Things That Matter Most. . . No.2
A CHRISTIAN VIEW OF BEAUTY
Even though the great artist Anatole France said that
we shall never be able to determine why a thing is beautiful, we
think it proper for Christians to exercise their aesthetic sense and
make inquiry into the nature of beauty. We talk about things being right and wrong,
and if we probe into the meanings of these
terms we are concerned with ethics. We speak of real
and unreal, which
gets us into metaphysics. And valid and invalid, which
involves us in logic. We speak of holy and unholy, which are
theological in import.
And we refer to things as beautiful
and ugly, which
get us into aesthetics. All these evaluations are part of our
everyday life, but such judgments should be meaningful. We should
understand why the things we judge to be good are indeed good. And
why is wrong wrong? Just so terms like beautiful
and ugly should
be appropriately used by the Christian. These are among the things
that matter most.
It might prove to be an insightful experience for us to
list those things we consider the most beautiful. And what are the
ugliest things you’ve seen?
There is almost universal agreement about the beauty of
a sunset, a starlit sky, a waterfall, a forest of evergreens. We also
reach virtual agreement as to the ugliness of death, slums, erosion
of the soil, a wrecked automobile. But for the most parr beauty is
subjective. To many people Elizabeth Taylor is beautiful; to others
of us she is not. I see beauty in a well-executed forward pass in a
football game; to many others it is nothing of the kind. As I look
back over my childhood. I can recall nothing more attractive to my
sight than a well-proportioned watermelon cooling on the back porch.
It became even more beautiful when placed on the kitchen table where
a long knife was gently thrust into it, cracking it open from one end
to the other, exposing its rich redness.
Others see beauty in the five-pound bass on the end of
their line; others in a birdie on the golf course; others in a great
speech in the halls of congress. Most of us have our greatest
experience with beauty in beholding our blushing bride at the altar
or in the squirming face of the newly-born baby in our arms. Most of
us do not find our paychecks hard to look at, and sometimes a diploma
or degree can be lovelier to behold than any sunset.
We are saying, as did the Jewish philosopher Spinoza,
that a thing is beautiful to us because it is desired. This would
make the most undesirable things the ugliest. This is what makes
cars, homes and women beautiful to so many of us. We view things as
beautiful in reference to their importance to us. That nail for want
of which a kingdom was lost would have been lovelier to behold than a
trunk of jewels. To a man lost at sea no sound or sight could be more
beautiful than a rescue plane circling above him.
Here we have the key to the Christian view of beauty.
Prayer becomes beautiful to us the more we desire communion with God.
So with unity, faith, worship. It is only after we have experienced
the ugliness of faction and division with all their pain and
heartache that we are in a position to see the beauty of sharing the
common life. It is in the face of doubt and fear that we see the
loveliness of a triumphant faith—a deep trust that through
Christ we are more than conquerors. How beautiful that is! And it is
in our realization of both the differences between men and the
inadequacy of man that we are struck with the miraculous beauty of
Christian worship. Rich and poor, the sophisticated and the simple,
young and old, the poet and the literalist, all alike and together
can worship the Lord of glory. What beauty that is, whether it
happens in a palacious edifice or in a dingy hovel!
An Illustration of Beauty
One of the most beautiful places on earth to me is
Bethany, which I prefer to identify without naming the state in which
it is located. Not that I have anything against West Virginia, but
Bethany is such a lovely name and the village is so important in the
history of the cause I so deeply love that I prefer simply to say Bethany. Isn’t
it a beautiful word? It is suggestive of the presence of God. In the New Testament it is a
village where our Lord was anointed and where He raised Lazarus from
the dead. In 1963 I was privileged to visit this little hamlet of
some 750 souls and see the old church edifice that now stands where
the home of Martha and Mary once stood. When I descended into the
tomb of Lazarus, which they believe is authentic, and stood by the
ledge hewn from the stone wall where Lazarus once lay, it seems that
I could hear the cry of the Messiah in the distance, “Lazarus,
come forth!”
There amidst the flicker of my guide’s
candlelight I found beauty, despite the dullness and dampness of a
deep and dark cave. The village itself is not appealing to the eyes
and the earth looks as if it has been raped by the elements, but it
was all a beautiful experience.
So it was with another Bethany I visited in Palestine,
the place where John baptized, which recent research indicates is
properly called Bethany. See John 1:28 in a modern translation.
Hucksters were selling small bottles filled with water taken from the
place where Jesus was baptized. I made my way to the traditional site
where the Baptist proclaimed the coming kingdom and immersed the
penitent for the remission of their sins, and of course where our
Lord Himself was immersed. It was a dirty, muddy little river, though
sufficiently large to do a lot of immersing. I just had to get into
that water, as I had the waters of the Dead Sea and the
Mediterranean. So with shoes, clothes, and all I piled myself in.
Anywhere else it would have been silly. But there it was something
beautiful to me, as was the muddy little stream.
Bethany. A
lovely name, isn’t it?
No wonder Alexander Campbell changed the name of the little hamlet
where he and others were to do such important things from Buffalo to
Bethany.
The physical beauty of our Bethany in America is
sometimes breathtaking. I recall an early morning walk with my wife
on a wintry morn amidst undisturbed snow. Inches of snow lay quietly
upon the finger-like branches of the countless trees, accented by
icicles brightened by the soft morning sun. Valleys and hills
stretched out endlessly towards the blue horizon as if crowded with
freshly-washed sheep with their full measure of white wool. It was a
winter wonderland.
Springtime is equally thrilling. The verdant hills with
their trees of many species defy description. The fresh air is surely
perfumed by the presence of nymphs who dance amongst the tree-tops in
the spring. The water brooks move majestically, as if inspired by the
music of a million birds. The old Buffalo, witness to a legion of new
births, twists and turns through the hills as if still determined to
be a maker of history.
Autumn at Bethany is a suitable symbol of the unity its
fathers sought to restore. The air is crisp and vital. The sunshine
is warm and confident. The robins and the orioles have built their
nests and nurtured their young, and now they make their annual
pilgrimage to points south, assuring us by their hesitant and belated
departures that they shall return, fitly symbolizing renewal through
recovery, the crowning effort of Bethany’s heroes. The gallant
trees, large and small and innumerable, take on all the colors of the
rainbow, assuring us that only God can make a tree, and depicting the
unity in diversity that both God and His church bear witness to.
It was these old hills of Bethany that welcomed the
Campbells and cradled the Restoration Movement. For all this I love
the place. It describes for me, far better than can my pen, the
meaning of beauty. It is truly a theatre of the glory of God.
The beauty of Bethany found its highest expression in
the unity meeting conducted there last summer in honor of Alexander
Campbell, who died a century ago after giving his life to the cause
of ecumenicity. Like the trees in the fall with their multiplicity of
colors, we had virtually every shade of brotherhood opinion
represented. It was the first time for many of them to study and pray
with their estranged brothers in Christ. The mutual love that
prevailed overshadowed the things that have for too long divided us.
It was fitting that this effort toward unity should take place at the
home of Campbell, who labored so tirelessly for so long for such an
ideal. It was at the same time tragic that Campbell’s own heirs
of the Restoration Movement were themselves splintered into numerous
sects.
But it was a thing of beauty to see these men sit down
together in the Old Church where the Campbells themselves gathered
each Lord’s Day a century before. The old meeting-house, long
in disuse, was opened for this special occasion. The speakers
represented the three major wings of discipledom. We all sat together
as brothers around the Father’s table. We worshiped together.
In that hour at least we were indeed one. We were brothers, and we
were treating each other as such. To glance about the room and see
brotherhood leaders—ministers, professors, editors—sitting
side by side before the Lord’s Table, men who supposed only a
few years ago that such an experience would be impossible, was a
beautiful thing to behold. Like all of nature about us, it
demonstrated the beauty of unity in diversity.
Conditions of Beauty
Even though beauty is largely subjective,
meaning that it is dependent upon our own
personal desires, it nevertheless follows that certain conditions
must prevail if a thing is to be deemed beautiful. Men may
justifiably differ as to whether a piece of abstract art is
beautiful, but something is seriously wrong when a man sees a bursted
water pipe as a thing of beauty.
1. Appropriateness.
Even gold is not lovely to look upon if
misappropriated. In Pro. 11:22 we read: “Like a gold ring in a
swine’s snout is a beautiful woman without discretion.”
When a gold ring is placed upon a finger in symbol of matrimony, it
is indeed beautiful. But in a hog’s nose it loses its beauty.
Solomon is saying that fair woman likewise loses her beauty when she
behaves indiscretely.
To me few things are lovelier than a library of books.
Books can mean so much: companionship, knowledge, freedom,
friendship. A man’s books become a part of him, and what is
more beautiful than a man with his books, ever searching for more
light to walk by.
But the library loses its beauty when it is inherited
by a giddy simpleton who sees books only as decoration and who toys
with them for the novelty of it. His reference to “my library”
does not have the meaning that it had with the previous owner. The
beauty is gone because it is no longer appropriate.
2. Perfection or Integrity.
David mentions in Psalms 27 that the one thing he asks
for is that he might “behold the beauty of the Lord.”
Psa. 96:6 reads: “Honor and majesty are before him; strength
and beauty are in his sanctuary.” The Lord is beautiful because
of His perfection. God has complete integrity. This is why we should
trust Him. He will do what He says He will do. God is truth and truth
is integrity. This is why we view truth as beautiful and falsehood as
ugly.
Ezekiel rebukes the proud city of Tyre for saying “1
am perfect in beauty,” for Tyre lacked integrity. The prophet
said to her: “You corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your
splendor” (Ezek. 28-17). Here is an instance of earthly beauty
(as man would see it) that is ugly before the eyes of God. Whereas
Psa. 149:4 shows that God gives beauty to the humble. “The Lord
sees not as man sees; man looks on the outward appearance, but the
Lord looks on the heart” (1 Sam. 16:7). What man, with all his
false values, sees as ugly the Lord may see as beautiful, and what
man sees as beautiful the Lord may see as ugly.
3. Harmony and Diversity.
Congregations and homes alike are beautiful when they
are harmoniously blended in love. There is diversity aplenty in every
family and church in the land, and there is beauty when that
diversity achieves oneness. There is no loveliness in sameness. Men
are so very different in so many ways, and their religion is a thing
of beauty when because of their love for Christ and for each other
they are one. Unity in diversity is the only kind of unity that is
possible.
“God has made everything beautiful in its time;
also he has put eternity into man’s mind” (Ecc. 3:11).
God not only made the tree, but he framed it with many elements of
nature. He not only made man, but placed him in an atmosphere of
great variety. Beauty is unity in diversity.
The Beauty of Holiness
The Bible says many interesting things about beauty.
Those who proclaim the gospel are said to have beautiful feet (Rom.
10:15). We are told that the beauty of old men is in their gray hair
(Pro. 20:29). Many women are referred to as being beautiful, but
Absalom is the only man so described, perhaps because “from the
sole of his foot to the crown of his head there was no blemish in
him” (2 Sam. 14:25). David’s eyes are described as
beautiful (1 Sam. 16:12) .
Both the temple and Jerusalem are mentioned as being
beautiful, as well as ornaments, garments, and crowns. The glorious
Messiah is said to be beautiful (Isa. 4:2), but the suffering servant
of Isa. 53, which is descriptive of the humanity of Jesus, plainly
says that He has “no beauty that we should desire him.”
There is a deceitful beauty: “Charm is deceitful,
and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised”
(Pro. 31:30). And so we have the young man being warned: “Do
not desire her beauty in your heart, and do not let her capture you
with her eyelashes” (Pro. 6:25).
The reference that best summarizes the Christian view
of beauty is I Chron. 16:29: “Worship the Lord in the beauty of
holiness.” This meets the standards for beauty: it is
appropriate, it is perfect and has integrity, and it is harmonious.
Rich and poor alike, master and slave together, men from all walks of
life, regardless of their differences in color, race and ideology,
can worship the Lord. And they are to do so with that holiness
without which no man can see the Lord (Heb. 12:15).
Like Absalom’s body that was without blemish, and
was therefore beautiful, just so our lives are to be surrendered to
the Lord in their entirety. This makes God beautiful to us, as well
as all His creation. We will then appreciate the beauty of His
purposes. Christ will be “the diadem of beauty” and He
will dwell in our hearts through faith. Life will then, and only
then, be a beautiful experience, despite its many hardships. And
heaven will be to us an eternity of beauty with God, the author of
all beauty.
“Let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us,
and establish thou the work of our hands upon us, yea, the work of
our hands establish thou it.” (Psa. 90:17)—the
Editor