Scriptural Stop Signs

There are those moments for all of us when we run into a big red stop sign when reading the Word.  Such a sign showed up the other day in a reading of Colossians.  In the first chapter at the verse 15 marker, there was such a word which said, "'He (Jesus) is the image of the invisible God,..."  It is the kind of Word which tickles the ear of the mystic causing a smile to come over the contemplative soul within, but also a Word which taunts the spirit of the blue collar seeker of black and white spiritual truths.

 

It is a Word which primes the pondering juices as well as a Word which speaks what is obvious.  What is obvious is that God is invisible.  He is not to be seen although He is ever present.  It is also obvious that seeing Jesus is seeing the Father.  (John 14:9)  Jesus is God become flesh and walking among us. (John 1:14)  What we see in the heart, spirit, and actions of Jesus reveals to us important insights about the nature of the Invisible One, God the Father.  Yet, as obvious as are these truths, there is still something about these word of the Scripture which leave our minds wrapped around themselves as we seek to understand more fully what cannot be understood completely.

 

How can Jesus be the image of One who cannot be seen and who is set forth as invisible?  In a search for insight I think of how I bear the image of my father and my mother, but both are now invisible to the eyes of those on earth.  Of course, it is a poor analogy in that they have not always been invisible, but they are no longer visible here even as I continue to be in the flesh in their image.  And, to go even further back is to realize that they both came from what was invisible.  Such is true of myself as well.  Could it be true as some suggest that everything visible was once invisible and that the coming of Jesus speaks to this truth concerning the God of creation?