For how great is His goodness, and how great is His beauty!
God’s goodness and beauty
There is no subject of contemplation more delightful to a serious mind than the goodness of the Lord. The prophet had been, in the preceding verses, describing the appearance of Christ as King of Zion, as just, and having salvation. He had been speaking of the blood of the covenant, by which the prisoners of Divine justice are delivered, and invited to turn to the stronghold. He had described the salvation which God should work out for His people by the Messiah, when they should be as the precious stones of a crown, lifted up on high, and God would save and favour them as His jewels and peculiar treasure. The prophet’s heart was so affected with the prospect of this mercy that he breaks out into the joyful acclamation, “How great is His goodness!” Learn that the Divine goodness in our redemption and salvation claims our admira tion and our praise. Here too we see the “beauty” of the Lord. How amicably His perfections shine in the dispensation of the Gospel; so that all who attend to it with serious minds will see and adore them. Here we observe mercy and truth meeting together, righteousness and peace greeting each other. Here, at the Holy Sacrament, we see the King of Zion, the image of the invisible God, in all His beauty, and He appears fairer than the children of men, and altogether amiable and lovely. Here also we see the goodness of the Lord; with what peculiar lustre this perfection of the Divine nature shines in our redemption by Jesus Christ. That goodness appears great if we consider how universally it extends: even to all mankind. Jesus is a propitiation for the sins of the whole world. If we consider the objects of it; mean and miserable mortals, whose goodness cannot extend to Him. This goodness is to terminate in perfect and everlasting glory and felicity. The fountain of all our comforts and hopes is Divine goodness. The streams are plenteous, and various. They enrich, delight, and satisfy the soul, and they flow forever. (Job Orton.)
The glory of Christ
This is manifested throughout all the Holy Scriptures. This is attested both by the Apostles and by our Lord Himself (Act_10:43; Luk_24:27; Joh_5:39). In the New Testament He shines like the sun in an unclouded atmosphere. In the Old, though generally veiled, He often bursts forth as from behind a cloud with astonishing beauty and splendour. Nor could the prophet himself forbear exclaiming with wonder and admiration, “How great is His goodness!” etc.
I. The goodness of our Lord. In the context He is set forth as the God of providence and of grace. And in order to behold His goodness we must view Him in both respects.
1. As the God of providence. As all things were created, so are they upheld and governed by Him. To Him we owe the preservation of our corporeal and intellectual powers. We are continually fed by His bounty, and protected by His arm. The meanest creature in the universe has abundant reason to adore Him--His own people in particular may discern unnumbered instances of His goodness in His dispensations towards them. His most afflictive as well as His more pleasing dispensations afford them much occasion for gratitude and thanksgiving (Psa_119:75).
2. As a God of grace. Jesus is the one fountain of spiritual blessings to His Church (Eph_1:22). Neither prophets nor apostles had any grace but from Him (Joh_1:16). To Him must we ascribe every good disposition that is in our hearts (Php_2:13; Heb_12:2). What reason, then, have His faithful followers to bless His name! With what gratitude should they acknowledge His continued kindness! Though they have often turned back from Him, He has not cast them off. Yea, rather, He has “healed their backslidings and loved them freely.” Surely every blessing they receive and every victory they gain should fill them with admiring thoughts of His goodness (2Co_2:14). If we have just conceptions of His goodness we shall be more able to behold--
II. His beauty. The world beholds “no beauty nor comeliness in” the face of Jesus. But the saints of old “saw His glory as the glory of the only-begotten of the Father.” This we also may see if we survey Him--
1. In this Divine character. “We cannot by searching find out the Almighty to perfection.” Little do we know of the greatness of His majesty, or the thunder of His power (Job_26:14). We cannot comprehend His unsearchable wisdom, His unspotted holiness, His inviolable truth and faithfulness. His glory is more than the feeble language of mortality can express.
2. In His human character Here we look at Him, as the Jews at Moses when his face was veiled. And can contemplate Him more easily because He shines with a less radiant lustre. But principally must we view Him during the course of His ministry. What marvellous compassion did He manifest to the souls and bodies of men! Not one applied to Him for bodily or spiritual health without obtaining his request. And when many were hardened in their sins He wept over them (Luk_19:41). His zeal for God was ardent and unremitted. His meekness, patience, fortitude were altogether invincible. Whatever was amiable and excellent in man abounded in Him (Psa_45:2). Nor, though continually tried in the hottest furnace, was there found in Him the smallest imperfection or alloy (Joh_14:30).
3. In His mediatorial character. With what readiness did He become a surety for sinful man (Psa_40:7-8). What astonishing condescension did He manifest in uniting Himself to our nature! How cheerfully did He go forth to meet the sufferings that were appointed for Him. His obedience unto death was the fruit of His love and the price of our redemption. How beautiful is He now in the eyes of those who behold His glory! And how will He “be admired and glorified by all” in the last day! Satan must have blinded us, indeed, if we be yet insensible to His charms (2Co_4:4). If we be true believers, He cannot but be precious to our souls (1Pe_2:7). (J. Benson.)
How great is His beauty--
The secret of beauty
Thelast words of Charles Kingsley were, “How beautiful is God!” Zechariah was thinking of the glory about to be given to Israel, about the prosperity soon to abound in the land, and he knows that it is all the good gift of God, so he cries, “How great is His goodness! How great is His beauty! Corn shall make the young men cheerful, and new wine the maids.” Wise men who have thought about the nature of God have always said that there must be three perfect things in God. There must be perfect truth, perfect goodness, and perfect beauty. By remembering this you may always tell the difference between true and false ideas about God. Every man and every child who worships a God about whom he has hard, cruel thoughts, although a Christian in name, gives only heathen worship to the Most High. All through the Bible God has been teaching men that He is beautiful. The Jews were taught to make their worship beautiful. At last Christ came. He did not seem to bring beauty down to man at once. The word “beauty” is never mentioned in the New Testament. But this was because Christ wanted men to look deeper for beauty than on the face and form. The beauty which Christ brought was beauty of the soul, of the heart, of the life, spiritual beauty which will never fade away with age, will never wither or decay. Here in our flowers today can we not try to see the beauty of God? They teach that His beauty is perfect in little things as well as in great. The tiniest flower is as perfect as the large. And the beauty is not for mere show, but for comfort and use. How often a flower teaches people about God! I have read of a poor sinful woman pressing a white flower to her heart in an agony of tears, because it came to her like the voice of God, telling of His wish for her to be pure and bright. We would like to reveal God to those around us. If so, let us be God’s flowers. Aim at three things in order that we may accomplish this our high task.
1. Let us have the beauty of worship.
2. Beauty of worship must lead to beauty of life.
3. All this will grow into beauty of character.
This is the beauty that lasts forever. To get this will take time. All the best things take time. (H. H. Gowen.)
Beauty
Oneby one the various traits of Divine excellence came before the mind of the prophet, and at last he, as it were, generalised them; and the whole vision struck him as one of extreme beauty. The wisdom of God, His justice, His purity, His truth, His love,--all of these, in quality, in quantity, and in harmony, form a symmetric whole, which deserves, if anything deserves it, the epithet “beautiful,” and meets the highest conception, and overreaches the highest aspiration which the human heart has for the element of beauty. Is beauty, then, a reality in the higher spiritual life? Is there in the inward, invisible, and truly spiritual life that which answers to our idea of sensuous beauty? Or is it figurative? I hold that beauty is first spiritual, and afterwards natural and material. I hold that it was Divine; that it inhered in the nature of God, and the nature of spiritual existence. Examine the relation of beauty to moral qualities. As God has created the world, beauty is not a kind of seasoning scattered upon the weightier realities. Men think that the beauty of this natural world is a kind of decoration. Perfectness and beauty are identical. Maturity, whether it be of fruit, or flower, or what not, works by stages towards beauty in the material globe. So that beauty is not an accident. Still less is it the trimming which God gave to the perfected work. It is the Divine idea of a mode of creation. As the human mind is cultivated, it becomes more and more sensitive to this quality. The less culture men have, the further they are from the admiration of beauty; that is to say, the less comprehensive is their admiration. When the human mind develops and grows toward its perfection, it grows toward the sense of beauty. But moral qualities come under this law, just as much as physical qualities do. Fulness, fineness, and harmony--there is the formula. In nature it is called quantity, symmetry: and the equivalent of this in moral elements is fulness, fineness, harmony. Whatever elements the mind produces when it acts so as to give fulness, fineness, and harmonious proportions to the product, are beautiful. That is to say, they produce the sense of beauty in those that look upon them, and tend universally to do it. Right things are commanded in the Bible, but it is not enough that we should be just, conscientious, true, amiable, or benevolent. There is to be fulness in each of these elements, and there is to be harmony among all of them. And here is the formula fulfilled which goes to make social and moral affections beautiful. It would seem enough to say to men, “Be kind, be generous, be benevolent”; but no, Let love be without dissimulation. God loves a cheerful giver. Give without grudging one to another. These are the elements that go to make beneficence; that free it from wrinkles; that give it largeness and generosity. The growth toward ripeness in moral experience is analogous to development in physical nature,--that is toward beautifulness. Just in proportion as any one of our better feelings becomes predominant over the others, men feel that character is growing lovely, attractive, admirable. And these are only step stone words that bring you to the last one, “beautiful.” There is nothing so beautiful in this world as beauty of character. Applications--
1. All the world recognises beauty in the lower grade of qualities. It is the higher moral experience that men lack a knowledge of Devotion is more beautiful than passion. The love of God in the soul is far more beautiful than any love of man can be. The qualities of religion to which we are called are supreme, not alone in importance, but in art even. They are essentially and intrinsically more admirable, more noble, more beautiful than all the lower experiences.
2. How great is the variety of spiritual things in the Christian life! and how few things are gained! How many persons are there that are beautiful in temper? How many whose good nature is anything more than the mere product of good health? How little is the Church beautiful in its grace!
3. The unbeautifulness of Christian life is sadly shown in me popular impression with regard to religion. Men mostly feel that religion is something that may be obligatory, but that there is nothing attractive about it. The true idea is, that a man who goes into a Christian experience, goes into a larger liberty, and goes into a larger joy.
4. Christians should at least be as sensible to spiritual beauty as to physical. All men should love beauty in common things.
5. God is bringing all good men toward that realm, and that indescribable experience which is hinted at in the words of Scripture. The work which is going on in us, we do not ourselves at all appreciate. (Henry Ward Beecher.)
