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INTRODUCTION:
Last week we started a series entitled “The beginning” out of the first few chapters in Genesis.
This series is relevant for us as we begin 2023 because it gives answers to some of life’s most foundational questions.
Why is there something rather than nothing?
Where are we and how did we get here?
Is there God and does it really matter?
What does it mean to be a man?
A woman?
What’s wrong with the world and can it be fixed?
These are questions that each of us wrestle with whether we know it or not.
Moreover, the answers we give to these questions - whether we know it or not - are fundamentally shaping the way we live in and look at the world.
That’s why we’re doing the series and why it’s one of the most important things I’ll ever preach.
It’ll also be one of the most relevant series we ever do because the topics we’re going to cover in this series intersect with our day to day life in very practical and profound way.
This morning, we’re going examine a truth that made it’s way into the very first line of America’s “Declaration of Independence.
Namely, that “all men are created equal and they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
Context/Review
If you have your Bible lets return to Genesis 1 and continue our journey through this book.
Remember, Genesis 1:1 gives a summary statement of God’s creation of all things.
Genesis 1:2 and following tells the rest of the story.
Genesis 1:1–2 (ESV)
1 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep.
And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
Verse 2 first describes our universe as “formless and void” (tohu wabohu).
The rest of the creation narrative is God giving FORM what is formless and FULLNESS to what is void.
Moses presents this creative activity of God with seven days of a week.
Days 1, 2 and 3 are about form.
God took that which was chaotic and put it into order.
He gave it structure and form.
Days 4, 5 and 6 are about fullness.
God takes the forms and fills them with life.
The structure God made in days 1-3 are given significance in days 4-6.
Day One: Separates darkness and light.
Day Four: Fills the heavens with a Sun, Moon & Stars.
(time is given meaning and earth given light)
Day Two: Separates sea and space (water above/below expanse in-between)
Day Five: Fills the sea below and the sky above with reproducing life.
Day Three: Separates water and land and enables the earth to produce vegetation and life.
Day Six: Fills the earth with reproducing animals (domestic, wild and reptile) and finally - the creation crown...
On day six - after creating the other living beings - God decides to create man.
(adam = humanity).
But, unlike anything else in creation, man is made in God’s image.
Read the Text
With that in mind, let’s read our text starting at the beginning of day six in Genesis 1:24.
Genesis 1:24–27
24 And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds—livestock and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds.”
And it was so. 25 And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind.
And God saw that it was good.
26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.
And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”
27 So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.
You can see this in the English but it’s especially visible in the original Hebrew: the word “create” (barah) is used three different times back to back to back with the creation of man in verse 27.
The creation of man is God’s crown for the creation week.
And the distinguishing mark of God’s creation of man?
He endows mankind with his image and likeness.
Two Hebrew words that mean basically the same thing.
One basically reinforces the other.
This truth, the Imago dei, as theologians call it - is one of the most foundational and important concepts in all of Scripture.
Western society, born out of the Enlightenment was built on the foundation of this truth.
It shapes our values and assumptions about right in wrong in profound ways.
This truth, more than most, has influenced our culture for the good.
So with the time we have left I want to answer two basic questions.
(1) WHAT is the image of God.
(2) WHY does it matter?
Or What DIFFERENCE does it make?
WHAT IS GOD’S IMAGE?
First, what is it?
At root it’s the ability man has to “image” or “represent” the reality of God in this world.
If our bodies were a mirror then people should be able to to look at that mirror and see a reflection of God.
Does that man that there is no distinction between mankind and God?
Of course not.
My driver’s license has my picture on it.
Is this me?
No! It’s a picture of me.
A representation.
It can speak for me and show people important things about me.
But it’s not me.
Being made in God’s image doesn’t mean we are little gods who can do all the things that God does.
It just means we have the ability and responsibility to “image” him.
(point others to the truth about his reality and essence)
So, we are “like” God but we are also very “unlike” God.
Or, to say it another way, we are “different” from the rest of creation but a “creature.”
nonetheless.
When it comes to understanding the image of God both are important.
We need to understand our creatureliness and our god-likeness.
Creature and a Person
You can see this dynamic of similarity and dissimilarity in the creation account itself.
There is continuity and discontinuity.
Similarities: Man is very similar to what came before him.
God is the cause behind man’s creation.
‘from the earth’
Man is dependent on God & creation for life.
Man is instructed, like creation, to do what God says.
So, on the one hand, man is a CREATURE.
We are "created by, dependent on, and subservient to the Creator.”
Dissimilarities: but man is also very different from what came before.
With Creation: “let there be...” With Man: “Let US create...”
With Creation: “according to their kind,” With Man: “In God’s image”
Creation: Limited responsibility.
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