That Masked Man

Black and white television was just taking off in the Tennessee mountains when I was born in the early 1950s, and I cut my teeth on some of the locally produced children’s shows that were broadcast live from a nearby station. One show was hosted by a cowboy wearing a mask like the Lone Ranger’s. He teased us about his true identity, and you can imagine our excitement when he announced one Monday that on Friday’s program he would remove his mask.

Ratings must have soared that week, because all of us tuned in excitedly, waiting for the dramatic moment when our cowboy host would unmask and reveal himself What did he really look like? Who was he in real life? The day came, then the hour, then the moment.

Reaching behind his head, he untied his mask. But to our consternation, just as the mask came off he turned his back to the camera, and we were left no wiser than before.

On Christmas evening, God took off His mask. He revealed Himself to us and allowed us to see Him as He really is. When we see Jesus Christ, we are seeing the very image of Almighty God.

“No one has seen God at any time,” says John 1: 18. “The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.”

I once read of a great European cathedral whose ceiling was adorned with a painting of God, drawn in brilliant colors. But the ceiling was so high and the cathedral so narrow that it hurt visitors to crane their necks to view the painting.

The ingenious rector place a mirror at ground level, tilted so that worshipers, by looking in the mirror, could study the image of the painting above. Hebrews 1 says that Jesus Christ is the “express image” of God’s person. Colossians 1: 17 calls the Christ-child, “the image of the invisible God.”

Colossians 2:9 adds, “For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” 1 Clippings from my files. - -