Nor is it only that our fellowship with Christ will, as a matter of course, show itself in our characters, and beauty born of that communion ‘shall pass into our face,’ but we are also called on, as Paul puts it here, to make direct conscious efforts for the communication of the light which we behold.  As the context has it, God hath shined in our hearts, that we might give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ Jesus.  Away with all veils!  No reserve, no fear of the consequences of plain speaking, no diplomatic prudence regulating our frank utterance, no secret doctrines for the initiated!  We are to ’renounce the hidden things of dishonesty.’  Our power and our duty lie in the full exhibition of the truth.  We are only clear from the blood of men when we, for our parts, make sure that if any light be hid, it is hid not by reason of obscurity or silence on our parts, but only by reason of the blind eyes, before which the full-orbed radiance gleams in vain.  All this is as true for every one possessing that universal prerogative of seeing the glory of Christ, as it is for an Apostle.  The business of all such is to make known the name of Jesus, and if from idleness, or carelessness, or selfishness, they shirk that plain duty, they are counteracting God’s very purpose in shining on their hearts, and going far to quench the light which they darken.

Take this, then, Christian men and women, as a plain practical lesson from this text.  You are bound to manifest what you believe, and to make the secret of your lives, in so far as possible, an open secret.  Not that you are to drag into light before men the sacred depths of your own soul’s experience.  Let these lie hid.  The world will be none the better for your confessions, but it needs your Lord.  Show Him forth, not your own emotions about Him.  What does the Apostle say close by my text?  ’We preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord.’  Self-respect and reverence for the sanctities of our deepest emotions forbid our proclaiming these from the house-tops.  Let these be curtained, if you will, from all eyes but God’s, but let no folds hang before the picture of your Saviour that is drawn on your heart.  See to it that you have the unveiled face turned towards Christ to be irradiated by His brightness, and the unveiled face turned towards men, from which shall shine every beam of the light which you have caught from your Lord.  ’Arise! shine, for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee!’

II.  Notice, secondly, that this life of contemplation is therefore a life of gradual transformation.

The brightness on the face of Moses was only skin-deep.  It faded away, and left no trace.  It effaced none of the marks of sorrow and care, and changed none of the lines of that strong, stern face.  But, says Paul, the glory which we behold sinks inward, and changes us as we look, into its own image.  Thus the superficial lustre, that had neither permanence nor transforming power, becomes an illustration of the powerlessness of law to change the moral character into the likeness of the fair ideal which it sets forth.  And, in opposition to its weakness, the Apostle proclaims the great principle of Christian progress, that the beholding of Christ leads to the assimilation to Him.