I clicked delete thinking, “The bookstore is hosting an event to promote a new Bible? That sounds boring.” That’s right, I used the words “Bible” and “boring” in the same sentence.
A week later, I shuffled my feet inside that same bookstore, waiting for an author to sign my book. My eyes wandered from one shelf to the next until something caught my eye on the wall. It was the painting below:
Genesis 1, The St. John’s Bible, used with permission
Just then a clerk walked by.
“What is that?” I asked, gasping for breath.
“Prints from the St. John’s Bible,” he said. “Aren’t they amazing? We sent an email about it last week.”
“That’s what the email was about? I totally misjudged that…can I get a tour?”
An hour later, I left the bookstore feeling like I did that Christmas morning when I was eight. I’d rolled out of bed, thinking it was just another December day…then I smelled the pancakes and remembered. I’d walked into the bookstore expecting a handshake and a scribble on a page. I left with God’s truth swirling through my eyes and into my heart.
If you’ve been following my blog, you know that I’ve been exploring how art can help us engage with God and understand the Scriptures. The St. John’s Bible does just that, with Chinese ink sticks and gold leaf, on the very pages–calf-skin vellum pages–of scripture. The paintings, which range in style from naturalism to modern art, embody the truths contained within the margins.
While I’ve spent much of my life suspicious that art and theology were, at best, step-siblings, the St. John’s Bible politely disagrees. Sure, it’s difficult to see the family resemblance, but the St. John’s Bible team saw the paternity tests: theology and art share biological parents.
Why else would they devote thirteen years to the project, developing “illuminations” that visually exegete the text? Why else take full days to transcribe a single page? Or, use hand-carved quills and pigments mixed on location?
I could say more, but you really just need to experience it for yourself. So, take a minute to flip through the Bible online, read about the process, or decide which print would look best over your fireplace.
Or, if you still haven’t found a Christmas gift for your great aunt who has everything, order her a copy of the Gospels. It’ll look great on her coffee table, and if she doesn’t like it she can always regift it to me. ?
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