Learning to Live with
The Glory of God

We begin here and now, while on earth, to become aware of that which will occupy our minds and Spirit’s vision throughout the endless ages of glory to come; the beauty of the Lord, the beauty of His holiness, the blessed glory of the character, the attributes and the ways of Our Heavenly King. A special fragrance fills this place, it permeates through the veil into the Holiest of all.

In the type the holy incense was specially formulated, compounded and set apart for most sacred use. Here we have the most blessed reality of that typical fragrance. To those who dwell in this "greater and more perfect Tabernacle" (Heb.9:11) this sweet incense is the breath of heaven itself. The very atmosphere even this moment emanates from and surrounds the Throne of God. It is breathed by those who have His spirit both sides of the veil. It is the atmosphere of Holiness, of Heavenly love. It has mountaintop purity. It is fresher and sweeter than anything of earth. Emanating from the Lord, it finds response in each heart that becomes its vessel.

The Love of God overflows into His people. It embraces all that is pure, and true, and all that is holy and good. It is characterised, wherever found, by its joy in all those things which delight the heart of the Lord. Fullness of mercy, compassion, tenderness, patience, understanding,—all that God is. Such are the ingredients of the sweet incense with which the Lord endows His beloved children. It produces within us that affinity with the things that are divine. It is that most blessed family bond which unites with the Father, the Lord Jesus, and each member. It flows on, with blessed anticipation, and readiness to embrace every creature.

Paul speaks of the Lord’s people becoming filled with the fulness of God. This infilling, he says, takes place as we continually contemplate the glory of the Lord. This year, and indeed each year of our pilgrimage, is the year of our change! Paul had in mind the effect upon Moses of old when he spake with God face to face. Not that he saw God, for no man has seen God at any time. (John 1:18)

There was a veil. Moses was enabled to behold the afterglow of the Lord’s goodness as He passed by. We picture it like a glorious sunset. This was a mount of transfiguration experience for Moses, and as he descended that mount the glory of God shone in his face. He had beheld the glory of the Lord and was changed. What had absorbed and awed his mind on the mount he now reflected from his being.

A greater than Moses is here. The fulness of that spirit of holiness in the heart of Jesus was poured out without restraint to fill the whole place with its clinging fragrance. Jesus was here, and He is here still. His fragrance clings to those who follow Him now through that first veil. As saints pass beyond that second veil, they leave behind a trail of broken alabaster boxes.

Behold the cloud of incense rise from every heart in which He dwells. The Master lives within the house, abundantly, the incense tells.

Such a state of heart absorbed in the glory of the Lord is learning to dwell with that glory, which is to be its eternal abode.

The word for "saint" in the New Testament is agios. The main stem means something of earth, but it is preceded by a definite negative, so that the whole word means "not of earth." This is characteristic of the way in which the heavenly state is described. When Paul was caught away to the heavenly realm in vision, he said that he heard things which are not lawful to utter. (2 Cor.12:4) The meaning of words is dependent upon experience. "Cat," would mean nothing to us if no such creature existed in the material world. The heavenly realm is beyond present experience, and therefore cannot be expressed with meaningful words. Hence we find in Scripture various expressions which use contrast with the present experience. In this way we are helped to glimpse something of those glories we cannot yet fully bear. "Unfading," says Peter, and "Unspeakable." "Not mortal," says Paul, "Not corruptible." "Not after the image of earthly things at all." "Not finite," "beyond limits or bounds."

Perhaps one of the greatest contrasts is between time, and eternity. Time is a dimension belonging to this material realm. Time sets a boundary to everything we experience, everything we do. Our minds are geared to this realm of time. It is therefore not easy to conceive that realm where time is no more, the realm of the eternal. Our Heavenly Father, we are told, inhabits eternity.

One of the greatest thinkers of recent years was Einstein. Perhaps he came nearer than any in pushing the boundaries of awareness beyond the limits of this present experience. He, it was, who conceived the possibility of time being an illusion. He suggested it to be a concept of the mind of those who dwell in time. Beyond such limited thinking and engulfing it, he theorized the probability of a timeless realm. In such a realm the whole history of man, past, present, and future, is spread out for comprehension in one sweeping view. The Scriptures have long anticipated such concepts. The Lord has known all His works from the beginning. It was according to that divine foreknowledge that He could view that completed Christ of many members before the foundation of the earth.

Over recent years some interesting studies have been progressing in Israel in what has become known as "the Bible code." Some may not be really sure what to make of this rather surprising idea. Hidden in the Scriptures, it is claimed, are an untold number of messages relating important news items both of man’s past, and of this present day. By use of a computer program, words have been discovered, spelled from letters of equal distance apart. Now we know that any large enough quantity of words or letters may produce patterns of haphazard or random coincidence. The "Bible code" is different, however, in that these words form coherent messages. Words are found bisecting each other, or in close proximity, with meaning and relevance to our day. The degree of probability of such messages happening by random chance are estimated at many thousands to one. The only way that such a complexity of coded writing could be formulated in the first place, it is agreed, would be by a mind capable of viewing man’s entire history in one grand sweep. The implications of this discovery are so great that scientific minds see their theories threatened. Scientists have long stated that the ability to state any happening beforehand is impossible. They have therefore discounted as nonsense the prophetic word of Scripture. The attitude of mind of these learned men towards the concept of "the Bible code" has therefore been one of scepticism. The code is also undermining the realm of Bible criticism by those clerics who suppose that the Torah (and other portions of the OT) had various authors, and who claim to trace their compositions by the different titles used of God in various parts. However, students of the Bible too may share a sense of wariness. Daniel 12, verses 4, and 9, speak of the sealing up of the book "till the time of the end." Habakkuk 2, verse 3, states, "For the vision [is] yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie:.." We have our own way of understanding these texts in relation to the running out of the great time periods leading into this day of Christ in which we live. The "wise" who "shall understand," (Dan.12:10) have not been conceived as University Professors of Mathematics, equipped with computer programs. Rather, these have been thought of as the "babes" and "nothings" of this world. To these, the Father reveals things "hidden" from the "wise" of this world. (Matt.11:25) Thus does He bring to nothing the wisdom of men. Some debate may therefore arise as to how we should view this recent and astounding discovery.

So, we have the statements of the prophetic Word of Scripture. We now also have the astonishing messages of "the Bible code." We may accept either one or indeed both of these as sources of truth. The fact underlying both remains, that Our God surveys the end from the beginning. We are learning to live with such a Being, with a Mind and Judgment perceptive beyond our thought. We are learning to live with the concept of divine Sovereignty, His complete ability to achieve everything that He designs. We are learning to live with a divine foreknowledge that takes into account the exercise of human freewill. Each of these attributes and much, much more, compose the glory of God.

When Paul met Jesus on the Damascus Road, we read in the Acts 26:13, that a light brighter than the midday sun shone along the road. [‘kata’ followed by accusative = along] It was the glory of God in the face of Jesus. Each step along the way increases our perception of the glory of God. It is a shining light, brighter than the midday sun. It shines along the way we tread. And it sanctifies. It is a glory that changes those into whose hearts it shines. Beholding, we reflect. Our God is beautiful in holiness. He will beautify His sanctuary. What this means is that the Lord Himself will be the beauty of the place wherein He dwells. He dwells with the contrite, the meek of the earth who mourn for sin. He dwells with the poor in spirit who are the pure in their heart’s desires. His fulness is for those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, who thirst after God, as the hart (deer) braying for the water brooks. He is a God that hides Himself, the world do not know Him. He is a Father that waits with delight to reveal Himself to His seeking child.

How amiable are His tabernacles. (Psalm 84:1) We read in one place that it was noised that Jesus was in the house. In like manner it will become evident when the Lord God dwells within the heart of His own. It is manifest in certain attitudes of mind and heart. A deep infilling of the fulness of God accompanies a delicate and captivating expression of holiness. It is a family likeness that cannot be hid. It becomes the mark or seal of all those that are His. It is a continual offering of praise, a living spirit and true worship of God, in the beauty of holiness.

Let us indulge now in reflecting on one most blessed aspect of the beauty of holiness. It results from the continual beholding of the glory of God. Thus, one of its chief attractive qualities is its complete absorption in the Lord and the things of God. "Wist ye not that I must be about the things of My Father?" Absorption in the things of God, means enthrallment in His goodness and glory. We are captivated by the very beauty of the Divine Character. We become engrossed in that which utterly delights and satisfies the heart and mind. Such an attitude stems from an increasing awareness of all that Our Father is, all that He comes to mean to us. We find the drawing power of His love and do not wish to resist. To know Him, becomes the driving preoccupation of life. It forms a strong distraction from all in this present world that would distress or offend.

Isa 58:11 "The LORD shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat thy bones: and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not."

Psalm 65:4 "Blessed [is the man whom] thou choosest, and causest to approach [unto thee, that] he may dwell in thy courts: we shall be satisfied with the goodness of thy house, [even] of thy holy temple."

Such absorption means dwelling in that other realm with the Lord. Here we enjoy those present blessed realities of that One Who is beautiful in Holiness. Here we share too that grander vision that belongs to He that inhabits eternity. Here present and future merges together, until difficult to separate. Thus, are we enabled to enjoy today the blessedness of hope’s tomorrow. The word absorption means "sucking in." As a beauty of holiness, it describes a state of hunger and thirst for the things of the Lord. As the hart panting for the water brooks, so pants our soul after Thee. (Psa.42:1)

Jer.31:14 "I will satiate the soul of the priests with fatness, and my people shall be satisfied with my goodness, saith the LORD."

In the state of holy absorption lies the power of translation. We are thus translated into the kingdom of God’s dear Son. Like Enoch of old, our daily walk is with the Lord. Each day we are drawn closer, until one day we are near enough for the Lord to translate us, through that veil, unto Himself. Every day of holy contemplation, the consciousness of that glory that surrounds us becomes more real. It is like a shining light along the way, and it grows more bright. It is the Lord’s response to the desires He has implanted into our heart.

Our cry ascends each day with that of David. "O send out thy light and thy truth: let them lead me; let them bring me unto thy holy hill, and to thy tabernacles. Then will I go unto the altar of God, unto God my exceeding joy: yea, upon the harp will I praise thee, O God my God." (Psalm 43:3,4)

There will be a last day of pilgrimage for each one of us. There will come a last step of the way, a last trial, a last moment of weakness. Then "face to face"—What will it be? The glory that surrounds us now we see as through a glass. It is reflected from the Master’s face in such a way that we can bear. But then, as scales fall from the eyes, that glory we shall see unveiled. Our sight will be as of angelic hosts who daily look upon the Father’s face, and in full beauty shall we then behold our King.

Dear brethren, may these senses grow to bless each day we tread below, combining love’s serenity with deepest sense of urgency. The peace of God, in full accord, with sense of triumph in the Lord.

DJH