How to represent Jesus in a live painting? White with a beard as he is often represented in churches? Not really! We had it in our hearts to paint a colorful Jesus, a Jesus in green, yellow, blue, white, red and orange. <\/p>\n
We are the camp \u201cJuntos in Portugal<\/em>.\u201d Organized by Joy and Life (Joie et Vivre<\/em>) in partnership with Mennonite Mission and the Youth Commission of Association des \u00e9glises \u00e9vang\u00e9liques mennonites de France (the Mennonite church in France), this camp made it possible for 13 youth and five accompanying adults to travel to the gathering of Portuguese Christians this summer. <\/p>\n During the camp, we experienced the joy of leading worship in two churches, the Mennonite Brethren Church in Loures and the Christian Community of Algueirao as well as a praise time in the Bible Institute of Portugal where we were staying. We had it in our hearts to praise God through a live painting representing Jesus. <\/p>\n Our internal reflection was as follows: we can\u2019t reduce Jesus to one color, to only one color. Jesus is not monochromatic, he is multi-colored. He loves diversity. He created diversity. He loves differences. He created us different. <\/p>\n We were able to try out our differences during this camp, joyfully and as a challenge. <\/p>\n Among us we were already different. <\/p>\n Finally, Jesus brings us together in our differences and teaches us to love difference. <\/p>\n During out times of praise we were Portuguese, French, English, Germans, and Spanish, \u201cJuntos<\/em>\u201d (together) praising and worshipping one person: Jesus. Not a white Jesus, but a Jesus of a thousand cols. <\/p>\n Doesn\u2019t our mission begin with recognizing the fact that our vision often reduces Jesus and humbly asking him to open us up to other ways of seeing him and serving him? Because that is what allows us to join with others sent by him with their way of seeing him and serving him. <\/p>\n Is it not a witness simply to live in unity with these Christian brothers and sisters? <\/p>\n Is it not the will of God to see his children united as a family, gathered to worship and serve a Jesus of a thousand colors? <\/p>\n As many participants in this camp have said: \u201cWe sensed the presence of God during the moments of praise in a number of languages and nationalities because our differences fade away. We are all part of the family of God! And this is clearly a foretaste of heaven.\u201d <\/p>\n \u2014Benoit Nussbaumer is the Joie et Vie youth camp director. <\/em><\/p>\n How to represent Jesus in a live painting? White with a beard as he is often represented in churches? Not really! We had it in our hearts to paint a colorful Jesus, a Jesus in green, yellow, blue, white, red and orange. We are the camp \u201cJuntos in Portugal.\u201d Organized by Joy and Life (Joie […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":96171,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"network":[178],"eventcategory":[],"class_list":["post-8046","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","network-young-anabaptists"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n
This article reprinted with permission from Christ Seul, November 2022 <\/h6>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"