Two people sit on top of a mountain and watch the most beautiful sunrise anyone could imagine. They both see the spectrum of colors move as the sky changes its shade from the darker tones of night to the glimmers of red on the horizon and then the warmness of the orange beam that eventually transforms the whole sky into a satisfying blue. They both hear the morning song of the birds as they witness the unveiling of the majestic, green mountains. One of the two witnesses praises God in gratitude and delight and the other ignores any notion that this beauty declares the glory of the Beautifier. They both witness and acknowledge the same reality of beauty and yet the difference between them is infinite. For one, beauty builds the anticipation of standing before its Creator, for the other beauty demands wrath.
In Romans 1, Paul makes it clear that God’s wrath is revealed in those who experience the creation of God and exchange his glory to worship the creation rather than the Creator. It is not that one has to be a believer to acknowledge or experience beauty. One must be a believer to know and live in the purpose of beauty and praise God in his glory. In his Psalm, David put it this way, “The heavens declare the glory of God and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.” (Psalm 19:1). In Romans 11:36 Paul declares, “For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.” The truth that we find so overwhelmingly clear in the Scriptures is that beauty can never be an end in itself. It is not good enough to acknowledge that something is beautiful. Every human being experiences the universal benevolence of God and can acknowledge the plain reality of beauty. Only some (the elect) can experience beauty in all the wonder of its purpose as they delight in the reality that beauty is a revelation of God. The difference between these two people is Christ.
“In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. 5 For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. 6 For God, who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” (2 Corinthians 4:4-6).
Mankind is blinded, not to the reality of beauty, but to the reality of God’s beauty in all his glory. Only through Christ can true beauty be known in its revelation of God’s glory. In every other way, the ignorance of God’s glory in every experience of beauty in this world is an accumulating mountain of evidence requiring a righteous judgment of eternal condemnation. For the Christian, as we know Christ by faith and live by faith, we know and experience God’s beauty in this world and delight in his glory by faith. Every time we don’t, we are called to repentance because everything that does not proceed from faith is sin (Romans 14:23).
Consider the reality of this for just a moment. In the universal benevolence of God, Mozart experienced the beauty of God’s creation. This is a creation that included the beauty of sound, tone, harmony, structure and order. Mozart used all of this to create symphonies that resound in beauty. Can we call one of Mozart’s symphonies beautiful when it seems that it was written from an unregenerate heart with no care for God’s glory? The answer is yes, of course we can. It is God’s creation of tone and harmony and structure, and it is God’s creation of human ingenuity and talent for which Mozart could compose a beautiful arrangement. In this sin-cursed world, those outside of Christ can compose beautiful art to their condemnation while those in Christ can enjoy that art to God’s delight.
How do you experience God’s beauty?