The Valley Exalted, and the Mountain Laid Low 2
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II. But I pass on to show how all this is necessary for the revelation of the glory of the Lord; and how, when the glory of the Lord is revealed, it exalts the valley, lays low the mountain, makes the crooked straight, and every rough place plain.
The revelation of the glory of the Lord was primarily and especially seen in the coming of Christ in the flesh. When Jesus came "in the likeness of sinful flesh," it was a manifestation of the glory of God. As we read in the gospel of John (Jn 1:18), "No man has seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has declared him." God being essentially invisible, for not only has no man seen, but no man can see him (1 Tim. 6:16), his glory can only be made known in the person of a Mediator who, as his only begotten Son, is "the brightness of his glory and the express image of his person." (Heb. 1:3.) It was the view of this glory which drew his disciples to his feet, as holy John speaks, "And we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." This glory, it is true, the world never saw, as the Apostle declares—"Which none of the princes of this world knew—for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory" (1 Cor. 2:8); for it was a spiritual glory, only revealed to the saints of God.
The glory of Christ in his first appearance in the flesh was to be "a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." His humiliation veiled his glory; but his Person was in itself unspeakably glorious as God-Man; his work was infinitely glorious, as the perfect obedience of a Son; his sufferings were glorious, as endured in conformity to the will of God; hisdeath was glorious, though in outward aspect so ignominious, as thereby destroying death and him who had the power of it, that is the devil (Heb. 2:14); his resurrection was glorious, as he was thereby declared to be the Son of God with power (Rom. 1:4); his ascension and sitting at the right hand of the Father was glorious, for there he entered into his glory (Luke 24:26); and his second coming will be glorious, for then he and his saints will appear together in glory. (Col. 3:4.)
But not only was the revelation of Christ in the flesh in itself unutterably glorious, but there is—what I am especially aiming at—the revelation of this glory in its measure to the SOUL. And this is when Christ is spiritually and inwardly revealed by the power of God; as Paul speaks, in his own case—"But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace, to reveal his Son in me." (Gal. 1:15, 16.) And again, as the experience of all believers—"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 face of Jesus Christ." (2 Cor. 4:6.) When, then, we have some manifestation of the beauty and blessedness, the blood, love, and salvation of the great and glorious incarnate God, then "the glory of the Lord" is revealed inwardly in the soul, as well as outwardly in the Person of Christ and the word of his grace. Now it is this, and this only, which fully and thoroughly exalts the valley, lays low the mountain and hill, makes every crooked place straight, and every rough place plain.
Let us, then, now see, one by one, how it accomplishes those blessed effects.
1. You, or at least some of you, as I before endeavored to open up have had many things in times past, or it may be at the present moment, very deeply to try your mind. Your bereavements and family afflictions have been or are very distressing; your losses in providence have very much exercised your mind; your sins at times have been or still are a great burden to your conscience; your doubts and fears have severely harassed you; and you have had many painful exercises, and may still have them, whether you are a child of God at all. Now you need something to come from the Lord himself into your soul to relieve you from this depression, from this pain and exercise, this grief and sorrow, this sinking of heart; that shall do for you what is spoken of in our text—"exalt the VALLEY." You need this bereavement filled up; this wound in your conscience healed; this painful exercise of mind removed; and something given to you that shall be firm and solid—a path in which you may walk without doubt or fear, guilt or bondage.
These troubles and trials in themselves give you no evidence of sonship; you cannot build a hope for eternity upon doubts and fears, guilt of conscience, and distress of soul. It is with the heart as with the natural soul—the marsh and the morass, the filthy ditch and the slimy pool lodge in the depression of the valley, but do not make the ground solid, or fill it up with firm, sound material. You saw, you felt, you still see and feel, that your troubles, trials, sorrows, losses, bereavements, do not bring into your soul the grace of God; on the contrary, that they produce or foster peevishness, murmuring, rebellion, unbelief, infidelity. This scum and filth of our depraved nature settled, worked, heaved, and fermented in the lower grounds of your soul. In all this there was nothing solid. What wise man builds a house in a morass or a quaking bog? What godly man can build for eternity on doubt and fear? You needed, therefore, something solid that you could rest upon, as satisfying you that your sins were pardoned, and that the Lord was your everlasting portion.
Now when the glory of the Lord is revealed—when Christ is made spiritually and experimentally known—when his Person is viewed by the eye of faith, his blood seen, his obedience looked unto, and a measure of his love and mercy felt, these divine and solid realities fill every aching void, supply every deficiency, make up every loss, remove guilt and bondage, and thus give solid ground for rest, and peace, and happiness.
2. Again—this "MOUNTAIN,"that stood perhaps for months before you, and which you thought never could be lowered; those amazing outward difficulties that surrounded you when you first began to make a profession; that contempt of the world that you felt you could hardly bear; those fears lest if you went on in this religion, you would have to sacrifice all your respectability, your position in life, and perhaps the little money you had gotten together—this mountain and hill that stood so long in your way, why, what was it, where is it when you experience any discovery of the beauty and blessedness of the Lord Jesus Christ? It falls in a moment by itself; and you wonder that you could ever have made a mountain of it. "Every mountain and hill shall be laid low."
So with your hard heart—your stony, rocky, unfeeling soul. Let there be only some discovery of Christ—some revelation of the glory of God—some manifestation of his love, and grace, and blood—down goes the hard heart! The rock is removed out of its place (Job 14:18); the stone is rolled away from the door of the sepulcher; the mountain flows down at his presence, and melts like the snow-wreath in spring before the Sun of righteousness.
Every difficulty, outward and inward, is now removed. You can now bear reproach, endure persecution, submit to every trial in providence and in grace. You can feel a solemn pleasure in casting your lot among the saints of God, for you now esteem them as the excellent of the earth. Having Christ, in him you have a basis of peace—a solid foundation on which to stand in life and death, time and eternity. And thus you find every mountain and hill blessedly laid low.
3. And your CROOKED PATH!That crook in your lot—that dispensation so peculiarly trying which has grieved you over and over again; those painful and perplexing circumstances, which have given such a color to your whole life, that you would have prevented or altered at any sacrifice, but cannot; those crooked things which every day lie in your path, and which are so amiss that the more you try to straighten them, the more crooked they become—let there be a revelation of the glory of the Lord to your soul; let there be a sweet testimony in your conscience that you are accepted in the Beloved, that your sins are cast behind his back, and that you are an "heir of God and a joint heir with Christ," where are your crooks then?
Your crooked temper itself, that crookedest of all crooks, becomes straightened; everything is now right; you would not have a single thing altered; the whole way in which you have been led is a way of wisdom and mercy from beginning to end; and you would not have a single thing different to what it has been and now is. The trial was very painful at the time; it was a heavy cross, and you sometimes thought you could never live through it. But now you can say—"Bless God for it! He supported me under it, brought me through it, and I would not have one thing different from what it has been either in providence or in grace."
But you cannot truly and honestly say this except you have been, or are now favored with a revelation of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. What is the mind of man—of any man—of your mind, my mind, under affliction? Let him be tried with pain of body, poverty of circumstances, sickness in his family, guilt of conscience, hard bondage in his own soul, without any beam of divine light upon his path, and what is he? A murmuring, rebellious wretch, without a grain of resignation, without a particle of contentment or submission to the will of God.
But let the glory of the Lord be revealed; let him have a view by faith of a suffering Jesus; let some ray of light shine upon his path; let there be some breaking in of the exceeding weight of glory that is to be manifested at Christ's appearing—where are all his crooked things now? All made straight. But how? By his crooked will—crooked because it did not lie level with the Lord's—being made to harmonize with the promise and precept, the footsteps and example of the blessed Jesus. The crook is not taken out of the lot, but straightened in the lot; the cross is not removed from the shoulder, but strength—that strength which is "made perfect in weakness"—is given to bear it. So it was with Christ himself in the garden and on the cross; so it is with the believing followers of the crucified One.
4. But how does the Lord "make the ROUGH PLACES plain"? That rough and rugged road, where stumbling-blocks were so thickly strewed; the unbelief and infidelity of your heart; the suggestions of Satan and the workings of your own reasoning mind, which entangled you in such a maze; the briars and thorns which so lacerated your feet—what becomes of these rough places when the glory of the Lord is revealed? All these stumbling-blocks are removed in a moment; unbelief is silenced; infidelity is put to flight; Satan slinks away confounded; the reasoning mind bows to the force of the Spirit's inward witness; what was difficult to understand becomes easy to believe; and the intricate mazes where reason was lost are made plain to a childlike spirit.
Nothing can stand the Lord's presence and power. When these are felt, what obstacle will not give way? what valley will then not be exalted? what mountain and hill not then be made low? what crooked path not then be made straight; and what rough place not then be made plain? But it is only the revelation of the glory of the Lord that does this; and without it the valley will still be a valley, the mountain still be a mountain, the crooked place still be crooked, and the rough place still rough. What need have we, then, to be looking up to the Lord, that he would manifest Himself in love to our soul!
III. Now comes the solemn declaration from the Lord's own mouth—"And all flesh shall see it together."I take the word "flesh" in two senses. "All flesh," in its widest signification, comprehends all who are in the flesh; that is, all the sons and daughters of Adam. "God has appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he has ordained, whereof he has given assurance unto all men in that he has raised him from the dead" (Acts 17:31). In this sense, "all flesh" shall see the glory of God; that is, at the day of judgment, the great day of account, they shall see the glory of God in his justice, who do not see the glory of God in his mercy. "Shall not the Judge of the whole earth do right?" When the glory of the Lord shall be revealed—when Christ shall come with all his saints—when he shall sit upon the great white throne, and gather all nations before him, shall not all flesh then see him? As we read—"Every eye shall see him and they also who pierced him." When the dead, small and great, stand before God—when the books are opened, and the dead are "judged out of those things which were written in the books according to their works" (Rev. 20:12), the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it. An incarnate God shall sit upon the throne of judgment; and those who have lived and died in their sins shall call upon the rocks and mountains to fall upon them, and hide them from the face of him who sits upon the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb. But they shall call in vain; for the indignant Majesty of heaven shall blaze forth in a million flashes of lightning, and they shall hear their sentence pealed in the tones of a million thunders. And thus "all flesh shall see the glory of the Lord," some to their eternal joy, and others to their everlasting sorrow.
But we may also understand the words "all flesh" as embracing, in a more limited sense, all the people of God in the flesh—the saints of the Most High now in their mortal bodies, who are still encompassed with all the sins and sorrows and infirmities of the flesh. The apostle, therefore, speaks of "living in the flesh," and "abiding in the flesh" (Phil. 1:22, 24), as expressing his continuance in the body. In this sense, the saints of God in their present time-state, in their mortal condition, before they pass from time into eternity, shall all see the glory of the Lord; there shall be a revelation of the glory of Christ to their souls, which they shall see below by faith, before they see it above by sight, face to face.
Now is not this what your soul is seeking after? And do you not find that without this you can get no solid rest nor peace? Is not your eye from time to time looking upward for some discovery of the glory of Christ to your soul? Is not your heart every now and then stretching itself up to the everlasting hills, that there may be some breaking in of heavenly light, some gracious discovery of the power and presence of the Lord Jesus? Are you not longing for some believing view of the Son of God—for some application of his atoning blood to your conscience—for some shedding abroad of his love to your soul—for some visitation of his Spirit and grace to your heart? Is all dark and dreary without the presence of Christ? Is all cold and lifeless unless you feel your heart in some measure, touched and softened by the word of his grace?
If you have ever seen anything of the glory of the Lord, you will want to see it again; if you have ever felt the presence of Christ, you will want to feel it again; and if you have ever known what his power can do, what his blood can save from, and what his Spirit can in a moment produce, you will want again and again a renewal of this heavenly blessing, that you may have a firm and solid evidence of your saving interest in the love and blood of the Lamb, have every guilty doubt and fear chased away, and your whole soul filled with joy unspeakable and full of glory.
IV. But I now come to my last point, the ratification that God has given that all these things shall most surely come to pass—"The mouth of the Lord has spoken it."More than seven hundred years before Christ came into the world, God spoke these words by his servant Isaiah, and he fulfilled what he spoke. The son of God did come in the flesh; the glory of the Lord was revealed; and all flesh did see it together by the miracles that he wrought, the gracious words that he spoke, the holy life that he lived, and the suffering death which, according to the clear language of prophecy, he died. But in a more special manner did those behold his glory "who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God."
Not one jot or one tittle of God's word can pass away. The word that is gone out of his mouth in righteousness shall not return void. And this word the mouth of the Lord has spoken for your consolation, you saints of God, you children of the Most High. You are waiting for the Lord to appear to your soul "more than those who watch for the morning." Often in the night season are you looking up to his blessed Majesty, that he would himself speak a healing, reconciling, comforting word with power to your heart. Many an inward sigh, cry, and groan come up to him whose ears are ever open, and many a secret prayer is spread out before these holy and gracious eyes which neither slumber nor sleep. You may often, left to yourselves, have to grope in darkness—thick, Egyptian darkness, that may be felt; but that very darkness makes you feel your need of light. The cry of the Church has always been—"Lord, lift up the light of your countenance upon us."
You may often feel as if immersed in the very shadow of death, and say with Heman—"I am counted with those who go down into the pit; I am a man that has no strength" (Psalm 88:4); but the very feelings of death—the chill at your heart, and the cold sweat upon your brow—make you long for the appearance of him who is the Resurrection and the Life; and who can in one moment whisper—"Fear not; I am alive for evermore, and have the keys of hell and death."
You may be pressed down at times with the power of unbelief, and think and say there never was a heart like yours, so unable to believe, so doubting at every step; but this deep conviction of your wretched unbelief, which is the Spirit's work to show (John 16:9), only makes you long for that living faith of which Christ himself is not only the Object, but the Author and Finisher.
You may be sunk at times in despondency, as to both your present and future state; but that makes you the more desire to have a good hope through grace, as an anchor of the soul both sure and steadfast.
You may feel at times the guilt, and not only the guilt, but the dreaded power and prevalence of sin; but that only makes you long the more earnestly for manifestations of pardon and peace, and that no sin may have dominion over you. "The mouth of the Lord has spoken it," that sooner or later you shall have every needful blessing. The valley you now feel shall be exalted; the mountain and hill shall be made low—the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain, and your eyes shall see the glory of the Lord Christ shall be made precious to your heart; he will come sooner or later into your soul; and then when he comes he will manifest himself as your Lord and your God. And so you keep hanging, and hoping, and looking up until he appears; for your heart is still ever saying, "None but Jesus, can do helpless sinners good."
Here, then, we must leave it in his gracious hands who has not said unto the seed of Jacob—"Do you seek me in vain?" "Has he said, and shall he not do it; has he spoken, and shall he not make it good?"
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