God's Work of Art

​"We are God’s work of art, created in Christ Jesus." Father Richard Rohr
 
We are still in the season of celebrating the incarnation of God in the birth of Jesus Christ. But as Richard Rohr points out, Jesus' birth was preceded by God's first incarnation when God created all things, as described in Genesis 1. 
 
God created the cosmos through Christ, who John calls "the Word" (John 1:1-3). According to Merriam-Webster dictionary, "word" is a gesture or series of gestures that symbolizes and communicates a meaning of an object or concept.
 
Other authors have used a plethora of words to describe this role of Christ – God's sign, symbol, image, likeness, mold, pattern, prototype, template, blueprint, carbon copy, model, instance, synthesis, icon, fulfillment, example, stand-in, mode of being, snapshot, photo, hologram, or archetype – through which all things were created. 
 
Richard Rohr describes Jesus as “the microcosm of the macrocosm, the hologram of the whole, the corporate personality for humanity—in other words, the stand-in for everything and everyone else (see Colossians 1:15–20)."
 
Cynthia Bourgeault refers to Christ being "the instantiation," a term arising from computer programming. "Instantiation is the process of creating an object, which is an instance of a class. A class acts as a blueprint or a template, defining the structure and behavior that objects of that class will possess. Instantiation brings that blueprint to life by creating a concrete entity in memory" (Gemini AI Overview, 11/8/25).
 
In this view, Jesus is considered an instance of the class called human or humanity. Jesus brings to life what being human is (or a human being is). Thus, Jesus is THE example of what we call human, the ultimate example of our species, Homo sapiens. Jesus is the image of God in Man, or the Man of God, more commonly called the Son of God.
 
Jesus said "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End. I am the root and descendant of David, the bright morning star." (Revelation 22:13, 16, NSRVUE)
 
Christ is the original being: our ancestor, our forerunner, our predecessor. The Alpha, the First, the Beginning, the Source. He is the Light that comes before the dawn and the Light that comes after the sun has set. Just as the planet, Venus, known as "the bright morning star," sometimes rises before the sun and other times sets after the sun, Jesus the Christ is both the root or source of David (coming before him) and the descendant of and heir to David’s throne (coming after him).
 
Our source, our beginning, our origination is harbored in Christ. Our being, our life, our vitality is contained in Christ. Our destiny, our end, our eternity is caught up in Christ. Our fullness, our completeness, and our abundance abides in Christ. He IS our life.
 
Jesus's point in his preaching, teaching and healing was that we are all sons or daughters of God. We realize or bring into reality our inherited genetic divine nature when we allow the Christ nature to shine through us. This process of union with God through Christ, of becoming the One who is the core of our being, is what we call contemplation.
 
Jesus is the invisible God manifested in human form for us to see and relate to. In Jesus, we begin to comprehend our humanity and gain a glimpse of our divinity. In Jesus, we see ourselves. In Jesus, we are saved from ourselves. In Jesus, we are given new life. In Jesus, we see God's unfathomed creative nature. In Jesus, we experience God's infinite love. In Jesus, we are saved for eternity.
 
In our practice of Centering Prayer we are abiding in Christ (who is the Word, Image, Blueprint, Template, …) so that the fullness of who God made us to be can be realized and lived out. In contemplating Christ, we recognize in ourselves God's work of art.