A Theology of Faces: Why I Am Not Eager to Wear a Mask
Brief Note: This post is not brief. This is the result of many weeks of searching, studying, wrestling, praying, meeting with other people to try to really understand why I am not eager to cover my face, even during a pandemic.
This article got quite long, so I split it into two parts. The first part is a theology of faces, simply trying to understand what faces mean throughout the Bible. A follow-up post will explore some practical matters and follow-up questions.
With baseball on hold most of the summer, fighting about masks has now become America’s pastime. Everyone takes a side and the battle continues every day. Who knew that a little piece of cloth on your face could cause so much consternation? “Why not just put a mask on, it’s not that difficult?” Or contrarily, “A little piece of cloth is not going to save you from death.” It has become so politicized that you can probably tell a person’s political preferences by their masking arguments.
Why does it have to be so difficult? The simplest option to protect one another in the midst of a pandemic, it seems, would be to just put a mask on. So why not just do it?
My answer: Because I want to love my neighbor.
“What?!” You might think, “How can you say that? Right now it is more loving to put a mask on to love your neighbor.”
It could be. But that isn’t an absolute statement. That’s the trouble I’ve had throughout this pandemic. We really don’t know what is best, but everyone is making proclamations of absolute certainty.
The more I am in Scripture, the more I see everything through a spiritual lens. And the more I see the world simply trying to fill a spiritual void by religiously appealing to secular wisdom. It’s not just the church that is religious, but so is the world. The government acts as king, giving orders from on high expecting conformity and allegiance. The medical community currently acts as the priesthood, telling us who is clean and unclean, laying out what we have to do to enter society. News and social media are full of prophets proclaiming doom and gloom upon those who don’t fall in line. Religion isn’t just the experience of the church. There are spiritual forces at work in all of this.
And Christians are righty confused knowing all that we are commanded to be in the midst of it. We are told to love our neighbors (Lev. 19:18; Matthew 22:39). We know we must submit to government (Romans 13:1–7; 1 Peter 2:13–17). Scientific endeavors are a good part of creation and our image-bearing dominion (Gen. 1:26–28).
But we also know Scripture emphasizes the importance of many other things. We must obey God rather than men (Acts 5:39). We are expected to march our way to the temple regularly to meet with God (Psalm 96) and not forsake the assembling of the saints (Hebrews 10:25). Christians are supposed to be a people who bear one another’s physical burdens (Galatians 6:2). There are dozens of commands to do things for one another that require close proximity.
Faithfulness in our current time doesn’t look like a blanket statement of right or wrong. It is seeking the face of Jesus trying to honor him in all these things. It is diving into his word to listen to him explain how we ought to love our neighbor. We need a multitude of perspectives to properly express the complex beauty of God in this world and to balance our singular emphases (we always tend to think our perspective is the most important, the most urgent). Yes, some authority does belong to the government, and some does not, but the authority to define those boundaries belongs to God. The authority to define how to love our neighbor is God’s, which he has revealed to us in his word.
And one of those things his word reveals to us is how important to his redemptive work seeing faces is. Our current division about masks is turning out to be a successful satanic attack on humanity to deny what makes us human and to keep the church from displaying the love of Christ written on our faces. What follows is a rather lengthy look at what the Bible says faces and why I am eager to fight to show my face to others.
A Biblical Introduction to Faces
The Hebrew and Greek words for the noun “face” occur over 2,200 times in the Bible from the very first phrases in Genesis to the very last promises of Revelation. Sometimes it simply refers to being toward the front side of some creature (Gen. 30:40 – “faces of the sheep”) or the large side of an object (Gen. 1:2 – “face of the waters”). But even when it does so it means to communicate a relationship between that animal, person, or object with another person or thing.
This is clearly seen in how faces communicate relationships between people. Most often the word “face” is used to reveal the identity or emotion of a person and show how that person relates to others. In many modern translations this is difficult to tell, because they often translate the meaning of the face-phrase instead of the words themselves. This is helpful to more quickly understand the meaning, but it comes at the expense of important clarity across Scriptures.
Faces communicate what is happening inside a person. We can’t just say, “We can’t know a person’s heart.” God designed for our faces to reveal what is happening in us. Here are some examples of what the state of a face reveals in the bible.
Hiding a face = shame or fear (Jer 7:19; Psalm 44:16; Dan 9:7; Ezra 9:7; 2 Chron 32:21; Jeremiah 51:51; Psalm 69:8)
Disguising, giving recognition to a face = showing partiality, unjust favor (Lev 19:15; Deut 1:17; 16:19; Prov. 24:23; 28:21; Luke 20:21)
Being face-to-face = acceptance/salvation/justice that creates nearness and intimacy, to be fully known (Gen 32:21; 33:10; 46:30; Psalm 42:6, 12: 43:5; Lamentations 3:35; Matt. 18:10; Acts 20:25, 38; 1 Cor. 13:12)
Angry face = cursing someone (Prov 25:23)
No face (or blank face) = sadness, gloom, distress (1 Sam 1:18)
Full face = gladness (Acts 2:28)
Light face = favor or blessing (Num 6:25; Prov 16:15; Matt 17:2; Acts 6:15; 2 Cor. 3:7, 13; 4:6)
Lifted face = peace, steadfastness, favor/grace (Num 6:26; 2 Kings 5:1)
Hard face = defiant (Deut 28:50; Ezek 2:4)
Set face = determination (Ezek 6:2; 13:17; 21:7; 25:2; Isaiah 50:7; Luke 9:51, 53)
Looking at a face = to find favor (2 Kings 14:8; Matt. 22:16)
Honoring a face = show respect (Lev 19:32; Lam 5:12)
Knowing a face = to be intimate with it (Prov 27:23)
Seeking a face = longing to be intimate with or seek the favor of/mercy from (1 Kings 10:24; Prov 7:15; 19:6; 29:26; Hosea 5:15)
Speaking to a face = to make clear (Malachi 3:1; Mark 1:2)
Fallen face = feeling defeated, rejected (Gen. 4:5–6)
To fall on a face = surrender (Matt. 17:6; 26:39; Luke 17:16; 24:5; 1 Cor. 14:25)
To request/entreat a face = to seek favor (Job 11:19)
Turn face away = refuse favor, reject a request (1 Kings 2:16, 20; Psalm 132:10; 2 Chron 6:42)
To alter a face = to change identity (Luke 9:29; 2 Cor. 3:16–18)
“Bread of the Faces” = “the bread of the Presence” that is in the temple (Ex 35:13; 39:36; 1 Sam 21:7; 1 Kings 7:48; 2 Chron. 4:19).
To harm a face = to put someone in submission (Matt. 26:67; 2 Cor. 11:20)
This is just a small sampling of texts referring to faces. Certainly these categories need refining and I’m certain a Ph.D. dissertation could be written on this subject. But this sampling is sufficient to explain that our faces are meant to be both windows into our souls and mirrors to reflect our relationships with others (primarily with God). We were made to display our faces to the world to both show the hope within and reflect the glory from above. That is made clearer by connecting some important stories throughout Scripture climaxing in Christ and his church.
A Biblical Theology of Faces
From the very first pages of the Bible we see the importance of faces. Faces are the means by which God reflects his joyful, glorious, love in the world. The first mention of a face is in Genesis 1:2 describing the Spirit of God hovering over the face of the waters. The waters’ face is looking at the Spirit. God shined light on it (his favor or blessing) and he called it good (1:4).
Similarly in verse 20 birds fly above the earth (literally) “upon the face of the expanse of heaven.” And in verse 29 plants grow “upon the face of all the earth.” The literary structure of Genesis 1 is setting up three realms which hold life. Each of these realms (water, sky, and earth) have a face that is alive displaying the glory of God (Isaiah 6:3; 43:7).
The height of that creation is when God creates humanity to reflect his image (Gen. 1:26–28). God made people to cultivate the face of the earth and relate to one another in a special way to reflect his own character throughout the world. In a way that no statue can, our faces express emotion, communicate partnership, bond one another together, and proclaim his majesty everywhere we go and interact with others.
As the story progresses, this reality becomes more clear in a negative way. We were supposed to see his face and reflect it, but after Adam and Eve sinned, Genesis 3:8 says when God showed his face to them they hid (again, the word “face” is translated to its meaning in the word “presence”).
We were made to delight in showing our faces to God, but instead this was the beginning of hiding our faces in fear, shame, guilt, despair, dishonor, hardness, and deviousness (as the earlier list summarizes). It was no better for the offspring of Adam and Eve as when God did not accept Cain’s offering (Gen. 4:5), Cain’s face fell. He was hiding his face from God because of the sin that was hidden in his heart.
Covering faces is the story of the Old Testament as the faithful remnant desires to be back face-to-face with him. When God saved Israel from slavery in Egypt, the people were not allowed to come near him because they would be consumed in their sin. They could not show their faces before such a mighty God. But God gave them instructions so they could build a meeting place with him that provided all kinds of covering so they wouldn’t see his face. Only one person could go in there, so Israel sent Moses to go for them. And Moses met face to face with the LORD (Ex. 33:11) “as a man speaks to his friend.”
Then God sent Moses back down to lead the people but he did not want to go. God promised him, “My [face] will go with you.” Moses was thankful because he knew only God’s presence among the people could save them from their despair. So he responded, “If your [face] will not go with me, do not bring us up from here” (Ex. 33:15). It is only by God’s face shining through their faces that they will be a witness to “every other people on the face of the earth” (Ex. 33:16). Again, God’s face shines from people’s faces in order to redeem the faces of the nations.
Moses was so eager to reflect the face of God that he asked God to show him his face. But being a sinner, if Moses looked at God’s face it would kill him. So God, put Moses in the cleft of a rock and showed him his backside (Ex. 33:22). And even that glory was so incredible that it transformed Moses. Then, Moses came down from the mountain with his face was radiant, shining with God’s glory (Ex. 34:29–35). This is how they knew God was with them.
When Moses was gone, the priesthood would manage the meeting place. God would dwell in the tent, and once a year (on the Day of Atonement – Leviticus 16) the high priest alone could enter into the Tabernacle to meet with God. Two priests had just died in Leviticus 10 for not properly covering their faces, so God gave instruction on how to do it properly.
In summary, the high priest had to provide extensive covering of his own face to stand before the face of God that was mercifully hidden behind a veil (Lev. 16:2). After ritually washing his body (symbolizing cleansing from sin), he had to wrap all kinds of garments around his body and head as another covering (16:4). Then he would kill a bull to pay for the sins of himself and his own family. After that fire was burning, he took a coal from the fire and brought it into the tent to fill it with smoke further covering his face from God. With all of this covering and purity from meeting with God, then he could go back to offer sacrifices for the people. All of this covering necessary in order to get a clean face to go back and bring redemption to the rest of the world.
It was a difficult process to come near God’s face. But it was the only hope they had. The temple and all its coverings was the only way to be near God’s face. So any time a faithful believer was far from the temple, he longed to be back in his presence by getting to that holy mountain, as the Psalms repeatedly cry out.
In Psalm 42/43 the Psalmist is far from Jerusalem and longs to be back on the mountain so he can (lit.) “see the face of God” (42:2). Though he is in mourning because he is so far from God’s face he knows that God is working to save him so he can confidently stand face-to-face with God, as he proclaims repeatedly “my salvation [literally, ‘the salvation of my face’] and my God” (42:5, 11; 43:5).
The Psalmist longed for it, but now we know what that salvation of our faces is. When did that salvation come that brought us face-to-face with God? It came in Christ. Jesus said, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.” (John 14:9). Jesus came to be the temple himself (John 2:19–20) so that if you have fellowship with him you have fellowship with God (John 17:21).
He came to bring us into God’s presence, like Moses, to be a mediator making it possible to be with God through a different kind of veil, the veil of human flesh. But wanting to give us full, unveiled access to the throne room, he still needed to deal with our sins so we wouldn’t be destroyed when we arrive and see his face fully.
In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus “fell on his face” (Matt. 26:39) feeling defeated, rejected for bearing the sins of his people around the world. He then hung on the cross crying out, “Why have you forsaken me?’ (Matt. 27:46) as “the Father turns his face away” (as the song How Deep the Father’s Love for Us laments). God hid his face from the perfect, righteous Son as we deserved, so that we can have his righteousness and stand face-to-face with God (Heb. 9:24).
When Christ rose from the dead, he sealed that guarantee that though we still must face death, after we do we can be welcomed before the face of God (the Reformers would say Coram Deo) and our lives now lived (as Moses did) carrying God’s faces on our faces.
This is Paul’s argument in Ephesians 2–3 and to the Corinthians. The Ephesians were socially distancing for all the wrong reasons, but he says all of those barriers were destroyed so we are now being built into a temple where we can all draw near to God and one another.
He says to the Corinthians that we are the temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 6:19). In communion (1 Cor. 11) we are walking into the temple to share the bread of presence (in the OT literally the “bread of faces”) with God and his people.
Having access to God’s face isn’t some ethereal, spiritual reality. It is to be experienced in this life, right now. Some day, when Christ returns, we will see his face (Rev. 22:4), but until then the gathered body of believers is to be the presence of God here on earth. We gather in his temple to see his face, have his face shine on ours, share the communion of faces made equal, and then, like Moses, we come down from the mountain into the face of the earth seeking to redeem it by reflecting his glory from our faces.
That’s exactly Paul’s argument in 2 Corinthians 3. He says in verse 18, “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.”
We are transformed by looking at the face of Jesus. And we see the face of Jesus in his temple, the church, when we see each other’s faces while gathering, singing to him, hearing his word preached, seeing new lives born in baptism, sharing bread with him in communion. This is how God designed us to reflect him in the world. This is how he equips us to be on mission to redeem the face of the earth.
By beholding the face of the Lord in each other as we gather together, we not only look at him face-to-face and experience intimacy with him, we also experience intimacy with each other, a family of God finding our greatest delights in each other. This is why Paul and Peter end their letters exhorting us to greet one another with holy kisses (Rom. 16:16; 1 Cor. 16:20; 2 Cor. 13:12; 1 Thess. 5:26; 1 Peter 5:14). The intimacy with God that he purchased for us in Christ we experience by bringing our faces to the point of touching. This isn’t just a cultural practice, but an expression of the family of God able to show our faces to each other in the presence of God, confident that through death our faces will be made able to stand before him face-to-face.
This is why I am eager to show my face and encourage the body of Christ to show her face to each other and in this world. Showing our faces reflects the glory of Christ and our hope in the resurrection. Because of Christ we can stare death in the face, and the darkness will not overcome the light radiating from our faces. This is how God designed to save the face of the earth: our unveiled faces singing, proclaiming, and reflecting his glory.
