The Condition of Beholding
Hebrews xii. 14 v. “Without holiness no man shall see the Lord.”
It is not a threat; it is a calm statement of the law of beauty. Spiritual beauty can only be seen by its possessor. Outward loveliness can be seen by a deformed body; but spiritual loveliness is invisible to a deformed mind. It would not help you to get into the picture-gallery; it would not help you to put your hand on the canvas; it is not a distance of sight, but of soul. You might stand under the very eye of the portrait and call it a plain face. So did the spectators in the great gallery of New Testament pictures; they admired Barabbas and neglected Jesus. In Barabbas they saw that which was familiar to them; it was in themselves, and therefore they recognised it in him. His was a material beauty — strong, muscular, athletic, the mirror of its age. The age would easily have seen its lord in him; but the beauty of Jesus was of another kind.
It was not massive; it was not muscular; it was not majestic; it was not such as we figure in the leaders of armies. It was the beauty of holiness, the beauty of self-restraint, the beauty of the calm sea which hides within its breast the capacity for storm. In such a face they could not see the Lord. It was not their ideal of lordship. It was not in their heart, and, therefore, it could not be in their eye. That which thou seest is the reflection of thyself; that which thou nearest is the echo of thyself; that which thou admirest is the image of thyself. Art thou a worshipper of Barabbas? it is because thou art Barabbas; thou beholdest in him thine own ideal of glory. No man can be attracted to a side of the gallery opposite to his own nature. Not by thy sin but by thy holiness art thou drawn to the face of Jesus. Even where thou comest in the sense of sin, it is not sin that brings thee. No man can see Christ’s beauty but by His beauty. Only love can behold love; only purity can discern purity; only that which is Divine can gaze on the Divine. Not by contrast but by resemblance is a man brought to Jesus. Though He stands on the mountain and thou on the plain, it is His own light by which thou seest Him. If thou art attracted towards Him, it can only be by Himself. Therefore, in thy dust and ashes, lift up thy head. There is gold behind the dust; there is fire below the ashes. The vision of His beauty is itself the prodigal’s best robe; only by holiness couldst thou have seen His face.