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The Icon of God from Cradle to Grave
Advent I
I Colossians 1:15-20 Luke 2:1-7, 23:32-38
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
December 1, 2002
Transcription of the spoken sermon
What do you imagine God to be like? What is, in your estimation, the nature of
God? Or, if God language is uncomfortable, what do you think is the character or
the nature of ultimate reality? Or, what is at the center of the mystery of being?
Maybe there is nothing. Maybe all of this is just a chance occurrence. But, if there
is some center, and you could call it God or you could call it the Infinite Mystery,
or however you would think of that, what would its nature be? If you think about
God, maybe you think about the old language when we used to speak about the
attributes of God. Well, what would be the center, the central attribute of God?
Or, the mystery of existence? Or, the heart of reality?
You haven't thought about it recently, eh? It is not every day you get asked such a
profound question. But, it is an important question, a very significant question,
because there is a lot of truth in the claim that we become like the God that we
worship, that we reflect in our nature, our being, our actions, our behavior, our
attitude and our spirit, that we reflect what we consciously or unconsciously
sense is in the deep depths and center of things. And so, it is not just a trick
question and it is certainly not an intellectual exercise I invite you to, but rather,
really deep down, how do you conceive God? What is your God like? What is the
ultimate Ultimate at the heart of reality?
That is a fascinating question and an important question, and we enter the
Advent season today around the table of our Lord and we come to remember and
what do we remember? We remember Jesus, and we come to the table where the
bread is broken and the cup is poured out and, as some years ago Dominic
Crossan said so simply and yet so potently, where you have body and blood
separated, that points to a violent death. Body and blood are not separated when
you die in your bed. So, we come to remember Jesus, body broken, blood poured
out, Jesus, a violent death. We come to remember that Jesus died, and we say
Jesus died for us. In the traditional liturgy of the church down through the
centuries, whether Protestant or Catholic, that death has been understood as an
atoning death for the sin of the world. Jesus took upon himself our sin, clothed us
in his righteousness, therefore opening for us the possibility of forgiveness and
© Grand Valley State University
�Icon of God from Cradle to Grave
Richard A. Rhem
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peace with God. It is that move very early on, that understanding or
interpretation of the death of Jesus that has made the church into a salvation
cult. This is a place where you come to find salvation. This is a place where you
come to have the assurance of sins forgiven and the assurance of life eternal. The
church is the place of salvation. And to the extent that the church has become the
place of salvation, the church has missed what I would suggest was the heart and
center of the life of Jesus.
The New Testament speaks in several places of Jesus as the icon of God. I had
Don read the passage from Colossians rather than Hebrews because it uses the
Greek word ikon from which our word icon comes, which means image or
representation or picture or figure. When you see the icon, you see the
representation of that to which the icon points, and obviously, the claim is that to
look at Jesus is to see the nature of God. We could have used that passage of the
writer to the Hebrews, God who in sundry times and diverse places spoke to our
forebears by the prophets as in these last days spoken unto us by a son who is the
effulgence of God's glory and the expressed image of God. John in his Gospel
says in 14:9, "If you have seen me, you have seen the father." Paul in II
Corinthians in the 4th chapter, sixth verse, says that we see the light and the
knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Jesus, the icon of God.
If we go to the Gospel of Luke, in fact, if we go to Matthew, Mark or Luke, one of
the first three Gospels, we will find this life set forth, this life portrayed. In Luke's
Gospel which is perhaps the most familiar and best loved, we have Jesus being
born in a cattle stall, in poverty and obscurity, and dying on a Roman cross in
ignominy and shame with grace on his lips. So, if Jesus is the icon of God, if Jesus
is the image of God, if Jesus is the reflection of God, if Jesus is the embodiment of
God, then this God pictured in the Gospel in Jesus' story is rather unGodlike,
right?
If you go to John's Gospel, there is a different nuance. Maybe it is more than a
nuance. This one comes from eternity assuming human flesh, carrying out the
divine mission, but even in those moments of crucifixion very much still in
control. But, not so the Jesus of the synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke.
There we have Jesus in the beautiful Christmas story and very much a product of
the social-historical moment in which he was born. He was born in the year in
which Caesar Augustus was reigning who could make a decree that would cause
peasant people to move cross-country, even a very pregnant woman on this
torturous journey, as the story tells it so movingly, coming to a place for which
there is no room for them, having to move into a cattle stall where a child is born,
a child who is born and adored by the off-scouring of society, the shepherds who
gather around in adoration. This one, born very much in his social- historical
context in poverty and obscurity and humility, and the life of Jesus portrayed in
that Gospel, as you go through it, is a life consistent with the humility, the
compassion, the care, the love, the grace, not a pussy-cat, but a love that has iron
in it, a love that is strong enough to confront the temple establishment or Pilate
© Grand Valley State University
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Richard A. Rhem
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in the moment of his trial, a love that is able - it's a strong love. This is no passive
observer of life. This is one who engages life with power and with strength but
always with grace and tenderness and humility. And then he dies as he dies on a
Roman cross, condemned through the collusion of the church and the state, with
grace on his lips. That is the icon of God. That is the representation of God in
human flesh, human experience.
But there is a tension in the New Testament because the passage that was read a
moment ago, the icon of God in I Colossians 1:15 goes on to speak about this one
as the firstborn of creation. This one is really something; this one is the agent of
creation; this one is in all things preeminent. In fact, in that same letter it says
that in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell. I am beginning to feel
some tension here. The writer to the Hebrews says that this one who was the
expressed image of God after he had made atonement for our sins, sat down on
the throne and throughout the New Testament there is that movement toward
the exaltation of the one who was humiliated. We'll come back to that in a couple
of weeks. To be sure, Paul says in Philippians II that Jesus emptied himself. But,
because he did, he was given a name above every name that, at the name of Jesus,
every knee would bow.
So, we have this interesting thing going on in the New Testament. We have this
picture of this beautiful human being born in humility, killed in humiliation, and
the claim is that he is the icon of God from the cradle to the grave, or from the
crib to the cross. And yet, we don't stay there very long. Very soon we want to lift
him up. Very soon we want to speak about him as the agent of creation. Very soon
we want to speak about him as the eternal word, and very soon we want to talk
about him reigning at the right hand until he subdues all his enemies. A little
tension there. I wonder why. I suggest it is because the church, when it got some
power and credibility, didn't really want to stay with Jesus meek and mild. I
mean, after all, if I am going to bow down to this one, I'd like this one to be
worthy of my adoration.
Now, if you can play God for a day, if you could forget the Bible and the
catechisms and all of your preconceptions, if you could just start out now, but
basically being the human being you are, and you could create reality, shape it,
how would you shape it? If you were going to call all things into being, how would
you make it work? What would you like to be at the heart of it? I started out with
a question - What do you think is at the heart of it? Now is your chance. Not, is
that the way it is, but if you could do it, what would you put at the heart of
everything?
And then a second question: How would you make that happen? What would you
conceive of as the ideal, and how would you bring it about?
Let's just say you said I would create a world in which might made right. That's
possible. A world in which might made right. Well, then the second question is
not necessary because then I know how you would effect it; you would do it
© Grand Valley State University
�Icon of God from Cradle to Grave
Richard A. Rhem
Page 4
coercively. You could exercise your power. If might makes right, then it is
guaranteed. But, what if you were to conceive of a world whose heart and center
were love and grace? Then how would you effect that? Then how would you make
that happen?
If it is love and grace, there is no coercion. If there is no coercion, there are no
guarantees. And if there are no guarantees because there is no coercion, then love
can be defeated. It seems to me that is what happened between the cradle and the
grave. God embodied in the flesh of Jesus entered the world in humility, lived
with passion, love and grace, and died violently because that was the world's
response to that embodiment of God as love in our midst. I'm not surprised about
the tension in the New Testament because, as a matter of fact, who needs a God
like that?
If you travel Europe a bit and go to the cathedrals, and if you go particularly to
Italy to Ravenna, there are all these marvelous mosaics full of gold and I
remember particularly in Ravenna in the dome over the chancel there is the
Emperor Caesar, and over here another, and in the center up at the top there is
Jesus, and that the name for that particular icon represented in that mosaic is
Pantocreator. Pan is the prefix meaning all. This is the ruler over all. This is the
ruler over all worlds. This one set in gold mosaic has the emperors down here at a
decent level. This Jesus rules. This Jesus reigns. This Jesus will come again, by
God! This Jesus will come with power and flashing glory, and will be a total
contradiction of the icon of God that he was in the days of his flesh. Icon of God
from Crib to Cross, from Cradle to Grave, humility, grace, compassion,
tenderness, love. And then, because that is not the kind of world we really believe
in, we transformed him into quite another icon, an icon with which we can live
more comfortably, an icon who is the representative of a God, God Almighty, God
all-powerful, God in control, God in charge. The only problem with this is, as I
said at the beginning, we become like the God that we worship. And we, too,
would be in control and believe that might makes right if might is ours.
So, what kind of a world would you create?
© Grand Valley State University
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Richard A. Rhem Collection
Description
An account of the resource
Text and sound recordings of the sermons, prayers, services, and articles of Richard Rhem, pastor emeritus of Christ Community Church in Spring Lake, Michigan, where he served for 37 years. Starting in the mid 1980's, Rhem began to question some of the traditional Christian dogma that he had been espousing from the pulpit. That questioning was a first step in a long and interesting spiritual journey, one that he openly shared with his congregation. His journey is important, in part because it is reflective of the questioning, the yearnings, and the gradual revision of beliefs that many persons in this part of the century have experienced and continue to experience. It is important also because of the affirming and inclusive way his questioning was done and his thinking evolved. His sermons and other written and spoken materials together document the steps in his journey as it took a turn in 1985, yet continued to revolve around the framework and liturgies of the Christian calendar.
Subject
The topic of the resource
Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Religion
Interfaith worship
Sermons
Sound Recordings
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Rhem, Richard A.
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/514">Richard A. Rhem papers (KII-01)</a>
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives.
Contributor
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Kaufman Interfaith Institute
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Language
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English
Type
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Sound
Text
Identifier
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KII-01
Coverage
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1981-2014
Format
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audio/mp3
text/pdf
Sound
A resource primarily intended to be heard. Examples include a music playback file format, an audio compact disc, and recorded speech or sounds.
Event
Advent I
Scripture Text
Hebrews 1:1-4, Luke 2:1-7, 23:32-38
Location
The location of the interview
Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
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KII-01_RA-0-20021201
Date
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2002-12-01
Title
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Icon of God from Cradle to Grave
Creator
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Richard A. Rhem
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Sermons
Relation
A related resource
Richard A. Rhem - An Archive of Sermons, Prayers, Talks and Stories: http://richardrhem.org/
Language
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eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Text
Format
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audio/mp3
application/pdf
Description
An account of the resource
A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on December 1, 2002 entitled "Icon of God from Cradle to Grave", on the occasion of Advent I, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: Hebrews 1:1-4, Luke 2:1-7, 23:32-38.
Incarnation
Jesus as image of God