Sometimes best-sellers portray unusual, even unnerving pictures of God. Could Shay Bourne in Jodi Piccoult’s Change of Heart be Jesus? Is the Holy Spirit Saraya, Keeper of the gardens, in William Young’s The Shack? Does the main character in the Joshua books depict Jesus?  Even the gospels give us four different portraits of Jesus, while  professing that Jesus is the full revelation of God.  Whether gospel or novel, words grope to reveal God.

We struggle with the question “Who is God?” Yet God wants to be known. God even made it easy for us by becoming human. But when we put everything we know about humanity together, we don’t come up with God. On the other hand, when we put everything we know about divinity together, we come up with the human Jesus Christ. The very first creed said it all: “Jesus is Lord.” Jesus is God’s self-communication. Jesus is God saying, “Here I am.”