Artist Statement: The title for this piece, featuring a beautifully carved and gilded dove and crucifix holding an altered Bible, is inspired by two well-known passages of Scripture involving Jesus. Luke 3:22 reads "and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: 'You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.'" All four gospels refer to a dove when explaining the Holy Spirit’s descent upon Jesus. This has resulted in the traditional image of a gentle dove sitting on Jesus’s shoulder or poised above him in crucifixes, paintings and statues.

Luke 4:14-21 reads, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because God has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. God has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord. Rolling up the scroll, he handed it back to the attendant and sat down, and the eyes of all in the synagogue looked intently at him. He said to them, “Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing.”
 

Here Jesus quotes from several passages in Isaiah. These Isaiah verses give Jesus his commission—his mission statement. The people of Israel have waited for centuries for the fulfillment of promises that God made throughout their history, beginning with Abraham.  Now Jesus declares that the wait is over—that the day has come—that the promises are fulfilled—the Messiah has come!  This is indeed good news.