In the Image and Likeness of God

“So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” Genesis 1:27

It really is an incredible twist in an overwhelmingly beautiful story. In the beginning God was about the business of speaking things into existence. This was no bloody battle between warring heavenly powers. God simply spoke and his word created homes for the birds and stars in the sky, for the creatures of the sea in the waters of the earth, and for the wild animals of the earth on the land. And it was all good. Then, at the climax of the creation account, God said, “Let us create humankind in our image, according to our likeness” (Gen. 1:26). God did and, indeed, it was very good.

It is a puzzling statement, one that Christians have tried to grasp and understand for millennia. What does it mean that we are created in the image and the likeness of God? The answer is complex and challenging, yet also simple and beautiful. I think that we can begin to understand what it means to be created in the image of God when we look at the second creation account (Genesis 2:6-25). This second account helps shape our vision by complementing and expanding the account in Genesis 1. We do not have the space here to compare the two accounts, but suffice it to say that the latter provides a look at the creation from a slightly different point of view, one in which God’s hands get dirty as he shapes the world and humanity into existence like a potter would shape clay. At the end of God’s work, he determines that it is not good for Adam to live life alone, in solitude, separated from others who were like himself. So God creates Eve, Adam’s counterpart and companion in life together.

I think that this reveals two incredibly powerful things about what it means to be created in the image and likeness of God. First, sharing in the life of God is essentially about sharing life together in community. Adam, as one created in the image of God, could not live alone in solitude, therefore God created Eve. As Christians, we believe that the God who we worship is Trinity, three-in-one. As we live together in full communion with other Christians, we understand more fully what it means to be created in the image of our God. Second, our lives are full of creative, life-giving potential. The God who created us in his image speaks life, breathing it into humanity. We share in this creative power. We have the ability to speak words of life, or of death, to others. We have the power to bring life into existence in others.

Life in the image and likeness of God is revealed in our shared life as the church. In the church we live in communion with each other, as we share the Spirit of the living God. Today, we are reflecting on the family. Our life in the image of God is most perfectly revealed in the family. The relationship between a wife and a husband, two who truly become one, is one of the closest ways we can reflect the life of the Triune God. The marital relationship is one in which the partners must come to understand what it means to live together in communion, sharing in the life giving bond of love that was the impetus for the creation. This life giving, creative power is made most perfect when wife and husband choose to come together to create the new life of a child. The love shared between wife and husband is a selfless and other-centered love, one that focuses on the needs of the partner more than on one’s own desires or impulses. As we come to understand and more fully embrace the church, marriage, and the family as a reflection of our God, we become transformed more into his image and share in the life giving power of life in community.

“God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good” (Gen. 1:31)