What does Jesus look like?

When I speak with my sons about what Jesus looks like, I am often surprised at how similar their responses are to the answers I would have given in my childhood. Even today when I think of the physical appearance of Jesus my mind brings forward the image of Jesus standing at the door and knocking, wearing a long off-white robe, a neatly trimmed beard, long flowing hair, and a fairly Caucasian complexion. This is the depiction of Jesus we had hanging on the wall in my childhood home.

I respond/react to this depiction of Jesus at various levels. At one level this is an image of Jesus that brings comfort. Jesus wants to be in relationship with me and cares deeply for who I am as an individual. The image brings warm memories of learning Gospel stories in Sunday school and at home during family devotions. Even today as I have grown into a faith that I claim as my own, I recognize how inherited many of my views or images of Jesus really are.

As a disciple and follower of Jesus Christ, I consider myself to be on an ongoing journey of discovery. As a result there is another level at which I find my subconscious depiction of Jesus to be personally troubling. Jesus was not a Caucasian male with “rock-star” hair! As to physical appearance, I imagine Jesus would have resembled others I have met from Middle Eastern regions with dark hair and an olive complexion. Could it have been that his complexion was weather worn from years in the semi-arid heat of Palestine? Surely the days spent walking many miles between villages, from Galilee to Jerusalem and back again, would have taken its toll? As I allow my personal image of Jesus to be shaped by my understanding of who Jesus was and is, I discover an image that is just as welcoming and caring as the image of my childhood, even if it is not as visually appealing.

The Jesus of the Gospels was primarily a rabbi – a teacher. Not a teacher in the conventional sense of a classroom with obedient pupils, rather a teacher who was able to draw lessons out of the deep realities of life. Jesus taught in a way that challenged both those closest to him and those who barely knew him, to re-evaluate and even reinterpret how they viewed their surroundings. He turned convention and tradition on its head and asked people to consider new possibilities for relationship between genders and across racial boundaries. He chose to travel in diverse crowds and welcome strangers to join him for a meal, all in an attempt to show that God was doing a new thing.

Jesus, the teacher, was all about revealing the kingdom of God. He was revealing a kingdom unlike anything people had considered before. He asked people to contemplate what leadership could (should) look like through the eyes of a servant. But even in the model of a servant, Jesus empowered those who listened carefully and sought to follow what he was about. He was the greatest teacher who ever walked the face of the earth, and yet he chose not to broadcast his teaching far and wide. Instead he focussed his energies on a small group of disciples – individual friends whom he called personally to walk with him and observe closely how he lived his own life, all the while teaching through the examples and experiences of everyday life. In this way he revealed, but also began to build, a new kind of kingdom.

More important than his role as a teacher and revealer of the kingdom of God, Jesus was and is the Messiah, the Christ, the Saviour. The image of Jesus as Messiah resonates most powerfully with me. Growing in understanding and appreciation for what Jesus accomplished as Messiah is of greatest value to me.

I believe that what mattered most to Jesus is that every person he spoke to; every group he taught; every disciple he nurtured in the journey of faith would receive God’s invitation of a saving faith. Jesus recognized that our human condition was trapped in a perpetual struggle to please our own desires and make our way to the top of the food chain. Left to our own devices we would likely digress into Darwin’s survival of the fittest, devouring anyone or anything that stands in our way. Through the model of the suffering servant, Jesus took on the guilt and shame that weighs each of us down and gave himself up as a sacrifice for our sin.

The cross of Christ and the empty tomb of the resurrection that followed three days later stand at the centre of the story of Jesus that I claim as my own. Without this salvific act, Jesus is just another prophet – an extremely important prophet, but not the Messiah. Because of the victory over sin and death that Christ accomplished through the cross, I claim that Jesus Christ is Lord both of my life and ultimately of all creation. Jesus truly is the only Way, the absolute Truth, and the greatest gift of Life (John 14:6).    

I recognize that I did not come to this view of Jesus as both rabbi and Messiah purely on my own. I have been nurtured in a Christian faith community from my earliest days and today I continue to serve in this same tradition. As such my depictions will likely bare some or even considerable resemblance to others in my faith tradition. There is some comfort in this homogeneity. At the same time, I seek to be open to other views – to other depictions of Jesus.

I have had some cross-cultural experience and have found the variety in depictions or presentations of Jesus to be fascinating and often question provoking. Within my own study and practice, I have tried to draw in some of these images and wrestle with how they inform or build upon my understanding of who Jesus was and is. Several years ago as part of a Bible study, I did a Google search of images of Jesus and was struck again by the wide variety of images and how each seemed to convey an attribute of Jesus that was truthful to the gospel account and yet very different from my childhood image.

The journey of faith – and specifically my own discipleship journey with Christ is one of lifelong learning. As such I appreciate (and dare I say look forward?) to opportunities when my views of Jesus are challenged and questioned. The Spirit which Jesus promised would come when he returned to glory is still stirring among us…that same Spirit has gifted me with affirmations of faith that are at times beyond expression...while at the same time invited me to embrace the challenge of carrying a servant heart in faith that is ready to listen, learn, and come to see and know Jesus in new ways.

That's definitely not easy/simple - and at times, not nearly as heartwarming as my childhood picture of Jesus.