an excerpt from: Images

An excerpt from: Images

...Anytime that I ascribe final power or praise to any kind of image, whether that is man or something that man has made, or even something that God has made, and not to God Himself, I no longer regard it as an image. I have just made it an idol. We should learn from objects, when they serve as images, what they are intended to portray, which is more than what they just functionally serve as, and only then will we enjoy or respect the image rightly and in full measure, seeing it point to the object of its representation.

Let's consider Noah for a moment. "By faith Noah, being warned by God about things not yet seen, in reverence prepared an ark for the salvation of his household, by which he condemned the world, and became an heir of the righteousness which is according to faith" (Hebrews 11:7). Noah was saved from the flood because he acted in faith to God. He obeyed the Lord's command to build an ark, but his trust for salvation was in the Lord and not in the ark. In reverence to God, Noah prepared the ark, which stood in his yard as both an image of his faith in God and an image of his condemnation of the world. The ark has no power over God itself and could have easily been sunk by God, but God kept the ark and was faithful to His word to Noah.

There is a sense in which the ark is an actual object, and there is another sense in which the ark is an image of another actual Object. The ark is a tangible image of the strength and fortitude of God against all destroying waters as it rises above all death and destruction. A very real image that Noah built with his hands that rocked and tossed and stunk, I’m sure, of all sorts of odors. But notice, if Noah had trusted in the ark, the work of his hands for his salvation, he would have been an idolator.

The sons of Korah understood their weapons of war to be images or means of seeing deliverance and not the actual source of their deliverance from their adversaries. They said, “Through [God] we will push back our adversaries; through Your name we will trample down those who rise up against us. For I will not trust in my bow, nor will my sword save me. But You have saved us from our adversaries, and You have put to shame those who hate us” (Psalm 44:5-7). The sons of Korah would play the part of the man in God’s trampling of their enemies, but they understood that God, not their bow or sword or skill in using them, was their deliverer as they experienced their own blood, nerves, exhaustion, and adrenaline in the reality of war.

We use the word “image” in all sorts of ways. We can use the word “image” anytime an actual object is serving as an evidence or representation of something else. An image is a tangible manifestation of something that could either be intangible itself, or unavailable at present, or not fully expressed or known until put to image, etc.

Let’s think about this for a moment. War would be an image of a tension (an invisible feeling) that is very real between two peoples, that is expressed (known, realized, imaged) through fighting. A warrior might have in his mind an idea (another type of image) for being able to defend himself, and so he makes a shield and sword (an image of the idea which is now an actual object itself). He trains hard (works out his ideas, or puts to image his thoughts and fears) with these weapons because he knows in his mind (he imagines) that the enemy is very strong (a reputation, an image). The reason there is a tension between the two people in the first place may be because of evidences (images) of injustices (evil hearts that were expressed) that are prevailing. So the oppressed people put forward leaders (breathing objects) to be a representative (an image) of their hatred for the injustices that were done. We could go all day long seeing images in objects that may be images themselves.

The reason I consider this line of thought is not to attempt to invalidate the value of an object by saying that it is only an image, but rather to see if there is even more to be understood, or more to be enjoyed from considering and discerning how any object, where it is not the final end object itself (meaning that it is not God), in some way points to or helps me understand something about the triune God since “by Him [Christ] all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities – all things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together” (Col. 1:16-17 ESV). And remember, this Christ is “the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation” (Col. 1:15 ESV). The world exists and works in images that are as real and live as your blood, and yet all have their conception in the invisible God who put to image what He was thinking...

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excerpt from The Affections of the Heart in Art - a wrestling for the full pleasures in art Jason Harms