Week of Prayer, Day 6: Contemplating God
Most scholars understand Colossians 1v15–20 (below) as an early Christian hymn or confession that Paul either quotes or adapts. Its purpose is to form the church’s imagination about Jesus: who he is and what he has done.
Take a slow, unhurried moment to read each line carefully. Pause over words and phrases. Let the heaviness of this confession settle in.
We look at this Son and see the God who cannot be seen. We look at this Son and see God’s original purpose in everything created. For everything, absolutely everything, above and below, visible and invisible, rank after rank after rank of angels—everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him.
He was there before any of it came into existence and holds it all together right up to this moment. And when it comes to the church, he organizes and holds it together, like a head does a body.
He was supreme in the beginning and—leading the resurrection parade—he is supreme in the end. From beginning to end he’s there, towering far above everything, everyone.
So spacious is he, so expansive, that everything of God finds its proper place in him without crowding. Not only that, but all the broken and dislocated pieces of the universe—people and things, animals and atoms—get properly fixed and fit together in vibrant harmonies, all because of his death, his blood that poured down from the cross.
Colossians 1v15-20 (MSG)
— Devotional —
“No one has ever seen God.”
This is one of the most striking claims in John’s Gospel. And his Jewish readers would have understood it to be true—obvious, even. Not even Moses, the great prophet of Israel, was permitted to see God’s face (see Exodus 33v20).
That hasn’t stopped humanity from trying. Across cultures and centuries, people have longed for visible encounters with the divine. Ancient idols were carved precisely because they could be seen—unlike Yahweh, who forbade images (see Psalm 115v4–8; Exodus 20v4). God cannot be captured in form.
And yet…
John concludes: “the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known” (John 1v18).
There is only one true image of the invisible God:
Jesus.
To look at him is to “see the God who cannot be seen” (MSG). Jesus existed “in the form of God,” and yet took on “the form of a servant” (Philippians 2v6–7). Not an idol shaped by human hands, but God himself taking on human flesh.
In other words, God cannot be grasped or fashioned by human imagination. Yet in Jesus, he has made himself visible.
“Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified.”
— Galatians 3v1
All this Christology can feel abstract.
Why does it matter?
Because what we fix our attention on shapes us.
Much of our mental energy is spent on what is fleeting: passing irritations, cultural noise, temporary headlines, endless commentary. These things fill the mind for a moment and then disappear. It is no wonder that our lives can begin to feel as restless as the concerns that occupy them.
Of course, we also think about what is deeply significant to us: our families, our work, our health, our beliefs, our responsibilities. These things matter. They matter to God.
Yet above even these stands something greater:
Jesus.
If he truly reveals who God is—if he is “supreme in the end”—then to set our minds on him is not escapism. It is alignment with Ultimate Reality. It is turning the compass of the heart toward a True and Eternal North.
Because everything else shifts.Circumstances change.People and possessions come and go.
Jesus does not.
And when the mind rests on what is ultimate, everything else begins to find its proper place.
“Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.”
— John 14v9
Again and again, the New Testament calls us to fix our attention on Jesus.
“Set your minds on things above, where Christ is.”
“Beholding the glory of the Lord.”
“Looking to Jesus.”
In the language of Scripture, seeing is not merely physical. It is the sight of faith.
In fact, both Paul and John describe eternity as a state of clearer vision. “Now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face” (1 Corinthians 13v12). “We shall see him as he is” (1 John 3v2). The promise of the Christian future is not that there’s less to see, but more—with clearer, full-spectrum, perfected sight.
Contemplation, then, is not inventing an image. It is fixing the attention of the heart on Jesus as he is revealed in Scripture. Not Jesus as we imagine him, but Jesus as he truly is—the crucified and risen Son of God.
And when we contemplate Jesus, we behold the Father.
— Prayer —
Use the guide below as a prompt for contemplating Jesus today.
[Pray this line from Psalm 16 out loud]
I have set the Lord always before me;
because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken.1. Meditate on a story from the gospels.
Without turning to it at first, bring to mind one of your favorite passages involving Jesus. Choose one you know fairly well. If nothing comes immediately, open the Gospels and select a story that draws your attention.
Walk slowly through the scene. Who is present? What do they need? How does Jesus respond?
Ask the Lord why this story resonates with you. What does it reveal about his character? His authority? His compassion? His holiness?
Spend several quiet moments reflecting on who God is, as revealed in Jesus.
2. Contemplate Christ.
Choose one moment from Jesus’ life below, or one that comes to mind.
He touches the leper.
He commands the storm.
He forgives an adulterer’s sins.
He speaks with outsiders.
He weeps for Lazarus.
He creates the world.
He hangs on a cross.
He restores Peter’s calling.Hold this scene before your mind. Do not rush. Consider what it reveals about who God is.
What kind of God touches the unclean? What kind of God commands wind and waves? What kind of God weeps? What kind of God suffers?
Let your understanding of God be shaped by Jesus.
3. Give thanks for what he has made known.
