Who is Jesus? We know His name was really Yeshua (Joshua), and that he was the promised deliverer of the Jewish nation, the messiah. Messiah means "anointed" which in turn means chosen. He's the central figure of Christianity, and He's my brother. Personally (and Biblically) Jesus adopted me as His brother
He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, (Ephesians 1:5)
4 But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, 5 so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons. (Galatians 4:4-5)
This is cool, I've never had a brother, and I'm not going to go in to how incredible it is to suddenly realize that I have one who created the heavens and earth and actually died to save me, but He is so much more than that...
Blessed is His Name, Saviour Redeemer! Thank you for this very timely and critical statement about Him. What joy it is to be one of His Beloved redeemed...
ReplyDeleteBlessings,
Kay Cude
Doug, if only you would not use an image to represent the Lord. Thank you for your prayerful consideration.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your comment, and I should do an article on this some day. My thought is - Jesus came to us as a man, what is wrong with depicting an image of how He appeared to us during his short ministry... but then there is the commandment against idolatry.
Deletegotquestions.org says:
When God first gave His Law to mankind, He began with a statement of who He is: “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt” (Exodus 20:2) with a warning that Israel was to have no other God but Him. He immediately followed that by forbidding the making of any image of anything “in heaven above or on earth beneath or in the waters below” (Exodus 20:4) for the purpose of worshiping or bowing down to it... Of course, simply having a picture of Jesus hanging in a home or church does not mean people are practicing idolatry. It is possible that a portrait of Jesus or a crucifix can become an object of worship, in which case the worshiper is at fault. But there is nothing in the New Testament that would specifically forbid a Christian from having a picture of Jesus. Such an image could well be a reminder to pray, to refocus on the Lord, or to follow in Christ’s footsteps. But believers should know that the Lord cannot be reduced to a two-dimensional image and that prayer or adoration is not to be offered to a picture. A picture will never be a complete image of God or accurately display His glory, and should never be a substitute for how we view God or deepen our knowledge of Him. And, of course, even the most beautiful representation of Jesus Christ is nothing more than one artist’s conception of what the Lord looked like.
Doug, I've come to the same position you have, however, there are many Christians who are distracted by depictions. For that reason I try to avoid using them.
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