“he had no form or majesty that we should look at him,
and no beauty that we should desire him.” Isaiah 53:2b
These prophetic words constructed by the prophet Isaiah are scandalous. As God breathed into the soul of Isaiah these words become the projection of a father declaring that someday the son that would be his offspring would have nothing physically compelling about him.
“Someday I’m going to have a son… but he won’t be much to look at.”
And yet God knew that His son would possess an attractiveness unlike any human to ever walk the planet.
There was something ever so beautiful about Jesus. He attracted enormous crowds, not because He was a side show, or hideous to look at… but because, in His rapturous humility, He attracted the lowly, the weak, the wounded, the contrite, the forgotten, the invisible, the blind, the lame, the deaf, the possessed, the rejected, the leprous, the destitute, the irreligious, the scoundrel, the promiscuous, the simple, the desperate.
In fact, Jesus’ gloriously attractive heart was repulsive to the proud, and the prominent, and the power-hungry, and the political. The self-righteous reviled Him, while the humble embraced Him.
Make no mistake, Jesus was beautiful… but in a way that transcended time.
God knew. His plan was perfect.
A square-jawed, chiseled body beauty would create a hysteria that would mask the glorious beauty of Jesus. God’s cosmic design was to deliver a Savior that would be impossible to ignore because of the transcendent beauty of His life.
We can wonder what He looked like, but we will never wonder what He was.
God flashed no pocket photos of His son – but He made certain that we could know Him. That we could approach Him. That we could be transformed by Him.
Is it any wonder that Jesus invites us to live beautiful lives… of meekness, of humility, of generosity, of grace, of mercy, of compassion, of forgiveness, of love… because this was His beauty. His majesty.
In His physical austerity Jesus found a wealth of beauty in a heart consumed with the things of God.
What amazing love. What mind-numbing humility… that the creator of the most beautiful things imaginable became something so profoundly unimpressive in order to point us to the things that matter most.
This is good news to everyone except those consumed with their own beauty. This is liberating to everyone except those held captive by their love for themselves. This is transformational to everyone except those that are content with “me.”
“he had no form or majesty that we should look at him,
and no beauty that we should desire him.” But make no mistake He was and He is our Beautiful Savior.
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