Church of the Holy City

Images of Jesus

Images of Jesus
Rev. Dr. David J. Fekete
April 25, 2010

Revelation 7:9-17 John 10:22-39 Psalm 23

In this morning’s Bible readings, we have about every concept of Jesus that people think of. In Revelation, we have Jesus as the Lamb in the center of the throne presiding over the whole heavens. Then by marked contrast, we have the Jews wanting to stone Jesus because they think Him a man only. We also have Jesus making that claim, that He is God. We have Jesus using Trinitarian language, calling Himself the Son of God. Then Jesus makes an interesting reference to Psalm 82, which reads, “I said, ‘You are “gods”; you are all sons of the Most High.’” This could be read as saying that Jesus is the Son of God in the same way that we are gods and sons of the Most High. At least, Jesus seems to use this Psalm to justify His own claim to be the Son of God. So we have five different ways of viewing Jesus in these readings. And these five ways of viewing Jesus are how people today still see Him. I’d like to talk about these ways of viewing Jesus this morning.
The picture that we have from the book of Revelation is a wonderfully inclusive picture. We have innumerable people surrounding the throne on which the Lamb sits. The Lamb is the risen Jesus Christ who presides over the whole heavens. What interests me in this image are the people worshipping the Lamb. They are, “from every nation, tribe, people, and language” (7:9). This means that all different races and nationalities are worshipping the Lamb–not just the saved Christians. In this picture, we see that everyone, everywhere who live the best they know are accepted by the Christ, and that they, in turn, will recognize God when they see Him. The salvation of the Lamb is for the whole world. Some Christians think that people of other religions will not be saved. This notion is what fuels their missionary efforts. They go to all parts of the world to convert others to Christianity so that they will be saved. I remember a Lutheran minister I met in Florida. I was going to work with him to fulfill a requirement for ordination. But he found one of our web pages, and had underlined the part that said, “He is present to save everyone, everywhere, whose lives affirm the best they know.” He pointed to that passage and said, “I can’t accept that.” For strict Lutherans, it is Christ’s reconciling sacrifice on the cross that saves people. Those who do not believe this are not saved. How sad. How much of a limit that puts on God’s love. For this minister, good Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, Taoists, and other religions would not make the cut. How refreshing is the picture we have in this passage from Revelation, that people “from every nation, tribe, people, and language” are all in heaven worshipping the Lamb. This is an image of Jesus that speaks to me. And the description of Jesus’ salvation is beautiful. The Bible tells us that,
They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat, For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water; and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes (9:16-17).
Moving on to another image of Jesus from this morning’s readings, Jesus says, “I and the Father are one.” How much more clearly can it be said that Jesus is God. At least that is how the Jews took it. The idea that God could assume a human form was blaspheme to the Jews. They were prepared to stone Jesus to death because He said so. They accused Jesus of being a mere man and claiming to be God. This is a doctrine that many today have a hard time with. Most people today admit that there was a Jesus, and that he was a great teacher and leader. They love His teachings. But many find it hard to accept that Jesus is God. But to me, that belief is at the center of Christianity, and it is at the center of our Swedenborgian faith. In a small book that summarizes the teachings of the New Church, Swedenborg writes, “Since the Father is in the Lord, and the Father and the Lord are one; and since the Lord must be believed in; it is evident that the Lord is God” (NJHD #284). But Swedenborg recognizes that there are those, even in Christianity, who do not believe this. He writes,
All who are of the Church, and in light from heaven, see the Divine in the Lord; but those who are not in light from heaven, see nothing but the Human in the Lord; when yet the Divind and the Human have been so united in Him that they are one; as the Lord also taught elsewhere in John: “Father, all mine are Thine, and all Thine are Mine (17:10) (NJHD 285).
Jesus seems to give people an escape route if this doctrine is too hard. He says, “If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me, but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works” (10:37-38). His own works were evidence of His divinity. So if it is too hard to accept a Divine Human, look at the works Jesus does and believe them. I take this to mean that what Jesus stands for is almost as important as who He is. His compassion for the sick, his demonstration of love, his miraculous power, the burning of their hearts when the apostles were near Him, all these things are what Jesus stands for, and what are to be believed. Who else but God can do these wonderful works.
Jesus calls Himself the Son of God. This is one of the places where traditional Christians get their ideas about the trinity. They teach that God is three persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. How they get a person out of the Holy Spirit I can’t understand. In fact, I can’t understand the whole idea of three persons who share one essence. Swedenborg strongly opposes the trinity. He thinks that traditional Christians are polytheists–that is, they believe in three gods. This reminds me of a graffiti I saw spray painted on the sidewalk in front of a Christian church in Boston. There was a star of David and the words, “You worship gods I can’t understand.” It is in this very John passage, that we find support for the unity of God in the one person of Jesus. John 10:30 says, “I and the Father are one.” That line is so clear that it is what led the Jews to want to stone Jesus. They understood it to mean Jesus is God. And that is exactly what that passage means. There are other passages in the Bible that make Jesus look separate from God the Father. When Jesus was in the humanity He inherited from Mary, He spoke to God as if to another. But there are other passages in which He is at one with God the Father, as in the transfiguration on the mountain top we find in Mark 9. There his clothes became dazzling white and He shone with the power and glory of God. I think that reason and the Bible can support the doctrine that God and Human are one in Jesus, and that there is no other person in the Godhead besides Jesus.
The passage from Psalm 82 brings up an interesting way of viewing Jesus, that I have personally encountered recently. Psalm 82 calls all of us gods, and “sons of the Most High.” I have a friend who told me once, “I believe that Jesus is the Son of God, but so am I. We are all sons of God.” Some people believe that Jesus united Himself fully with God, and that we all have the potential to unite ourselves with God too. Often people of this belief will say that Jesus did it more perfectly than most of us could. But they hold open the idea that what Jesus did, we could all potentially do. It is true that for Swedenborg, union with God is what salvation means. We are saved to the extent that God’s Holy Spirit is in us. But Swedenborg also makes a clear distinction between what Jesus did and what we can do. Jesus is an avatar of God. His Humanity is infinite and one with the Father. We will always be finite. No matter how closely we approach God, we will always be finite and the ratio of finite to infinite is infinite. We will never be an avatar of God. The belief that we are sons of God in the same sense that Jesus is is making Jesus a mere man, and not a Divine Human. In this sense, it is not much different than the belief of the Jews who saw Jesus as a man and not God.
Jesus says, “Blessed is he who is not scandalized by me” (Matthew 11:6). And to some a Divine Human is a scandal. The works that Jesus did and continues to do are one with His being and person. His Divine message and acts of love are who and what God is in His Being and Essence. Jesus is one with the Father, and as such, could do nothing but show the infinite love and compassion that God has for every nation, for all tribes, and peoples and tongues.