The Beauty of Holiness - The Holiness of Beauty

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.” (Isaiah 6:3)

Holiness, glory, and beauty are inseparable. God’s holiness is manifest in the brilliant and otherworldly radiance of glory – glory that streams from God’s throne and invades and pervades all creation. This sacred glory takes the form of beauty – sacred beauty that is a formal expression of God’s holiness and God’s glory.

Why, then, does beauty play such a minor role in contemporary expressions of faith – especially among protestants, and even more particularly, evangelical protestants? Why do we make such a big deal about holiness and glory while simultaneously ignoring beauty?

The great philosopher, Plato, proposed three qualities of eternal significance: truth, goodness, and beauty. All are certainly important. However, in the evangelical world, truth and goodness receive far more attention than beauty. We love our theology (truth) and demand goodness (ethics) while neglecting beauty (art, aesthetics).

At best, beauty has often been treated as a Cinderella, compared with the attention paid by theologians to her two sisters, truth and goodness, an attention manifested in theology’s predominant concern with doctrine and ethics, and resulting in the intellectualization of religion in recent centuries.[1]

Our emphasis on conceptual, judicial, and moral categories far outweighs our interest in beauty, splendor, and loveliness. And yet all three – truth, goodness, and beauty – are essential and eternal aspects of God. Each finds its source in God; without God there would be no truth, goodness, or beauty. Put simply:

• God is truth. All truth – whether religious or not (and truth is much bigger than “religious” truth) – reflects its source, namely, God. When we experience truth, we experience God. When we illumine truth, we illumine God.
• God is good. All goodness reflects its source, namely, God. When we receive good, we taste God’s goodness. When we do good, we reflect God.
• In the same way that God is truth and God is good, God is beauty. All beauty reflects its source, namely, God. When we experience beauty, we experience God. When we create beauty, we reveal God to others.

Neglecting Beauty

If this is the case, why then do we tend to neglect beauty? Is there a reason why we are hesitant to speak of beauty? Following are a list of reasons why we do not give beauty the attention we give truth and goodness.

Beauty is merely decorative. We often reduce our definition of beauty to encompass that which is simply pretty, inoffensively pleasant, or harmlessly nice. We have good reason to do so. Much of what passes for beauty is simply this and nothing more. Thomas Kinkade paintings and Precious Moments figurines have a certain beauty, but it is not the profound beauty of Rembrandt or Michelangelo. Kinkade paintings and Precious Moments figurines possess a naïve innocence, an inoffensive pleasantness, but do not reflect the deep dimensions of beauty found in reality – beauty that includes humanity and its dark dimensions.[2] But even Kinkade paintings and Precious Moments are light-years ahead of most of the “Jesus-junk” which litters many Christian bookshops. Teddy bears with crosses on their bellies and Jesus action figures simply send the wrong message – the beauty is detached from truth and is lost in mere sentiment.

Beauty is simply subjective. This is expressed in the popular cliché: “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” The sentiment is that beauty is completely subjective and possesses no objective quality. However, our difficulty in defining beauty should not prevent us from recognizing an objective element to beauty – an element that goes beyond mere taste.

Some things are simply more beautiful than others. Michelangelo’s marble statue of King David is more beautiful than any Precious Moments’ figurine. Classical music is more beautiful than “Weird Al” Yankovic’s ditties. In order to appreciate the deeper dimensions of beauty in fine art or symphonic music, one must train and refine one’s tastes. Philosopher Mortimer Adler argues that

individuals can be trained in the experience of beauty, their tastes can be improved or cultivated as they can be trained to apprehend more and more complex objects. And this fact, while it indicates, of course, the subjective aspect of beauty, also points to something in the object which is itself beautiful. For otherwise, if this were not the case, there would be no sense in which we could speak of the improvement in a person’s taste. If there is any sense at all for speaking of improving the individual's taste, it must be because objects are more or less beautiful and the person whose taste is improved is able to appreciate the beauty of the more excellent thing.

Let me make that point a little more clearly. The better the individual’s taste is the more beautiful will be the objects he can appreciate.[3]

A greater appreciation of beauty comes about when we make a concerted effort to enlarge our capacity to enjoy deeper dimensions of beauty. This includes our enjoyment of God. Some have suggested that life is simply a training ground to learn how to better love, adore, and enjoy God. Through spiritual teaching and practice we enlarge our capacity to appreciate and experience God’s beauty. Though all people can enjoy a symphony, those who have understand all that is involved in a great performance – music theory, instrumental technique, etc. – will enjoy a good concert much more than those who don’t. The initiate may still enjoy the concert, but their capacity to do so will expand with increased awareness, understanding, and experience.

Beauty is useless. In The Stones of Venice, John Ruskin writes, “Remember that the most beautiful things in the world are the most useless; peacocks and lilies for instance.” Ruskin is correct: God has created a vast amount of “useless beauty.” The universe is filled with glorious displays of brilliant beauty. However, Ruskin’s statement is not completely true. The human body is beautiful and very useful! Yet, his point is important. In our competitive consumer society, we often value efficiency and usefulness over beauty.[4] But for the Christian, all things – including the beauty in all things – glorify God and are thus worthy of our appreciation and care. Jesus saw God’s glory in simple lilies, fallen sparrows, and human hair. We should do no less.

Beauty is deceptive. Benjamin Franklin said, “Beauty and folly are old companions.” Wise King Solomon taught, “Charm is deceptive, and beauty is vain” (Pro. 31:30). The great St. Paul warned that “even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light” (2 Cor. 11:14). In light of such wisdom, we tend to shy away from beauty, wary of its alluring temptations.

Certainly, Franklin is right, “Beauty and follow are old companions.” But then again, so are beauty and wisdom – and beauty and truth! Certainly, beauty can be deceptive, but so can truth-claims. Obviously, beauty can hide inner ugliness, but so can hypocritical moral behavior. Perhaps we experience a heightened sense of suspicion in regard to beauty because of the overwhelming flood of deceptive beauty-claims in popular society – claims that beauty is only found in youth, or in novelty, or in pencil-thin bodies. Certainly, there is such a thing as sham-beauty; but there is also sham-truth and sham-goodness. The deceptive possibilities of truth and goodness do not prevent us from pursuing them; neither should the deceptive capacity of beauty prevent us from seeking it.

Beauty is uninteresting. In Man and Superman, George Bernard Shaw wrote, “Beauty is all very well at first sight, but who ever looks at it when it has been in the house three days?” Certainly, we can become bored with beauty, but the problem lies with us, not with beauty. The same thing can occur with truth and goodness. Truths taken for granted can leave us empty. Assumed goodness can be taken advantage of.  

The challenge is to constantly return to beauty with new eyes and a fresh perspective. We need to have the heart and mind of St. Augustine, who cried out, “Late have I loved you, O Beauty, ever ancient, ever new.” We can never exhaust God’s beauty, for God is the infinite source of all beauty.[5]

Despite all the excuses that fuel our neglect, we need beauty! If nothing else, we deeply feel the absence of beauty. Without beauty, our faith loses its luster – its very glory, its sacred aura. We must recover the beauty of holiness, and re-experience the holiness of beauty or our religion will become nothing more than dry and dusty truth encrusted with overly-demanding morals. Richard Harries is right: “Beauty must once again play a central role in our understanding of the Christian faith.  Without a positive theological evaluation of beauty there is no motive to delight in God and no compelling reason to love him.”[6]

Divine Beauty

From ancient times, beauty has been at the heart of the worship of God. The first explicit giving of God’s Spirit to his people involved equipping artists and craftsmen to create beautiful objects for use in divine worship.

Now the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “See, I have called by name Bezalel, the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah. And I have filled him with the Spirit of God in wisdom, in understanding, in knowledge, and in all kinds of craftsmanship, to make artistic designs for work in gold, in silver, and in bronze, and in the cutting of stones for settings, and in the carving of wood, that he may work in all kinds of craftsmanship… in the hearts of all who are skillful I have put skill.” (Exodus 31:1-6)

God’s priests – who represented God to the people and the people to God – were to be clothed with “holy garments… for glory and for beauty” (Ex. 28:2).[7]

The beauty of worship corresponds to the beauty of God. Numerous passages call attention to God’s beauty:

• One thing I have asked from the Lord, that I shall seek: That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the Lord, And to meditate in His temple. (Ps. 27:4)
• Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God has shone forth. (Ps. 50:2)
• Splendor and majesty are before Him, Strength and beauty are in His sanctuary. (Ps. 96:6)
• Bless the Lord, O my soul! O Lord my God, Thou art very great; Thou art clothed with splendor and majesty (Ps. 104:1)
• On the glorious splendor of Thy majesty, And on Thy wonderful works, I will meditate. (Ps 145:5)

After an extensive evaluation of these and other passages, Patrick Sherry summarizes their significance: “The attributions of beauty to God… seem to arise from a powerful experience of His presence or an intense yearning for Him, and the language used is that of joyful praise, awe, and adoration.”[8] Clearly, divine beauty possesses an enormous power to touch us deeply!

The Power of Beauty

Beauty holds a prominent place in divine worship, and thus, in the divine life. Beauty captivates us, provokes adoration within us, and is reflected in the adornment of worshippers in the beauty of holiness and glory.

Attraction. Experiences of beauty hold a tremendous power to grip and transform us. Beauty stirs and satisfies our deep longings. The experience of beauty itself is persuasive. “Indeed, beauty is the persuasive power of God’s truth and goodness.”[9] As such, beauty haunts us in order to captivate and transform us.

Moral principles are vital, yet so often we have to drive ourselves to do what is right.  Beauty, on the other hand, haunts us.  It draws and compels and gives...  I might respond to God as a great commander-in-chief but I could not give myself to him as the goal of all my longing and my supreme delight.[10]

Our response to beauty’s attractive power resembles the experience of falling in love.

There is a lovely disarray that comes with attraction. When you find yourself deeply attracted to someone, you gradually begin to lose your grip on the frames that order your life. Indeed, much of your life becomes blurred as that countenance comes into clearer focus. A relentless magnet draws all your thoughts towards it. Wherever you are, you find yourself thinking about the one who has become the horizon of your longing. When you are together, time becomes unmercifully swift. It always ends too soon. No sooner have you parted than you are already imagining your next meeting, counting the hours. The magnetic draw of that presence renders you delightfully helpless.[11]

With our emphasis on the intellect (truth) and behavior (goodness), we rarely stop to reflect on the power of beauty. We assume that the attractive power of the gospel comes from a clear intellectual presentation (truth) or from a desire for a higher standard of moral behavior (goodness). In reality, it is beauty that has the greatest pull. In other words, we assume that the progress of engagement with the gospel is:

cognitive --> behavioral --> affective
we think right in order to behave right in order to feel right

In reality, the progress is:

affective --> behavioral --> cognitive
we are emotionally touched which results in transformation of behavior and renewal of the mind

Beauty attracts because it strikes a chord deep within us: “Experiences of beauty can be intensely emotional, affecting the very core or being... the vast majority of us, however, are touched and moved by what strikes us is beautiful.”[12] Powerful feelings are aroused by beauty – feelings of pleasure, delight, wonder, and longing. These feelings possess a great capacity to transform us – a power equal (if not greater) to clear facts (truth) or moral behavior (goodness). Of course, the most potent mixture is a unified combination of all three!

Adoration. We are attracted to what we adore. Conversely, we adore that to which we are attracted. Quite simply, we are wired for worship of something or someone. We naturally celebrate beauty. We automatically experience aroused affections for that which we find attractive. For this reason, the apostle Paul incorporates the metaphor of liturgical worship – worship inspired by holiness, glory, and beauty – as a guide for all of life (Romans 12:1-2).

The essence of true religion is faithful worship of God. “Indeed, the very reason for the Church’s existence is the more perfect hallowing of the Name.”[13] Unless we adore God first, we will never be able to serve God rightly. True Christian living begins with authentic Christian worship. We are unable to truly live as we ought to unless we adore whom we ought to. The mystic Evelyn Underhill puts it this way, “It follows once more that wholehearted adoration is the only real preparation for right action… First the awestruck recognition of God: and then, the doing of His Will.”[14]

In Romans, Paul teaches that the answer to the two greatest human problems – ungodliness and immorality (Romans 1:18) – is true worship and godly behavior (Romans 12:1-2). The answer is given in the proper order. We cannot have authentic godly behavior without dealing with the root of sin – false or untrue worship. And yet, far too often, we want morally good behavior without authentic Christian adoration. We want “the shoot without the root; Christian action without Christian contemplation.”[15] We want to do God’s will without making every effort to hallow God’s name.

The problem with good behavior for reasons other than God’s glory – no matter how good these reasons may be – is that it leaves us focused on the self. We do good from an egocentric foundation. The discipline of worship draws us out of the self and places our focus on the object of our adoration. We act out of love for Another, rather than simply to improve the self. The act of worship – this “royal waste of time” which accomplishes little that the world (and many in the church!) would deem efficient or effective – holds tremendous power to awaken our affections and empower us to God-centered service for the sake of God’s glory.

Adornment. We long to become like that which we love and adore. With hearts overflowing with love and affection, we seek to reflect the divine beauty in our own lives. We attempt to hold this beauty within our hearts. In the process we are transfigured by its radiant power.

The desire to adorn our lives with the beauty of divine holiness and the light of sacred glory is at the heart of the Christian life. This desire is behind every expression that God would be glorified.

For this reason, Paul encourages Titus to teach his people to “adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in every respect” (Titus 2:10). Our lives are to reflect the beauty of what we believe. The divine beauty is to work its way into our hearts so that we may express it in all we do. It is an adornment that is “not merely external” but involves “the hidden person of the heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God” (1 Peter 3:4). God is pleased when he sees his beauty reflected in the deepest dimensions of our lives.

Thus the four words of this petition [“Hallowed by Thy name”] can cover, criticize, and reinterpret the whole of our personal life; cleansing it from egoism, orienting it toward reality, and reminding us that our life and work are without significance, except insofar as they glorify that God to whom nothing is adequate though everything is dear. Our response to each experience which He puts in our path, from the greatest disclosure of beauty to the smallest appeal to love, from perfect happiness to utmost grief, will either hallow or not hallow His Name; and this is the only thing that matters about it.[16]

Putting it All Together

There are two ways to put together these three aspects of the power of beauty: attraction, adoration, and adornment. In one sense, we can view them as progressive stages in Christian conversion and Christian growth:

• attraction = evangelism
• adoration = conversion
• adornment = discipleship

If this helps us focus our evangelistic efforts more toward expressing and inviting people to experience the beauty of God, then it serves a useful purpose. God’s holiness is “the infinite beauty and excellence of his nature.” Like Jonathan Edwards, we agree that “it is this sight of the divine beauty of Christ, that bows the wills, and draws the hearts of men.”[17]

However, I prefer to see these three aspects of the power of beauty – attraction, adoration, and adornment – as normal rhythms of the Christian life. Throughout our Christian journey, we experience deeper attraction to God, greater adoration of God, and progressive adornment by God. None of these aspects are simply steps along the way. Instead, they are places we constantly return to, with more profound understanding, greater enjoyment, and deeper transformation.

When we grasp this, we can release the idea that the intellect is the main agent of transformation. Beauty that allures the affections is just as important to Christian growth – if not more! Who wouldn’t rather spend time drinking in the beauty of his or her lover, rather than simply hearing facts about the lover, or even doing good for the lover?[18] Our desire is to behold beauty God’s beauty, not simply in reflections, but face to face. Only this can satisfy the thirst and longing God has placed in our soul. And this desire is ultimately satisfied in Christ!

To worship is to experience and express divine beauty. When we participate in beauty we come into the presence of the Holy. All the beauty found in nature and human art reflects God’s glory and shows us something about God. Therefore, “Whenever we awaken beauty, we are helping to make God present in the world.”[19] Conversely, “those who destroy the beauty of God’s creation or who create ugliness may be sinning against the Holy Spirit.”[20]

All beauty is a gift. It is a grace, an elegance, given by God to us as a reflection of God’s goodness and truth. In light of this, John Calvin provides us with an important warning: “If we reflect that the Spirit of God is the only fountain of truth, we will be careful, as we would avoid offering insult to him, not to reject or condemn truth [or goodness or beauty] wherever it appears. In despising the gifts, we insult the Giver.”[21]

“When goodness, truth and beauty are combined we have glory.  When boundless goodness, total truth and sublime beauty are combined in supreme degree, we have divine glory.”[22] May we not diminish God’s divine glory by making light of beauty!

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© Richard J. Vincent, 2005