This window stirs so many emotions within each of us. For some who have grown up in this church, the window represents a familiar landmark which you have seen and loved as long as you can remember. Others of us who have come more recently see in it a lovely and delicate work of art—lavish in color, rich in texture, pregnant with meaning. Yet others see in the individual expressions of those surrounding Jesus a reflection of how these men felt about this young boy who was far beyond his years in both knowledge and wisdom.

Examine with me for a few moments the faces of those who are surrounding the young boy Jesus, listening to him as he asks questions and gives answers. The artist has done a magnificent job of capturing facial expressions and body language in stained-glass. The face of each man gives us a mirror into his soul as he encounters this enigma. In the faces of these four men are reflected four attitudes indicative of how we, today, feel about Jesus.

Moving from left to right as you face the window, the first man stands, stroking his chin as he looks at this child of only twelve years whose knowledge and wisdom far exceed his age. A contemplative thoughtfulness dominates his features. He is intrigued by this boy, fascinated both by his questions and his answers, but he is also uncertain about just what he is seeing and hearing. The expression on his face and the stroking of his chin suggest the reservations he has about Jesus. His first encounter with Jesus has left him profoundly impressed, intensely stirred, and deeply thoughtful.

Many of us today approach Jesus in this same manner—intrigued but uncertain. No one will ever discover Jesus to be a simple personality. Just beneath the surface lie hidden depths that puzzle even the keenest of minds. Pilate's wife, deeply disturbed by what she had seen of Jesus, said to her husband, ``Don't have anything to do with that innocent man, for I have suffered a great deal today in a dream because of him'' (Matthew 27:19). Only a brief time later Pilate, following his conversation with Jesus, came before the crowd with a perplexing question on his lips: ``What then shall I do with Jesus who is called Christ?'' (Matthew 27:22) Now, as then, Jesus remains life's supreme and eternal enigma—simple on the surface, but of infinite and unfathomable depth.

The second man looks at Jesus through worshipful eyes. Consider the soft adoration in his eyes, and his hands clasped unconsciously in an attitude of worship. He doesn't understand just who or what this young lad is, but he does know that he has discovered in him what he has been seeking all of his life. Someone has said: ``In every life there is a God-shaped blank that must be filled, if not by God then by something less than God.'' This man has found in Jesus the substance that fills completely the God-shaped blank in his life. It was as though Jesus were the missing words to a tune he had been humming all of his life.

Jesus can fulfill all of our spiritual needs. If we but open our eyes and our hearts, we too can realize in Jesus what we have so desperately been seeking in life. What he has to offer can be found nowhere else. A young lady named Betsey Patterson was considered to be the most beautiful woman in America at the turn of the 19th century. Wealthy, lovely beyond imagination, prestigious—it seemed the whole world should be her playground as she lived out her life in perpetual happiness. A letter to a close friend revealed just how hollow and meaningless the world's glitter proved to be: ``I have nothing but money...I am dying with boredom...I am tired of life.'' How tragically sad is even the most glamorous life without the presence of Jesus Christ. Jesus himself said it best: ``I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me'' (John 14:6). Leslie Weatherhead, the great psychologist and pastor, on nearing the end of his ministry at City Temple in London, commented on an upcoming radio interview: ``I am to be asked shortly on a radio program to answer the question, `What have you learned from life?' Well, I have learned a lot of things from life, but from my own failures, from the confidences of innumerable men and women, from the rough and tumble of forty-five years in the Christian ministry, and from my observations as a student of personal, national and international affairs, I will tell you the outstanding thing I have learned. It is this: Life will only work out one way, and that is God's way. He made it like that. Every other way has across it a barricade bearing a notice which says, ``No thoroughfare this way.'' If you surmount the barrier, there is a precipice. Men will not learn the truth of half a dozen words: ``OUTSIDE GOD THERE IS ONLY DEATH.'' After all, Jesus did say, `I am the Way.' Perhaps He meant it. Perhaps He was right after all.''

Look now at the third man around Jesus. Both his expression and his posture speak nonverbally of the argumentative. See the fire in his eyes and the aggressive position of his hands as he gestures at Jesus. He has detected an intellect equally as keen as, if not superior to, his own and he is debating fervently with Jesus. To him, Jesus is a challenge to his reason, an imponderable object for his speculation. He is arguing with Jesus simply because he enjoys arguing. The disturbing questions this young boy has raised in his mind can be held at arm's length by making Jesus nothing more than an object with which to debate. His debating became his defense against dealing personally with the staggering truths he was hearing.

How like the modern mind! We talk about Jesus in order to keep from dealing with Jesus. Debating issues slides easily into being a substitute for commitment to a cause. So long as we can relegate Jesus to a topic for discussion, we don't really have to get serious about our personal relationship to him. But Jesus stubbornly refuses to remain a mere topic for debate, but forever remains a person to be accepted or rejected in a personal commitment.

Then there is the fourth man—a rabbi, sitting with the open Scriptures on his lap. Contemplate the awe, approaching profound fear, etched in this man's features as he sits with his hands on either side of the open book while he listens to living words of life coming from a simple boy. I think that perhaps I have more sympathy for this man than any other who stood around Jesus in the Temple on that day. How well this great scholar knows those scriptures, the prophecies of the Messiah. How committed he has been to studying and teaching those scriptures to which he has dedicated his life. And now everything he has held dear and inviolable is being challenged, and that by a mere lad. If this boy is correct, then everything to which he has devoted his life is called into question. It is small wonder then, that his face shows deep and profound fear.

Many today still attempt to squeeze Jesus into their neat, small molds and make him conform to their narrow ideas. But he still refuses to fit our patterns and conform to our little expectations of him. Jesus effects profound changes in the very centers of our lives. We can never approach Jesus casually for, once met, he stains the very fabric of our souls. In her novel, Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte has her heroine, Cathy, say, ``I've dreamt in my life dreams that have stayed with me ever after, and changed my ideas; they've gone through and through me, like wine through water, and altered the color of my mind.'' I like that because that is precisely what Jesus does. He alters the color of our minds.

Jesus is far too big to fit into our neat little schemes of life. He is always breaking the fences and pushing out the walls of our petty and small ideas of who he is and what he does in our lives. Jesus' story is simply too big to write. John recognized this bigness as he came to the end of his gospel. He concluded that gospel by writing, ``Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written'' (John 21:25). The interesting story is told by Sportswriter Red Smith of Laurence Stallings, novelist and film script writer. On one occasion, Laurence Stallings was invited to cover a major football game between the universities of Pennsylvania and Illinois in 1925. The game, played on a muddy field in a downpour of rain, featured the notable football great, Red Grange. During that game, Red Grange ran for three touchdowns and set up yet another in the most adverse weather conditions. Laurence Stallings could only pace back and forth in the press box, saying over and over again, ``I can't! I can't write it! It's too big.'' Jesus is too big to be contained in one gospel or four gospels or a world full of books. He does nothing less than challenge the very foundation of our souls and the center of our being. You may accept Jesus or reject him but you can never be indifferent to him.

Take one final look at the beautiful window depicting Jesus in the Temple. That window preaches its own sermon. Look carefully again at each face surrounding the boy Jesus. The faces reflect four distinct attitudes toward Jesus. Those faces are thoughtful, worshipful, argumentative and, finally, fearful. Which face best reflects how you feel about Jesus? In this sanctuary, beneath this window that has looked down on important decisions for Christ for 72 years, is God leading you to make a decision for Jesus Christ that will forever change your life? Remember that you, too, are a face in the crowd surrounding Jesus. What is your attitude toward him?

Harold L. McDonald
First Baptist Church
Albemarle, N.C.
March 3, 1991