Disclaimer: Dangerous things happen when Narie is doing a calc test and listening to the radio.
As I was listening to the radio, on came a song by Sanctus Real, called The Face of Love. (You may be able to listen to it here, by clicking on the link which says "The Face of Love". I knew there was something which I had been meaning to do a post about, and this song was it!
I’ve seen Your face on stained glass, in colored lights
In pictures of You looking to the sky
You’ve been portrayed a thousand different ways
But my heart can see You better than my eyes
‘Cause it’s love that points the portrait of Your life
The face of love
The face of love
You look more like love everyday
I’ve read Your words in the pages of Your life
And I’ve imagined what You were like
I may not know the shape of Your face
But I can feel Your heart changing mine
And Your love still proves that You’re alive
The face of love
The face of love
You look more like love everyday
You are the face that changed the whole world
No one too lost for You to love
No one too low for You to serve
So give us the grace to change the world
No one too lost for me to love
No one too low for me to serve
Let us see, let us be Your face...
Is there any Bible basis for pictures of Jesus? I think that rather, there is Biblical basis for NOT having pictures. The main reason which I have heard stated for having pictures of Jesus is to teach people about Him.
However, we cannot portray Him accurately, and while most people would agree with this, I don’t think they understand the full scope. The best description we have is Isaiah 53:2, “…He had no form or majesty that we should look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him.” But, people argue, we can portray characteristics. Well, looking at the typical picture of Jesus, I can see a slim white guy with brown, longish hair (by the way, what is the long hair about? Whatever happened to I Corinthians 11:14?) and light eyes, looking very meek (at least I think that’s what He’s supposed to look like), and as if I could beat Him at arm wrestling. Uh… OK… Apparently, our culture has confused “meek” and “weak”. I understand how that could happen – they DO sound a lot alike. 
Being meek calls for a restraint of power. It is not especially meek to refrain from beating up a policeman who has pulled you over for running a red light. It is meek to be kind to someone who has been nasty to you when you could be mean back and could get away with it.
Jesus had way more power than we could ever dream of – than Darth Vader could ever dream of – than Saruman could ever dream of. Jesus did not stay on the cross because He couldn’t get down – He stayed on the cross because He humbled Himself to death, even to death on the cross (Philippians 2:8).
So pictures cannot capture this characteristic, and really they cannot capture any characteristic, because as R.C. Sproul points out in his book The Holiness of God, all of God’s characteristics are holy. His love is holy, His justice is holy, and how can holiness be shown? We don’t even fully understand what holiness is; it is something set apart from this world, but if we could portray it, it would no longer be different than the world. All the characteristics which we can picture are human characteristics.
Are we trying to evangelize people about Christ’s humanity? If that is all that we need to do, then we can throw out the Westminster Catechism, which says that man’s chief end is to glorify God, we can throw out Jesus’ name Immanuel, for what would it matter if He is God? In fact, if all that we are concerned about is His humanity, then we can throw out the entire gospel, because we are not told, as Douglas Adams said, that a “man had been nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice for people for a change…” Rather, the apostle John boldly declares at the very beginning of his gospel, that “the Word was God.”
So… pictures of Christ are not accurate, cannot be accurate, and are in fact teaching an anti-gospel message. This is a dangerous thing, then, to be bringing into the church to “teach” the gospel. It can leave people with extremely false ideas of what their head should be filled with when they come together to worship God. After The Passion of the Christ came out, Billy Graham said, “Every time I preach or speak about the Cross, the things I saw on the screen will be on my heart and mind.” Man-made images are not what should be going through our heads during worship!
The good news is that we don’t need pictures to teach about Christ. Jesus Himself said, “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.” (John 14:26)
Hopefully there will be an entry coming soon about being the face of Christ -- being ambassadors for Him. More stuff from summer camp '05! |
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