Jesus, The Visible Image

Jesus, the Visible Image

He is the image of the invisible God.

Colossians 1:15

IN WORD We’ve heard it all before: Jesus was just a good teacher, a moral philosopher, a social revolutionary, a martyr—anything but divine. Unfortunately for the skeptics, there’s no evidence of a Jesus who did not claim deity for Himself. And in the culture that was prepared for Him, He was certainly not claiming to be one of many deities. No, He implicitly claimed to be the one true God—Yahweh, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. That’s the stumbling block of the gospel. This suffering servant, this humble man of Galilee, this relatively poor man from a relatively poor family, taught with authority, forgave sins, allowed people to worship Him, claimed unity with the Father, and invoked for Himself the divine name of deity: I am.

Think of that. The invisible God became visible. The mystery of the ages was revealed. For a brief time in this world, the vague and often distorted speculations of ancient Greek philosophers, Persian magicians, and Oriental sages were answered. God showed up in the flesh. And He wasn’t at all what we expected.

But we have come to love Him, haven’t we? Though we haven’t seen Him in the flesh ourselves, we read the testimonies of those who have. And our belief in those testimonies has opened doorways of experience for us in which His Spirit has proven to be alive and powerful. The invisible God has a visible image, and we are drawn to Him. Our worship is an enigma to an unbelieving world, but to us it is life. Jesus is God.

IN DEED Is Jesus an integral part of your worship? If not, you are missing something. You may be worshiping a vague concept of God—a life force, a cosmic power, a God who works in mysterious ways. And our God is all of those things. But He has given us more specifics than that. He has opened the curtain on much of the mystery. His ways have been demonstrated on the very earth we live on. He has had human blood pulsing through His veins. He has shed human tears. And He has died a human death. Worship Him. He was made visible so we can.

The only Christ for whom there is a shred of evidence is a miraculous figure making stupendous claims.

—C. S. LEWIS