There’s a scripture that has confused me for years. It’s Genesis 1:26-27, and you’ve likely heard it.
"For God made human beings in His own image - in the image of God he created them, male and female he created them."
Thankfully, I’m a little less confused by it now that I understand the context of the culture in which it was written.
In ancient near-Eastern culture (when the Genesis story was circulated) all ‘gods’ were represented by an ‘image’ of some kind, i.e. a statue, or sculpture, or even a king.
Images of gods were thought to contain the real power, presence, and essence of said god.
People believed that the sculptures were as good as the god him/herself. The images were sacred, which is why they were also often worshipped.
To know this context is to realize the dramatic statement that the author of Genesis was making about the God of Israel: that this God would not and could not be represented by statues or sculptures, but the mediators of God’s presence to the earth were actually to be
human beings.
This is why God often goes off on the Israelites for attempting to create statues or other images of Him to worship in the Old Testament (see Exodus 32). Of course, poor Aaron and the others were simply attempting to comprehend God in the way that their culture made sense of gods, but, their God was unique. It was as if God was saying, “no, YOU are to be my image! YOU are my representation on the earth. A statue falls drastically short of what man and woman are capable of!” Humanity is called to image God and be the mediators of His presence on the Earth. That's our original programming! Being made in God’s image doesn’t necessarily mean that we physically or emotionally resemble God, but it means we have a sacred purpose: to be image-bearers of God to the world. It is no surprise then, that Paul refers to Jesus as the “the image of the invisible God” (Col. 1:15). Jesus lived out the calling of humanity perfectly: he lived as “the exact representation of God’s being” (Heb. 1:3). When we follow in the footsteps of Jesus, we are enabled (now by God’s Spirit) to live out our calling.
We exist to represent (to image) God to the world. Church, let's represent God well.
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