THE STAINED GLASS WINDOWS
OF FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH


THE MOSES AND ABRAHAM WINDOW

(Northwest corner)


Abraham and Moses Window


As the history of the people of God was inaugurated with God's covenant made to Abram, (Genesis 17:1-5) at which time the Lord changed his name to Abraham (a Father of many nations) so our windows begin with a symbolic representation of Abraham, the man. Abraham's greatest test of faith, even more demanding than the call to leave his homeland at Ur of the Chaldees, was the divine command to slay his son Isaac (Genesis 22:1-2). It is this incident in Abraham's life which is depicted in this window. The sacrificial knife is in his left hand and above his head burns a fiery altar around which have been written the words of his reply to Isaac, "Here I am, my son." (Genesis 22:7) In the end, of course, the life of Isaac was spared and a ram was substituted in his place. In Christian Theology, Abrahams submission to God's will is seen as a prefiguration to the death of Jesus, so that the figure of the ram's head became, at a very early date, a symbol of the sacrifice of Christ on the cross.

If Abraham was the father of Israel, Moses was her law-giver. The second panel of this window represents Moses in this role. His right hand is raised in teaching and his left embraces the tablets of stone in which were cut the divine commandments. Above Moses' head is a brazen serpent entwined in a cross, commemorating the event in Numbers 21:4-9 when a plague of snakes, caused by the Israelites' complaints, was halted, when Moses constructed a brass serpent mounted on a pole, and which is reminiscent of Christ's statement in John 3:14: "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness so must the Son of Man be lifted up." The symbolism of the cross is obvious. The words around the brazen serpent are those of Moses taken from his song of victory after the crossing of the Red Sea. "The Lord is my strength." (Exodus 15:2)

In the quatrefoil above, another incident in the life of Moses is recorded, his encounter with God at the burning bush. It is interesting to notice that in both representations of Moses in this window, there is commemorated the statement in Exodus 34:55 to the effect that rays of light played about the head of the prophet as he came down from Mt. Sinai. For all his greatness, however, Moses never loses his humanness, displaying anger, frustration, and lack of self-confidence in addition to his leadership abilities, humility, and perseverance.

This window bears the following inscription: "In memory of Anna I. Baker." It was placed in the sanctuary when the church was built in 1933.