Archive #1-10
All materials copyright (c) 1998, Ken Wade
"A Fresh Look at Jesus" is a weekly devotional based on the life of Jesus Christ. To subscribe, send a message to freshlook@worldnet.att.net with "subscribe" as the subject. The first devotionals in the series are found at the Jesus Central "Meditations on the Life of Jesus" page. The weekly mailings are posted here within a few weeks after they have been sent out.
Devotionals #1-10 are on this page. Use the following links to go to pages with later devotionals: #11-20 #21-30 #31-40
A Fresh Look at Jesus #1
"Then he arose, took the young Child and His mother, and came into the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning over Judea instead of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. And being warned by God in a dream, he turned aside into the region of Galilee." (Matt 2:21-22 NKJV)
I've enjoyed taking a look at the early life of Jesus, focusing on the places where He went, to learn about His character and His mission. I've noticed over and over again that even as a tiny baby, He showed remarkable courage--panache perhaps--in going, as it were, right into the lion's den. But what's this about his father avoiding Judaea because of the ruler there?
In an earlier meditation we noticed one possible reason why Joseph took his son to the northern part of Palestine--it had to do with Israel's history, and the time of Solomon and Jeroboam. But there were other, practical reasons as well. The book _The Bible as History_ by Werner Keller tells us this about the situation in Judaea at this time:
Herod on his deathbed made a will in which he nominated three of his younger sons as his successors. Archelaus was to succeed to the kingdom. . . . Archelaus was acknowledged as king by his family and was acclaimed by Herod's mercenaries. . . .. But throughout the country the news of the despot's death brought uprisings of a violence that had seldom been seen among Jewry. Their burning hatred of the house of Herod was mingled with their loathing of the Romans.
Instead of lamenting the death of Herod, they proclaimed their grief over the deaths of his innocent victims. The people demanded that [two scholars whom Herod had] burned like torches, should be atoned for. Archelaus replied by sending his troops to Jerusalem. There 3000 people were butchered on one day alone. The courts of the Temple were strewn with corpses. This first act of Archelaus revealed at one stroke the true character of the man--Herod's son yielded nothing to his father in cruelty and injustice.
That was the situation as it existed in Judaea--the area around Bethlehem and Jerusalem--when Joseph brought Jesus and Mary back to Israel from Egypt. I've pointed to the courage of Jesus, in being born into difficult circumstances. But neither He nor His Father were fools. There's a fine line between faith and presumption, and the Father never demanded that His Son be needlessly put in danger. He had a better plan, one that would often bring Jesus back to the northern regions called Galilee, to minister to the needs of those oppressed by Herods other sons and the Romans.
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Is there such a thing as a courageous baby? I mean, babies generally have very little choice about where they are born, or what happens to them. They're at the mercy of their parents!
And yet, if you've read the other meditations in this series, you've seen that I refer again and again to the courage that Jesus manifested, even before He was able to walk or talk.
As with almost everything about Jesus, there's more to the story than immediately meets the eye.
It seems odd to speak of a baby as though he had the ability to choose where he would be born, and to whom, but the case of Jesus is different from others. His birth was predicted clear back at the beginning of human history. After Adam and Eve first sinned, God came looking for them in the Garden of Eden, and in action and words promised that one day He Himself would come to earth and die in their place--take the punishment for their sin--in order to make it possible for them to go on living.
God's actions in taking an innocent animal at that time, and sacrificing it in order to make coats of skins for Adam and Eve to wear, was a prophecy that their innocent Saviour would one day die, in order to cover their sinfulness with what we, today, call His robe of righteousness.
And in Genesis 3:15 we find this
enigmatic prophecy: "And I will put enmity Between you and
the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise
your head, and you shall bruise His heel."
This was a prophecy that was to be fulfilled at a certain time
and in a certain place, and God, in His wisdom, knew exactly what
He was promising to do. He knew that in making this promise, He
Himself, as God the Son, was choosing when and where He would be
born.
In Daniel 9, God went a step further,
and even predicted the exact years when the Son would live and
die on earth.
Jesus chose to come to earth and live in the exact time and place
that the Gospel writers tell us about. His birthplace and
birthdate were part of a carefully-thought-out plan. And God the
Father continued to be involved in His movements, while He was a
helpless infant, and throughout His adult life.
Is it possible for a newborn baby to be courageous? In the case of Jesus, the answer is YES! He chose when and where He would be born. He chose to put the world on notice that God was about to establish a new kingdom of righteousness. And He chose to do it in a way that set off alarms all over the kingdom that Satan had been running for so long.
He came to earth knowing it would be a hard, painful trip. But for Him it would have been even more painful not to come, because His heart of love longed to redeem His wayward creatures.
That's you and me. Thank God for a courageous baby, and a courageous Saviour!
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Facing My Fears
It's easy to do something, no matter how scary, if you know the outcome will be good--if you know you won't really get hurt.
Or is it?
Today's meditation is a bit introspective, looking at how the experience of Jesus can be compared to my own life, because that's where the rubber really meets the road. It's great to talk about what Jesus did. It's better yet to let some of that rub up against my life, to better understand what He experienced, and to let some of His life rub off on mine.
Have you tried Space Mountain at Disney World? When my kids were about 11 and 12 we took them there, and they must have done that ride a dozen times. Once was enough for me. It was kind of fun, and I felt pretty safe--after all Disney's reputation was at stake. But I still couldn't see any point in throwing that much tension and adrenaline into my system--leave that for the younger set who crave excitement.
The all-time favorite place for our family to go is to the sand dunes near Florence, Oregon. Starting when our kids were about 5 and 6, we went there as often as possible, which was only a few times, since we lived in places like Washington, DC and Singapore while they were growing up. But we still enjoy going back and running up and down the dunes a few times, having races (I always used to win, now I never do!)
Last year we were introduced to the largest free-standing dune in North America in, of all places, Idaho! Only our younger son, Seth (age 18 at the time), could go with us that day, and as we climbed up on the dunes, we noticed how the wind had created steep cliffs in the sand. With a little encouragement, Seth backed away from one of these cliffs, got a running start, and jumped off, falling 10 or 15 feet before his feet dug into the sand, giving him a soft landing.
He kept going at it harder and harder until he was dropping 25 to 30 feet before stopping. It looked like fun, so I gave it a try. I had seen him do it over and over, and I took a few mild jumps to prove how fun it was, then backed up and decided to do a full-tilt leap to see how much free fall I could get.
I knew I'd have a soft, harmless landing at the bottom, but guess what. Every time I'd approach the edge of the cliff running pell-mell, I'd chicken out, and take a short step, or slow down to where I'd only fall 10 or 12 feet.
I sat down and reasoned with myself, reminding myself that I wasn't going to get hurt. I ran at that cliff over and over again, but never could force myself to take the kind of leaps my son would take.
Was it easy for Jesus to come to earth and suffer with us for 30+ years? Was it easy for Him to go to the cross because He knew that as long as He remained faithful, the end would be a glorious resurrection?
I discovered that, at least for me, knowing there's a soft landing at the bottom doesn't make taking the leap any easier. It took a lot of courage for Jesus to come to earth. And the wonder of it is that, in living out that courageous move, He didn't have to become a tough, unfeeling macho man, denying Himself the ability to reach out and touch those in need, those weaker than Himself, the fearful, and even those who had retreated from the battle with Satan in full-scale surrender.
What a courageous, and kind, Saviour!
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"Like father, like son," we often say when we notice a peculiar trait that’s been passed from generation How much is nature and how much is nurture has been disputed for years. The February, 1998 issue of _Discover_ magazine has an interesting article "The Tall and the Short of It" that the way a child is raised can have a drastic impact even on how tall the child and his or her children will grow. Certainly in the spiritual realm, nurture has a lot to do with how tall we grow.
Jesus, of course, received much of His heredity from His heavenly Father. But what can we say about Joseph? Should this earthly father of the Saviour get any credit for the way his Son turned out?
What sort of a man would God the Father entrust with the responsibility of raising His Son on earth? We don’t hear a lot about Joseph after the early days of Jesus’ earthly life. But what we read about him in the nativity stories gives us some important clues as to his character.
Probably the characteristic that stands out most boldly is a willingness to respond to the will of God. Picture yourself as the owner of a small business--maybe a one-man shop. You get the government summons to go to a distant place to fulfill your obligations. You could go by yourself, but you sense that the hand of God must be leading in this--you know the prophecies about the Messiah being born in Bethlehem.
Your faith has already gone out on a limb in accepting the message of an angel who appeared to you in a dream, telling you that your fiancee’s pregnancy is the doing of God.
Your fiancee claims that an angel actually, physically appeared before her very eyes, but all you’ve had is this message that came in the form of a dream of an angel.
In response to these angel messages, you close up your shop and take your very-pregnant wife-to-be with you on your long journey--intending to be gone just long enough for her to give birth. But then these "pesky" angels keep coming to you in dreams, and over and again you’re told to abandon your well-laid plans and go somewhere new.
Joseph literally had to become a migrant worker in response to the instructions he received from the angels. But he was willing to do it, because he was a godly man who placed the will of God above his personal pride.
John’s Gospel tells us that Jesus told His disciples "My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work" (4:34 NKJV). We know that Jesus’ human spirit responded fully to the Holy Spirit. But it was His earthly father, Joseph, who was entrusted with the task of showing his Son how to respond to His heavenly Father. God chose a godly man for the task of raising His Son. Thank God that Joseph proved true to the task. His godly example was crucial in the mission of Jesus to save the world.
Oh, that I might be a man after Joseph’s, and Jesus’, own heart!
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Have you ever noticed the odd little plot twist that occurs right at the beginning of the gospel story? In Matthew 1:21 we read that an angel told Joseph that Mary would "bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins."
Then two verses later Matthew explains that this was done to fulfill Isaiah’s prophecy that a virgin would conceive "and they shall call His name Immanuel."
It seems a little odd, doesn’t it? Why was our Saviour named Jesus, instead of Immanuel?
Perhaps we can find a clue to this mystery in events that occurred years later, as He prepared to begin His ministry.
Picture the scene, about thirty years after Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem. John the Baptist has come out of the wilderness, dressed in the rough camel’s-hair garments of a prophet. As people come to hear him preach, he begins quoting familiar passages from Israel’s prophets.
He quotes from Isaiah 40 a passage that talks about a time when Israel has suffered enough for her rebellion against God, and it is time for God to become active again in delivering His people from oppression. Those listening would no doubt interpret his prophetic message as a proclamation that it was time for God to purify His people and exalt those who have been pushed down and trodden under the feet of their Roman oppressors.
Now consider the place where John was doing this preaching, for the place is significant to the message. It was a place called "Bethabara beyond the Jordan" (John 1:28 KJV). And remember that John was doing more than just preaching there. He was also baptizing people--taking them down into the River Jordan and dipping them under the water.
What John was doing was highly symbolic in more ways than most people realize. The baptism itself was important as a symbol of repentance and washing away sins and beginning a new life. But _where_ John was doing this is just as important to understanding the symbolism as _what_ he was doing. Because in taking people down into the Jordan, from there on the far side of the river, John was reenacting the original entrance of Israel into the promised land under the leadership of Joshua.
John’s preaching and baptizing formed a powerful announcement that God was now ready to act anew in delivering His people and leading them into a new kingdom.
With that level of expectation set up, imagine the excitement of the people when John promised that another, greater leader would come soon, and then one day, there on the far shore of the Jordan, looking back toward the promised land, John pointed to another man and said "This is the promised leader!"
And when the people asked the name of the new leader, He answered "Joshua!"
For the name "Jesus" is just a Greek mispronunciation of Jesus’ real name: Joshua.
Immediately the people knew that here was their new Saviour to lead them into their new kingdom. And in that way He was also Immanuel--for God had returned to His people as promised.
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I think I was nine or ten years old when I proved to myself, rather painfully, that I wasn’t Superman. You may wonder what in the world that has to do with taking a fresh look at Jesus, but follow me on this for a moment. I think you’ll see it by time I’m done.
My mother didn’t like for me to watch Superman on TV--even though it was just the old black and white stuff from the fifties. She was afraid it would put silly ideas into my mind.
My, what a perceptive woman she was.
Somehow I managed to sneak a few clandestine episodes while she was away, and I managed to prove her right. The show did put some pretty stupid ideas into my head.
Kids today watch Power Rangers, and go out on the playground and try karate kicks on their friends. For me, watching Superman convinced me that anyone could fly if they just put their mind to it. In particular, I decided that _I_ could fly, if I just believed strongly enough.
I knew the Bible text that says "Faith without works is dead," and I knew that just believing that I could fly was pointless if I didn’t put my faith to the test by doing the work of flying.
Fortunately we didn’t live near any cliffs or tall buildings, or you probably wouldn’t be getting this e-mail devotional today--at least not from me! I decided the best place to prove my powers would be right in my own bedroom. It was a fairly large room, and I could creatively visualize myself jumping off the old iron bedstead and zipping a few tight circles around the room before coming to a perfect two-point landing on back on the bed.
Despite my faith in myself and my ability to fly, it still wasn’t an easy thing to stand there on the end of the bed and launch myself out into thin air, in the way I had seen Superman do it. But I knew that was what I had to do to unlock my hidden powers.
And that was how I proved to myself that I wasn’t Superman. It was, literally, a painful lesson. Fortunately the floor was carpeted!
When you get done laughing at me (or reminiscing about your own childhood adventures in idiocy), take some time to consider Matthew 4:3 "Now when the tempter came to Him, he said ‘If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become bread.’ "
It’s been forty days since Jesus heard the voice of His Father speaking from heaven, proclaiming that He is indeed the Son of God. Forty days of loneliness and hunger. Nonetheless, I doubt that hunger was the main issue at stake in Jesus’ mind as He faced this temptation. After all, it wouldn’t have been a sin to turn the stones into a meal.
The issue Satan was attacking on was faith. Trust. Belief. If he could get Jesus to doubt for just a moment that He really was the Son of God . . .
There’s an old saying: "When all you have is a hammer, everything begins to look like a nail" that might apply here. When a man has a certain kind of tool or power, it is very difficult not to try it out--to put it to use. If you don’t get to use that power or skill for a time, you begin to wonder whether you still have what it takes, don’t you?
And that’s where Satan hit the man Jesus. "Try it out--just prove that you’ve still got the power--just a little experiment to prove to yourself, and me, that you really are God’s Son.
I said that those forty days in the wilderness were lonely days for Jesus. In the strictest sense, I think I have to take that back. For all during those days He had been fellowshiping with His Father, and there was no room for any doubt in His mind. Satan couldn’t get through to Him on that pride, or tool-usage issue, because He stood securely in contact with His Father, and He knew what was most important: Not physical food, but that communion that He had enjoyed during the days of His fast. And so He had His answer ready for Satan: " `Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God' " (Matthew 4:4)
Jesus’ security came not from what He could do, but from Who He knew.
Not a bad example for us, either, is it?
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Personal identity.
My style.
Who I am.
Why you should respect me.
All these things are important to us as we try to set ourselves apart, try to justify our existence. We make statements about these things every day by how and where we live, where we go, what we drive, what we wear, how we groom ourselves. Consciously or unconsciously everything we do is calculated to create an impression--yes, even for those who may have gotten stuck in the 70s counter-culture and never quit making the statement that we have nothing to prove by how we look or dress!
If you’ve "arrived" at a certain level of success or power in your life, it’s a very hard thing to not claim the turf or respect that you’re due for all the hard work you invested in getting where you are.
The day after Jesus performed one of His greatest miracles--feeding 5,000 men + women and children with the contents of a small boy’s sack lunch--the excited throng tracked Him down on the other side of the Sea of Galilee, wondering how He had managed to get there. (He didn’t bother to tell them that He had walked across the lake.)
When they found Him, they asked for a repeat performance: "‘What sign will You perform then, that we may see it and believe You? What work will You do? Our fathers ate the manna in the desert'" (John 6:30, 31 NKJV).
The message is clear: If you are the great leader that we should follow--if you’re the "new Moses" we’ve been promised (see Deuteronomy 18:18), then show your stuff. Give us bread to eat, like Moses did for our ancestors.
Just 24 hours earlier, Jesus had gazed out over a similar throng--people who had followed Him and listened to Him way past lunch time--and in compassion for their hunger, He had used His miracle-working power to supply their need.
This day the people are simply inviting Him to do the same thing again--to demonstrate His power anew. That, after all, is just good science. The best proof that something can be done is to duplicate the experiment and get the same results.
But Jesus didn’t respond with a handout. He refused the people’s request for a miraculous meal. Why?
Jesus had already covered this exact same ground once before, but that time it was Satan who issued the challenge. "‘If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread’" he had said (Matthew 4:3 NKJV).
But Jesus had nothing to prove to Himself, to the devil, or to other people. Those who listened to Him would have to accept Him on the basis of what He taught, not what He brought. His message of truth served as His credentials, and He never used His miracle-working power to serve Himself or to validate Himself or His ministry. He reserved it for exercising compassion--meeting others’ needs.
So, in spite of His own desperate hunger, after fasting for forty days; despite His natural human need to be respected or popular, He resisted the temptation to become a carnival sideshow, or an X-files investigee. Perhaps more difficult yet, He resisted the temptation to prove His status.
Jesus found His self-worth, His meaning in life, through serving the needs of others.
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"‘Do you not see all these things? Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down’" (Matthew 24:2, NKJV).
Recently something about this prophecy of Jesus struck home to me in a different way than before. I phrase it in the form of a question: Who do you identify with more in this story, Herod or Jesus? Of course as Christians, we’re programmed to say "Jesus!" (Remember Kindergarten class at church, where the right answer to every question was "Jesus!"). But let’s take a closer look.
There’s a rule I heard in some business seminar that says that most people spend 80 percent of their time doing things that they know how to do best. For Herod, if you look at the evidence, what he knew best was building huge buildings and fortresses. According to the Illustrated Bible Dictionary from InterVarsity Press, Herod "furthered that emperor’s cultural policy by lavish building projects, not only in his own realm but in foreign cities (e.g. Athens). In his own realm he rebuilt Samaria and renamed it Sebaste . . . he rebuilt Strato’s Tower on the Mediterranean coast, equipped it with a splendid artificial harbour, and called it Caesarea . . . in honour of the emperor. Other settlements and strongholds were founded throughout the land. In Jerusalem he built a palace for himself on the W wall; he had already rebuilt the Antonia fortress (called after Antony) NW of the Temple area. The greatest of all his building enterprises was the reconstruction of the Jerusalem Temple, begun early in 19 BC." You can add to that list the huge fortress at Masada the mountain he had chopped down to size to build the palace known as the Herodion or Herodium.
I suppose what caught my eye in this story was the great effort that Herod invested in perpetuating himself. Stone, stone, stone. Everywhere he built things out of good, hard rock, hoping it would last for ever.
But Jesus, with the prophet’s eye, could look at the massive stones he had stacked atop one another--stone monuments supposedly erected in honor of the God of Israel, but really known as "Herod’s Temple," and He could see through it all.
But I saw myself in Herod. Because lately I’ve been looking at my own life, pondering what it is that makes me tick--what drives me to do what I do. I came to realize that my life has often been motivated by the same drive to create things and leave them behind as remembrances of myself. I don’t build out of stone, I tend toward the more modern material of invisible electronic impulses stored as infinitesimal blips on magnetic media.
If you’re a computer type, what words strike more fear into your life than "hard disk crash"? They conjure up images of hours, perhaps days or weeks of work suddenly disappearing into a black hole of oblivion. The monuments to accomplishment that you’ve devoted your life to suddenly becoming less real than the phantasm of last night’s dreams.
That was the vision that Jesus had of Herod’s greatest monument.
For Jesus knew that whatever material things we build our lives around will sooner or later come to nothing.
And there, on that hill, looking back at the temple, He went on to teach His disciples about what would really count: trust in God, a kingdom focus, caring for those in need (see Matt. 24 and 25).
Jesus Himself, built His monument out of perishable flesh, but it has endured much better than the stones Herod piled up. And it will continue to endure and prosper as long as we take His message to heart.
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"So I answered, 'Who are You, Lord?' And He said to me, 'I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom you are persecuting' (Acts 22:8 NKJV).
This week as I was studying on the life of Christ, I looked up all the references to Nazareth, and something I had never noticed before jumped out at me. The most common appellation attached to the name Jesus was the name of the city where He grew up. You never hear Him called Jesus of Bethlehem, Jesus of Egypt, or Jesus of Heaven, in reference to the other places He had lived. And in the text quoted above, we discover that when the Lord accosted Paul along the road to Damascus, He even identified Himself as "Jesus of Nazareth."
An amazing thing, when you consider the reputation that place had. Remember the comment of Nathaniel: "‘Can anything good come out of Nazareth?’" (John 1:46 NKJV). The implication being that it was the kind of place most of us would want to forget being from.
As I noted in another of these devotionals, there was good reason why Joseph chose to take his family north into Galilee. There was too much turmoil in Judea for it to be a safe place. But there’s another little-known geographical detail that may have played into the decision as well.
We know Joseph was a carpenter, and most pictures I’ve seen in Bible story books picture him toiling day by day in a little shop attached to his house, repairing a neighbor’s plowshare, or building tables and chairs. But what the artists fail to take into account is that Nazareth is just down the road--about four miles from the city of Sepphoris--a place that was much more famous than Nazareth in the days before Jesus became well known.
While Joseph, Mary, and Jesus were living in Egypt, Sepphoris became the center of a Jewish revolt against the Herodian dynasty. When Herod the Great died, the rebel leader Judas, son of Ezekias, captured and pillaged a palace that Herod had built at Sepphoris. After Herod Antipas put down that revolt, he decided to make Sepphoris his capital city.
That meant that for the next twenty years or so, there were massive building projects going on just a few miles down the road from Nazareth. I can’t help but believe that news of this played a part in Joseph’s decision to return to his native city.
Is it possible, then, that both Joseph and Jesus may have walked the dusty road to Sepphoris day after day, or perhaps week after week, to help build palaces for Antipas?
Consider the lesson we drew in last week’s thoughts. Jesus, looking at the magnificent buildings Herod the Great had constructed in Jerusalem predicted their ultimate destruction. He Himself may have worked on Herod’s son’s buildings in Sepphoris--repairing the damage after an earlier war.
Only about 20 years after Antipas started construction in Sepphoris, he decided to move his capital down to the Sea of Galilee, so he had new palaces built in a brand-new city he named Tiberias. Perhaps Jesus watched as the magnificent work at Sepphoris began to deteriorate and fall into ruin through neglect.
Now, remember the title Jesus assigned to Antipas: "Go, tell that fox, 'Behold, I cast out demons and perform cures today and tomorrow, and the third day I shall be perfected' (Luke 13:32).
And remember what else He had to say about foxes: "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head" (Luke 9:58).
Could it be that Jesus had looked on all the finery that this world had to offer, as He helped to build Antipas’ great palace at Sepphoris, and He labeled it for what it was--nothing better than a hole for a fox to sleep in.
He saw through it all, and He forsook it all that for the life of an itinerant teacher, for He could see that the only thing that really matters is where you lay your head in eternity.
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How do you see Jesus? What does He look like to you?
The post-ascension pictures we get of Him from the Bible don’t give us a lot of detail about physical characteristics. I think it’s safe to assume that most of what John wrote about His appearance in Revelation is symbolic rather than literal, physical description. Otherwise, we’d have to assume that Jesus spends His days riding horseback around heaven with bloody clothes on and a sword sticking out of His mouth (see Rev. 19:11-15),
Artists through the centuries have made many attempts at capturing their understanding of the Savior on canvas. All attempts are, of course, limited. There is no way the full image of Christ can be accurately portrayed in two or three static dimensions. That’s why He chose malleable, moving, living human flesh and spirit--in the form of His disciples--as His medium for revealing Himself to the world. Through His teaching and His love, He sought to recreate Himself in them. If He was to be revealed to the world, it would have to be through lives that had been transformed by association with Him.
The same is true today. The finest painting or sculpture can never reveal the Savior of the world to the world. Still today He has to become flesh and dwell among us in the bodies and spirits of Christians.
There’s an intriguing display titled "We Would See Jesus" at a website called First Church of Cyberspace at http://www.execpc.com/~chender/GalleryII.htm There are quite a few artists’ conceptions of Christ there. The man who posted the page prefers one done by Rembrandt.
What intrigued me was that after I looked at the Rembrandt painting, I went to another site that’s linked from the First Church Gallery (click on the word Rembrandt) and compared Rembrandt’s painting of Christ to several Rembrandt self-portraits that are posted at the other site.
There’s uncanny similarity--in lighting and other features.
The question is, was Rembrandt seeing Christ through a Rembrandt-shaped mask, or was he seeing himself through a Christ-shaped mask?
How do you see Jesus? How do I see Jesus? Is our vision of Him constrained by our own humanity? Are we able to get beyond our own needs, our own image, to perceive the real Jesus? Probably not, most of the time. We tend to read the gospels to find answers to whatever questions are troubling us at the moment. Our minds naturally gloss over aspects that might contradict what we want to believe.
But God challenges us to see the big picture. To continue to read and study--to let Him peel away the masks we impose on the Savior, until we get a clearer vision. A vision in which we see ourselves through a Christ-shaped mask, rather than imposing our own image on Christ.
That’s the challenge I leave with you this time. Get into the gospel for yourself. Study, read, pray. Ask God to remove the mask, and to reveal the real Jesus to you. (and in you)
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