In the Image of God
Imagine that you are driving your car at a high rate of speed and as you approach a stoplight at a busy downtown intersection you realize that your brakes have totally failed.
As you quickly survey the situation you see that, parked on the right is a brand new BMW...parked on the left is a big diesel trailer truck carrying thousands of dollars of valuable cargo.
On either side of the car and truck are expensive pieces of real estate....and walking right in front of you...right in the middle of your lane is one of the most pathetic looking human beings you have ever seen. She appears to be very unhealthy....hardened by years of sleeping on park benches or under bridges....Her mouth droops to one side....her clothes are a conglomeration of filthy rags...she drags one foot behind the other in a kind of limp....and her demeanor tells you that there is probably something wrong with her mental faculties.
Now....remember....your brakes have failed....so as you hurtle toward this intersection at high speed, you must choose what your car will crash into....
… the BMW, the truck, the valuable real estate....or the old street lady.
Which would you choose to sacrifice and which would you choose to save?
Now you are probably all thinking that this is a bit of silly question because what ever we hit, it would certainly not be the old lady. But why? Why choose to let her go unscathed? In what way is she more valuable than the BMW, the semi or the real estate
1. Maybe you would argue that in the woman, there was some intrinsic attractiveness. Something more than could be found in material possessions. I don’t think this is it because although some people are attractive, the lady in question is not attractive in the least. If we’d based it on attractiveness, you probably would have put the car and the property before this woman.
2. Okay, maybe another explanation would be that humans are worth more because they are productive and can create things of use and value – unlike an inanimate piece of machinery. But again, I’d have to challenge you – Yes some humans are extraordinarily productive, but there are others who are certainly not.
I heard a joke this last week about a couple of council workers. – One would dig a hole, then the other would fill it up again. They worked furiously all day without rest – without even a smoko break – that’s impressive. An onlooker was amazed at their hard work, but just couldn’t understand what was going on so after a while his curiousity got the better of him and he asked – “I can see all the hard work you are doing, but what on earth are you doing” Wiping his brow the digger replied, “Well normally we’re a three man team, but the bloke who plants the trees is sick today.”
Now this is not to say council workers are dumb or lazy – I wouldn’t be game, but the fact is that some people are just more productive than others and I’ll tell you one thing, this little old lady was not productive in the least. She probably hadn’t had a job in several decades and let’s face it, the truck could carry more cargo than her any day.
So why is the Little old lady worth so much? Well, I’ll let you into a secret – it’s because she is made in the image of God.
You don’t believe me? Well turn your bibles to Gen 1:26, we read here about God’s creation of the world and more specifically him creating man and woman.
GE 1:26 Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground." So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
We have special worth, because we are made in the image of God, but what does that mean.
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?
The word “Image” here means a copy or a counterpart. In some way we all are copies of God. We are a reflection of God almighty. He couldn’t create another God just like him, so he created an image which would reflect his glory on the earth.
When we speak of being made in the image of God it is not our looks or our physical make up that are like God. It is more like being God’s counterpart in the same way that Eve was Adam’s counterpart. When God took a rib from Adam’s side and made a woman, Adam proclaimed, "She is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh" it was indicative of the fact that Eve was his counterpart. Adam was not complete without Eve, even given all the other animals in the garden. Eve was not identical to Adam, but was similar, some might say superior – but I don’t think so!!!
A little girl once reported home what she had learned at Sunday school concerning the creation of Adam and Eve: "The teacher told us how God made the first man and the first woman. He made the man first. But the man was very lonely with nobody to talk to him. So God put the man to sleep. And while the man was asleep, God took out his brains and made a woman of them."
Aren’t heresies terrible – the Sunday school teacher was probably a woman.
Anyway – enough of that - Eve was an essential counterpart made in the image of Adam. Similarly with each of us. God’s creation wasn’t complete without man – to have a relationship with and fellowship with.
How do we know we are special then? Because we are made in God’s image.
HOW ARE WE LIKE GOD?
Now, you may be asking, how are we like God?
We could list of several features like
• We have a spirit. God is also spirit. Jn 4:23 says
“a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.”
We relate to God on a spiritual level - spirit to spirit.
• We have a free will. We were created with a freedom of choice to determine whether we want to follow God or our own desires. Thus Joshua could rightly say to the people of Israel - Josh 24:14-15 But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.
• We have a Created with a moral dimension (Eph 4:24). A conscience which tells us what is right and wrong. We are able to reason what it is that God would have us do.
Dr Lloyd Jones says “Man was made intellectually and morally in such a way that there was a kind of integrity about him, nothing false, nothing imperfect, nothing wrong. There was a straightness, and uprightness. There was a truth. His nature was one; it was balanced; it was exactly what it was meant to be: moral and intellectual integrity, expressing themselves in "righteousness and true holiness.” (Eph. 4:24) [God the Father, p. 173]
• We have a rational nature. That means that we are able to reason or to think intelligibly about things. Yes my dog can do this to a limited extent, but she is no where near on the same level as a man or a women. We are able to analyse situations and meditate on God and his goodness.
• Lastly, we were created to have dominion over nature. Now many people jump on this phrase and see that the idea that we are to rule over and subdue the earth means that we can do whatever we want. But God is not giving us a license for recklessness. The idea of rule and subdue means to organize and care for. In fact, in Genesis 2 God tells Adam to tend the Garden that He has given men. This is more the idea of being a faithful steward than it is to dominate. We are to be more like gardeners than we are miners.
Think of what it would mean if someone told you to rule over the fields of their farmland and subdue it? Would that mean you could do whatever you wanted on that land? Would you drive around with your friends in your trucks and make all kinds of neat tracks in the mud? Would you put your garbage out in the fields? No. The person who told you to rule and subdue the farmland was really telling you to make it productive. They meant you should cultivate the ground and subdue the weeds and bugs. Having dominion over the earth does not give us license as much as it gives us a responsibility. God has entrusted us with the task of taking care of His creation. It is a job that he hasn’t given to any other creature I mean when was the last time you saw a lion pulling out weeks. We are like God because we have been given responsibility. We have not done a very good job.
Note that each of these four items are not dependant upon you as an individual, your training, your success or other. They are intrinsic to being human. You have a spirit, a conscience, an intellect and a responsibility because you are a human and no other reason. Note also that they are in no way diminished because of the fall – the fact that we have rebelled against God. We are still, regardless of our spiritual condition, images of God.
WHY DID GOD CREATE MAN IN HIS OWN IMAGE?
That leads onto the last question I want to raise tonight. Why did God create Man in his own image? Surely God created man for a greater purpose than to be a gardener. The answer is Yes - He was created for the purpose of a relationship – a relationship between God and man.
Because we are humans, we have a special status before God. We know this because we were the only creature made in God’s image. He created us because he wanted to love us. He cares for us in a special way. Jesus said in Matt 6:26 6 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?
He created each of us as someone to love and he created us in turn to love him. This is the basis of our relationship with God. God created us and showers down his love on us, but he intends that we respond by in turn loving us. We love because he first loved us (1 Jn 4:19).
A picture of this relationship is seen in Jesus’ relationship with his Father. Because he was a man, Jesus too was created in the image of God. He shared the attributes that we too share, but his relationship with God was perfect. You want to see what God wants from our relationship – look at the relationship Jesus had with his Father – total commitment, total dependence, total obedience and regular communication. All this worked itself out in terms of a love for his fellow man. This is what we need to model in our relationship with God.
If you don’t have a relationship with God tonight, you are missing out on a big part of what you were created to enjoy. Yes you may feel fulfilled and successful at times, but God’s purposes for you are so much more. To be fully human, we need to be doing what we were created for and that means cultivating a relationship with God our Father.
Every human being is God’s creature made in God’s own image. We were created with aspects of God’s character so that we could worship and serve God our creator. This is where we get our value from – this is where we find our worth. So when you feel depressed or useless, remember that you are a reflection of God and are valuable both to him and others because of this fact.
