While I was attending a vespers concert at New College last week, in honor of the great Italian composer Palestrina, it struck me anew how the chapel architect had carved the Gospel into the very stones.

The cascading statues that grace so many chapels in Oxford have always put me in mind of the verse “so great a cloud of witnesses…” As I admired the stone art in the minutes before that evening’s choir commenced, I realized how subtly the architect had shaped the apparently uniform rows into a great cross.

At the bottom stand the prophets of the Old Testament, with Moses – bearing his two tablets aloft – at the center.

Immediately above him, Mary cradles her baby boy. An elaborate canopy frames the mother and child with carvings like fire, like the fiery crowns that descended on Pentecost.

Still more elaborately crowned rises the crucifix, interrupting the flow of statues with an offset alcove above where kneeling angels adore the sacrificial Lamb.

At the peak of the sweeping parade, forming the arch where wall meets ceiling, Christ the judge sits enthroned over all.

Trace the progress of these figures, and you see the pattern: the Word – made flesh – died on the cross – for our sins – and he will come again to reign, forever.

Hallelujah!