Arno Gaebelein - The Lord of Glory

For a number of years the first pages of each issue of “Our Hope” have been devoted to brief meditations on the Person and Glory of our adorable Lord Jesus Christ. Three reasons led the Editor to do this: 1. He is worthy of all honor and glory, worthy to have the first place in all things. 2. The great need of His people to have His blessed Person, His past and present work, His power and glory, His future manifestation constantly brought before their hearts. 3. There is an ever increasing denial of the Person of our Lord. In the most subtle way His Glory has been denied. It is therefore eminently necessary for those who know Him to tell out His worth. Long and learned discussions on the Person of the Lord have been written in the past, but are not much read in these days. We felt that short and simple meditations on Himself would be welcomed by all believers.

All these brief articles were written with much prayer and often under deep soul exercise. It has pleased the Holy Spirit to own them in a most blessed way. Hundreds of letters were received telling of the great blessing these meditations have been and what refreshing they brought to the hearts of His people. Weary and tired ones were cheered, wandering ones restored and erring ones set right. Many wrote us or told us personally that the Lord Jesus Christ has become a greater reality and power in their lives after following this monthly testimony.

Suggestions were made to issue some of these notes in book form so that these blessed truths may be preserved in a more permanent form. We have done so and send this volume forth with the prayer that the Holy Spirit, who is here to glorify Christ, may use it to the praise and glory of His worthy Name. We are confident that such will be the case.

New York City, October 1, 1910.

“Unto Him who loveth us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God His Father; to Him be glory and dominion forever.” – Rev. i: 5-6.

“Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing.” – Rev. v: 12.

“Then they that feared the Lord spake one to another: and the Lord hearkened and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him for them that feared the Lord and that thought upon His Name .” – Mal. iii: 16.

“Let us go forth, therefore, unto Him without the camp bearing His reproach. For here we have no continuing city, but we seek one to come. By Him, therefore, let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is the fruit of our lips, confessing His Name .” – Hebrews xiii: 13-15.

“Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so. Come Lord Jesus.” – Rev. xxii: 20.

OUR ever blessed Lord, who died for us, to whom we belong, with whom we shall be forever, is the Lord of Glory. Thus He is called in 1 Cor. ii:8, “for had they known they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory .” Eternally He is this because He is “the express image of God, the brightness of His Glory” (Heb. i:3). He possessed Glory with the Father before the world was (John xvii:5). This Glory was beheld by the prophets, for we read that Isaiah “saw His Glory and spake of Him” (John xii:41). All the glorious manifestations of Jehovah recorded in the Word of God are the manifestations of “the Lord of Glory,” who created all things that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, who is before all things and by whom all things consist. He appeared as the God of Glory to Abraham (Acts vii:1); Isaac and Jacob were face to face with Him. Moses beheld His Glory. He saw His Glory on the mountain. The Lord of Glory descended in the cloud and stood with him there (Exod. xxxiv:5). How often the Glory of the Lord appeared in the midst of Israel. And what more could we say of Joshua, David, Daniel, Ezekiel, who all beheld His Glory and stood in the presence of that Lord of Glory.

In the fulness of time He appeared on earth “God manifested in the flesh.” Though He made of Himself no reputation and left His unspeakable Glory behind, yet He was the Lord of Glory, and as such He manifested His Glory. In incarnation in His holy, spotless life He revealed His moral Glory; what perfection and loveliness we find here! We have the testimony of His own “We beheld His Glory, the Glory as of the only begotten of the Father” (John i:14). “They saw His Glory” (Luke ix:32) when they were with Him in the holy mountain. They heard, they saw with their eyes, they looked upon, their hands handled the Word of life, the life that was manifested (1 John i:1-2). In His mighty miracles the Lord of Glory manifested His Glory, for it is written “this beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee and manifested forth His Glory” (John i:11).

And this Lord of Glory died. The focus of His Glory is the cross. He was obedient unto death, the death of the cross. He gave Himself for us. Without following here all the precious truths connected with that which is the foundation of our salvation and our hope, that the Lord of Glory, Christ died for our sins, we remember that God “raised Him up from the dead and gave Him Glory ” (1 Pet. i:21). He was “received up into Glory” (1 Tim. iii:16). “Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His Glory ” (Luke xxiv:26). The risen Lord of Glory said: “I ascend unto my Father and your Father; to my God and your God.” He is now in the presence of God, the Man in Glory, seated in the highest place of the heaven of heavens “at the right hand of the Majesty on high.” He is there “far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come” (Eph. i:21). He is highly exalted, the heir of all things. In that Glory He was beheld by human, mortal eyes. Stephen being full of the Holy Spirit “looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the Glory of God , and Jesus standing on the right hand of God” (Acts vii:55). This was the dying testimony of the first Christian martyr. Saul of Tarsus saw this Glory; he “could not see for the Glory of that light” (Acts xxii:11). John beheld Him and fell at His feet as dead. And we see Him with the eye of faith. “But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death crowned with Glory and Honor ” (Heb. ii:9).

But this is not all. The unseen Glory of the Lord and the unseen Lord of Glory will some day be visible, not to a few, but to the whole universe. He will come in the Glory of His Father and the holy angels with Him (Matt. xvi:27). The Lord of Glory will be “revealed from heaven with His mighty angels” (2 Thess. i:7). He will come in power and Glory, come in His own Glory (Luke ix:26) and sit on the throne of His Glory (Matt. xxv:31). His Glory then will cover the heavens (Hab. iii:3) and “the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea” (Hab. ii:14). The heavens cannot be silent forever and He who now is the object of the faith of believers, and the One whom the world has rejected, will come forth in all His Majesty and Glory and every eye shall see Him. Then every knee must bow at the name of Jesus and every tongue confess Him as Lord. In that manifestation of the Lord of Glory and the Glory of the Lord we His redeemed will be manifested in Glory. He will then be glorified in His saints and admired in all them that believed (2 Thess. i:10). He will bring His many sons to Glory (Heb. ii:10). We are “partakers of the Glory that shall be revealed” (1 Pet. v:1). The God of all Grace hath indeed called us unto His eternal Glory by Jesus Christ. “And when the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of Glory that fadeth not away” (1 Pet. v:4). “But rejoice inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ’s sufferings, that when His Glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy” (1 Pet. iv:13).