Questions

Question first appeared on July 20, 2003
Why are churches richly adorned when Jesus dressed humbly?

The interior of an Orthodox Church is designed to reflect what the Kingdom of God (Heaven) looks like. We get a glimpse of Heaven from the Scriptures and the visions that appeared to personalities such as the Prophets Isaiah and Elijah, St. Paul and St. John the Divine. None of these descriptions of Heaven reflect that it=s a slum. On the contrary, Heaven is paradise, adorned with all of the best of God=s creation, gold, precious stones, etc.

Orthodox churches and the worship that takes place in them are an intentional attempt to recreate the atmosphere of Heaven, God=s Kingdom. The Orthodox Christian who comes to worship God is transported out of the material world and placed in the midst of a Avision@ of Heaven.

Yes, Jesus was humble. His earthly family was of a modest background. He owned no property and had no wealth. A...Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.@(Matt. 8:20) Jesus came to show us exactly how we must relate and behave toward God and toward each other. He is the icon, the image, of what we must strive to become. It is in being united to Jesus Christ through baptism, and becoming more like Him through prayer and Holy Communion, that will bring us to Heaven.

And yet, the earthly Jesus is not the Jesus we encounter today. That Jesus only existed in the roughly thirty-three years that He lived on this earth. We cannot bring back that time. We cannot recreate that era and once again sit at the feet of the humble Jesus of Nazareth and listen to His teachings. And, we dare not become nostalgic, wishing that could return to that time.

The Jesus we encounter and come to worship in our Orthodox Church today is the ascended Jesus, the glorified Jesus, the Jesus Who Asits at the right hand of the Father,@ the Jesus who is Lord, Who will come Ato judge the living and the dead, Whose Kingdom shall have no end.@

See how St. John the Divine describes Him: A12 Then I turned to see the voice that spoke with me. And having turned I saw seven golden lampstands,13 and in the midst of the seven lampstands One like the Son of Man, clothed with a garment down to the feet and girded about the chest with a golden band.14 His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and His eyes like a flame of fire;15 His feet were like fine brass, as if refined in a furnace, and His voice as the sound of many waters;16 He had in His right hand seven stars, out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword, and His countenance was like the sun shining in its strength.17 And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, >Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last.18 AI am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of Hades and of Death.=@ (Rev. 1:12-18)

For these reasons, even in the poorest of Orthodox Christian villages, the Church is the richest building.