The Image of God and the Kingdom of God

And that is the key for understanding the biblical theology of children and people in general.

Being God’s image bearers primarily means two things.

One, because we bear God’s own image and likeness that means God has given us the great gift and calling of having a relationship with him.

And that relationship leads to worship where God’s image bearers glorify, magnify, and honor God for who he is. In worship God’s image bearers celebrate the glory of God.

The second thing it means to be an image bearer of God is that we represent him on earth.

God created man and woman in his image and likeness, Genesis 1:26 says, to have dominion.

That means that Adam and Eve, and every person since, was created by God in his image and likeness to represent God as Vice-Kings and Vice-Queens who in their dominion over the earth, proclaimed God’s glorious dominion over all things.

That the dominion of God’s image bearers would be a testimony everywhere they went of God’s dominion as the One True Sovereign over all the universe, the Creator of Heaven and Earth.

When you put all of this together, that means people, as God’s image bearers, were created solely for the glory of God.

To give him glory as worshipers and to represent and proclaim his glory as they exercised dominion over the earth.

That’s Why Genesis 1:27-28 says So God created man in his own image,

in the image of God he created him;

male and female he created them.

28 And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion.

So God created Adam and Eve and he placed them in the Garden of Eden. The place of God’s presence, blessing, life, peace, justice, and righteousness.

The Garden of Eden was the Kingdom of God on earth.

And then God told Adam and Eve to fill the earth and subdue it. To extend the borders of God’s Kingdom across the entire planet.

Well how? Be fruitful and multiply. Be fruitful and multiply.

Children, and raising children were always a part of God’s plan to glorify his Name on the earth.

That as God’s image bearers were fruitful and multiplied, as the Vice- Kings and Queens filled the earth, God’s kingdom of perfect righteousness, justice, peace and blessing would fill the earth, and those same image bearers would worship him filling the earth with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.

And that is God’s ultimate plan for this creation. If you’ve ever stopped and asked, what exactly is the point of all this? The answer is simple: God’s glory.

Again and Again the Scriptures promise that the knowledge of the glory of God will fill the earth. That everything God has made will worship him and him alone.

Now sin, obviously, put a bump in that road. In sin the image of God was defaced. It was still there, but now it was marred, twisted and mangled into a ruin of what it once was.

So that now, everywhere God’s image bearers go they worship and serve the creature, false gods instead of giving glory to the Creator who is blessed forever! Amen (Rom 1:25).

That is why Jesus, the perfect Adam, the Eternal Son of God, took on human flesh and became a man, lived a sinless life and died in the cross in our place for our sins, and rose again three days later.

And then Jesus ascended into heaven to sit at the right hand of the Father where the Bible says God gave him a Kingdom with everlasting dominion, and he will have dominion from sea to sea to the ends of the earth (Daniel 7; Psalm 72:8).

Children are part of this process. Part of the way God fills the earth with the knowledge of his glory