I want you to picture Jesus…. Take a moment, close your eyes, bring up his image. I’m curious to know what image you hold of him. What’s it based on? Has it changed over time? Is it a picture you hold from when you were young or has it changed over time?
Do you have a favorite image of Jesus? What’s he doing? What kind of expression does he have? Does he look friendly or stern? What’s he wearing? Is he tall or short, blonde or brunette, beard or clean shaven? Is he glowy and flowy, or humble and simply dressed?
I would imagine that each of us holds a different image of Jesus, something that reflects our theologies and our experiences of Jesus in our lives. Some images might be similar but there will be little differences – a smile, the crinkle of eye wrinkles, the colour of hair, the stance he is holding. And that is fine – this diversity in images. Actually, this diversity gives a depth to the person of Jesus that otherwise wouldn’t happen. Jesus’ actual appearance isn’t really known, at least not with 100% certainty, and over the last 2000 plus years he has been portrayed in millions of different ways through art, photography, and iconography.
(Slide: Jesus side view)
The picture on the screen is likely one you’ve seen before. This is the all time most reproduced picture of Jesus, created in 1940 by Warner Sallman. Sallman worked in marketing and had connections with various publishing agencies who worked with Sallman to distribute this image widely to Protestant and Catholic audiences. The image has been printed on prayer cards, stained glass, faux oil paintings, calendars, books, candles, night lights, collectible plates, magnets, throw blankets, t-shirts, mugs…. And it has hung in thousands of church across the continent for decades.
So if your image of Jesus looks a little like this, it’s not unexpected!
In the 1990’s there was a new focus amongst various scholars and theologians to find the “historical Jesus” – to move past the Jesus of European likeness to a Jesus that reflected the reality of his time and place. Using the technologies available through archeology and anthropology, new facts about Jesus and his life came to light in a way that was unavailable to us in the years before. In 2001 a BBC documentary was released which included the work of Richard Neave – a forensic anthropologist – who used an first century Israeli skull along with computer imaging programs, clay and knowledge of historical Jewish and Middle Eastern features to create a face that may have hypothetically looked like a neighbour of Jesus or perhaps even Jesus himself. Perhaps you recognize this face:
(Slide: Historical Jesus)
Not surprisingly, this “new” image of Jesus or possible likeness of Jesus caused quite the controversy in North America, mostly because it was so far removed what we were used to Jesus looking like – white, blond and blue eyed. However, wasn’t and isn’t the only “new” or different way of representing the person of Jesus in the church. If we were to do a tour of Christian churches globally, we would find that there are indeed many different ways that Jesus is represented, most of which are unfamiliar to us, maybe even unsettling or disturbing to us, but are contextual representations that allow Jesus to be a closer part of their experience.
Early in Christianity’s history as it spread throughout the world, colonialism usually led the way – images of white European Jesus came with the European explorers, settlers, missionaries and priest to places such as North America, South and Central America, India, Africa and Australia, along with smaller island nations. The indigenous peoples of these countries, those who had long lived on the land, learned about the Christian faith from those who “knew” that Jesus and God were white, because, well, at that time, these newcomers to the land believed that their ethnicity and race was superior (more educated, more civilized, more… well, everything) so it only made sense that the God and Jesus they taught about would look like them rather than the people they were “teaching.” To have a brown or dark skin Jesus would be an inferior Jesus. These missionaries and settlers used this white skinned Jesus to support the taking of land and resources, while subjugating and enslaving the original peoples. White Jesus allowed the newcomers to rule over whoever was there that didn’t look like them and their Jesus.
This is painful aspect of our Christian history. It is hard, but also necessary to acknowledge that the institutional aspect of our faith has stumbled so brutally in so many ways, using Jesus as a tool of the very oppression his ministry sought to break down. Is it any wonder, after centuries of horrible behavior, that people don’t want to deal with the church? There has been lasting damage that people today that will take generations to undo and heal … but there are little things in our own spheres of influence that can start to change things and one of those things is slowly expanding our images of Christ include more than a blonde, blue eyed Christ. Not replacing, but recognizing that this is one of a myriad of ways we can imagine Jesus.
As you might have figured out that today is Transfiguration Sunday, where each year we hear a version of the story of Jesus making his way to a mountain peak with some close friends and experiences something mysterious and miraculous. Jesus and his friends retreat to the mountain for some time to pray and to rest, a simple time away from the gathering, insistent crowds. But sometimes mountain peaks hold more than quiet and spectacular views, sometimes important moments take place up in the thin air and chilly temperatures, just as it does for Jesus today.
Jesus heads up the mountain with Peter, James and John, all of whom are deeply faithful Jewish men. These men had all been steeped in the cultural and faith teachings of Judaism and knew the stories of their faith ancestors like the back of their hands. They knew that Moses and Elijah were among the most important figures in the history of God’s people – the stories of Moses parting the Red Sea and saving the Israelite people, and the prophet Elijah facing off against Jezebel and Ahab would have been deeply ingrained in their beings as it would have been for any Jew at that time. Which is why when Jesus started teaching, preforming miracles, and sharing the new of the kingdom of heaven, people started to questions just who he might be. There were several ideas about Jesus’ identity, even among the disciples who spent all their time with him… they wondered if he was a rabbi, a revolutionary, a prophet, a new Moses, a new Elijah, a new Jeremiah, a new John the Baptist…
No one had a definitive answer… until Peter, James and John went up that mountain with Jesus and he was revealed to them in a new way – the bright glow of the illuminated Jesus signalled that this person had moved from being friend and teacher, to something more, The Messiah, the anointed one, God in human form. It wasn’t enough to shine like a star to prove Jesus’ authority, from deep in the cloud cover a voice spoke, God’s voice, affirming Jesus’ belovedness. Moses and Elijah join Jesus to cement his importance in light of their shared Jewish faith and then, then the disciples standing on that mountain top truly understood who this friend and rabbi was. And then all of a sudden it was gone – the light, the voice, the prophets – and Jesus starts back down the mountain. The last thing he says is “Tell no one about this… wait until after the son of man comes back from the dead.”
There has been more and more talk in the last couple of decades about how representation matters in toys and movies and books, and educators now know that kids gain confidence when they see characters and toys that look like them. It makes a difference to kids to have a doll or superhero with the same skin colour as them, and until recently that wasn’t possible for brown and black skinned children. How much more important must it be, then, for both AND adults to know that God represents all cultures and skin tones as well.
One example of this is Black Liberation Theology, which teaches that teaches that God has special love for the poor and the oppressed, and that the God who freed the Israelites from slavery under the Egyptians would likewise free Black people from slavery, segregation, lynching, and oppression. Imagining Jesus himself as Black brings the incarnation even closer to Black people and their experience.
With all this in mind, I’d like to invite you to take a moment of reflection as we consider images of Jesus from a variety of sources. Perhaps the Jesus image that you came with this morning will remain your favourite or maybe you’ll notice one in this collection that speaks to you in a different way…
