The king in his beauty

Front matter

Shelf

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

.

Preface

We sometimes see a bright jewel, which has many smooth, polished sides or surfaces. It is pleasant to take up such a jewel ; turn it carefully over ; look at its many surfaces, one after another; and notice the different views they present, of the beauty shining out from that precious stone.

Now, the character and work of the Lord Jesus Christ, our blessed Saviour, may well be compared to such a jewel. There are very many sides to this jewel. And there is a wonderful variety in the rays of light and loveliness, that shine out from these different sides. No two of them are exactly alike. It is an interesting and profitable study to examine this jewel carefully, and see the amazing brightness and beauty that are hid in it, and are all the time shining out from it.

The aim of the present volume, * is to assist the young in doing this. Their attention is here called to a few of the shining surfaces of this great Jewel. Jesus, in the riches of his grace, and the wonders of his love, is the one theme of these sermons.

PREFACE.

If the reading of them shall help any of his young friends, in their efforts to know Jesus more, to love and serve him better, and, in so doing, to be happier, and more useful, the writer will feel abundantly rewarded for his labor.

Contents

I. The King in his Beauty 11

II. The Beauty of the King 45

III. The King in the Beauty of his King-

I. The King In His Beauty

“ Thine eyes shall see the King in his beauty .”

Isaiah xxxiii. 17.

The King here spoken of is Jesus. This promise refers to heaven. There will be many glorious things for us to see when we get to heaven. But the grandest, and the most beautiful of all, -will be to see Jesus himself. The apostle Paul says that there “we shall see him as he is.” It must have been a blessed thing to have seen Jesus when he was on earth ; but that was nothing compared to what it will be to see him in heaven. When Jesus was here, in this world, we have no reason to suppose that he was remarkable for the beauty of his appearance. We are not told indeed, by the good men who wrote his life in the Gospels, how he looked. The prophet Isaiah is

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

the only one of the sacred writers, who has given any particular account of his appearance “when Jesus was seen among men.” And he speaks of him as — “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief ; with no form, nor comeliness, and with no beauty that we should desire him” (Isaiah liii. 2, 3).

But it will be very different when we come to see Jesus in heaven. There will be wonderful beauty, and glory, about him there. And those who love and serve him here, will see all this beauty and glory there. Jesus prayed for this very thing when he was here on earth. In the 17th chapter of St. John’s Gospel, we have written out for us the great prayer which Jesus offered for his people, just before he went to be crucified. In the twenty-fourth verse of that chapter, we have these wonderful words ; — “ Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me.” These words of Jesus, in his prayer, give us the best

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

explanation we can have of the meaning of the prophet Isaiah, when he wrote the sweet promise contained in our present text. “ Thine eyes shall see the King in his beauty.” If you ask me to tell you what this promise means? I would answer the question by turning to these words of Jesus in his prayer — “Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am ; that they may behold my glory.” The King spoken of in one of these passages, is Jesus, who is speaking himself in the other passage. The “beauty” that Isaiah speaks of, is the same thing as the “glory” that Jesus prays about. Isaiah calls it “the King’s beauty.” Jesus calls it — “my glory.” Isaiah does not tell us where this beauty was to be seen; but Jesus tells us. He says it will be — “ivhere I am” And we know very well where Jesus is. Jesus is in heaven. And every one who loves Jesus can look up to him, and say; —

“’Tis where thou art is heaven to me,

And heaven, without thee can not be.”

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

And so these words of Isaiah lead our thoughts up to heaven — “Thine eyes shall see the King in his beauty.” We all hope to go to heaven when we die. If we really love and serve Jesus, we certainly shall go there. And so we should be interested in hearing of what we are to see when we get there. God has not told us much concerning heaven. We should try to understand all that he has told us. The apostle Paul was taken to heaven, before he died, and then came back again to earth. He saw “the King in his beauty,” there ; but he never told about it. He said he was not allowed to tell what he had seen (II Cor. xii. 4).

And so we can only learn about heaven by studying what God has told us of it in his blessed word. This passage in Isaiah is one of the places in which it is spoken of. “Thine eyes shall see the King in his beauty.”

And when we come to think of the beauty, or glory, of Jesus in heaven, there are three things with which that glory will be con-

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

nected, and which we must speak of, in order to understand this subject properly.

The first of these is — the place — where Jesus unit he , when we see him in his beauty.

We call this place heaven. In the Bible it is compared to different things. Sometimes it is spoken of as a paradise, or garden, full of all bright and beautiful things. When Adam and Eve were first created, you know that God put them in such a garden, or paradise. In that garden, we are told that God made to grow, “ every tree that was pleasant to the eye and good for food.” And we know they would have been perfectly happy there, if they had only minded what God told them. But Satan got in there, in the form of a serpent, and tempted them to eat of the tree, of which God had said they must not eat. And then they were driven out. In this way that Paradise was lost. But Jesus came to restore it to us. And heaven is compared to a garden, because it will be a place in some respects like the Garden of Eden. It will be a “Paradise Kestored.”

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

But it will be better than that first Paradise, because Satan will never be allowed to get into it to tempt us. And we shall never sin, and never be put out of it. Heaven is spoken of as a paradise in II Corinth, xii. 2, 4, and Rev. ii. 7.

Sometimes heaven is spoken of in the Bible as “ a country." Paul calls it — “a better country, that is a heavenly” (Heb. xi. 16). The original word here means a Fatherland. Canaan, you know, was the land, or country, promised to the Jews. And while they were toiling in Egypt, or travelling through the wilderness, it was the thought of that blessed country, that promised land, that cheered and comforted them. That was a beautiful country. God called it “a land flowing with milk and honey,” he said it was — “a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and hills ; A land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig-trees, and pomegranates, a land of oil olive, and honey; a land wherein they should eat bread without scarceness, and not

► THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

lack any thing in it; a land whose stones were iron, and out of whose hills they might dig brass” (Deut. viii. 7-10). And so the land of Canaan was one of God’s types, or figures of heaven. And when we read in the Bible about the fertility and glory of that land it should lead us to think of heaven, the place where Jesus is, and where “our eyes shall see the King in his beauty.”

Sometimes heaven is spoken of in the Bible as a kingdom, where all is “righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost ” (Rom. xiv. 17). Sometimes it is spoken of as a temple, in which all God’s people shall worship, and serve him day and night, without ever feeling weary (Rev. iii. 12, iv. 8). Sometimes it is spoken of as a building , a house , or home, in which all who love God will be brought together, as one great family; all knowing and loving one another, and perfectly happy in being with Jesus, where he is, and “seeing the King in his beauty.” This is the way in which Jesus himself spoke of heaven, when he said —

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

“In my Father’s house are many mansions; I go to prepare a place for yon” (John xiv. 2).

But the fullest description we have in the Bible of heaven, the place where Jesus is, is when it is compared to a city. In one place it is called “a continuing city ” (Heb. xiii. 14). In another place it is spoken of as — “a city that hath foundations , whose builder and maker is God ” (Heb. xi. 10). But it is in the last two chapters of the Bible that we have the fullest descriptiqn of heaven. And here it is represented as a city. But it is the most beautiful city that any eye has ever seen, or any ear has ever heard of, or any mind has ever thought of. Gold, and pearls, and precious stones, are the only materials employed in the building of this city. Earthly houses only have those parts of them which are seen, finished off beautifully. The foundations, and those parts not seen, are made of very coarse, rough materials. But it is very different with the house, or city, which Jesus is preparing as our heavenly home, — the place where we

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

are to “see the King in his beauty.” The very foundations of this city, even down to the lowest of them, are made of precious stones. Each of its gates is made out of one vast pearl. The walls and streets of the city are all made of pure gold. Only think of a city paved with gold; where the people walk on gold, and where the gold is as fine and transparent as glass, so that you can see through it. How poor and mean the grandest palaces of earthly kings become compared with this!

How much beauty there will be in such a place as this ! We see a great many beautiful things in this world of ours. A day in spring is beautiful, when the leaves are bursting open, and the flowers are coming out, and the birds are singing, and the air is balmy, and the sun is bright; — yes, a day in spring is beautiful. The rising sun is beautiful, and so is the setting sun. A moonlight night is beautiful. Our world is full of beauty. And yet this world is only the prison-house, in which God keeps his disobedient children. But if God can afford to make his prison-house so beautiful, how much more beautiful must the palace be in which his Son is to reign as King ; and where his own dear children are to live forever? When the Psalmist is speaking of this place* he says — “ the perfection of beauty,” is there (Ps. 1. 2). There is no perfection of beauty in this world. Here the ripest fruit has some speck in it. The sweetest rose has a thorn on the stem, or a worm at the heart of it. The brightest sky has a cloud upon its surface ; and the sun itself has dark spots on its face. There is something to mar the beauty of all our brightest things in this world. But in that world, — that city, — that place where Jesus is — there will be nothing to mar the beauty that is seen everywhere. It will all be “the perfection of beauty.”

A little girl was gazing up at the starry sky one clear night. She seemed to be very much occupied in thinking about something. Her mother said to her; “What are you thinking about, my dear ? ”

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

“ Oh ! mamma,” she said, “ I was thinking if the outside of heaven is so beautiful, how very beautiful it must be inside !”

A very sweet thought, indeed, and one we may often consider ourselves, when we look up at the sky, on a clear, bright night, and see how it sparkles in its loveliness. That is the outside of heaven.

Sometimes when people are dying the heavenly land, where Jesus is, comes very near them, so that they can see it before they die.

THE LAND BEYOND THE MOUNTAINS.

A little boy lay dying. His father and mother were sitting on one side of his little bed, and the doctor was waiting and watching near. He had been silent for some time, and appeared to sleep. They thought he might pass away as he slept. But suddenly his blue eyes opened, wide and clear, and a sweet smile broke over his face. He looked upwards very earnestly, and then turning to his mother said ; — “ Mother, what is that

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

beautiful land that I see there, beyond the mountains ? ”

“ I don’t see any mountains, my dear,” said the mother.

“ Look there, mother dear,” he said, pointing up. “They are very near now; so large and high; and the country beyond them seems so beautiful ! The people are so happy; and there are no sick children there. Is that the heavenly land I see?”

“Yes, my child,” his mother sobbed, “that is the heavenly land where Jesus dwells.”

“Oh, mother — oh, father, don’t be sorry for me ; but come after me, to that beautiful land. Good-by, mother dear, I’m going now; and Jesus has sent his angel to carry me over the mountains.”

These were his last words. He died in his mother’s arms. The angel carried him over the mountains to “ see the King in his beauty.” But he had caught a glimpse of its brightness before he went away. The beauty of the place is one of the things that will help to make up the glory, or beauty,

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

that we shall see in Jesus when we go to heaven.

The second thing tmU he — the company — about Jesus when we see him in his beauty.

However beautiful the 'place may be, which is to be our heaven, we never could be satisfied with that alone. Jewelled walls, and pearly gates, and golden streets are all very well. They must be wondrously beautiful. But these, of themselves, could never make us happy. When we go to the house we live in, and which we call home , what is it that makes it feel so sweet and pleasant to us ? It is not the walls of the building. It is not the furniture of the rooms — the tables, and chairs, the carpets on the floor, or the pictures that hang on the walls. It is not these things that make that place home to us; but it is the presence there of a dear father or mother, of brothers and sisters, of those whom we love, and who, we know, love us. And so it will be with heaven. The place will have something to do with the beauty we shall see, and the happiness we

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

shall enjoy there ; but the company will have much more to do with it.

And now let us talk a little about the company we shall meet in heaven. Who will make up this company? Well, to begin with, the angels will form a part of this company. We are told in the Bible that there will be in heaven — u an innumerable company of angels ,} (Heb. xii. 22). I never saw an angel. You never saw an angel. No doubt that any of us would feel frightened, if we should see one cbme into the room where we were. But we know, from what the Bible tells us, that the angels are very beautiful. They are always spoken of as clothed in white. They are sometimes spoken of as having wings, but not always. Sometimes they have appeared in the form of men, or women, but without any wings. We are not told how they looked; but we know that they must be very beautiful in their appearance. And to see such a beautiful place as heaven is, filled with such beautiful beings as angels are, must help to make heaven very beautiful.

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

But now, I think I hear one of you say: — “Ah! yes; the angels, I dare say, are very beautiful. But then I don’t know them; and they don’t know me. I should be afraid of them. I don’t think I could feel at home, or happy with them.”

This is very natural. And if there were to be none but angels, in the company of heaven, it would not feel very much like home to us. But then there will be others in heaven, besides the angels. All the good people that we read about in the Bible will be there. Abraham will be there; and so will Joseph, and David, and Daniel, and Peter, and John, and Paul. And all the good people, who have died since, will be there too.

But then the company of heaven comes nearer to us even than this. I suppose there is not one person who will read these pages, but has some friend, or relation, in .heaven. Have you lost a beloved father, or mother, or uncle, or aunt, who loved Jesus? You will find them in heaven. Have you lost

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

a dear brother, or sister, old enough to love and serve Jesus? You will find them in heaven. Hear what an aged minister once said, on this very point.

HEAVEN.

“ When I was a boy I used to think of heaven as a glorious golden city, with jewelled walls, and gates of pearl, with nobody in it, but the angels, and they were all strangers to me. But after awhile my little brother died; then I thought of heaven as that great city, full of angels, with just one little fellow in it that I was acquainted with. He was the only one I knew there, at that time. Then another brother died, and there were two in heaven that I knew. Then my acquaintance began to die, and the number of my friends in heaven grew larger all the time. But, it was not till one of my own little ones was taken that I began to feel that I had a personal interest in heaven. Then a second went, and a third, and a fourth; and so many of my friends and

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

loved ones have gone there, that it seems as if I knew more in heaven than I know on earth. And now, when my thoughts turn to heaven, it is not the gold, and the jewels, and the pearls that I think of — but the loved ones there. It is not the place, so much as the company that makes heaven seem beautiful.”

Have any of us lost dear little baby brothers and sisters, too young to learn about Jesus here? We shall find them in heaven. Did you ever think of this, that there are more children in heaven, than there are grown people? It is so. Do you ask me how I know it? I will tell you.

It is very well known that more than half of the people born into this world die while they are children. But Jesus takes all the little ones to heaven. He taught us this himself when he took them in his arms, put his hands on them, and blessed them; saying — “ Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of heaven .”

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

Here, then, we are sure that at least one half of those born into the world go to heaven, because they die as children. But what becomes of the other half! Do they all go to heaven! Alas! No. A good many of them never love, or serve, or trust in Jesus. It is a sad thing to say it, but it is true, they can not go to heaven. And if the whole of one half of those born into the world die as children, and thus go to heaven, and only part of the other half, who grow up to be men and women go to heaven, then it is plain, that as the whole of one half is greater than a part of the other half, there must be more children in heaven than there are grown people.

And some people think that when children die, and go to heaven, they do not grow up to be men and women, but that they always remain children. I am not able to say, for certain, that this is so; because God has not told us about it; and no one can tell us for him. But I hope it may be so. For I do love children so much that I should like to

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

think that there will always he children in heaven. But if they all grow up to be men and women, by and by, there will be no children there, and this, it seems to me,' would not be so pleasant.

If you go into a garden you never find all the flowers in full bloom at the same time. Instead of this you will find, mingled with the full-blown flowers, some buds half opened, and others just beginning to open. And this variety adds very much to the beauty of the garden. But heaven is God’s garden. Christian men and women will be the full-blown flowers in that garden; and children wiU he the huds. And it seems to me there will always be buds there, as well as flowers in full bloom. But God is much wiser than we are, and which ever way he orders it will he the best.

But this company in heaven will be all good, and kind, and holy. They will be all “made perfect.” Here, in this world, we have no perfect children, and no perfect men and women. But we shall all he perfect

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

there. There will be none blind, or deaf, or lame, or sick in heaven. There will be none cross, or proud, or selfish in heaven. There will be no ugliness of any kind in heaven. There will be perfect beauty in the place, and perfect beauty in the company there. And they will all know and love one another there. No one will feel a stranger, or alone in heaven.

It is a very painful feeling that we have when we find ourselves alone, and unknown, among strangers.

THE STRANGER NOT A STRANGER.

In the early settlement of the city of Cincinnati, there was only one way for persons to get there, and that was by means of the flat-boats that passed up and down the Ohio river.

On one occasion a boat landed there. It - had come down the river from Pittsburgh. There was a company of people on board that boat, who were going to Cincinnati to live there. Their friends were expecting their

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

arrival, and had met, down by the side of the river, to welcome them. As they left the boat their friends gathered around them, to shake hands with them, and give them the warmest kind of a welcome.

But in that company, who had just arrived, there was one who was a stranger. He had no friends, or any one that knew him in Cincinnati. There was no one there to shake hands with him, or bid him welcome to the place. He had been feeling lonely before, he felt ten times more so now.

The crowd was beginning to scatter, leaving that stranger alone on the boat. Leaning over the railing of the boat, he called after them, saying —

“ Friends, if there are any of you who love the Lord Jesus Christ, I am your brother.”

In a moment half a dozen of them were at his side. They shook him warmly by the hand, and bade him welcome to their homes.

How different Cincinnati seemed to that stranger now, from what it did a moment

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

before ! The place indeed was the same ; but 0, how different the company seemed! He was among friends now, and that made him feel at home.

And so it will be with us when we get to heaven. Jesus will know and love every one who enters there. He will introduce us to those who are there, and they will all love us, because we love Jesus. Angels, and Christians, old and young, men, women, and children, will all make one great happy family.

“ Thine eyes shall see the King in his beauty.” There will be beauty in the place , and beauty in the company.

But there is a third thing that ivill have more to do with the beauty of heaven, than either the place , or the company — and that is — the person AND PRESENCE OF JESUS.

But what shall I say about this point of our subject? It is easy enough to talk about the place , where heaven is to be. It is easy enough, too, to talk about the company that will be there; but when we come to think

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

about the person , and presence of Jesus , in heaven, who is able to speak on such a subject ?

There was a celebrated painter, once, who was making a picture of Jesus, in the midst of his twelve apostles. In arranging the picture he concluded to paint the apostles first, and not begin with their Master till he had finished them. As he went on with the picture, he tried to do the very best he could, with each of the apostles. He took the greatest pains with their figures, their positions, their dress and their faces. As he went on with his work he was very well pleased with it. After finishing the apostles he began with the person of Jesus. He got on very well with this, till he came to the head, and face, of our blessed Lord. Then he laid down his brush and paused. He felt that the face of Jesus ought to be made to appear as much more beautiful than his disciples, as the sun is more glorious than the stars. But how could he do this? He had tried so hard to make the 3

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

disciples look well, that he felt he had no power left to make their Master appear as much superior to them as he ought to appear. And so he finished the person of Jesus all but the head, and then painted him with a white mantle thrown over his head. He thought that when persons came to look at his painting, they could imagine what the face of Jesus ought to be, better than he could represent it by painting.

And I feel very much as that painter did, when I come to speak about — the person and presence of Jesus in heaven. All who love Jesus here on earth, agree in saying that from what they know of him now, he is — “the chief among ten thousand, and altogether lovdy.” Then how will he appear, when our eyes come to “ see the King in his beauty,” in heaven? Just look for a moment at what some good Christian men have said about Jesus, from what they knew of him, here in this world.

When John Newton was thinking of him, he said —

THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY.

“How sweet tlie name of Jesus sounds In a believer’s ears !

It soothes his sorrows, heals his wounds,

And drives away his fears.”

A good Koman Catholic who lived more than six hundred years ago, expressed his feelings thus —