I wonder if you have an image
of God? Many people do, even if it’s one they can’t believe in – that old man
with a long white beard, the heavenly schoolmaster, the dictator who rules the world. Maybe a doting father
– or even a loving mother. Or perhaps a
painting you saw has left an impression on you – a painting of an ancient
figure elevated above Jesus with a white dove between them. With such a plethora of images, some highly questionable, no wonder all three great
monotheistic faiths, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, forbid the depiction of
God. “But”, you might say, “what about all the images of Christ in churches?”
Well, in a sense, they’re not images of God; they represent the human form in
which Christians believe he clothed himself and as Orthodox Christians know, if
God chose to reveal invisible things in visible matter then we honour God by doing the same.
In the end God remains a
mystery beyond our comprehension so to say ‘I don’t believe in God’ begs the
question – well, what is it exactly that you don’t believe in because it’s likely
that the Church doesn’t believe in that either. Once you begin to define what
God is then God, in a sense, slips
through your fingers. Nowhere in the
Jewish scriptures (the ‘Old Testament’) is there a definition of God – the
closest one gets is that remarkable statement when God said to Moses: “I am who
I am” or “I will be who I will be” or whatever the original Hebrew words mean. Now
that seems to suggest God is not so much a ‘thing’ as a state of existence that
cannot be named. One might say that God is the is-ness of is, pure being or becoming. Some speak of God as an ‘ocean
of love’ or the heart of a mystery and so on. But none of these expressions
seek to define what, in the end, is and always has been beyond our
understanding. I know some object to
saying that God is a mystery but that’s how it’s always been. It’s not a ‘cop-out’
but, as St Ephrem the Syrian back in the fourth century realised, only
something greater than God could possibly define God and there can be nothing greater than God … So perhaps we might say that 'God' is
a useful three-letter word to identify what is unidentifiable but which men and
women down the centuries and around the world have believed in. I know we like
to name things as it gives us the ability to identify them but – whoever or
whatever God is – it would seem God
clearly doesn’t want to be identified because as the Little Prince in Antoine de Saint-Exupéry beautiful little book of that name said: “What
is essential is invisible to the eye.”
Yes, there have been other ways
of trying to identify God – the Holy, Faithful or Wise One for example – but
these are merely attributes people have used to speak of God. Then there are
metaphors: God is the potter, we the clay; the nursing mother or loving Father;
God is light and in Him there is no
darkness etc. Two of the most common ways of speaking of God are as the 'most Compassionate' and 'all-Merciful' One or the Holy, Faithful or Wise One, attributes which lie at the heart of
both Christianity and Islam. Then there are metaphors: God is the potter, we the
clay; the nursing mother or loving Father; God is light and in Him there is no
darkness etc. But you cannot say God is this or that.
God is not this baby any more than
God is that old man. What you can say,
and what the Church says, is that God clothed Himself in our flesh and wore the
garments of this baby who grew into a 33 year-old Palestinian man. He on whom
we gaze with the eye of faith is the image of the invisible God, the first-born
of all creation. And then you would be able to say that what
we see in Him reflects the nature of that which He contains leading Charles
Wesley to sing:
Jesu,
thou art all-compassion,
Pure unbounded love thou art.
But, more wonderful still, what we see
in Him is a bright reflection of what lies within us. We can reflect
aspects of that diamond-studied divine compassion and love that dwells in Him;
our being contains a reflection of the wonder He incarnates and which we are to
reveal. If you behold glory in this child, that glory can be reflected in us,
as the Turkish writer, Elif Shafak, has said: “How we see God is a
direct reflection of how we see ourselves. If God brings to mind mostly fear
and blame, it means there is too much fear and blame welled inside us. If we
see God as full of love and compassion, so are we.” Perhaps, them, we might say that the aroma of 'God' invites us to seek the ultimate depth of all our
being, the creative ground and meaning of all our existence. Maybe, then, it cannot
be said that God ‘exists’ as you or I do, and that simple, three-lettered word offers
the way we can express the inexpressibleness of life – that which painters
and poets also struggle with. The great silence where a Word echoes; the
expression of all that is, has been and will be. The silence of love.. The
eternal darkness in which light shines.
If, then, the baby in the manger
distracts you
from seeing what lies in the Cave of
Bethlehem;
that reflection of the depth of human
life,
then look beyond and realise the potential
present in yourself,
the mystery that lies in the recesses
of your own heart,
Perhaps, the importance of this Feast
isn’t just that we celebrate God’s incarnation –
it is the Feast of what our humanity
can become.
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