So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. Genesis 1:27 NIV
Have you ever stopped to think about who we are as the human race? We are some pretty impressive life forms. Of all the other creatures on the world we are leagues ahead in communication, self-awareness, creativity, capacity to build, capacity to better ourselves and the list goes on. Although the natural world is filled with wonder, humans are its crown jewel. Yet in the midst of being the most glorious creatures on earth, we alone bear responsibility for the hurt, crime, immorality and all the unsavory parts of life on this planet. Perhaps it is all reflective of mistaken identity.
When God created man and woman, He did so “in His image.” Theologians have been discussing what this means for years and even still, most are under the impression that there is more here than meets the eye. Among other things, to be created in God’s image is to bear His attributes, handiwork, capacities for emotion, desire to create, etc. When Adam and Eve were removed from their garden estate they forfeited a realization of this image, beginning to take on the qualities of another.
Scripture tells us that we were once as our father the devil but now belong to our Father God (Jn 8:44). The history of our human race is a story of being trapped between the two. We were created as God’s image bearers but along the way we forgot who we belong to; we forgot who we look like. Instead, we had a tendency to mirror those attributes of the deceiver who endlessly seeks to keep us bound by evil and false identities. However, that power had an expiration date and Jesus began his reversal of this loss; he made it abundantly clear when he told his disciples that he had come to “seek and save that which was lost" (Lk 19:10).
Jesus saw people differently. He saw a person not as they defined themselves or through the identity assigned by others, he saw his Father’s image trapped beneath layers of sin, self and residue of the world. His work was to free that which was within. Michelangelo once gazed at a block of marble and with hidden inspiration created a masterpiece. When asked about his work he said, “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.” Jesus did the same; he looked through our mess and then through his work, removed those things which bound us to set us free in him.
As we teach others we stand before a humanity that God is still working on (our number included). He is looking at something within us that He put there: His image. He is longing to set us free to be who He purposed us to be. As we interact with others, the clarion call from God is ever before us. He has tasked us as one of the many “carvers”. As we lead and minister to our students it is our job to look past what others may see or even what they may see, and look much deeper within. Deep in each person is their intrinsic, God-given value, worth so much that Jesus traveled through the cosmos to this unique planet to pay an eternal price.
Let us part with these words from C.S. Lewis:
"It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no 'ordinary' people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilisations -- these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whome we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit -- immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously -- no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner -- no mere tolerance or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment."
--C. S. Lewis, From The Weight of Glory.
https://icctejournal.org/issues/v10i2/v10i2-norsworthy-belcher/