The mirror image

By David ReayFriday 30 Aug 2013LifeWords DevotionalsFaithReading Time: 0 minutes

Read John 14:8-10

8 Philip said,”Lord,show us the Father and that will be enough for us.”

9 Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me,Philip,even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say,’Show us the Father’? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father,and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather,it is the Father,living in me,who is doing his work.

In a particular church in Rome there is a wonderful painted ceiling. The problem is that it is too high up for people to see it clearly. So the curators of the building have placed a mirror on a table directly below the ceiling. By looking at this mirror,people can see what the ceiling looks like.

Jesus is like a mirror which God holds up to us so we can get an idea of what he is like. If we want to know what God is like,there is no better place to look than Jesus. What does God think of children? Note what Jesus thought of them. What is God’s view of money? Observe Jesus’ teaching on the subject. How does God view human power and authority? Pay attention to how Jesus acted and taught on the matter. Jesus is the human face of God. He is God spelling himself out in a language we can understand.

Philip and perhaps the other disciples were wanting some sort of insight into God when all the time he was staring them in the face in person. They figured that special though Jesus was,indeed the Messiah,there was still some material beyond Jesus which might shed some more light on God. Jesus tells him,and us,that there is nothing more to tell. It’s as if God tells us humans that he has sent Jesus and “that’s our blooming lot.”

True,God can’t be exhaustively known by any human being. We always have to live with mystery when it comes to God. But not too much mystery. Jesus reveals enough of God so we can love him,relate to him,and have him shape our lives. God isn’t embedded in some fog beyond our apprehension. He isn’t hiding from us as if divinity can’t possibly be tainted by humanity. In Jesus,he has revealed enough of himself for us to get on with. A search for God that neglects or even downplays Jesus is doomed to end in some sort of tame,identikit God of our own creation. To deal with God we must deal with Jesus. Embrace Jesus and we find ourselves in the encompassing embrace of God.

Blessings
David Reay