The Secret of Beholding Jesus

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ome readers come to the Bible to gain insight or to learn truths and principles. However, coming to the Bible with your head can leave your heart untouched. There is so much more to gain from the Scriptures than truth about God. You can gain God Himself! The true riches are to be found in beholding and

knowing the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Pharisees made a deadly error in how they approached the Scriptures. They dissected Scripture cognitively, but they didn’t seek the heart behind the truths revealed, and thus they came to know the Book but not the Author. This is what Jesus meant when He said to them, “‘You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me. But you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life’” (John 5:39-40). Everything in the Scriptures was screaming at the Pharisees, “See Jesus as you read, see Jesus!”, but they missed it.

The Scriptures have always been intended to direct our hearts to a Person. Paul said that “the purpose of the command- ment is love” (1 Timothy 1:5); that is, the entire purpose of the Old Testament was to enflame the hearts of God’s people for the

The Secret of Beholding Jesus

beauty of His face. They got hung up, however, on dogma and creed and missed the living relationship that God longed to have with them.

Jesus’ words to the Pharisees raise a frightening possibility: We can read the Bible avidly and never get to know the Lord. Even though Jesus is pointed to on almost every single page, it’s possible to read the words and never develop a burning-heart relationship with Him. Jesus was saying we ought not come to the Scriptures to gain knowledge about a Book; rather, we ought to come to the Scriptures to gain knowledge about a Person. The Living Word desires to meet us in the Written Word, if we will but come to Him in the reading.

Here’s the secret: Your reading in the word can be a dynamic and living encounter with the person of the Lord Jesus Christ! Don’t come to the word out of a sense of rote duty to knock off your daily quota of chapters; don’t come merely to master spiri- tual principles or to glean clever insights; come to gaze upon the majesty and mystery of the altogether Lovely One, the One who has captured your heart! He waits for you behind the veil, watching to reward those who pant and yearn for Him as for springs of living water. Come with a cry in your heart to see Him and know Him. With a tiny breath of His Spirit on a single word of Scripture, He can set your heart racing with fresh revelation of His power and glory.

When Jesus joined up with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus after His resurrection, He began to explain to them how He was the central theme of the Scriptures. Imagine the glory of this encounter—Jesus revealing Jesus to the human spirit from the written word! Little wonder that those disciples later recalled, “‘Did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us on the road, and while He opened the Scriptures to us?’” (Luke 24:32). It’s the opening of the Scriptures concerning Christ to the thirsty soul, through the power of the Holy Spirit, that gives the burning heart. This is the great pursuit of the secret place!

Jesus chided the Sadducees with this indictment, “‘You are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God’” (Matthew 22:29). This suggestions three sad possibilities:

Secrets of the Secret Place

• We can know the Scriptures but not the power of God.

• We can know the power of God but not the Scriptures.

• We can know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God.

My heart cries out, “I want to know You, Lord! I want to behold You in Your Scriptures. I want to know You and the fullness of Your power! Manifest Yourself to me in Your word, O my Lord!” It is because of this heart-cry that I run into the secret place. I long for Him so much that I am lovesick with unfulfilled desires. “Oh, when will You come to me?”

My experience has been that I don’t get to know Jesus better in prayer. Prayer is where I express my love according to how I have come to know Him. Prayer is love exchanged. But if I am to come to know Him better, I must approach His word and behold Him there. To know more of Christ requires revelation, and rev- elation usually requires meditation in the word. “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord” (2 Corinthians 3:18).

Oh, how we long to behold Him! I consider, with a certain kind of envy, the living creatures who do not turn from facing straight ahead no matter where they go (Ezekiel 1:12-17). Whether they go up or down, left or right, forward or backwards, their faces are constantly facing straight forward—at the throne! They have the glorious privilege of ever gazing upon the beauty of the King. Lord, this is how I want to live my life, too. That no matter where I go and what I do, my face might be fastened upon the throne and beholding the radiance of my beloved Lord.

The more I see of Jesus in His word, the more I realize that He is nothing like me. But when I see Him in His uniqueness, this is the very thing that draws me most passionately into His heart. I’ve discovered that I am naturally attracted to that which is different from me (as the saying goes, opposites attract). Jesus is stunning in His singular beauty and matchless majesty. And oh, what a privilege I have—to come to the secret place and gaze upon Him in the Scriptures, forever fascinated with the adventure of growing in the knowledge of Him who died for me!

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