I'd like for us to give our attention
to Acts chapter 1, verses 9, 10, and 11. I've titled our message this morning,
Beholding His Glory. Beholding the glory of the Lord
Jesus Christ, not the glory of the prophets, not the glory of
the apostles, not the glory of God's ministers, not even the
glory of the angels. but the glory of the Lord Jesus
Christ. That glory that excelleth, Scripture
says, His glory excels, goes beyond any other glory. This passage that I'm about to
read, even though it's worthy to read the whole chapter, but
because of time I'll not do that, But this is concerning the ascension
of the Lord Jesus Christ, His leaving this earth. And He was received up into heaven. This man that was 33 plus years
old was caught up into heaven. Those
that looked, Those that beheld, they did not really understand
what they were seeing. They understood faintly what
they were seeing. And I feel like I can be identified
with them. I understand faintly. I look
through a glass dimly. I want to see more, and I'm encouraged
by this fact that these men did later see more. It's by revelation. Look with me in Acts chapter
1, verse 9. And when he had spoken
these things while they beheld, he was taken up, and a cloud
received him out of their sight. And while they looked steadfastly
toward heaven, as he went up, behold, two men stood by them
in white apparel, which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why
stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus which is taken
up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner
as ye have seen him go into heaven." The person whom these moral men,
mortal men, were blessed to see disappearing out of their sight
into the vast, expansive space, this had never been seen in this
manner before, into the heaven of heavens, was none other than
the resurrected and glorified God-man, God incarnate, the Son
of God, the Son of Man. All that He came to accomplish
here on this earth in His flesh was accomplished. He had glorified
His Father and He had finished the work which he came to do,
namely, to obtain eternal redemption, eternal salvation for the elect
of God. And in so doing, he established
for them an everlasting righteousness and put away their sin forever. This is who they saw leaving
this earth. He had finished the work that
God the Father had sent Him to do. He finished it perfectly. We see Him in His divine nature
if we see His glory. And we see Him in His sinless
humanity if we really see and behold His glory as the God-man. He glorified the Father here
on this earth. He pleased God. He satisfied
His Father. God accepted the work that He
had completed, He had finished, and He left out of their sight. That's simple, isn't it? That
plain. But it's miraculous. Here's a living man in the flesh. In John chapter
1, the Scripture says the Word was made flesh. And we beheld
His glory. How do we behold His glory? In
His redemptive work. as God and His man. This one man, perfect in human
flesh, ascending into glory. And today, July 13, 2008, as time is here on this earth,
this same man resides in the flesh on the right hand of the
Father. And He's there ever living to
make intercession for His people. Glory is something which distinguishes
one from all others. And this would be an endless
task that I could never, ever complete to try to describe to
you the Lord Jesus Christ and how He is so different from us. But there are two or three things
that make Him glorious in His glorious person that distinguishes
Him from all others. One of the things is this, that
in Him, in the Lord Jesus Christ, the one that I present to you
this morning as the only Redeemer, In this man resides, dwells,
all of the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And let me say this right at
the beginning. If you don't know Him this morning,
you'll not be able to behold His glory with the redeemed. You may believe it as much as
a man can believe it in doctrinal truth. You may believe it theoretically. But all to behold is glory and
know Him. That's where it's at. That's
salvation. This is life eternal that we
may know God and Jesus Christ in Thy scent. And you'll never
know Him until you behold Him. in His glory. He's distinguished
from all others because this man in the flesh has no sin. Has no sin whatsoever. He is a sinless, harmless Son
of God. There may have been some that
witnessed this wondrous event that did not understand. And
there may be some here this morning that witness the reading of these
words written by the pen of the Spirit of God that do not understand. This seems to be the case. The angels seem to perceive this
because they said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing
up into heaven? They stand and gaze and wonder
what is going on. He's leaving us. Just a few hours prior to this,
they looked at a man hanging on a cross. They said, He's dead. He's leaving us. They were sorrowful. They were sad. What's going on? And now they outside of Jerusalem,
they saw this same one that was dead, alive, and they saw Him
ascend out of their sight. And they stood there gazing up. They saw the event, but maybe
not the glory of Jesus Christ as yet. But this one thing is for certain. All of the elect, may I use that
word repeatedly this morning? Because this is a major concern
to the elect. All of the elect will. Without
doubt, behold His glory. You may not behold Him yet, but you will behold Him, if you're
one of His. He will reveal Himself to all
of His children. You may have sat and listened
to the gospel for years, And yet never have beheld His glory.
There was men that walked with Him in His earthly ministry three
and a half years that had never beheld His glory. But they did. They were His. They saw the event that made
it not the glory of Jesus Christ. I know this was so with me. And I'll admit it readily. I
don't know when, as far as the day and the hour
and the moment, but I know there was a time that I didn't know
the Lord Jesus Christ. I didn't understand. I didn't
see Him. I didn't behold His glory. But
now, by God's grace, I do, just a little bit. That's a miracle. The revealed glory of Jesus Christ is His attributes, His virtues,
and His character displayed in His accomplishment, in everlasting
love, in His life and death, in His flesh, in the satisfaction
of divine justice. and the obtaining of eternal
redemption for His sheep. I know I said a mouthful there,
but you know it's so. That is His manifest of glory.
Glorious or glory means this as well. It means exaltation,
achievement, awesome splendor, astounding beauty, that which
separates Him from all others, all creation. It is only those
that beheld His glory and do behold His glory that are saved. To know Him is to behold His
glory. That's our subject this morning,
beholding His glory. All those for whom He died will
behold His glory. If you can behold His glory this
morning, you have new eyes. He's given you new eyes. He's given you new sight, new
perception. You've got eyes that you didn't
have before. Not these natural eyes, but eyes
that can behold the unseen. We look at Him whom we've never
seen. We hear Him who we've never heard. Or shall we say it this way?
We see Him who we can't see. We hear Him who we can hear.
We believe on Him whom we've never heard speak.
We believe every word that He says. I'm not here to prove anything
this morning. I'm really not. I'm not here to make an argument,
a doctrinal argument. It is my desire to preach the
Lord Jesus Christ in His glory. Beholding His glory. If you can
embrace Him in love, now listen to me, this is important.
If you can embrace Him in love, in His glory, You have a new
heart. If you have ever beheld His glory,
you will never be the same. Those that beheld the Lord Jesus
Christ were changed forever because they had a new heart, new eyes,
new ears, new life. We behold His glory in the gospel. We behold His glory in worship
and adoration. We behold His glory in prayer
and communion with Him by His Spirit. We behold His glory as
we live out our life by faith in Him. He's glorious. I'm here this
morning to brag on a person. I'm not here to brag on what
He's done. Who He is makes what He's done glorious. But I want
to preach Christ to you, a person to you, who is altogether lovely. It would be my desire to behold
Him. And it is my desire for you,
for you to behold Him, that we may behold Him together. Wouldn't it be wonderful if this
little group of people, everyone from the smallest to the greatest,
from the youngest to the eldest, would be able together to behold
His glory? He alone is worthy of glory and
honor and praise. In Mark 14, verse 62, Jesus said, Sometimes get your commentary
out and look, or get your Bible out and look at the I Am's in
the Scripture, or the Lord Jesus Christ in the Old Testament and
in you. He said, I Am. He said, I Am. And you shall
see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power in glory. In glory. He's our glorious. God. He's our glorious Savior. He's our glorious Redeemer. He's
our glorious High Priest. He's our glorious Intercessor.
He's our glorious Friend. He's our Prophet, our Priest,
and our King, and He's glorious in all of His office. He is exalted
above the hills, above the universe, above the angels, above men.
Above all, He's glorious. He's the man that rules and rules
for His people in love and care. He cares for us. He's glorious
in every aspect, everything about Him. There's no fault in Him.
He's glorious to be praised in His glorious tabernacle. on His
glorious throne. He is full of glory. May we, by God's grace, behold
His glory this morning. Our Lord prayed that we would.
You know, I'm convinced that there's some folks here on this
earth and maybe right here this morning that can behold His glory. Maybe somebody right here this
morning can really behold the glory of God, isn't that so? In Jesus Christ. They can really
see, have fellowship with Him, communion with Him, and worship
Him, and believe Him, and love Him. Maybe somebody right here
this morning can do that. Isn't that wonderful? He said
that we would. He prayed that we would. Listen
to this. This is the words of the Lord
Jesus Christ. He said, Father, I will that they also whom Thou
hast given Me be with Me where I am, that they may behold My
glory. That's our Lord praying. And
if God ever answered anybody's prayer, He answered his son's
prayer. His son said this. The Lord Jesus
Christ said this. He said, I know you always hear
me. And you always give me what I ask. I know that. He said, Why? That they may behold
my glory which thou hast given me. Why? For thou loved me before
the foundation of the world. And guess what? He loves his
people just like he loved his son. That's amazing. That's what
he said. I wouldn't believe it if he hadn't
said it. With the same love, he said,
with which you love me. He said, that's how I love them.
And he said, you see my glory. My glory is revealed to you and
it's going to be revealed to them. If you could behold the Lamb
of God, isn't that how John introduced the Lord Jesus Christ? He said,
Behold the Lamb of God. The Lamb of God is a suffering, resurrected Savior. The Lamb
of God represents Him. He who lived and died and resurrected
in the midst of the throne is the Lamb. And we beheld His glory
as the risen Lamb, the risen, crucified One. When John introduced
him, he said, Behold the Lamb of God. And as I try to proclaim
Him this morning, as weak as I am, and as weak as my words
are, I say to you, Behold the Lamb of God. Behold Him. Look upon Him. The Scripture says that we do
behold Him. In Hebrews 2.9, but we see Jesus. who was made a little lower than
the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory
and honor. We see Jesus crowned with glory
and honor. Why? Because He tasted death
for His people. What are we looking at? I've often heard folks say, not
in a long time, but I used to hear it a lot, folks would say,
well, when I come to the doctrines of grace, when I came to the doctrines
of grace, when did you come to Christ? Oh, I love the doctrines, we
say. Do you love Christ? Do you? Has He tucked you in
His arms and hugged you up to His breast and told you He loves
you? And have you laid your weeping
cheek on His breast and wept with tears of joy and tell
Him that you love Him too? Oh, the glorified Lamb of God. Sinner, fall in love with Him.
Come to Him. Believe on Him. Bow to Him. He alone is worthy. He alone
is glorious. I didn't behold Him, but now I do. And I stand with my mouth agape
as Thomas did. My Lord and my God. How did I get here? How did I
get in your presence? By my grace, he said. I brought
you. I brought you. Things clear up. Listen to me. Religion is confusing. Doctrine is confusing, apart
from Christ. But things clear right up when
He, by His grace, enables us to behold His glory. Things just fall in place. Everything's
all right, and He teaches us, and we grow like little babies.
We don't want to leave. He said, come learn of Me. I
am meek and lowly in heart. Come learn of Me. Behold My glory. In 2 Corinthians 4, 6, for God
who commanded the light to shine out of darkness has shined in
our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory
of God. in the law, in the doctrines, the knowledge of the glory of
God in the face of Jesus Christ. You know what I'd prefer if you
told me you loved me? For you to stand right in front
of me and look me in the eyeballs and say, Tommy, I love you. I mean, any way you want to tell
me is fine with me. I like to hear it. But I tell you what, He just
does it one way. He brings us face to face with
the Lord Jesus Christ. And we see the glory of God.
We behold His glory. His name is glorious, isn't it?
What a glorious name. There's no other name like it.
No other name like His name. His name is who He is. His name
identifies Him. He's the Lord of glory. He's
the Lord Jesus Christ, Jehovah God, God our Savior. That's what
His name means to us. There's just something about
that name, isn't there? There's just something about
that name. Lots of folks, most folks, it's
just a cuss word. That's right. Folks even claim to be believers.
I've heard folks that claim to believe the doctrines of grace.
Just slinging his name around like it's mud. That tells me one thing. You
say, well, you're being judgmental. Fine. Anybody can do that. They've never beheld His glory.
Holy and reverent is His name. I may not say nothing, then I
might. But boy, I just don't like to
hear it. I don't like to hear folks come off of it. And it's
not because I'm holy or because I'm better or anything like that,
but how in the world could a man behold the glory of God, believe
on Christ, love the gospel, and just throw his name down like
a dog's name, huh? His name is glorious. In Isaiah
9, 6, listen how glorious it is, listen. For unto us, us. I like the way God wrote that,
don't you? Unto us, a child is born. Unto us, unto us, a son is given. And the government shall be upon
his shoulders, and his name shall be called Wonderful." Full of
wonder. Counselor, the mighty God, the
everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. His name is glorious. In Nehemiah 9.5, then the Levites
said, Stand up and bless the Lord your God forever and ever.
And blessed be thy glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing
and praise. Oh, his name's glorious. Psalm
72, 18, Blessed be the Lord God, the God of Israel, who only doeth
wondrous things. And blessed be his glorious name
forever. Name's glorious. Philippians
2.9, Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given
him a name which is above every name. His name is above every
name. Psalms 24, verse 7, Lift up your
heads, O ye gates, and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors,
the King of glory shall come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord strong and mighty, the
Lord mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O ye gates,
Even lift them up, ye everlasting doors, the King of glory shall
come in." Who is this King of glory? The Lord of hosts. That's
His name. The Lord of hosts, the Lord of
many, the Lord of multitudes. And He has a people which no
man can number. Multitudes. What is His name? Behold, a virgin
shall be with child, shall bring forth a son, and I shall call
His name Immanuel. which is God with us. That's
who He is. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places, glorious places, in Christ, glorious. He's glorious in His work. He's
glorious with His people. He's raised us up together and
made us set together in glorious places in Christ Jesus. Who is He? His name is glorious.
Who is He? His name tells us who He is.
Who do men say that I am? The earth to Christ. The anointed
of God. The Son of the Living God, that's
who He is. His work is glorious. Oh, what a glorious work He did.
Isn't His work glorious? He alone, that's what separates
Him from all others, who He is. And puts virtue to what He did. Gives virtue to what He did.
The Lord Jesus Christ and His work gives glory to His Father. His work is glorious. He successfully
and completely and everlastingly redeemed His people. The Lord
Jesus Christ, the Redeemer. In Psalms 111 verse 1, Praise
ye the Lord, I'll praise the Lord with my whole heart. in
the assembly of the upright, in the congregation, the works
of the Lord are great, sought out of all them that have pleasure
therein." Do you have pleasure in the works of God, in the work
of Christ? Do you have pleasure in His work?
God was pleased with His work. He saw the travail of His soul
and was satisfied. He said, this is my beloved Son
in whom I am well pleased, and all of His people that know Him,
that He's brought by faith to know Him. and reveal Himself
to have pleasure in His work. As a matter of fact, this is
the only pleasure we have on this earth is looking at Him,
beholding His glory, and seeing His glorious work that He wrote
for us. That's the only real and lasting
pleasure there is. We try to find pleasure other
places, but it's so vain, it's so temporary, it's so unlike
Him. It just, it don't satisfy. But to behold Him in His glory,
to behold His glorious work, gives great satisfaction. His work is honorable and glorious
and His righteousness endures forever. He hath made His wonderful
works to be remembered. The Lord is gracious and full
of compassion. Oh, His work is glorious. Wonderful
works to be remembered. Oh, remember. We partake of the
Lord's Supper. He said, this doing remembrance
of me. Remember Him that way in the ordinance He's given us.
And we remember Him when we sin, don't we? Huh? Remember Him. Don't you? How often do you sin? How often
don't you sin? That's a better question. Every
day. And all our various sins drive us to behold Him and behold
His glory. What am I going to do about it?
I've already done it. It's like, look to Christ. Look at what He's
done to Jesus. Oh, we behold His glory. He put away sin with
the sacrifice of Himself. My sins are gone. Did you hear
what Jesus has done for me? My sins are all taken away. gloriously
taken away, wonderfully taken away. Oh, and to be able to remember
it, to remember Him, that the Lord is gracious and full of
compassion. David wrote in Psalm 145, verse 9, I will speak of
the glorious honor of thy majesty and of thy wondrous words. And
men shall speak of the might of thy terrible acts. And I will
declare thy greatness. I cannot but declare His greatness. I may be talking to somebody
down at the boat dock and I say, boy, Louis Cates, he's a fine
man. He's my friend. Boy, he's a fine
man. Don't you say anything bad about
him. That's all right. But boy, I tell you what, I'm
going to declare the greatness of the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm
going to brag on Him. There ain't nothing wrong with
Him. He's never done anything wrong. Everything He does is
good and glorious and great and forever. He's my Redeemer. He's my Savior. He's my friend. I will declare
Thy greatness. They shall abundantly utter the
memory of Thy great goodness and shall sing of Thy righteousness." What do we do when we come together? We speak of His righteousness
and His goodness. Don't we? I hope I do. Well,
that's what I want to do. If I don't, you call me on the
carpet. If I misrepresent, I know I'm fallible and I make mistakes.
And you probably see all those over and over and over again.
But boy, if I ever lie on God and lie on His Son, boy, you
set me up real quick and say, look here, you know, you're talking
about my Lord. Because He's great. He's worthy
of our praise and our honor and glory. The Lord is gracious,
full of compassion. His redemptive work is glorious.
He alone could glorify the Father by His perfect obedience in the
obtaining of everlasting righteousness for us, for His people. He alone
could do that, that which distinguishes Him from all others. There could
no one else redeem me. There could no one else work
out a righteousness for me, provide a righteousness for me. No one
else could put away my sin. It took the doing and dying of
the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. No one else could do
it. No one else was fit to do it. Only Him. He's the only Savior of sinners.
There's no other name given under heaven among men whereby we must
be saved, just Jesus Christ. That's all. And I'm learning more all the
time what Paul meant when he said, I dare not preach anything
among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I know I do sometimes,
but I don't have no business. It's my fault, and I confess
it, and forgive me. But there's no business in me
getting up here chasing rabbits to preach Christ. And I'm learning,
just beginning to learn, maybe, to set before sinners the glory
of the Lord Jesus Christ. You'll perish without Him. But
boy, if you ever see Him, behold His glory. You're going to live. You're not going to just exist,
you're going to live. Isn't it sad that some folks
spend a lifetime on this earth and never live? Oh, let me live in the light of thy
countenance, to behold thy glory. This one thing I desire, that
I may dwell in the house of the Lord forever. and behold His
glory, behold His beauty. He alone could atone for the
sins of His elect. John 17, verse 4, He said, I
have glorified Thee on the earth. I have finished the work that
You gave Me to do. I need to hurry. His gospel is glorious.
His redemptive work is glorious, but His gospel, His gospel of
good news, which is the news of Him, the gospel declares Jesus
Christ and His work. His gospel is glorious, and there's
not a half a dozen gospels. There's only one. I wish we could
get that straight. Eventually we will, by God's
grace. There's just one gospel. Folks are going to say, well,
you believe you're on one right, and you're too narrow, and you
say all these things, make all these accusations. Let them have
it. Let them have at it. It ain't going to hurt nothing.
Don't worry about it. There's only one gospel. There's
only one God, and He's sovereign. There's only one Savior, and
that's the Lord Jesus Christ. And man can't save himself. And
anything or any person that'll lose to something different than
that is preaching a false God, a false gospel, a false Christ.
They're not beholding His glory. The gospel is glorious. 2 Corinthians 4, In whom the God
of this world has blinded the minds of them which believe not,
lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the
image of God, should shine unto them. For we preach not ourselves. I'm nothing. That's what the
writers say. I'm nothing. I can't do anything. I'm not anything. Can't do anything.
Never did anything. I'm nothing. We don't preach
ourselves. You know, these preachers like
to have all these degrees hanging on the wall, D.D., Masters and
Doctors. I don't even want to talk to them.
They're far above my head. I couldn't understand them anyhow. But what they're doing is promoting
themselves. If I had a degree, you'd never know it. You'd never
know it, first of all, by listening to me. And you wouldn't know
it because I hung them on the wall. I'd put them in a paper
shredder. We preach not ourselves, but
Christ Jesus the Lord. And ourselves, what? Your servants. For Jesus' sake. Just an instrument
that God was pleased by His grace to raise up. One worm to tell
a bunch of more worms. Somebody said, or to get a good
meal. One beggar tell another beggar
where to get a good meal. One dying worm tell another dying
worm where they can live and be happy. For God who commands
the light to shine out of darkness has shined in our hearts to give
light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus
Christ. And His church is glorious. And I'm going to close with this,
I promise you. His church is glorious. We may not look like it. We look
at the outward appearance. As a matter of fact, the Scripture
says about our Lord, when we shall see Him, there is no beauty
about Him that we should desire Him. They looked at Him and they
said, there's just another Jew. He's causing problems, let's
kill Him. Wonder what they said? But oh,
they couldn't see His glory. Folks can't see Christ in you
either. They just can't do it. What we preach, who we preach,
what we believe to most folks is just another doctrine. And
it's hated by most of the world. But His church is glorious. It's
glorious because of its head. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
head of the church. Our glorious head. Ephesians
5, 25, husbands love your wives. Even as Christ also loved the
church and gave himself for it. Husbands, if we, literally, if
we would try to love our wives half as much as Christ loved
the church, we'd love them to death, wouldn't we? Christ loved his church. without reservation, loved them
even unto death. He gave His life for the church.
Husbands, love your wife even as Christ also loved the church
and gave Himself for it, that He might cleanse it, that He
might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle
or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish.
Now, this is what you and I don't see. Seldom do we see it. A believer mostly sees his unworthiness,
his sin, I'm sad to say, but by God's grace, sometimes he
lets us behold his glory. But this is what we don't see
a lot of the time, and I wish we could. is that we as children
of God, as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, those that behold His glory,
we are glorious because Christ is our head, because Christ has
put away our sin, because Christ has clothed us with His righteousness.
There is nothing about us that has any spot, wrinkle, blemish,
or any such thing. In God's sight, we're as pure
as the Son of God. That's so unbelievable, sometimes
we just don't want to see it like that. But it's so. It's
so. We're clothed with His righteousness.
We have no sin. Christ is our head. Behold His glory in the church,
in the midst of the congregation. Christ in you, the hope of glory. That's amazing. That's amazing. These men outside the city of
Jerusalem, they saw the Lord Jesus Christ being taken up into
heaven. They stood there gazing into
heaven as he went away. And the angels dressed in white
apparel said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up? This
same Jesus, this glorified, resurrected man will come again in like manner,
the glorified Son of God. He's full of glory, full of grace,
and full of truth. I hope this morning I preach
Christ to you. Let's bow our heads.