RESURRECTION
By Alister McGrath
Fortress, 96 pp., $15

Resurrection is the fourth in a series of five books by Alister McGrath. The Truth and Christian Imagination series also includes Creation, Incarnation and Redemption.

Professor of historical theology at Oxford University, England, McGrath has written many books, but these are unusual. He has a unique way of putting together fine art, appropriate poetry and biblical stories with theological reflection that lay people can understand and appreciate. And the layout, colors and use of details of the paintings are well-coordinated and add much to the overall design and beauty of the work.

This book, he says, "tries to create space for reflection on the meaning of Christ's resurrection for the way we think and the way we behave." He likes to use fine art "to enhance the process of reflection." He thinks poetry is sometimes "more effective than theological analysis" on the themes he is discussing.

The best place to begin to do this, he claims, is to consider the Gospel accounts of the resurrection. He reminds us that we live in history, and the Christian faith "speaks of a God who acted in history."

Making new discoveries
The first of the seven chapters is called "the strangeness of the Resurrection," and McGrath asks readers to imagine a world where the resurrection of Christ and the hope of eternal life are unknown. Try to imagine ourselves in the New Testament world; try to imagine ourselves in the world of the disciples "as they watch Christ die before their eyes."

If we push back all we know of what happened later and allow ourselves to be taken by surprise, living through these early events in our imaginations, we may notice things we had not seen before. As we live through the current Easter season, we may see that it was more than an historic episode, and it is all about "how it affects the way we live and think" today. For this chapter, McGrath used Maurice Denis's oil on canvas Holy Women at the Tomb.

Chapter two is "the road to Emmaus," an easy one to imagine. McGrath points out how human beings observe their environment. "What we see is shaped by what we expect to find," he says, and none of the disciples expected Resurrection. It wasn't part of the usual pattern of beliefs and expectations. The stranger, Jesus, opens to the two travelers the story of "himself in all the Scriptures" (Lk. 24.27). Still they do not know him until he breaks bread with them in their home. To illustrate this, McGrath chose "a striking picture by He Qi, one of China's most important Christian artists."

One of the most dramatic scenes is shown in the painting The Incredulity of St Thomas by Guercino, 1621. Who could forget the look on Thomas's face as he stretches his fingers toward the wound in Christ's side? And Jesus' response: "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe." That's us; those encouraging words are in there for us (Jn. 20:29).

The final book in this series is to be titled God. I can hardly wait to see what he says about that!