Sermon Tone Analysis

By Pastor Glenn Pease

Dr. Rosenow, a man who devoted his life to medical research, was asked, what led him to this as his life's task, and he told this story.

He grew up on an isolated farm in Northern Wisconsin, and as a boy he had an unforgettable experience when his brother became dangerously ill.

The nearest doctor was sent for, and when he came to the house, Dr. Rosenow, then only a boy, followed the doctor into his brothers room, and hid behind a sofa to observe.

What he saw determined his career.

The doctor poured out medicine to give to the patient, and then he turned and said to his parents, "Have no fear, he is going to get well."

The light that came into his parents faces was wonderful to behold, and so deeply impressed him that then and there the boy behind the sofa determined that he would do something that would cause light to appear in people's faces.

We cannot begin to measure the powerful influence of shining faces in history.

Longfellow said of one-

The light upon her face

Shines from the windows of another world.

Saints only have such faces.

When Adoniram Judson, the great missionary, was home on furlough, he passed through Stonington, Conn.

Where a young boy saw his face glowing with the love of Christ.

He was so deeply impressed that one of the chapters of the book he wrote when he became a pastor was entitled, "What A Boy Saw In The Face Of Adoniram Judson."

This boy became Dr. Henry Clay Trumbull, a great soul winner.

Now you may not know Dr. Trumbull or Dr. Rosenow, or the million others whose lives have been changed by beholding faces, but all of you know the man in this third illustration of the powerful influence of a shining face.

He was not a boy as the other two, but was a grown man who had already determined his profession.

He was engaged in duties that would make his face bitter and fearful.

By his own confession he says, he was in an angry rage when suddenly at midday he saw a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, and with that vision his whole character and career was changed.

Paul had seen the light, not just a light, but the light, the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

In spite of the fact that he was persecuting Christ, the face he saw was not a face of anger like his own, but a face of mercy and forgiveness, and from that time one Paul followed only the light that came from his Savior's face.

To behold the face of Christ, and to reflect the light of His face was the constant goal of the Apostle Paul.

He was not a man of a thousand faces, but the man of one face-the face of Christ.

He renounced all underhanded and cunning methods, and walked in the open light of the face of Christ.

Paul could have written the words of the poet,

For this I strive, for this I pray,

For this all else resign:

Be like my Master everyday,

Set forth on earth the Christian way,

Reflect His face in mine.

Author unknown

In Margaret Deland's story, The Awakening Of Helina Ritchie, a small boy looking at a picture of the baptism of Jesus in which the artist had a face looking out of the clouds asked, "Is that a good photograph of God?" Dr. Lavendar, the pastor said, "If it looks like a kind father, I think it is a good photograph of God."

The Apostle Paul would say, however, that the real authentic photograph of God is the Son of God, who is the express image of God.

Jesus said, "He who has seen me has seen the Father."

Paul says to the Corinthians here in verse 6, that the source of our knowledge of God, in all His glory and beauty, is in the face of Jesus Christ.

Back in 318 He lays it down as a spiritual principle, that only as we with open face gaze upon the glory of the Lord Jesus, can we be changed by degrees, and become like Him.

Looking at the face of Jesus is not just poetry, it is an essential and practical aspect of the Christian life, for those who desire to be Christlike in all their living.

This means, of course, that the face of Christ is not His literal face, but is the whole character and conduct of Jesus as it is recorded in the Gospels.

The face, however, is the part of the body the most expressive of one's life and emotions.

If you wish to know if a man is happy and glad, or sour and mad, you look, not at his hair, hands, back, or feet, but at his face.

The face is the index of the heart and mind.

When Shakespeare said, "You have such a February face, so full of frost, of storm, of cloudiness," it is not hard to guess the mood of the one he refers to.

As Lewis Evans said, "Your face doth testify but you be inwardly."

The eyes in the face take in light from without, while the face itself is the organ by which we express the light, or lack of it, within.

Abraham Coles wrote,

Contending passions jostle and displace,

And tilt and tourney mostly in the face.

Unmatched by art, upon this wondrous scroll,

Portrayed our all the secrets of the soul.

This was true for Jesus, as for all men.

The life of Christ can be portrayed by a series of portraits showing the expressions of His face.

The album would begin with the baby face of Jesus in the manger, and then would come the studious face of boyhood, when he debated with the scholars in the temple.

Then comes His delightful happy face as he healed and taught.

Then on the mount of transfiguration His face shown as the Sun.

Then comes His determined face when He steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem to face the cross.

Then comes His face of anguish and tears in the garden of Gethsemane.

On the cross we see His disfigured face from the crown of thorns, and finally His conquering joyful face manifested in the happy days following His resurrection.

We can't begin to look at the whole album, but we can focus our eyes on a couple of these pictures of the face of Christ which should challenge us to seek more often to meditate on Him until we literally see Him face to face.

First of all let's look at-

I. HIS DELIGHTFUL FACE.

All of this emphasis of Paul on glory in the face of Christ implies a face of beauty and delightful joy.

The middle ages lost sight of this face of Christ.

It was an age of ascetics.

Men were going off to monasteries where they fasted and cut themselves off from the normal life of man.

They forgot that Jesus never did this.

The artists began to picture Jesus only as He appeared in those last hours of His suffering.

The only text they could see to paint by was that of Isaiah 53:3, "A man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief, and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not."

This was a true picture of Christ in His suffering.

The deformed face of Christ was real, and for us who know the love behind that agonizing face, even it contains beauty.

Christina Rossetti put it so well in poetry.

Is this the face that thrills with awe,

Seraphs who veil their face above?

Is this the face without a flaw,

The face that is the face of love?

Yeah, this defaced, - this lifeless clod,

Hath all creation's love sufficed,

Hath satisfied the love of God,

This face, the face of Jesus Christ.

Keep in mind that Jesus was the spotless Lamb offered in sacrifice, and so even though He was made ugly by the sin of man, He was in His own perfection the most beautiful of all men.

We ought never to lose the picture of His suffering face, but to suppress all others with it, and to impose this gruesome image on the whole life of Christ is a great perversion.

Some who have looked so long and often at the face of sorrow have concluded that Jesus never smiled or laughed.

This baseless tradition, with nothing but silence for a foundation, began as early as the forth century, and still has its effects yet today, for it is all too seldom that Christians consider the delightful smiling face of Jesus.

The evidence for this portrait is abundant, even though there is no specific text that says Jesus smiled, as it says He wept.

One half-positive poet suggests that He might have smiled when He blest the little children.

"A Man on earth He wondered once, all meek and undefiled, and those who loved Him said-He wept, none ever said He smiled.

Yet there might have been a smile unseen, when He bowed His holy face I ween, to bless that happy child."

Such a half-hearted defense of the smiling face of Christ is a witness to how strongly men have been influenced by the sad face of Christ on the cross.

It is almost as if it was irreverent to think of Christ as a person enjoying life.

It would be extremely abnormal for a person with very little to be happy about to go all through life without a smile or laughter.

It is inconceivable that He who came that we might have abundant life should do so.

Unless we are convinced that joy, laughter, and smiling is of the devil, rather than the gift of God, we must accept the reality of His delightful face.

Just try and imagine Jesus as a special guest at the wedding of Cana where He added to the joy of the occasion by His miracle of changing water into wine.

Can you imagine Him all the while expressing no smile or emotion of delight, but keeping His face as solemn as if He was fasting?

I can hardly conceive of Jesus being stuck with such a dead pan face even during the 40 days of fasting and temptation in the wilderness.

Certainly one who said so often to others in time of trial, "Be of good cheer."

Must have had a spring of joy in His own heart to fill His face with light, even while facing the ruler of darkness.

Jesus was the light of the world, and in Him was no darkness at all.

Jesus told His disciples to keep their faces clean and to look happy and healthy when they fasted.

They were not to display a sad face in search of sympathy, or to be praised for being so sacrificially religious.