A child draws diligently with crayons. His teacher asks, “What are you drawing?”

“I’m drawing a picture of God.”

“Honey,” the teacher corrects, “no one knows what God looks like.”

The boy responds without looking up, “Of course not, my picture isn’t done yet!”

We laugh at the boy’s boldness to show the world God’s face. Then we turn back to continue creating our own picture of what we think God is like. Sometimes we think he’s like this: “I know what I’m doing is wrong, but God will understand because there are really good reasons why I do it.” It’s as if we think God sits in heaven with a huge rug that he uses to sweep our wrongdoings under. What does God actually look like? “May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all” (2 Corinthians 13:14).

He is our Father, whose love caused him to create our world. He was brokenhearted when we rejected his love and insisted on living life on our own terms. He is the Son, whose mercy wouldn’t allow him to see us get what we deserved. He cared more for giving us the joys of heaven than keeping his own life. He is the Holy Spirit, whose desire for fellowship with us caused him to work faith in our hearts. We now live in the warm glow of God’s forgiveness. In this picture, a self-portrait by God, there is no rug. There’s only a bloodstained cross, shining with his love.