If you were asked to come up with an image to represent power and strength, what would it be? I guessing that it would likely not be a lamb. Popular images of strength and power when I was growing up included John Wayne, Superman, and any number of cowboy and military heroes. Not a lamb among them.John's gospel presents Jesus very differently than in the other gospels. Jesus is always in control. Jesus never prays to be spared from the cross in John. Instead, the cross is portrayed as his exaltation. And John narrates Jesus' trial before Pilate in such a way that Jesus is much more in control than Pilate. Pilate is driven about by forces beyond his control while Jesus oversees the event.
And yet, one of John's primary images for Jesus is "the Lamb of God," a lamb who is slain along with the other Passover lambs. Strange that the gospel which depicts Jesus as the least human looking and the most god like would choose such an image. Perhaps this should challenge me to reexamine my own notions of power and strength.
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