emblematic of the unknown

tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10307996.post-1141448890351662322006-03-03T20:47:00.001-08:002006-03-11T22:12:30.543-08:00emblematic of the unknownok so im taking a class in Exodus this semester. its going well. i like it. the last few weeks we've been going through the Ten Commandments (which is also know as the Decalogue, which i found out this semester). anyways, so we've been going over them in class and i basically know them off by heart because i grew up in church and i've been watching Charlton Heston throw the stone tablets at the golden calf since i was born, so you could say im familiar with them. 1. I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. 2. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. these are the first two. they start us off. and its as if with these commandments God is saying: 1. 'remember who I am.' 2. 'remember who you are.' why do i sum up the second commandment as 'remember who you are'? well, i was thinking about it the other night. and i found it interesting that God tells them not to make a carved image of anything. so He didn't want them to make anything that was supposed to represent Him. fair enough. i mean honestly what finite image could justly encompass an infinite God? nothing. the answer is nothing. see all the statues of all the other gods and goddesses were lifeless. just inanimate objects that people bow down to. but the gods and goddesses themselves are without life, so it only makes sense that their images would themselves be without life. but our God is alive. so no object that we would create to represent our God would do because it would be lifeless and our God is full of life. so then my mind just keeps wandering: so God is an imageless God? because for an image to be ascribed to Him, well...it would have to be alive. and thats when it hit me. see God solved this problem... in the beginning. [Gen. 1:27] "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them." we are that image. that's why the second commandment is as if God was saying, 'remember who you are, don't carve for me an image of some object, you are my image, the life you live bears my image, bear it well.' i've been listening to this band called Thrice ALOT lately. they are amazing. the first song on their new CD is called 'Image of the Invisible' these are the lyrics: we're more than carbon and chemicals free will is ours and we can't let go we can't allow this, the quiet cull so we sing out this, our canticle we are the image of the invisible we all were lost now we are found no one can stop us or slow us down we are all named and we are all known we know that we'll never walk alone we're more than static and dial tone we're emblematic of the unknown raise up the banner, bend back your bows remove the cancer, take back your souls we are the image of the invisible though all the world may hate us, we are named though shadow overtake us, we are known i don't know about you, but to me those lyrics are powerful. and so then the question we need to be asking ourselves is, what does it mean to be made in the Image of God? to be bearers of His image? and im starting to believe that He lays it out for us in the verses that follow Gen. 1:27. (28-31) what do you think?darryl.cole.silvestrihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06449566798315564292noreply@blogger.com