With the Christmas season fast approaching Christmas trees are flying up, presents are being wrapped, and a little mistletoe is hung from above the doorway (at least on the third floor at Boyce). Here we are to celebrate the advent. My question is how exactly do we do that? Sadly, we do it in an idolatrous way. Each year thousands of church’ are pulling out their nativity scenes from the attic, dusting off the wise men (never-mind they were never there,) and placing the cute baby Jesus in the manger for all to see. My question to you guys is- should they do this? And what should we do about it? Is the image of Christ being slenderized and is it ok? Perhaps i am extremely jumpy about this because Im reading Packers book, but he makes a great point, quoting Calvin “a true image of God, wrote Calvin, “is not to be found in all the world; and hence…His glory is defiled, and His truth corrupted by the lie, whenever He is set before our eyes in visible form.” He goes on to say that “the heart of the objection to pictures and images is that they inevitably conceal most, if not all, of the truth about the personal nature and character of the divine Being whom they represent.” So in meditating on the incarnate God, the One who interred into he world as a babe, and was cradled in a cattle trough- the same God who created the cosmos out of nothing, the sustainer of all things, the very breath of life that became flesh and dwelt among us- how dare we dishonor his name by making images to aid in worship JUST as the Israelites did with Aaron. So i urge us all to watch our idolatrous hearts and seek the true image of the God-Man- the image found in the Bible. That is the true image and the one that can represent His glory to the finite understanding we have.
-Josiah
brady412 said
Packer makes such good and tight arguments about the images issue. I think it is important to rethink the nativity scene outside our churches. Does it just become another icon associated with Christmas? This is really an important issue. Good thoughts.
aloginow said
I agree boys, the only image of God we should have should be from the Bible. Whether it’s the Passion of the Christ, The Nativity, or the picture of Jesus your Grandma has on her mantel. First of all Jesus was jewish, not european (he didn’t look like Jim Caviezel) and these things are imprinted in our mind. When we pray to Jesus this is what we see. I am all about art, and redeeming it, but to give God a man made image is against the Second Commandment.
kendo said
I know that my mom gets the Nativity Scenes out every year. I guess I never really have thought of it being idolatry or making an image for God. My question – say Jesus was alive today – Would it be okay to take a picture of him with a camera and hang it on a wall??? This is purely hypothetical, but I think that there should be a balance understanding Jesus was fully man and fully God. I agree with Packer. People sometimes worship images of Jesus and that is in violation of the 2nd Commandment. By the way, Brady, what about the Fourth Commandment? Just kidding . . . But we could take this too far and exalt Jesus’ deity over his humanity so that we do not even acknowledge he had real human flesh that got scraped and dirty just like us. We can look at history and see guys like Schwenkfeld who completely get it wrong with his views on incarnational Christology/celestial flesh.
- Kendall
josiahnol said
well i would say that yes, hypothetically speaking, that if Jesus were alive today it wold be ok to take a picture of him. the problem that i have is that any representation (other than the real thing) is probably aiding in some form of worship. and our picture of Christ sould only come through the gospel, not a painting on the wall. i dont know about you guys but after seeing the Passion of the Christ, I were left with an image- a brutal image at that, and regardless of whether i was aware of it or not, when i prayed i had that image in my mind. do you see my point?
-Josiah
josiahnol said
and yes Kindall you made an excellent point! we should take caution not to disregard the humanity of Christ, but i think prohibiting images keeps the the total God-Man image to be seen only through the Gospel. cheers. God bless
David said
I’ve been conflicted by this for a long time. I grew up Roman Catholic and always had the one famous picture of Jesus in my room along with a statue of Mary. When I got married my parents gave me the famous infinite prague. Please correct me if I botched up the spelling but many of you probably know what I mean. When I started to read the Bible after going to a generic Christian church, I immediately took down everything. I thought wow this is wrong. I recently bought a nativity set because I just think it’s beautiful. I don’t bow down to it. But I have the Bible open to the section about the birth of Jesus right in front of it. My wife and I want to leave it out all year because of what it represents. The birth of the greatest person ever to walk the earth. I don’t need it to remind me. I think about it everyday and give thanks in prayers every night when I hit my knees. Am I wrong? I keep wanting to say yes but deep down I feel it’s OK.
josiahnol said
Hey David, thanks for your comment!! Over the past month or so i have been contemplating this more and more, and i think i personally am starting to lean towards a more “flexible” view of this sort of thing. However, i think we should take it with great caution if we represent Christ in any image or form. The main premise of my argument was that any image automatically involves some form of worship (even subconsciously). i am not as sure of that as of now, but i would say this: if an image of God is aiding you in worshiping Him in some form that is not represented in the Gospel, then i would get rid of it. again, i am still thinking about this and haven’t come to a firm conclusion; once i do i will post it. Your thoughts guys?
Brady said
As someone who has argued staunchly against images of Christ, I am leaning towards being more flexible on the issue. What more beautiful picture could there be than Christ on the cross? To appreciate that beauty in the form of art, is that wrong? I think it is wrong to create an image to worship it. However I wonder if it is okay to have a picture of Christ on the cross if its intention is depict his sacrifice which reminds us of the true Christ who died for us? I really don’t know.
Kendall said
Motive in the creation may be good, but its affect on the minds who view it – that is where the problem lies. People worshiping Christ and having an image of him in their head that is not him . . .