Last Sunday we explored the Christian spiritual discipline of worship. And one facet to our worship — or perhaps I should say “aid” to our worship — that I did not even touch on yet is close to my own heart is symbolism.
Even before those first followers of the Risen Christ came to separate from the Jewish faith of Jesus, the re-embodiment of Table fellowship akin to what we call “communion” was the defining feature of their gathered worship experience. And even still today, this particular ritual is laden with symbols: bread and cup, body and blood, broken and made whole, poured out and gathered up, a first coming and a second coming…
Moreover, the sacred spaces in which we worship have been purposefully filled with symbols that have genuine meaning. We carve and weave and melt them into the very structure of the space like runes, hoping they tell the story that is always both within and beyond our telling.
We have been conditioned to recognize the cross, of course, though we may not realize that all the plus signs (+) in stained glass are small crosses and all the X’s are representations of the greek letter “chi” — both symbolizing Jesus. In the sanctuary space in which we gather there are doves aplenty, which symbolize peace, represent the Spirit, and invoke biblical stories such as the Great Flood. In several places we have the dove and cross together, invoking both Spirit and Son and reminding us of those gospel accounts of the Spirit appearing as a dove within Jesus’s embodied life.
At the bottom of each stained glass window is a creature that may seem curious: a bull with wings, a bird of some sort, a lion with wings, and human-like person with wings. These are not individual symbols but interconnected ones, the result of a long evolution of symbolism. In Ezekiel 1, the prophet describes seeing “something like four living creatures… each had four faces, and each of them had four wings… the four had the face of a human being, the face of a lion…, the face of an ox…, and the face of an eagle” (vv.5, 6, 10). In the second century CE, the Christian leader Irenaeus seems to have been the first to identify these four representations with the four gospel writers (and by association, the gospels themselves). There has not been universal agreement about which symbol lines up with which gospel, but the most common interpretation is that the “man” represents Matthew, the lion represents Mark, the ox represents Luke, and the eagle represents John. As a curious aside, I wonder whether the eagle and ox windows were intended to be installed in the other order to follow biblical order.
And of course, there are colors too: red, blue, green white, yellow/gold, purple… All of these have symbolism that is connected to times of the year, biblical stories, and theological concepts. We have literally permeated the space with reminders, and then promptly forgotten to pay attention to any of it. Or perhaps not. Either way, consider this an invitation to look with fresh eyes, to explore like children of the Living God, and to enter into worship and Love with gladness.
Remember, we’re all in this together
Pastor Michael