Thursday, January 13, 2011

Maybe He Was Purple With Three Heads?

The other night while watching "All In The Family" with my grandparents a conversation about Jesus started up. So for about thirty minutes I sat there listening to my grandparents discuss what color Jesus was. According to my grandmother there was no possible way Jesus could be black. So I asked her how she knew this. Her answer, "a very smart preacher told me that there is no way Jesus could be black because of where he was born." My grandfather agreed with her.I wanted to end this conversation so I said, "Well he wasn't white either. He was either white or black." My grandmother goes, "He wasn't  black!" Ok so now I really want to bash my head off the wall; "I don't care if he was purple and had three heads he knew what he was talking about." It managed to end the conversation but left me thinking about what happens when we try to figure out what God looks like. One of the ten commandments  is "You shall not make for yourself an idol...." When I was little and even now, when someone tells me not to do something I ask, "why not?"So why doesn't God want us to make an idol? In the ancient world people made idols of their gods out of metal and worshiped them. But God made the Israelites a nation of priests and it was their job to show the world what God looked like; by loving everyone just as God loves everyone. Arguing about Jesus' skin color is like arguing about what God looks like; it takes the mystery out of faith. And without mystery there can be no faith.

Go in PEACE. Be Peace. Live PEACE.

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