BEHOLD,
THE BEAUTY OF THE LORD
The Lord is my light and my
salvation; whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my
life of whom shall I be afraid? When evildoers assail me, uttering slanders
against me, my adversaries and foes, they shall stumble and fall. Though a host
encamp against me, my heart shall not fear; though war arise against me, yet I
will be confident.
One thing have I asked of the Lord,
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 inquire in his
temple.
Psalm
27:1-4
That I may dwell in the
house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of
the Lord… I used to think that David’s desire to behold the
beauty of the Lord every day of his life was a kind of indulgence and luxury, like
wanting to go to the symphony three times a week when there's a war going on
all around.
But the longer I live, the
more I see of my own heart, the more I see of the world around me, the more I
begin to understand that David’s desire to behold the beauty of the Lord and the
effort David went to, to be able to do this. These were not a luxury. These are
what kept David sane.
In a world where there
are enemies, whether it's danger, whether it’s all kinds of evil, ugliness,
despair everywhere, and where David finds sin in his own heart.
For him to be able to
daily turn aside from all this and somehow penetrate through the realm of
spirit and behold, to the beauty of the Lord, to see something good, something
clean, something holy, something right…
This is what kept David on the track.
This is what kept him from going mad.
One thing have I desired of
the LORD, 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.
Now as long as David disciplined
himself to behold that beauty, to seek it, there was no way anybody could
corrupt him.
Recall the time King Saul
and his whole army we're pursuing David as if David were some kind of wild
animal to be caught and killed. And then one day Saul stumbles into the very cave
where David and his men are hiding. It’s dark in the cave, and he can't see
what's going on, but they can. And David’s men whisper to him, “the Lord is
giving him into your hand. Kill him. Now is your chance”. And
David responds, “no way. I'm not going to touch him, that's up to the
Lord.” He has a sense because he's beholding God’s beauty and living in
God's presence of what God would have him do and what God would not have him
do. He just knows.
It was when David began
to drift away from this desire, to behold God’s beauty all the time that he
began to stumble and lose his way for a while. If David had been beholding the
beauty of the Lord that afternoon when he looked down from the rooftop and saw
the magnificent Bathsheba bathing, he would have immediately turned away his
eyes and he would have lifted his mind once again to be renewed in a vision of the
transcendent splendor of the God of Israel. And he would have saved himself,
and Bathsheba, and Uriah, and the whole nation of Israel untold misery.
One thing have I desired of
the LORD, 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.
Now we're not talking
about escaping the world, withdrawing from the world. We're talking about
beholding the beauty of the Lord in the midst of everyday life. Now, apart from
God our everyday life is really not very nice, even when it appears to be quite
nice from the surface, beneath the veneer, it’s not very nice.
Our own hearts, for
instance, are not exactly innocent. If anyone ever played a tape of the thoughts
that rattle through our heads in a single day. If anyone could put out a video
of the images that go dancing across our minds in a single day, who of us
wouldn't be embarrassed?
And the world around us keeps
bombarding us with voices that urge us to hate our neighbor, to envy our
neighbor, to mistrust our neighbor, to covet what our neighbor has, to deceive them.
The world around us also
bombards us with all kinds of images, that imply, that tell us often and very
directly, that paradise is really the fulfillment of every lust.
And Paul urges us,
Be
not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind.
Romans
12:2
Otherwise, you're going
to sink down into this crud. And how in the world can we be renewed in our
minds, unless we're able to get our eyes off this crud and behold the beauty of
the Lord.
Especially when we go out
into the world as we are called and sent to do, to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus
with power, to give people healing and hope. When we really stop talking about
it, and actually go out there, whether it's on our jobs, or in our
neighborhoods, or in our homes, wherever it is…. and begin to proclaim the Gospel
in the real world… we soon find ourselves surrounded by absolutely overwhelming,
horrendous problems. Problems that will engulf us unless we can see beyond the
problems to the beauty of the Lord.
A TV movie, the Day After,
portrays a hopeless parade of sick, dying, miserable victims of radiation not knowing
where to go. And these people were portrayed as something that will happen perhaps
in the future. This misery that was shown to us, that attempted to manifest to
us as something that's going to happen in this world when the bombs begin to
fall…. this misery is already here.
It's here and it's not only
among the starving masses of Somalia, or in refugee camps, or in battle zones,
or the skid rows of every big city in the world. But it's everywhere we look. Everywhere
we look we see sad, lonely, angry, troubled, bitter, frightened people. And the
misery gets into us too.
Now, if we're going to
bring any kind of meaningful hope to such a world, and if we're going to sustain
that hope in ourselves, while we do it, we're going to have to learn how to get
our eyes on something truly good… all the time, to train our minds to behold
the beauty of the Lord, to see the transcendent splendor of God in the Son.
If we don't, we're just
going to sink right down into all the despair. The despair is not always the
hopelessness that you see in apocalyptic movies. The despair is also “get
all the gusto you can, you only go around once”…
That's not hope. It’s despair, it's sick.
If all there is, is an
afternoon in the sun with a bottle of booze or our dope.. we’re in bad shape.
The law of
the LORD is perfect, converting the soul:
The testimony of
the LORD is sure, making wise the simple.
The statutes of the LORD are right,
rejoicing the heart:
The commandment of
the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes.
The fear of
the LORD is clean, enduring for ever:
The judgments of
the LORD are true and righteous altogether.
Psalm
19:7-9
So against the background
of all the lies that the Father of Lies… spews out into this world…. to
convince the world of those lies….God approaches us
with something that is perfect, sure, right, pure, clean, true, righteous.
But that's not going to
do us any good… unless we get our eyes on it. If we're looking at all the junk
and we never see this, what good does it do us?
But we all with unveiled face, beholding
the glory of the Lord
are changed into his likeness from one
degree of glory to another by the Spirit of the Lord.
2
Corinthians 3:18
Paul is telling us that
it is absolutely possible to behold that glory with unveiled face. And Jesus promises
that he will manifest himself, reveal himself, to those who follow him.
“I will not leave you desolate; I will
come to you.
Yet a little while, and the world will see
me no more, but you will see me;
because I live, you will live also.
In that day you will know that I am in my
Father, and you in me, and I in you.
He who has my commandments and keeps them,
he it is who loves me;
and he who loves me will be loved by my
Father,
and I will love him and manifest myself to
him (reveal myself, show myself to him).
John
14:18-21
These words are to everyone who ever has
or will follow Jesus.
What we need to see if
we're going to live in this world with a clear mind and not become distracted by
the corruption, or the false hopes, or the despair that surround us and that
also fill our flesh, we have to see that it is possible, absolutely possible,
to behold the glory of the Lord with unveiled face. It’s possible to see the
splendor of the Living God shining from the face of his Son, that it’s possible,
in some way, for every one of us to behold this. And once we get it clear that
such a vision is possible for every one of us, not just for Saint Francis of
Assisi, or Saint Augustine, or for Luke, or John, or Matthew, but for every one
of us.
Once we get that clear
that we can have such a vision of God…there are four things we need to do.
Desire the Beauty
of the Lord
The first thing we need
to do is to desire the beauty of the Lord.
One thing have I desired of
the LORD, 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.
Blessed
are the pure in heart for they shall see God
Matthew
5:8
The pure in heart are the
ones who desire to see that beauty.
Think of the sacrifices
we have made for lesser desires, the efforts we've gone to, the time we spent
on much, much lesser goals than that.
What is it that I desire?
What is it that drives my life?
What is the longing that leads me on?
Lord God, help me to
unload and get rid of every desire that distracts from this one desire… so that
you become, Lord God, the one desire of my heart.
Seek the Beauty of
the Lord
The next thing we need to
do is to seek the beauty of the Lord.
One
thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after.
Now we turn our desire
into a pursuit.
We don't just sit around
and wish the vision would come.
We pursue the vision.
We seek it.
Every man or woman who
has ever come to the place where they are able to behold the glory of the Lord
with unveiled face, got there by seeking.
Somebody might say, “well,
wait a minute the vision is a gift of grace”. True, a vision of God is always
a gift of grace. But the only people who ever receive that gift of grace are
those who seek it. “Well, what about the Apostle Paul, he wasn't seeking it
and bang there it came”? But don't
kid yourself, Paul was following the light he had. This man was going by what
he thought was right. He was wrong, but this man at least followed the light he
had. He didn't sit on top of truth and rot with it. And the vision came to him.
Do you want to see the Lord, the glory of the Lord with
unveiled face?
Seek it!
Do you want to hear God speak?
Seek Him!
Do you want to meet Jesus alive from the dead?
Seek Him!
And seek him in specific
ways.
We make time to seek him. We all need to make
time for him in prayer daily.
Seek him in the gathered fellowship. We
underestimate the awesome things that go on when the saints come together.
Seek him by following the light that has
already come.
If I'm really serious
about having a vision of the glory of God and beholding the beauty of the Lord,
then I'm going to take the trouble to block out some time every single day
where I'm going to close off everything and look for him.
If I'm really
serious about having a vision of God, I am going to gather with the saints at
least one day out of seven, unless I'm dying or at the North Pole. I’m not trying
to lay down a rule here, but I believe this is important for me. I believe I need
that! Not… my Athlete’s Foot acting up today, I
think I'll stay home or I'm not in the mood, or I don't feel very receptive, or
I don't think I want to be around those hypocrites. If I'm serious about
pursuing the face of God, I'm going to be among the Saints.
If I'm also going to do the
things the Lord shows me, in whatever way he chooses to. I'm going to follow
the light I have. If I get light on the
fact that Father is calling me to get reconciled with that brother or sister.
I'm going to do that. And if the word in some way shows me that it's time for
me to open up my hand and share my goods with that person, I must do that.
And if it's clear that I
have to go and find that forgotten sheep and bring it back to the fold. I have
to do that.
Once
we seriously pursue that vision, the vision comes, it always comes.
It
never, never, never fails.
And when the vision comes
and we begin to behold the beauty of the Lord, we are ready for the third step,
which is to open our hearts to it.
Open our Hearts to
the Beauty of the Lord
That
I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life,
To
behold the beauty of the LORD.
The House of the Lord is
not a place. It's a state of the heart.
So that instead of a
flash of vision and then nothing, a clear insight for five minutes, and then
nothing.
It's
that I dwell there, I live there.
He
that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High
shall
abide under the shadow of the Almighty
Psalm
91:1
Dwells there…stays
there…lives there day in and day out.
That means the opening of the heart.
It means that I take off the veil, and behold his
glory with unveiled face.
It means that I humble myself and become a child when
the glory of the Lord descends upon us as we sing together and it's there and
we know it's there.
What do we do with it? Do we open our hearts to it or let it fly on by,
have a couple of goose pimples and go on our way rejoicing, or do we open our
heart, let it come in?
We come together around
the Lord's table. We eat his flesh and drink his blood…. in with and under that
bread.. is the Spirit of the Lord. Breathing through that wine is the Spirit of
the Lord. And as we eat and drink this food the issue is, do we open our hearts,
that last inmost door of our hearts, and truly let Jesus get in there?
Conform Our Lives
to the Beauty of the Lord
Finally we need to
conform our lives to the beauty of the Lord.
Conform our lives, not to
the illusions of the world around us, and not to the vanities and fantasies of
our own hearts, but to the beauty of the Lord that we soak up every day.
Now I begin to bend my
life into that. I pour myself into that. I yield to it.
What I look at is what I
become.
When I behold that glory with
unveiled face, I begin to rise up into it, and become like it.
To conform our lives to the
glory of the Lord, means that we look at it, keep looking at it, and keep
peeling away everything in our lives, every thought, every desire, every
ambition, every fear that interferes with it, that keeps us from yielding and
bending to it… until our eye is single and our heart is pure.
Don’t ever let anyone tell
you or imply that it's impossible to behold the glory of God in this life of
flesh and blood. It is possible.
Men and women before have
done it. And there are many people on
the Earth right now who are beholding the glory of the Lord with unveiled face,
and are being transformed by it.
And this can happen for
us too, if it's not already happening, and if it is already happening, we know
there's more ahead, more to be done… if
we will ….
Desire the beauty of the Lord.
Seek the beauty of the Lord.
Open our hearts to the beauty of the Lord
Conform our lives to the beauty of the Lord
Then the Lord himself
will anoint our heads with the oil of his Spirit. And he will cause our cups to
so overflow with his life, with such an abundance, that instead of sinking down
into this world of despair, we will take authority over that despair, bringing
to this despairing world, the one hope and the one beauty that it will ever
know or see…. from which every other beauty and hope comes… the beauty of God
shining from the face of his son Jesus.
One thing one (one thing) have I desired
of the Lord, that will I seek after.
That I may well 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.
Sermon 1983 Richard
Bieber
Transcribed and edited
2022 by Maranatha Mirror