Jun 2, 2020
“So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” (Genesis 1:27, NRSV)
What does it mean to be made in the image of God? Is it about emotions, or morals, compassion, a sense of justice, creativity, or does God look like us? To confuse matters further we could enter into the gender debate. Is God a male? Is God both, or neither male and/or female?
I don’t really want to enter into that debate at all except to say that I think that both men and women are created in the Image of God. I think that detail is important because it implies relationship. I don’t want to enter into the same gender marriage debate here either. The important thing is that God made two different people in God’s image. God made a community. In the story of the first man in Genesis 2 this is expanded. At first God just makes the man by himself, but this is unsatisfactory because the man is lonely. God must make another for the man. We are made for relationship!
Since we are made in the image of God I believe this is true of God as well. At least part of the image of God is that God is relational. How else could we say “God is love”? This is one of the reasons I am so attracted to the doctrine of the Trinity. God is eternally relational. Before the universe existed, God was already love, because God was Father, Son and Holy spirit. God is, and was, and always will be one united community of love.
When we are one united community of love, that is when we most reflect the image of God within us. One way to look at the teaching, practice, life and death and new life of Jesus, is to see it as the way God draws us into God’s one relationship of love. Jesus became one with us even unto death, so that through the Spirt we might become one with him and the Father. This relational nature is a very significant part of what it means to be made in the image of God.
God our Dad, we can only call you Father or Dad, because that’s what Jesus calls you, and because the Spirit, your eternal companion, and Jesus’ eternal companion has been poured into our being, our core, our heart. We are so grateful, filled with a love, for which there are no words, for this gift of relationship with you. In Jesus’ Name. Amen
For an image for this scripture see:
https://biblia.com/verseoftheday/lightbox/EN_Genesis_1_27 Shared from Logos Bible Software https://www.logos.com