This is a challenging question that Jesus put to his disciples, and as Christians, it is one that is put to us today. Paul in response to the question said that Jesus is the image of the invisible God (Col 1:15). In the Gospel of John it says, No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known (John 1:18).This God that we cannot see is made visible and knowable in his Son: the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:4). In Paul’s letter to the Hebrews it says, Long ago God spoke to our ancestors on many and various ways by the prophets, but in these days he has spoken to us by a Son … . He is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being (Hebrews 1:1-3). It goes on to say that this Jesus had to be like his brothers and sisters in every respect … tested as we are, sharing our flesh and blood (2:17, 4:15, 2:14). Jesus is a divine person in which God is totally present.

God is with Jesus in everything he does as a human being. We know what God is like by the words of Jesus. In Jesus, God call us to be his people and asks us to imitate the earthly Jesus. God reveals himself to us in human form. We often forget this human aspect of Jesus. We turn him into a divine object that sometimes seems far away from us, and has no critical impact in our lives. We see him in heaven because we feel that he is safer there. We kneel before him and call him our Lord, but he has little influence in what we do on a daily basis and in the life of the world. But Jesus is a challenging person to have around. He challenges us to live the gospel in its fullness.

In a mysterious way, in Jesus God fully and completely communicates himself to us: In him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell (Col 1:9). Jesus is divine in that he is the perfect representation of God in the world. He manifests God’s presence in the world. God presents himself as fully human so that we can understand who God is, and God’s call to us to follow him as his sons and daughters. Understanding God and what he expects of us, allows us to be his ears, eyes, mouth, and hands and feet - images of God in the world. When we read the Gospels, we learn about the Good News presented to us by Jesus. We learn about the God of Jesus who created the heavens and the earth – we learn who our God is. In Jesus we can confidently tell others about God and his love for us. We are also challenged by the life of Jesus to be his followers and to share what we know about him with others.

It might be helpful to slowly read the Gospel of Mark and look at Jesus as prophet, teacher, and healer; relate to his concerns for the poor, women, children, sinners, and fellowship with others; and study his personal traits, such as, faith, how he handled temptations, love, prayer, compassion, forgiveness, humor, exasperation, anger, and fear. In this way we can hold him up as a model to compare our lives to, and we can ask the Holy Spirit to help us to become like him.