Daniel the Prophet many years ago had a vision of a giant statue. Its head was gold but its feet were a mixture of tin and clay. It was a vision of civilization and societies. However, to the modern mind the colossus was inverted. We like to think that modern man is better than ancient man. Our society is more advanced, we are more cultured.
The vision of Daniel was illustrated to me a number of years ago in England when I went to an archeological site. What I saw was that as one went deeper, the archeological finds were better and more substantive. The finds at the Roman level were more substantial and more elegant. As one worked their way through level after level of history, the finds became less substantial, more transitory and moved to the level of what we would call trash and junk at the modern level.
Today we construct our church buildings of tin. The people of the middle ages did not do so. Their churches were beautifully constructed of stone. The churches of Notre Dame, Chartes, and Canterbury put our churches to shame. The medieval stained glass windows were stories of the Bible expressed in colored glass and sunshine, revealing the gospel even to the illiterate. The stained glass of the Middle Ages can not be duplicated today.
We think of ourselves as being advanced. We aren't. We worship today the gods of science, youth and pleasure. Medieval man worshipped God as God.
It is true that worship is of the heart. True worship from the heart is as elegant in a tin building as in a stone cathedral. However, we should not be condescending to the people, artists and artisans, who rather than fritter their lives away in front of a TV set, gave their lives to build monuments to God.
Interesting, the Bible says that it is God who builds and Christ who is the cornerstone. God too is building a grand monument in the midst of society. It is a holy church to contain the glory of God and we are stones of that church.
What we build passes away. What He builds remains forever. Do you have eyes to see it? Can you catch the vision?
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