Pastor Tim Brown, Calvary Chapel Fremont, Sunday August 21, 2011

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    In His Image

    Genesis 1:26-31

    …man is in some way and in some degree like God…Clines TynBul 19:1 p53   

You are sitting next to someone who is some way and to some degree is like God.  Go ahead - roll your eyes! Science tells us that evolution has elevated your neighbor to a few DNA strands above being a monkey.  The Bible tells us that your neighbor was created a little lower than God.  Little higher than monkey or little lower than God?   

I want you to leave here today w/ a greater appreciation for your neighbor/deeper understanding of the image of God/greater desire to live for Christ.   

“Let us make man in our image…”  Uh-oh, a committee!  Many various interpretations – Spirit?/Christ/?Majestic plural?/Addressing the assembly of angels?  However – not recruiting help, but announcing decision.  We were camping @ ½ Moon Bay this last week and I said to Eli, “Let us split some wood.” “OK, what can I do?” “Stand back/watch.” I said ‘us’, but I acted alone.  God said ‘us’ and acted alone.   

Because ur created in the image of God you have certain capacities/ responsibilities.  We will see what each one was supposed to look like/what it actually looks like due to sin.

You have the Responsibility to be God’s Representative

When a king ruled over a realm/not physically present/his image was set in that place as a witness to the reality of his rule/reign/ claim to that place.  Even as the king’s statue pointed to the king/meant to remind of the king, so humans are to point to the king/remind of the king – this is His world and He lays claim to all.   

When the locals rebelled against that king, they would tear down his image.  The defacing of the image was the rejection of his rule.  Cf.  Saddam Hussein’s statue being torn down.  If a pic of me in lobby were defaced…

The deceit of sin has made the image think that he’s not the image, but the real thing.  “It all belongs to me.”

The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against the LORD and against His Anointed, saying, “Let us tear their fetters apart and cast away their cords from us!” Psalm 2:2-3
 
You have the Responsibility to Rule Over Creation

G1:28/Ps. 8:3-9 Rule over the fish/birds/every living thing… He didn’t say to rule over man.  But what has been the history of mankind?  The story of war/kings/empire/conquest.  Man not only rules over creation of God, but seeks to dominate the image of God.  Man was never meant to rule over the image of God – God is to rule.  I am to leave you, as the image of God, free to follow your Creator.

Fish/birds/cows are expendable - we make people expendable – abort the babies/ euthanize the elderly/save the whales

Human savagery – Attila the Hun killing and burning/Genghis Khan/ brutality of Europe in the Middle Ages/religious wars after the Reformation.  We are so glad that we live in kinder/gentler times.  Yet - trench warfare of WW1/ovens of WW2/tribal warfare of Africa.  But that’s a different century/continent.  Abortion/elderly abuse/ organ harvesting/sex trafficking… violence against image of God – rejection of God’s rule.

Infants in the womb are made in the image of God.  Abortion is the destruction of God’s image/rejection of God.  The elderly/little boys and girls/homeless/helpless/person in next cubicle/stranger on BART/bad driver on the freeway/Muslims… all are in some way/degree like God.  In brutalizing His image we are rejecting the rule of God/ asserting the rule of self.

With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the likeness of God; from the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be this way.  James 3:9-10

In ruling over creation, we dominate/oppress/deface God’s image.  

You have the Responsibility to Act Like God (from JAMT 11:2)

Intelligence – faculty of knowing/reasoning – know right/wrong/ truth/falsehood.  After the Fall, man is no longer speaking the truth/darkened in understanding. We think apart from God.

Volition – ability to will/choose/make a decision.  After the Fall, we can still choose/tend toward wrong choices.  We choose apart from God.   

Morality – acting in conformity w/ God’s will.  After the Fall, the moral nature of man is corrupted/his bent is toward self, not others.  We act apart from God.

You/I are created in the image of God/have the responsibility 2b God’s representative/rule over creation/act like God.  But thru all history, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory/image of God.

Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.  Romans 1:22-23

Adam exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for a corruptible  image/failed to live up to full obligations of being God’s image.  Noah/Israel exchanged…  

Jesus is the image of God

Jesus expressed fully/faithfully fulfilled obligations of being God’s image.  In Christ, the divine image is fully seen.  Jesus is the perfect representative, ruler, and in His intelligence/volition/ morality was fully the image of God.

He is the image of the invisible God…  Col. 1:15

You were created in the image of God, but sin corrupted/distorted that image.  Through Christ, the divine image is renewed in you.  That which was lost thru Adam’s disobedience is restored/renewed in Christ’s righteousness.   

…put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.  Eph. 4:24

Do not lie to one another, since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices, and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him… Col. 3:9-10

When you are regenerated by the Holy Spirit you became a partaker of the divine nature.   

For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son… Romans 8:29  Represent / rule / act

I have mentioned four images of God –

Adam/Eve - complete image of God/You and I - corrupted image/Jesus - perfect image/Followers of Jesus - renewed image of God.

You weren’t born complete/perfect, but corrupted.  As the Holy Spirit renews you as the image of God, you can embrace your responsibility to be God’s representative/rule/act…  Salvation isn’t just going to heaven when you die, it’s becoming what you were always meant to be – God’s representative/ruler/act…

    …the Israelites were not to understand Yahweh as operating w/in a community of gods.  Nor were they to imagine Him functioning as the head of a pantheon surrounded …He works alone.  The concept of a pantheon assumed a distribution of power among many divine beings.  This is God announcing to the heavenly court His decision to share His rule w/ humanity… SBJT 12:1 p37

    Likeness specifies a relationship between God and humans such that ADAM can be describes as the son of God/image describes a relationship between God and humans such that ADAM can be described as a servant king…the first focuses on the human in relation to God and the second focuses on the human in relation to the world.  SBJT 12:1 p29

    Unlike the first creation where he first made the place and afterwards the people to live there, in the new creation he is first making the people and afterwards the place where they will live.  SBJT 12:1 p33

Jesus personalized the image of God -  

…and he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?”  And he said, “Who are You, Lord?” And He said, “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting… Acts 9:4-5

Mt. 25:31-40

There’s a further consideration -  

    ..the primary function of the image was to be the dwelling-place of spirit…   Clines TynBul 19:1 p81

If the primary function of an image is to be the dwelling-place of spirit – this is where Jesus comes in.  Sin ruined the image of God in man/Jesus came to show us what God and man should look like.