Mike Paschall . com

“God created man in His image. Ever since, we’ve been returning the favor.” -Mark Twain.

I recently attended a couple of funerals that took place inside of churches I had never attended. I didn’t know either person being memorialized, but I knew at least one of the family members. Both services were beautiful and fit the normal pattern of the stuff that we do at funerals in the South.

During one of those services, the projected image on a massive screen behind the altar showed a large image of Jesus with a kid on his knee. At first I didn’t really pay much attention, but the longer I looked at the picture, the more it dawned on me that Jesus looked identical to Barry Gibbs of the famed Bee Gees. Of course, I had to mention that fact to a friend who was sitting nearby on my pew. The glare of his wife suggested, “Am I going to have to separate you two?”

What kind of put me over the edge was the picture of the child. He had a chili bowl haircut, platinum blonde hair, and radiant blue eyes. Where the heck did that kid come from? Sweden? How the Fig Newton did a kid from Sweden get to Jesus back then? Barry Gibbs and a kid from Sweden… in a church in Central Texas… WOW!

The other service provided another opportunity to take note of the art in the church, but it wasn’t quite as obvious. This service involved family, so it pretty much obligated me to make a comment. In a hallway after the service, there was an 8” x 10” picture of a very white Jesus. My nephews were the first to hear my keen observations: “Oh look, Jesus has a mullet.” He did. Jesus looked like a white hockey dude… with a serious mullet. People in Michigan or Minnesota would have been very proud.

I know. I need help.

Artists have been trying to capture the essence of Jesus for a really long time. Of course we don’t know what He looked like exactly, but at least we have some idea of what a Middle Eastern man could have possibly looked like before day spas, hair salons, Wahl beard trimmers, plastic surgery and sunscreen. I’m thinking a darker complexion than… say… me?

That’s kind of the point of this. Do we make Jesus out to be somebody who is like… me? He thinks as I do, He likes and agrees with my politics, He absolutely adores my theology, my worship style preferences and God talk, He totally approves of my flawless style, He too is a conservative capitalist and likes winners, and basically he likes grits because I like grits (that’s a Pastor Peter Lord quote).

I think I should be scared if He really is like me. I know me. I know me well. I need a counter-influence that can still love me regardless of how little I know and understand about the things of God. I would like to love like Him. I would like to be known as a person who embraces everyone I encounter. But, it’s not going to be very good if it’s the other way around.

I love hearing my Paige’s Jon lead worship. I believe in the boy’s juice and I always feel wind when I get to be around that. One Sunday recently, while visiting his church, I felt I had a very liberating encounter while worshiping. I could see Jesus at a distance. I couldn’t make out the details of his face, but I could tell that he had on a brightly colored coat. As I moved closer to him, his coat looked like it was covered in thousands of bottle caps with different colors and different writing on each one. Suddenly, He dropped the coat off his shoulders and the coat fell to the ground. He said, “See me.” I pointed to the crumpled coat, “What about that?” He said, “Those buttons are your projections of how you see me… how everyone sees me. Your paradigms are in those buttons. Don’t be distracted by those projections. See me.”

That was the end of that moment.

There’s more to Him than a tanned Fabio in a smock. Way more. Find the real. Don’t be so certain you understand it all or Him. He may not think like us at all (especially when it comes to the stuff on our spiritual buffet). Those buttons were ours. Not His.

“Ah, ah, ah, ah… staying alive… staying alive.”

Love you people!

-MDP-