I'm going to ask you to take
your Bibles and turn with me to the Gospel according to John
chapter 1. John chapter 1. I'd like to read one verse, verse
14. John 1, verse 14. And the Word was made flesh,
and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the
only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." Let's
pray. Our Father, this evening we ask
your blessing upon the preaching of the Gospel. We pray, Lord,
that you would bless the hearing. May we worship this evening.
For Christ's sake. Amen. We speak often of the glory of
God. The glory of God. And when we
consider that precious subject. Our hearts are immediately lifted
in a spirit of reverence and respect concerning that blessed
thought, the glory of God. Here we are this evening, creatures
of the dust, How can we behold the glory of
God? John said that they did. That's what he said. The Word was made flesh, dwelt
among us, and we beheld His glory. Now, while we readily admit that
this subject is too high for us to fully comprehend. We know
that truly we're creatures that see through a glass darkly, but
we see. Our eyes are held to to the ability
to be able to fully comprehend the glory of God. But, I know
this, God's Word bears out that one day we're going to behold
His glory. Now listen to this, Revelation
21-23, And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon,
to shine in it. For the glory of God did lighten
it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. Now, if you've ever
been in a cave, y'all been there before, you know how you get
way back in the cave and they tell you by standing still, now
we're gonna turn the lights off. And then I want you to put your
hand up and see if, you know, you can't see anything. Light
is that by which we behold. Without light, you just can't
see. We see tonight because these lights are on. We see during
the day because the sun is shining. We see because of light. And
the Scripture says, in that day, that city, that heavenly Jerusalem,
the church, not going to have need of a sun or a moon because
the glory of God did lighten it. Now here we are. We believe that in that day God's
glory is going to shine such that we're going to see. We're going to see Him and in
seeing Him we'll see His body. I'm talking about His body. In that day, we're going to see
the glorified saints. All that have gone before us,
that died in the Lord, that died in the faith. There's coming a time where we're
going to see them. And we're going to know them. The disciples, Peter, James,
and John, on the Mount of Transfiguration, the Scriptures declare that Moses
and Elijah, who had passed hundreds of years before Peter, James,
and John were ever born, and they knew them. They knew who
they were. They knew them. Margaret, you're going to see
Bob. I believe that. You'll see Bob. Bob, your dad. There was a group that followed
the Lord Jesus Christ when the centurion in Matthew 8 asked
the Lord to heal his servant. And you remember he said, the
Lord said, I'll go to your house and the centurion said, I'm not
worthy, you come to my house, speak the word. My servant will
be healed. The Lord said, I've not seen
greater faith. But then he said to a group that
was following him, He said, many shall come from the east and
west and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom
of heaven. But the children of the kingdom
shall be cast out into outer darkness. There shall be weeping
and gnashing of teeth. He's saying we're going to know
them. We're going to see Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They're part
of the body. I've used this before. I know
that's my hand. I know it is. I've seen it before. I know that's my hand. You're
going to know those that have departed in the faith before
us. We'll know them. So in heaven,
God's people are going to see the Lord's glory. And when I say they're going
to see the Lord's glory, that takes in His glory as the Redeemer
and the Redeemer of those sheep that are there, there's His glory.
They're going to see His glory. But Moses besought the Lord with
this request. He said, show me Thy glory. Show me, I desire to see your
glory. And the Lord of glory, the one
of whom it was said spoke to Moses face to face as a man speaks
to his friend, graciously answered that request. And here's what
he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee. All of the goodness of Almighty
God is the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. So here's what
God Jehovah said to him. I'm going to cause my goodness. You're going to see, you're going
to see, and he saw him by faith, but you're going to see the Christ.
You're going to see the glory. I'm going to call all my goodness
my glory. Hebrews 1, 3 says, "...who being
the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person,
upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by
Himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the
Majesty on high." He said, I'm going to cause all my goodness
to pass before you whenever God's people behold the glory of God. I'll tell you who they're seeing.
They're seeing by faith the Lord Jesus. I'm going to cause my
goodness to pass before. And he said, I will proclaim
the name of the Lord before thee, and will be gracious to whom
I'll be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I'll show mercy.
He said, in showing you my glory, in causing you to see the Lord
Jesus Christ, By faith Moses saw Him. He didn't see Him in
body, but by faith he saw Him, like we do. I will cause all
my goodness to pass before you, and I will proclaim the name
of the Lord before thee. And this is what the Spirit of
God does for us, His people. In revealing unto us Christ,
he says, I will proclaim the name of the Lord. What was the
name that the Lord told Moses to tell the children of Israel?
You go into Egypt and you tell Pharaoh, let my people go. And
Moses said, who am I going to say sent me? He said, you tell them that I
am that I am has sent you. I am that I am. You tell them
that the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, the sovereign God
who shows mercy and compassion to whomsoever He will, has sent
you. That's what you tell them. I'll tell you, when the Spirit
of God comes in power to God's people, Here's what they see
by faith. New eyes, new heart to believe. They see the goodness of God
with new eyes. They see Christ. They see their
Savior. They see life. They see Him. That's what they see. And they
hear in their heart the proclamation of the sovereign God. who has
mercy and compassion on whomsoever he will." That's who they see.
They see Him and hear His voice for who He is. So the Lord promised
to show mercy to Moses in showing him His glory. And truly, Moses
saw by faith the glory of God in the person of the Lord Jesus
Christ. God's glory, through whom God's people would be redeemed
and saved. Scripture says Moses saw him
and wrote of him. That's what the Lord said to
a bunch of Jews. He said, had you believed Moses,
you would have believed me, for he wrote of me. Moses wrote the first five books
of the Bible. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Deuteronomy,
Numbers. And whenever Moses wrote under
the inspiration of the Spirit of God, when he began to write,
he wrote of Adam and Eve being clothed with the coats of skins
in the garden. Do we not see the Lord Jesus
Christ laying down His life, shedding His blood? That animal
had to die. They would be clothed? Did we
not see the righteousness of Christ covering them? Moses wrote
of me. When he wrote of the seed of
the woman that should bruise the serpent's head, did he not
write of Christ? Whenever he wrote of the ark
of Noah, Noah built an ark. and Noah and his wife and their
sons and their wives, those animals that got in the ark, did he not
write of Christ? Moses wrote of me. How about
that brazen serpent? How about that smitten rock?
How about the sacrifices in the desert, in the tabernacles? Moses wrote of me. Moses, show
me your glory. He said, I'm going to cause all
my goodness to pass before you. Moses saw Christ. And he said,
I'm going to proclaim the name of the Lord, sovereign God, and
I'm going to teach you that. Show me your glory. Yes, the
Lord revealed his glory to Moses. And Moses saw him. Moses rode
of him. But there was a blessed day that
God was pleased to make an open manifestation of His glory. And the scripture says, but when
the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son,
made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were
under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. John wrote concerning God's glory,
Christ Jesus the Lord. John wrote, and the Word was
made flesh and dwelt and tabernacled among us. And we beheld His glory. The glory as the only begotten
of the Father, the only one who has come from the Father, full
of grace and truth, He said, we beheld Him who is one with
the Father in essence. One in will, one in purpose,
one in power. We beheld His glory. But while the Lord Jesus Christ
was on this earth, walking before God and before men, The one that John said, we beheld
His glory. Were there not many others that
saw Him too, but didn't see His glory? What was it that John
and the other disciples, we, he said, we, beheld His glory? What was it that they beheld
concerning His glory that many others did not see. What is it,
let me ask you this, that we that believe behold of His glory? Moses saw Him, believed Him by
faith, and that's the only way we can see Him right now. What is it that we see concerning
the glory of God? Here's what it is. First, I've
got two points. First, they beheld Him in His
glory as the mighty God. And they knew it. They knew it. Many saw Him. Many saw His miracles. But John
said, we beheld His glory as God. We knew who He was. By the revelation of the Spirit
of God, turning over to John 6, verse 66 to 69, there were
a lot of people that were following Him. And the Lord said in verse
65, He said, Therefore said I unto you that no man can come unto
Me except it were given unto him of My Father. You know, you
stand up and preach that today. in most places. And let me just
make sure that I make it perfectly clear on what he said. No man has the ability, no man can,
no man has the ability to come unto me except it were given
unto him of my Father. Well, what are you saying? I'm
saying that man is totally depraved. I'm saying that man is spiritually
dead. That's what I'm saying. I'm saying
that man cannot come to Christ except God the Father grant him that coming. You cannot come
to Him. Somebody says, well, what if
I want to? You won't want to. You won't want to. God Almighty is sovereign in
election, sovereign in redemption, sovereign in calling. He's sovereign. He's God. He does as He will. In the army of heaven, among
the inhabitants of the earth, no man has the right to question
Him. He's God. And from that time, verse 66,
many of the disciples went back, walked no more with Him. And
said Jesus unto the twelve, Will you also go away? And Simon Peter
answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of
eternal life, and we believe and are sure that thou art that
Christ, the Son of the living God. John said, We beheld his glory. We saw Him and knew Him to be
God. And we believed on Him as He
revealed Himself to be. God. God Almighty. One who has mercy and compassion
on whomsoever He will. That's who we know He was. And we saw Him. We saw Him in
the display of His deity. We saw Him heal the sick and
raise the dead. We saw Him walk on water. We
saw Him speak to the waves and to the wind. And they settled
down immediately. And we asked ourselves, what
manner of man is this? This is God. They saw Him in
His glory as He was transfigured. Turn to Luke 9.28. Luke 9.28. They saw Him when He was transfigured
on the Mount of Transfiguration. That glorious display of His
majesty before His humiliation in the Garden of Gethsemane.
I thought, what a marvelous act of God's grace. Soon they would
behold Him in the garden of Gethsemane, sweating, as it were, great drops
of blood, crying unto the Father, Father, if it be possible that
this cup pass from me, nevertheless, not my will, but Thine, be done.
Praying in agony, souls in agony, they saw Him, But before he went
to the garden, he took him up on top of the mountain, a transfiguration. And the scripture says in Luke
9.28, it says it came to pass about eight
days after these sayings, he took Peter, John, and James and
went up into a mountain to pray. As he prayed, the fashion of
his countenance was altered, and his raiment was white and
glistening. And behold, there talked with
him two men, which were Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory
and spake of his decease, which he should accomplish at Jerusalem.
But Peter and they that were with him were very heavy with
sleep, and when they awoke, they saw his glory and the two men
that stood with him. They saw the display, the manifestation,
the veil that was removed. And they saw Him in deity. John said, we saw Him. We saw Him. Before He went to
the Garden of Gethsemane, in the days of His humiliation,
God showed them this is who I am. Emboldened them. Encouraged them. John said we saw His glory. How
do we see the glory of God? We see by faith Him with eyes
made new in regeneration. We know that He's God. Sovereign
God. God in heaven and earth. He's
God. He's not trying to be God. Not trying to do anything. Not
trying to save somebody. He saves whosoever he will. He
calls them and they come. He told Matthew, follow me. Matthew followed him. When he
spoke, I tell you, that power went forth and affectionately
drew. We beheld his glory. The second point was this. The
glory of Christ that John declared he saw was when the Lord Jesus
Christ, in His submission to the will of the Father to redeem
the sheep, gave Himself into the hands of wicked men that
He might bear the guilt of His people upon the cross. John said, we saw Him who is
the Lamb. We saw the Lamb. We saw God Almighty humble Himself, made Himself
of no reputation. We saw the God-Man Mediator. We saw Him give Himself and lay
down His life. John said we, his disciples,
saw with our eyes the Christ and knew that this was God who
had humbled himself as no man born of Adam could humble himself.
and laid down his life. Peter in Acts 2 speaking, one
of the ones that were of the we that saw him, Acts chapter
2, John preaching on the day of Pentecost, John 2.22. You
men of Israel, hear these words, Jesus of Nazareth, a man, approved
of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs, which
God did by Him in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also know.
Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of
God, ye have taken and by wicked hands have crucified and slain,
whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death, because
it was not possible that he should be holding of it." John said,
we saw His glory. as the substitute of His people,
the redeemer of His people. We saw the federal head who bore
the guilt of His own everlastingly given to Him from before the
foundation of the world and took their place. He was there, made sin upon that
cross and it pleased God. to bruise Him. It pleased God
in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ to put away the guilt
of His people. And there He is, doing exactly
what He had prayed for the Father to do to Him. Look at John 17,
1. John, in that high priestly prayer,
here's the Lord Jesus Christ praying. These words, John 17,
1, spake Jesus and lifted up His eyes to heaven and said,
Father, the hour has come. Glorify Thy Son that Thy Son
also may glorify Thee. as I have come into this world
according to the everlasting covenant of grace to redeem the
people of your choice that you gave me, entrusted to me as the
surety of the sheep. And I haven't, according to that
covenant of grace, eternally stood as the surety for them.
I will answer for them. I will save them. I will redeem
them. I will die taking their place,
becoming them. I will lay down my life, being
made flesh, humbling myself according to your will. Father, glorify
me. Display the glory of Your purpose
and my purpose. Glorify me and support me and
sustain me and uphold me that I may glorify Your virtues of
mercy and compassion to Your people. Lord, I've come to do
the work that You sent me to do, to finish the work. And soon cried, it's finished.
Father, glorify me. Here He was at Calvary and the
promise of the Father, John 12, 28, being fulfilled. The Scripture says John 12, 28. The Lord praying said, Father,
glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from
heaven saying, I have both glorified it and will glorify it again. What did he mean? He said, I
glorified it, glorified my name in sending you and displaying
you and showing you to be God. God with me. One. I did it and
I'm going to do it again. I'm going to display you as the
Lamb who humbled himself. I will do it. The Father. He caused His goodness and glory,
Christ Jesus the Lord, to pass before the face of not only Moses
and John, but us, His people, and the others that He's called
out of darkness, beholding His deity and His humiliation. There's His glory. Show me Your
glory. I'm God. I'm God Almighty. The I am that I am. The Christ,
the Messiah. Abraham told Isaac, when Isaac
asked him, you know, remember, here's the wood, here's the fire,
where's the lamb? God will provide Himself a lamb. John saw God as man. The God-man lay down his life
on the tree, shedding his blood for the redemption and salvation
of his people, satisfying the law and justice. And then John
wrote, we beheld his glory, God's glory to pass by the transgression
of his people in Christ. Proverbs 19.11 says that the
discretion, or the prudence, or the wisdom in handling a matter,
the discretion of a man defereth his anger, and it is his glory
to pass over a transgression. That's true of men, surely, what
the scripture says, but oh, the discretion of God to be just
and justify a sinner. How wonderfully is the glory
of God justly and mercifully displayed in the redemption of
God's people. God's people, in the time of
our Lord's humiliation, they physically and spiritually, they
saw His glory. 1 John, same one that wrote the
Gospel of John, wrote this, that which was from the beginning,
which we've heard, which we've seen with our eyes, which we've
looked upon and our hands have handled of the word of life,
for the life was manifested, and we've seen it, and bear witness
and show unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father
and was manifested unto us. Brethren, we too We see, right
now, by faith, the glory of God, the Lord Jesus. What do we see? We know He's God. He's God. That's what Peter said. We're
convinced. You're the Christ. You're God. You're the Son of the living
God. And we see Him as our Savior and Redeemer. John was with Him
on the mountain. Transfiguration, he saw that
veil removed and he was with him in the garden, when the Lord
did sweat drops of blood. And under the inspiration of
the Holy Spirit said this, Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and
it doth not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when
He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him. as He is. We're going to see
Him. Lord, this evening, show us Your
glory, and according to His promise, He has by faith, and very soon,
one day, shall by sight. May the Lord bless these words
to our heart, for Christ's sake. Amen.