"One thing have I asked of the LORD, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to inquire in his temple." ( Psalm 27:4 )
The Farmer rotated his humble herd this past week into the lower pasture. Since this field doesn't have access to a water source, I fill up a couple of those big, sturdy rubber tubs sold at a local farm store with an extended garden hose connected to a nozzle at the well pump in the upper field.
Yesterday when I went to check the cow's water supply I felt bad because I had let it get empty. Cows can really go through water in this heat! The cows, resting in the shade of a nearby oasis of locust trees, remained in their reposeful positions except for the Farmer's bull. He stood and began to approach slowly understanding my present chore.
When the cool, fresh water began to cascade from the hose and into the main tub, the bull drew closer. I lifted the hose occasionally and sprayed him off a bit. The steam lifted from his smooth black fur in the midst of the liquid droplets dancing in the air.
I admired his strength.
The Farmer had brought him home from another farm in our area almost two years prior as a young bull calf with good breeding potential. He had since sired several nice, brawny calfs, honestly, too well. He seemed to be a gentle soul of a bull. I had not known him to be raucous or aggressive.
But today, waiting in the unrelenting, late summer heat as the sun poured out full throttle, standing still for more than a few minutes, I realized that his majesty had snuck up on me.
His sleek, ebony hide stretched amply across a mass of healthy, protruding shoulder muscles. I noticed that his head, once small, barely rising above the overgrown stick weed in the pasture, was now wide and most prominent as he turned it gradually toward the fresh supply of water before him. His long, thick tail continued to take occasional swipes at the annoying swarm of flies buzzing above him. He swallowed huge gulps of water from the tub, and then lifted his massive head to take a breath.
At once I seemed to come to my senses, and a chill ran from the top of my ball cap to the bottom of my dirty tennis shoes. The reality of the two feet of empty space between us with my only defense being a flimsy garden hose had sunk into my brain. I backed up gently and let myself out of the gate putting the electric fence between us while allowing the water hose to continue flowing into the tubs above the fence, replenishing the gallons of water he had inhaled.
I had permitted myself to be enthralled in his beauty, becoming unaware of anything else around me.
It registered with me as I finished filling the troughs that this captivation can be good or bad. Bad when we become so enamored with something in this world that we lose sight of reality and everything else around us. Even good things can become idols.
However, when we are captivated with the transcendent beauty of Jesus, paradoxically, it actually awakens our senses to the world around us, to the suffering and to the grace. Reordering our loves, as Augustine taught, will cause us to love everyone and everything else in our lives much better. We also develop grace to endure the processes that enable those changes to occur.
I never understood the beauty of Jesus because I never understood salvation; I thought I did. Once I held still long enough to gaze over and into the Scriptures, his beauty became real to me; I became better at pointing others toward it. I wasn't as intimidated anymore because I had experienced it for myself.
We must never stop praying for God to open our eyes and stop our wayward feet from wandering away into the things of this world from the beauty of Christ before us, to secure deep inside of us a desire to fix our gaze on him.
The beauty of Jesus opens our eyes to see the beauty in his creation, to see the budding, awkward calf mature into the handsome, majestic bull. And to delight in it. His beauty gives us the ability to see through the brokenness, and to rejoice at the hope of one day seeing creation restored, imaging the resplendency of the world to come.
More importantly, the knowledge of his beauty, his love and sacrifice, the emptying of himself for us, empowers us to see ourselves and others growing from immaturity and pride into wisdom and humility. To see the Bride one fine day robed in her future glory. The beauty of Jesus invites unity in her.
When we come to our senses as disciples of Jesus mesmerized in the majesty, beauty, and holiness of the resurrected Christ, against the backdrop of broken humanity, that is not just before us, but has come to live in us, if this merciful, gracious truth awakens a sudden, holy fear in our souls, we know we are on the right track.
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| Starlight and her young bull calf from the Farmer's bull |
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