The Father of all glory, who proclaimed that glory through angels, prophets, patriarchs and the ancient saints, manifested the might of his glory in the son of his love. If we regard the son as a man with a divine message, we elevate the message only and do not behold the Christ: if we regard the son as the divine message itself, we behold the Christ and his message. And that which we behold is God.
Jesus was not God the Son, the second person of a trinitarian godhead: the deity in him was the Father. But his whole personality, character and behaviour manifested Yahweh. So, if we know him in the flesh only, we do not know him at all. This was the meaning of his words to the Jews, “If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also” (John 8. 19).
“Shew me thy glory”, said Moses to the angel who was with him in the mount Sinai, who gave him the tables of the ten commandments and in whom the name, Yahweh, was.1 And the deity caused the theophanic glory in its effulgence to pass on before as his hand covered the face of Moses. Then he removed his hand and Moses saw the glory receding.
Yahweh had manifested himself idealistically to Moses as “He who will become the power and the righteousness”. And that power and righteousness will become a manifested fact—no longer an ideal—in Christ and the saints.
This revelation of the idealistic glory was a manifestation of the Father’s righteousness: “. . . Yahweh, Yahweh El, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and fourth generation.”
This is the glory that Moses saw receding: it was the manifestation of a glory that was fading with time; because, as he watched, it went farther and farther from him until it was seen no longer. We know now that it had been ready to age and vanish away (Heb. 8. 13).
And he came down from the mountain with the splendour of God in his face; and he put a veil over his face so that the children of Israel might not see the glory fade to its end.2
Whereas Aaron and the other Israelites were afraid to look upon Moses’ face (Ex. 34. 30), we have the great boldness to ascend, as it were, the mount of transfiguration, there to look on the glory of God Manifested, his face shining and his clothes white and glistening. And seeing the glory of Yahweh as in a mirror (which is Christ), we also reflect the theophanic glory, being changed into the same mirror-image from one degree of glory to another (2 Cor. 3. 13-18). Like Moses, we see God’s Angel revealing God’s righteous attributes; but, unlike him, we see it drawing ever nearer. Like Moses, our faces shine with the splendour of God; but, unlike his, our splendour shall never fade, for it is not a superficial splendour of the shining of our skins but the outward-going irradiation of the divine laws engraved on the converted heart. Moses saw the glory in the back-parts of an angel: we have seen it the face of Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 4.6)
The first manifestation was of the glory receding: the second was of the glory developing: the first, was of the glory fading; the second, was of the glory that would go on and on from glory to glory as by the Spirit of Yahweh. If the temporal splendour was wonderfully beautiful, how much more magnificent will the eternal splendour be!
These considerations form the background to the events recorded in John 12. 20-26; and explain the seeming strangeness of Jesus’ response to the news that certain Greeks wished to see him.
He had arrived at Jerusalem with triumph to the exalted shouts of, “Hosanna in the highest: blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord”. But he was not beguiled by the plaudits of the vain crowd: soon enough they would be crying, -Crucify him, crucify him!”. No, it was not the people’s eulogies that was his glory: it was the victory of the crucifixion expressed in that great and magnificent shout of triumph that reverberates in the world’s ears to this day—”It is finished!”.
These Helenes—Jews of the Diaspora, or Greek proselytes—had come to the feast; and they approached Philip the Galilean saying, “Sir, we would see Jesus”. Philip in turn told Andrew; and the two of them told Jesus. His answer concerning his hour of glory does not relate to the triumphal entry, for the record says plainly (verse 23) that his words are intended as an answer to Philip and Andrew: “The hour is come that the Son of man should be glorified”.
This was the beginning of the end of his probation; but it was the beginning also of a new birth and a multitudinous begettal: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.”
What, then, was the significance of the Greeks wishing to see Jesus? Surely it was this: “And I, if I been lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.” But this entailed certain obligations for those who came: “He that loveth is life shall lose it; and he hateth is life in this world shall keep it unto eternal life.” And this meant that his disciples should be willing to follow him in prison and to death: ” If any man serve me, let him follow me.” “Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: But for this cause came I unto this hour”.
The eternal attributes of the Father of glory manifested themselves in the living of Jesus when he died to the worldly glory (an event typified by a kind of preview in the wilderness temptation), choosing rather the loss of his own life-in-this-world by obedience to the ever-living word of God; and those divine attributes were manifested again by his physical death for the redemption of thousands whom Yahweh is calling out of all nations as a people for his name —a people called to manifest, with Christ, the same righteous attributes of the Father: “merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty.”
The example of this surrender of all things, and the epitome of our present conclusions is John 12. 28: “Father, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying,’ I have both glorified it, and I will glorify it again.”
Yes—”I have glorified it in the law en-graven in stone; I will glorify it again in my law engraven in the fleshy tables of the heart—there in the hearts of my people will I write my attributes, and they will see Jesus. In the person of my son will they behold me as in a mirror; and by my Spirit will they be changed into that same image from glory to glory. And when he returns, they shall be like him, for they shall see him as he is”.
Would ye see Jesus? You would see God, for he manifested God— as you must and I must: “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father”. Yet he is but the head of the multitudinous Christ Body; and the divine manifestation is yet to be completed when all the chosen righteous will, as one in God, manifest the God who is one; and when the pure in heart shall thus behold him (Matt. 5. 8).
“Wherefore, lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees; and make straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lame be turned out of the way; but rather let it be healed. Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see Jesus.”
We have not come to the mountain smoking and quaking, to Sinai; but we have come to the assembly of saints, the mountain of promise, to Zion the holy: we have not come to the mount of litigation, but to the mount of transfiguration—not to the glory revealed in ordinances, but to that revealed in a son.
To stand at the foot of Sinai is to have a veil over the heart: to stand on the mount of transfiguration is to see Jesus, the mirror-image of the invisible God; and to be changed into that same glory.
Shall we be foolish enough to reason away the need for complete and utter consecration? Living sacrifices are we; wheat are we, dying to our own selves that we might bring forth a hundredfold more.
“We would see Jesus—yet the spirit lingers Round the dear objects it has loved so long; And earth from earth can scarce unclasp its fingers;
Our love of these scarce makes this love less Strong.”
Only the Word can reveal Christ; only after imbibing the Word can the life manifest him. See him in all the Scriptures; see him in your brothers and sisters; strive to educate yourself and them till you know, by the perseverance of your predetermination, nothing in your lives and theirs but Jesus Christ and him crucified. Let the vision deepen, heighten, widen, till God Manifested becomes the all-in-all of each life, and we wait with confidence for the ultimate manifestation of the sons of light.
References
1—Moses did not see the Deity’s very person, but his manifestation in the person of an angel. See Num. 12. 8, and note that the “face to face” of Ex. 33. 11 here, becomes “the similitude of the Lord”. “Face to face” in the sense of Moses’ seeing the literal face of the Father is obviously not meant by Ex. 33. 11, for see verse 20. See also Acts 7. 38; Gal. 3. 19; Ex. 23. 20, 21
2— The italic “till’ in Ex. 34. 33 is misleading. The R.S.V. translates correctly here and in 2 Cor 3. 13.
Reflections on the Potter and the Clay