The 'face' of God is so strongly figurative an expression that its
metaphorical character cannot but be obvious to the most cursory reader.
The very frankness, and, we may say, the grossness of the image, saves
it from all misconception, and as with other similar expressions in the
Old Testament, at once suggests its meaning. We read, for example, of
the 'arm,' the 'hand,' the 'finger' of God, and everybody feels that
these mean His power. We read of the 'eye' of God, and everybody knows
that that means His omniscience. We read of the 'ear' of God, and we all
understand that that holds forth the blessed thought that He hears and
answers the cry of such as be sorrowful. And, in like manner, the 'face'
of God is the apprehensible part of the divine nature which turns to
men, and by which He makes Himself known. It is roughly equivalent to
the other Old and New Testament expression, the 'name of the Lord,' the
manifested and revealed side of the divine nature. And that is the
hiding-place into which men may go.
We have the other expression also in Scripture, 'the light of Thy
countenance,' and that helps us to apprehend the Psalmist's meaning.
'The light of Thy face' is 'secret.' What a paradox! Can light conceal?
Look at the daily heavens--filled with blazing stars, all invisible till
the night falls. The effulgence of the face is such that they that stand
in it are lost and hid, like the lark in the blue sky. 'A glorious
privacy of light is Thine.' There is a wonderful metaphor in the New
Testament of a woman 'clothed with the sun,' and caught up into it from
her enemies to be safe there. And that is just an expansion of the
Psalmist's grand paradox, 'Thou shalt hide them in the secret of Thy
face.' Light conceals when the light is so bright as to dazzle. They who
are surrounded by God are lost in the glory, and safe in that seclusion,
'the secret of Thy face.'
A thought may be suggested, although it is somewhat of a digression from
the main purpose of my text, but it springs naturally out of this
paradox, and may just deserve a word. Revelation is real, but revelation
has its limits. That which is revealed is 'the face of God,' but we
read, 'no man can see My face.' After all revelation He remains hidden.
After all pouring forth of His beams He remains 'the God that dwelleth
in the thick darkness,' and the light which is inaccessible is also a
darkness that can be felt. Apprehension is possible; comprehension is
impossible. What we know of God is valid and true, but we never shall
know all the depths that lie in that which we do know of Him. His face
is 'the secret'; and though men may malign Him when they say, 'Verily,
Thou art a God that hidest Thyself, O God of Israel!' and He answers
them, 'I have not spoken in secret' in a dark 'place of the earth,' it
still remains true that revelation has its mysteries born of the
greatness of its effulgence, and that all which we know of God is 'dark
with excess of light.'
But that is aside from our main purpose. Let me rather remind you of how
the thought of the secret of God's face being the secure hiding-place of
them that love Him points to this truth--that that brightness of light
has a repellent power which keeps far away from all intermingling with
it everything that is evil. The old Greek mythologies tell us that the
radiant arrows of Apollo shot forth from his far-reaching bow, wounded
to death the monsters of the slime and unclean creatures that crawled
and revelled in darkness. And the myth has a great truth in it. The
light of God's face slays evil, of whatsoever kind it is; and just as
the unlovely, loathsome creatures that live in the dark and find
themselves at ease there writhe and wriggle in torment, and die when
their shelter is taken away and they are exposed to the light beating on
their soft bodies, so the light of God's face turned upon evil things
smites them into nothingness. Thus 'the secret of His countenance' is
the shelter of all that is good.
Nor need I remind you how, in another aspect of the phrase, the 'light
of His face,' is the expression for His favour and loving regard, and
how true it is that in that favour and loving regard is the impregnable
fortress into which, entering, any man is safe. I said that the
expression the 'face of the Lord' roughly corresponded to the other one,
'the name of the Lord,' inasmuch as both meant the revealed aspect of
the divine nature. You may remember how we read, 'The name of the Lord
is a strong tower into which the righteous runneth and is safe.' The
'light' of the face of the Lord is His favour and loving regard falling
upon men. And who can be harmed with that lambent light--like sunshine
upon water, or upon a glittering shield--playing around Him?
Only let us remember that for us 'the face of God' is Jesus Christ. He
is the 'arm' of the Lord; He is the 'name' of the Lord; He is the
'face.' All that we know of God we know through and in Him; all that we
see of God we see by the shining upon us of Him who is 'the eradiation
of His glory and the express image of His person.' So the open secret of
the 'face' of God is Jesus, the hiding-place of our souls.