He Will Beautify The Meek With Salvation

Psalm 149

“He will beautify the meek with salvation”

There is a new television reality series called EXTREME MAKE OVER. In this series they select certain individuals who feel they are in need cosmetic help and attempt to make them beautiful.

# 1

A man from the back mountains of Tennessee found himself one day in a large city, for the first time standing outside an elevator. He watched as an old, haggard woman hobbled on, and the doors closed. A few minutes later the doors opened and a young, attractive woman marched smartly off. The father hollered to his youngest son, “Billy, go get mother.”

#2

One man once said to his co-worker, “My wife spent four hours in the beauty shop the other day.”

“Wow, that is a long time,” answered his co-laborer.

“Yeah, and that was just for the estimate!” he replied.

# 3 A young man once boasted, “My wife inherited her beauty.”

“How is that?” asked a friend.

“Her uncle died,” he explained, “and left her a store.”

The Bible speaks of a beauty that doesn’t come from cosmetics but comes from Christ.

Christ can take a dirty heart and make it clean. He can take a disturbed soul and make it peaceful. Christ can take a dull life and make radiant. Christ can and wants to bring beauty to our lives.

I. The Divine INTENTION - “He WILL BEAUTIFY”

“He will beautify” gives us the divine desire of God. When God created the world, He made it beautiful. Genesis 1 declares five times that God looked at what He had created and it is recorded that He said it was good. However, sin marred that which God had made, and God wants to make beautiful again that which sin has marred and tarnished.

A. There is a love of beauty that man shares with God

When man finds something beautiful, he wants it for himself and for those he loves. Man shares this love of beauty with God. God is preparing Heaven for those He loves, and He is sparing no cost. Revelation tells us that the abode of the righteous will be splendid and glorious. It has streets of pure gold with single pearls for gate, and single gems for the foundations.

B. There is a loss of beauty that man sees in life

Sin destroys that which God made beautiful.

After sin, man’s paradise became a wilderness. The roses contain thorns, and the docile tiger suddenly became a hungry meat-eater. O sin, what hast thou done to this earth! This earth is under the curse of sin!

However God wants to give unto man “beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.” It is not God’s will that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.

II. The Divine PROVISION - “He will beautify the meek WITH SALVATION”

God wants and desires to bring loveliness into living that has been destroyed by sin, and He does it by what the Bible calls salvation. God wants to save and transform individual lives.

A. Salvation is wrapped up in a person

Acts 4:2

1. The notice beyond exemption - “Neither is there salvation in any other”

In Christ alone is cleansing, pardon, forgiveness, and life everlasting. Jesus is not a value that we can negotiate, nor is He a preference we can reject.

2. The name beyond expression - “None other name under heaven given among men”

No other Savior but Jesus; no salvation if He is rejected; no other name to save from destruction, unless He is accepted. No man ever came, or can come, to the Father but by Him.

3. The need beyond exemption - “We must be saved”

It is imperative - we must be saved! Being saved is not a choice; it is an absolute must. Every man needs salvation.

B. Salvation is worked out in a process

For many the Christian life could be described as an “up and down” or an “on and off” experience. Paul describes the Christian life as an “in and out” experience. Christ having been received must be released to do what He wills with us!

Salvation consist of an inward and an outward work. There is something to be worked out because of someone who is working in. The work that God has done in our hearts must be worked out from within so that it is visible in our daily lives. “Work out” was used in a couple of ways that is suggestive to what Paul is saying:

1. The believer is to experience a FULL Christian life

A miner goes into a mine and works that mine to get out all the valuable ore in the mine. The miner attempts to get the utmost value out of what was securely in his possession. As a Christian I am to mine what is already mine. I am to work the mine of salvation and enjoy all that it has available to me in Christ.