He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
Heb 1:2-3
What do you see when you see Jesus? You see the Father’s heart. You see Calvary’s suffering. You see grace. You see love, embrace, and forgiveness. You see our prodigal lives returning to the father’s house. You see acceptance and approval not based on our performance, but based on Christ’s perfect righteousness displayed on the Cross.
“You are right,” he says,”you are lost, if you look only to yourselves. Who is there who has not lied, murdered, committed adultery? Who does not have this possibility lurking in his heart? You are right when you give yourself up as lost.
But look, now something has happened that has nothing to do with your attitudes at all, something that is simply given to you. Now the kingdom of God is among you, now the father’s house is wide open. And I–I am the door, I am the way, I am the life, I am the hand of the Father. He who sees me sees the Father. And what do you see when you see me?
You see one who came to you down in the depths where you could never rise to the heights. You see that God ‘so’ loved the world that he delivered me, his Son, to these depths, that it cost him something to help you, that it cost the very agony of God, that God had to do something contrary to his own being to deal with your sin, to recognize the chasm between you and himself and yet bridge it over. All this you see when you look at me!”
Helmut Thielicke, The Waiting Father: Sermons on the Parables of Jesus, trans., John W. Doberstein (New York: Harper&Row, 1959), 28. [paragraphing mine]