Comments on: Praying to Father, Son and Holy Spirit

By: Ruthie

Ruthie — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 02:56:35 +0000

Sara, I really like your point that the only way not to limit God is to acknowledge that he is living by having a relationship with him.
This icon business is something I’ve been reading about in a book called “The Open Door: Entering the Sanctuary of Icons and Prayer.” I am not knowledgeable enough about church history or theology to condemn the use of images in prayer or even fully understand it, I just do know that they’ve been used for ages. Icons seem to be a revelation of the character of God in artistic medium. I am under the impression that many icon artists were divinely inspired and knew God intimately. The authors of the Bible were inspired by God to write but these words also, are not God. If we can be in danger of limiting our worship of Jesus to images of him rather than his full being I want to say we can also be in danger of worshipping the Bible instead of a mysterious, living God, limiting him to ancient history. I do realize however, that the Bible is the Word of God left to humanity and icons are not. Does anyone have insight?
The last thing I would like to say is that I am not quick to judge orthodox traditions and methods of prayer as automatically errant or insincere because they are clothed in ritual, I wouldn’t name them as habitual because they involve consistent practices like using icons. I think this is a common way of thinking in our circle of modern believers, I have definitely thought this way so I wanted to mention it.There is something beautiful and encouraging about prayer in these ways. I don’t have to always have the inspiration to imagine a prayer to God in every situation; I can use the words of a poet or the painting of an artist both inspired by the Holy Spirit to worship.

By: Sara

Sara — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 14:45:37 +0000

Andrew & Joe,
I understand where both of you are coming from. Jesus did come as a man to help us relate to the Father. However, like Joe said, many people do imagine Jesus as a white guy. I think that’s the sad thing. So many people lack a relationship with Jesus that they depend on portraits of art to depict for them the Son of God. This way of understanding who Jesus is can be dangerous–I wouldn’t say idolatry, but I would say limiting. For example, there are pictures out there of Jesus as a white guy in a robe, holding a sheep with a shepherd’s staff. Yes there are places in the Bible where Jesus refers to Himself as the Great Shepherd, but to recognize Him as only that is limiting to His character. I think many people when imagining Jesus get stuck on only a handful of pictures of Jesus rather than directly interacting with who Jesus was and is through the Word. If we are continually reading Scripture and seeing different images of Jesus, then our view of Jesus will not only grow but so will our relationship with Him.

By: Joe

Joe — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 22:00:44 +0000

Yes, it’s interesting how people usually picture Jesus as a white guy. I don’t know what his skin tone was. But I do know that, with very few exceptions, the early church fathers were black. Jesus was a man of a particular place and time, a member of one human culture. But he continually incarnates himself all over the world in many different cultures in his living Body, the Church. That would be an interesting discussion to have sometime.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 21:37:40 +0000

Well what I was trying to say was that when picturing Jesus, people tend to conjure up an image of a portrait of Jesus they’ve seen or James Caviezel. But I guess even so they’re not worshiping the image.

By: Joe

Joe — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 15:05:00 +0000

Hi Andrew. Idolatry is worshiping created things rather than the creator. Even if we don’t know how Jesus looked, forming a mental image of him hardly seems to fit that category, because he is the creator. I have heard some Christians (e.g. Harold Camping) say that it does, but I just don’t understand that way of thinking. In my humble opinion, anything that we can do to relate to God, as long as its consistent with his self-revelation in scripture and history, seems like a good thing.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 02:43:23 +0000

Oopsy haha. But wouldn’t you say that picturing Jesus when praying can possibly become idolatry in that it’s difficult (or even impossible) to imagine something that we’ve never seen before? I think your paragraph that talks about what names we call God and who we pray to shows that we need to be careful of the things we do, even if they’re done with good intentions, because we can end up in the wrong.