Margaret’s Song

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  There was a king in Thule,  True even to the grave;  To whom his dying mistress  A golden beaker gave.  At every feast he drained it,  Naught was to him so dear,  And often as he drained it,  Gush’d from his eyes the tear.  When death came, unrepining  His cities o’er he told;  All to his heir resigning,  Except his cup of gold.  With many a knightly vassal  At a royal feast sat he,  In yon proud hall ancestral,  In his castle o’er the sea.  Up stood the jovial monarch,  And quaff’d his last life’s glow,  Then hurled the hallow’d goblet  Into the flood below.  He saw it splashing, drinking,  And plunging in the sea;  His eyes meanwhile were sinking,  And never again drank he. “Margaret’s Song” by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) in “Faust. Part I.”

"How could some see God and not be changed?"

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This question was one of many (so far) fielded at the end of the first day of lectures I gave in Kenya, Africa on the subject of "Man, Sin and Salvation." This specific question is best understood in context with other questions preceding this post.

Is it possible for one to see God and not be changed? Perhaps that is a better question. So far we have noted the devastating effects of an encounter with God, taking special observation at the extension of grace from God, that one should be allowed to tolerate His presence. One simply cannot see God and not be changed.

"But," one may ask, "what about Jesus? Since Jesus is God, how could people encounter Him and not react the same way as those in the Old Testament?" While deity of Christ is sure, we must also remember the manner in which God revealed Himself as the Son. Philippians 2:6-8 gives us an idea about how this happened: "although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross."

He knew that we would not understand what it meant for Him to be equal with God, so in order for Him to accomplish His plan, He "emptied Himself"; that is, He manifested Himself physically as a servant, subject to the laws of the universe geographically and physically. He remained fully God while being fully man.

Jesus lived on this earth among the spiritually dead, who were spiritually blind and deaf as well. And we read that those who encountered Him were changed, in some way or another.

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