One of the paintings SOTHLC has commissioned to be painted is now complete: The Hodegetria. This is a painting of the child Jesus with His mother, Mary, who is pointing to Him as the salvation of the world.
Church tradition has St. Luke as the first painter of this painting. Although this cannot be proven, it does testify to the historical lineage of this painting and that it may have adorned the worship spaces of the Christians described in the book of Acts. Archaeologists have found remains of this painting in caves where Christians worshiped dating from the 2nd century!
What is different with our Hogedetria is that it is not in the two-dimensional style of the Eastern Christian churches (from the 7th Ecumenical Council, 787 AD). Instead, our Hodegetria is in the three-dimensional style of the Western churches, of which the Lutheran Church is part. Thus, our painting unites both Eastern and Western traditions, even reaching to what some call the “primitive” Christian Church, the Church of the Apostles.
But more than the lineage of this painting is the theology behind it. The painting is a visual representation of what the Church has 
confessed even before the books of the New Testament were canonized: “who for us men and for our salvation [Jesus] came down from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary and was made man” (Nicene Creed, 325 AD).
Eventually, the plan is to hang this painting in the chancel, where it will adorn our worship space and confess visually what we confess vocally every week in the Creed.
The next art article will be on the Pantokrator, the second painting SOTHLC has commissioned.
