By: Dr. Jonathan Juilfs
聽“Jesus Christ is the image [Gk. eikon] of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him, all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible….He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church…and through him, God [the Father] was pleased to reconcile to himself all things…by making peace through the blood of his Cross.” (Colossians 1:15-20, NRSV)
During last聽week鈥檚 chapel (Nov 2), Prof. Phil Irish (Art) and several of his students facilitated a communal 鈥減ainting鈥 that we worked on throughout the liturgy (including during the message time). Phil provided a canvas on which was a life-size outline of a body with hands raised鈥攍ike the arms of Jesus on the Cross鈥攁nd sectioned into squares in which we, the members of the Body of Christ, could each paint a small patch in colors that we had chosen. The final product was a pastiche of our Redeemer community 鈥済rafted鈥 onto the body of Christ, a beautiful and poignant pictorial symbol of our unity-in-diversity and of our communal desire to bind ourselves to Christ and to be his 鈥渕embers鈥 reaching out to the world in love. This 鈥淕od Sighting鈥 reinforces my persistent awareness that the spiritual work ongoing in our midst is not just about academic knowledge, information building, or even skills acquisition. It is about the very literal 鈥渇ashioning鈥 of the Body of Christ, the building of a community that is the living image鈥攖he icon鈥攐f the invisible God, just as Jesus is the living image of God the Father. Thanks be to God!
For your reflection:
1) How is God calling me to be part of His Body of Christ?
2) How can I step into this further?