of God’s glory and the express image of His person.
Jesus was meek and lowly and obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him and with His stripes we are healed. Yes it did indeed please the LORD to bruise Jesus, His only begotten Son. Such love, such wondrous love, that God should love a sinner such as I.
Having purged our sins by Himself, He is now seated on the right hand of the throne of the majesty in the heavens. What a High Priest!
Now we the sons of God know that, when Christ shall appear we shall see Him as He is. Until then we will await his appearing.
Yes the sky shall unfold, preparing His entrance; the stars shall applaud Him with thunders of praise. The sweet light in His eyes shall enhance those awaiting and we shall behold Him, face to face. Face to face in all His glory, We shall behold Him.
