Daily Devotion for April 26th 2025

Information

Anneke Kaai- van Wijngaarden, born in 1951 in Naarden, Holland, studied at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam after a classical education at the Gooise Academy for Visual Art.  Her paintings are inspired by the Bible and faith.  Studying in the late sixties and early seventies was a time in which many traditions and values, rightly or wrongly, were overthrown. Anneka notes “the Church also got it in the neck and God was declared dead! The latter affected me deeply, because despite my doubts and questions, I experienced God as very close. This poignant accusation gave rise to my wish that, as soon as I graduated, I would be inspired by this God, who was ‘alive and kicking’ to me…I find my Inspiration in the Bible and related themes and I hope that the viewer experiences something of this ‘Inspiration’ when seeing my work. As a painter I experience that my faith feeds my work and that my work strengthens my faith.”  Anneka paints a series of works in a theme, the theme for today’s work is the Apostle’s Creed.

Matthew 28.1-8
 
After the Sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb.2 And suddenly there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. 3 His appearance was like lightning and his clothing white as snow. 4 For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men. 5 But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. 6 He is not here, for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. 7 Then go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’ This is my message for you.” 8 So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy and ran to tell his disciples.
 
Reflection 

Anneke’s depiction of resurrection and ascension does not include figures and is not narrative. As such it can be very helpful for anyone struggling with a literal interpretation of those gospel events. Rob B, an artist in our congregation, talks of 3 traditional elements within a painting “foreground, background, and a connecting object – bringing about the unity of the image”. He notes that “if you stare at the black in isolation it looks infinite. If you look at the brownish/whitish part the black disappears and ceases to exist. These extremes appear irreconcilable suggesting the painting is binary in meaning.  If so you could argue the painting breaks traditional rules by presenting dis-unity. But then that is contradicted because the lighting streak connects the two separate parts making it tripartite”. 
 
And that’s one thing Jesus’ resurrection does.  It breaks the rules and it makes connections which defy reason.  In contrast to the two static darker elements of the painting, the lightening streak is dynamic and sizzling with energy and creates another dimension to reality.  This is a breaking through of electrifying proportions, an unimaginable violation of the norm of life and death. 
 
‘But that I can’t believe’ was written by Bishop John Robinson in 1967 – around the time Anneke was studying.  Whilst questioning traditional beliefs about resurrection, for him ‘the empty tomb is not the Resurrection any more than the shell of the cocoon is the butterfly. And the real interest of the New Testament is in the butterfly, not the cocoon’.  The reality, the concrete truth of the resurrection, is in the continuing experience of believers to this day, experience which like Anneke’s painting knows of the drab and the dark but is shot through with the utterly captivating, ever moving shaft of light and power which is God among us.  And in so doing it transforms and it redeems taking  human life and lifting it above and beyond itself into the very heart of God.
 
Prayer
 
God in every mystery
holding us in the between places
thin enough for heaven and earth
to get tangled.
God in every light,
darkness and glory
who crosses the lines of our theology
with a story.
May we meet here
in the borderlines
where all that is rational
gets mixed up in all that is imaginative,
and where systems get redrawn with new colours,
and let you grow a little more …
(Rev Roddy Hamilton – Church of Scotland)