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JesustheBeautiful-final from Refreshing Hope Ministries on Vimeo.

Transcript: 

Today I want to talk about Jesus The Beautiful, and what I have learned about Him over the years. Now when I say beautiful, some are going to quote Isaiah 53:2 so I need to lay a bit of a foundation first: 

Isaiah 53:2-3 (NKJV) — He has no form or comeliness; And when we see Him, There is no beauty that we should desire Him. He is despised and rejected by men, A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.

The word “beauty” in that verse is speaking about the physical appearance of Jesus when He walked on the earth. God chose to make His Son nothing special to look at. Just a common man, born in a stable, to poor parents. 

What I am saying is that there is an inner beauty that is not shown on the surface of your skin. If you only measure beauty by outward physical attractiveness, then porn stars will be at the top of your list. I say there is something deeper than that, and over the years, I have seen beautiful people make themselves very ugly, and some homely people appear beautiful. 

So can we use the word “Beautiful” to describe Jesus? Yes. There are many scriptures that connect beauty to God. 

Psalm 27:4 (NKJV) — One thing I have desired of the LORD, That will I seek: That I may dwell in the house of the LORD All the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the LORD, And to inquire in His temple.

Psalm 96:6 (NKJV) — Honor and majesty are before Him; Strength and beauty are in His sanctuary.

One that I want to focus on is Isaiah 52:7, it tells us:

Isaiah 52:7 (NKJV) — How beautiful upon the mountains Are the feet of him who brings good news, Who proclaims peace, Who brings glad tidings of good things, Who proclaims salvation, Who says to Zion, “Your God reigns!”

This is Jesus. The Gospel of Jesus Christ IS the “Good News” and Jesus brought it. Acts 7:20 tells us that Moses was beautiful in God’s sight, how much more so was Jesus. So yes, I believe that we can apply beauty as an attribute to Jesus scripturally.  

Now I want to talk about why it matters. See Jesus was not physically or outwardly attractive, but yet people were drawn to Him like a magnet. In Luke 9:14 there were about 5,000 men following Jesus when He fed them with a few loaves of bread, not counting women and children. Why were so many people drawn to this simple carpenter?

Some reasons were that He was pure, fresh, untainted, understanding, and loving. Contrary to what is taught today in many places, Jesus did not condemn the sinners. The sinners flocked to Him, and Jesus actively sought them out like in the case of Zacchaeus (Luke 19:5) and it changed their lives. Jesus ate lunch with sinners while the religious elite stood outside and whined about it.


Matthew 9:10–13 (NKJV) — Now it happened, as Jesus sat at the table in the house, that behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat down with Him and His disciples. And when the Pharisees saw it, they said to His disciples, “Why does your Teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” When Jesus heard that, He said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy and not sacrifice.’ For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.”

We love to quote John 3:16 in the church, but very few quote John 3:17:

John 3:17 (NKJV) — For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.

What I am saying is that many have taken the beauty of Jesus, His message, and turned it into a message of condemnation, fear, guilt, and shame. They use “churchology” as a means of power and control. We have sat through “one on one” sermons where the pastor is preaching to correct YOUR behavior. Sylvia and I have had them call out our names during their sermons to make sure that we understood that the message was for us, simply because we had asked questions about a previous message. God gave His sheep a brain, and I think that we should use it. That “leave your brain at the door” idea never worked for me.

Numbers 12:3 states that Moses was the meekest, most humble man on the earth. Yet we have heard “Touch not My anointed” thrown around far too much by people that were not like Moses at all. I think that we need to come down from our private holy mountain and rejoin the common people like Jesus did. 

What have we done to the beautiful truths that Jesus left us with? It is appalling to see how far that we have drifted away from what matters. Today is Mother’s day and every church sign that we have seen is displaying a “Mother’s day service.” I have nothing against honoring Mother’s, but let us remember that Mother’s day was created by a greeting card company so that they could sell greeting cards for profit. A funny thing is, that when we mention Easter and Christmas, we get all kinds of complaints about them being pagan holidays and people boycott the services. Yet Mother’s day and Father’s day are embraced when they were created purely “for profit.” Please pardon my ranting…

Jesus and the Gospel of Christ in its pure, un-perverted form, is absolutely beautiful. But there have always been those that try and add requirements to it and to make it more strict. Paul told the Galatians: 

Galatians 1:6–8 (NKJV) — I marvel that you are turning away so soon from Him who called you in the grace of Christ, to a different gospel, which is not another; but there are some who trouble you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed.

Paul told them this because people had come into their church and required them to be circumcised in order to be saved. They had “perverted” the original message of salvation. God told Adam to not eat the fruit from the tree in the center of the garden of Eden, and a few verses later Eve said that they could not eat, nor touch it. The tendency is always to increase the strictness and severity of God. Cake on layer after layer of this and you have something that we call religion, that has little resemblance to what God intended to redeem His people. Instead of setting people free, we bring them into bondage. Jesus said it best in Matthew 23:15:

Matthew 23:15 (NKJV) — “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.

Now don’t get me wrong, I am not condoning sinful behavior. In my own life, I try to walk close to Jesus. I try and keep a short repentance list, when I stumble in some way and the Holy Spirit convicts me, then I try and get it under the blood quickly by old fashioned repentance. Like telling God: “I am sorry, please forgive me for that.” For example: Jesus told us to love our neighbors as ourselves. I don’t always manage to do that, so I end up asking for forgiveness. I am condemning adding our words to the word of God and turning things into sin that were never intended to be, and then finding a verse that we can twist to support it. 

Jesus is beautiful. He needs no makeup and His word needs no additions. To know Him, is to love Him. That is why the crowds of thousands followed Him. Too many still see Jesus on a crucifix. I have news for you, Jesus is no longer on the cross and He has died His last time. The suffering servant was a season of His life just like being a baby in a manger. The next time Jesus comes, it will be as The King of Kings. Philippians 2:10 tells us that every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord. 

If we can get out of the way and let Him flow through us, then His love will touch the people around us. I have had people come up to me before and say: “I want what you have. I want to know the Jesus that you know.” Even though their families went to church every time the doors were open, they saw something different. 

What I want to stress is that we can be a carrier of the real thing. That we don’t have to pretend that we are holier than we actually are. We don’t have to wear that plastic church face like we have it altogether, instead we can be the broken people that love Jesus with all their heart, soul, mind and strength. This is my prayer today:
 
 
Prayer: Heavenly Father, I pray that You draw my heart to You, that You let me carry Your very presence here on the earth. That You protect me from deception and perversions of Your word. That when people meet me, they meet You. That You speak to me, and through me. Let me meet Jesus the Beautiful in a life changing way for I am Yours. In the name of Jesus Christ I pray.