Immortal, Invisible

 

[An automated transcript of the teaching video]

The Apostle Paul instructed the believers at Colosse to teach and admonish one another in psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. That’s what I intend to do by explaining the meaning of this hymn—Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise. I’d like to explain the meaning of the hymn against the backdrop of the Framework of Sovereign Grace, which is God’s master plan for the ages.

You’ll notice the hymn was written by Walter Smith. This was a 19th century gospel preacher belonging to the Free Church of Scotland.

I’d like to read for you the stanzas of the hymn, beginning with the first stanza:

1 Immortal, invisible, 

God only wise,

In light inaccessible 

hid from our eyes,

Most blessed, most glorious, 

The Ancient of Days,

Almighty, victorious, 

Thy great Name we praise.

2 Unresting, unhasting, 

And silent as light,

Nor wanting, nor wasting, 

Thou rulest in might;

Thy justice, like mountains, High soaring above

Thy clouds, which are fountains 

Of goodness and love.

3 To all, life Thou givest, 

To both great and small;

In all life Thou livest, 

The true life of all;

We blossom and flourish 

As leaves on the tree,

And wither and perish—

But naught changeth Thee.

4 Great Father of glory, 

Pure Father of light,

Thine angels adore Thee, 

All veiling their sight;

But of all Thy rich graces 

This grace, Lord, impart

Take the veil from our faces, 

The vile from our heart.

5 All laud we would render; 

O help us to see

’Tis only the splendor 

Of light hideth Thee,

And so let Thy glory, 

Almighty, impart,

Through Christ in His story, 

Thy Christ to the heart.

The words of this hymn make me feel as if we’re standing on holy ground. It’s all about the perfections of the Triune Jehovah. But let’s not miss the message of the hymn. The hymn expresses the joy and the wonder in the regenerate sinner’s heart, as he or she reflects upon and beholds the glorious Godhead of the Triune Jehovah. We’re therefore looking at the third branch of the gospel—the sanctifying power of the Holy Spirit.

And just to remind you the meaning of this third branch of the gospel, the sanctifying power of the Spirit begins with the work of regeneration—when the Spirit of God unites the soul with the Lord Jesus Christ, thereby communicating to the soul, the life and the virtues of Christ. The soul is forthwith made alive unto God and filled with the spiritual blessings of Christ’s love, joy, peace, faith, and so forth, having then been made spiritually alive unto God through Christ. The regenerate sinner is given spiritual eyes to see, and spiritual ears to hear, and a spiritual heart to feel the glory of God in Christ.

Now, before the new birth, we were dead in sin. We were blind to saving grace. We were deaf to the gospel and entirely numb to sin and the work of salvation. Yes, we knew God as our Maker, but we did not worship Him as such. We knew God as our Law-giver, but we did not obey Him. We did not know God as our Redeemer and Savior. And when these things were told to us in an unregenerate condition, it went over our heads, as it were. We could not understand how God is Redeemer and Savior to us, spiritually. But now, having been born again, the gospel is not only good news to our ears, but with new eyes and a new heart, we can see and we can feel the glory of God in Christ Jesus. 

And you see, it is now, having been born again, that we are enabled to worship God in spirit and in truth. And that is the meaning of this hymn. It’s about the regenerate sinner, worshiping God, the Triune Jehovah, in spirit and in truth, which is the result of his or her new birth. With that said, allow me now to read for you once again the stanzas of the hymn in connection with the Framework of Sovereign Grace.

Stanza 1

“Immortal, invisible, 

God only wise,”

Immortal—That is, God is ever living. He has life within Himself. He cannot die. He is self-existent. He is immortal.

Invisible—That is, God is a spirit being. A spirit being is invisible. A spirit being has no body or parts. A spirit being is a simple being, meaning, God in essence is one indivisible essence. He’s not a composition of parts.

God only wise—the difference between the wisdom of man and the wisdom of God would be that between a worm and a man. Consider the wisdom of a worm compared to yourself. Well now, here is a little comparison then between the wisdom of yourself and that of God. That is why He is only wise. Not that we don’t have wisdom, but our wisdom compared to God’s is nothing.

“In light inaccessible 

hid from our eyes,”

There is a brightness, a glory, a brilliance, a beauty, too bright for creatures to behold, especially sinful creatures.

“Most blessed, most glorious, 

The Ancient of Days,”

The Ancient of Days is a reference to God, existing from everlasting to everlasting, meaning God is from the beginning and He has no ending. But of course, this is a reference to time. We know that God is eternal. He exists outside of time, and therefore, while He’s called the Ancient of Days within the context of time, He is an eternal being.

He is most blessed, meaning there is no other that can receive higher praise than God himself.

And he’s most glorious, meaning no other is endowed with the excellencies of the Godhead.

“Almighty, victorious, 

Thy great Name we praise.”

He is almighty, meaning He is absolutely sovereign. He is the King of kings and the Lord of lords. He is therefore victorious. That is, He always succeeds. He is never defeated.

Stanza 2

“Unresting, unhasting, 

And silent as light,”

Unresting, meaning He never rests. He’s always active. God in His essence is an active spirit being. There is never a time He is inactive. You know, when you and I come to the Lord in prayer and we don’t feel He’s hearing us or answering us or working in our lives, and we sometimes are tempted to think that God is inactive…He’s not doing anything, that’s certainly not true of the Godhead. God is always active. In fact, the only reason this world exists, the only reason you exist, is because God is constantly, actively, upholding all things by the word of His power. So he never rests. He is an ever active spirit.

And, He’s unhasting, meaning He’s never in a rush. He’s not rushing. He methodically brings to pass in time, all that He has decreed from eternity. He’s never in a rush. He’s never early and He’s never late. He is always on time.

And, He is silent as light, meaning, God has a glory which requires no accompanying sound. Think for instance, of the glory of lightning. Lightning is always accompanied with the sound of thunder. But for God, the glory of God, as the true light, He has no need for the accompanying sound of thunder. You remember on the first day of creation, God said, let there be light, and there was light. But there was not a sun created until the fourth day of creation. Henceforth, where did that light come from without a sun? Well, that was the eminence of God’s glory himself. It was the light and the blessedness of God’s glorious being, silent as light, that cast brightness upon the earth during the first three days of creation.

“Nor wanting, nor wasting, 

Thou rulest in might;”

He’s not wanting, meaning He’s never in need of anything. He doesn’t need you. He doesn’t need me. He doesn’t need the creation of this world to add anything to Himself. He never needs to consult angels or men when accomplishing His purposes. God stands in need of nothing and no one. He is an independent autonomous being.

And, He’s never wasting, meaning that He never does anything excessively. There’s never leftovers. Henceforth, we believe in something called a limited atonement. That is, when the Lord Jesus Christ shed His precious blood on the cross, He did not spill one ounce of His blood for the atonement of sins for any one other than those that had been given to Him by the Father. The particular redemption of the Lord Jesus Christ is in exact proportion to His limited atonement for the Lord’s elect people. So, He’s not ever wanting, nor is He ever wasting.

He rulest in might, and that He does! As I said earlier, He is the absolute sovereign Lord and King of kings. He has both the right and the might to do all that He pleases. He has the authority and the ability to carry out all that He chooses to accomplish.

“Thy justice, like mountains, 

High soaring above

Thy clouds, which are fountains 

Of goodness and love.”

So, imagine the mountains that God creates in the world. These are used as emblems of His justice. So, God’s justice, like mountains, high soaring above; and then Thy clouds, which are fountains, of goodness and love. So, here are clouds above the mountains. These clouds are emblems of goodness and love, the goodness and love of God. And these clouds, of course, shed forth rain—the rain of God’s goodness and love. So while, the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is undergirded by the justice of God—God is just and the justifier of the ungodly through the redeeming work of the Lord Jesus Christ—it is in this sense that He then pours down the blessings of goodness and love to His people, all through the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Stanza 3

“To all, life Thou givest,

To both great and small;”

As mentioned earlier, God has life in Himself and He gives life to all others. God does not derive His life from anyone, but all other creatures derive their life from Him.

“In all life Thou livest, 

The true life of all;”

God is the true life of all, for in Him we live and we move and we have our being.

“We blossom and flourish 

As leaves on the tree,

And wither and perish—

But naught changeth Thee.”

For ourselves, we have a beginning. We blossom, we flourish, we wither, and we die or perish. That, my dear friends, is the cycle of life. We begin, we blossom, we flourish, we wither, we die, we perish. We’re always in a constant state of change. But for God, He is eternal. He is self existent. He exists outside of time and therefore God never changes. He is as glorious as He ever has been, ever will be, ever is now. He is eternally glorious, unchanging.

Stanza 4

“Great Father of glory, 

Pure Father of light,”

Every good gift and every perfect gift cometh from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.

“Thine angels adore Thee, 

All veiling their sight;”

You realize, there are elect angels just as there are elect human beings, and there are non-elect angels just as there are non-elect human beings. Well, the non-elect angels do not adore the Triune Jehovah. They are rebels of God. They hate God, as do the non-elect humans. But there are elect angels who do adore the Triune Jehovah. And so brilliant and wonderful are the perfections of God that even these angels have to veil their sight when looking upon Him.

“But of all Thy rich graces 

This grace, Lord, impart

Take the veil from our faces, 

The vile from our heart.”

You realize, the vile in our hearts blinds the eyes from beholding the glory of God.

Stanza 5

“All laud we would render; 

O help us to see”

The word loud means public praise—all public praise we would render, O, help us to see,

’Tis only the splendor 

Of light hideth Thee,”

The glory of the Godhead, compared to light, is the only clothing that hides the Creator from the sight of His creatures. And make no mistake, the creatures of God are not hid from Him. God sees both the wicked and the righteous. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in God’s sight, but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.

“And so let Thy glory, 

Almighty, impart,

Through Christ in His story, 

Thy Christ to the heart.”

What is the glory of God? In short, the gospel of our salvation is the glory of God. It is the Lord Jesus Christ. And that is why we ask the Lord to be pleased to impart Him and this glorious gospel to our hearts. And, my dear friends, that should be the daily prayer of every regenerate sinner—that God would be pleased to bestow upon us, a fresh supply of the communicating graces, or virtues, of Christ to our souls, by the effectual power of the Holy Spirit. And that alone is what would give to you and me the ability to worship the blessed, all glorious triune Jehovah, in spirit and in truth.

You realize there is nothing that so humbles our souls, and edifies our hearts, and sanctifies our minds, and strengthens our faith, and nurtures our affections, and comforts our spirits, and settles our doubts and fears and anxieties, than a contemplation on the glorious nature of the blessed Godhead. And that is the meaning of this hymn. Which is now my great honor to invite you, with me, to sing the words of this hymn to the glory and honor of our God.

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