Radiance

"Who are these wearing white robes?” says an elder to the narrator in the Book of Revelation, as he glimpses all the Blessed in heaven. The elder then answers his own question, “Why these are the ones who have survived the time of great distress; they have washed their robes and made them white in the Blood of the Lamb.” Now anyone who has ever tried to remove even a small blood stain from a piece of clothing can understand that it must have been a near-impossible task in first century Palestine, long before OxyClean, Spray and Wash or Shout. And so we can only wonder at the perfectly ridiculous image of robes made radiantly white by washing them in lamb’s blood. But this is not just any lamb. And the offbeat beauty of these words reveals the truth of the dazzling, unprecedented victory of the Lamb of God, which he has “achieved not by domination and aggression” but by his loving acquiescence even unto death.* It is Jesus’ self-forgetful love that has created this radiance.

Photograph by Brother Anthony Khan. *Insights from Wilfrid Harrington.