God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”…
So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.
(Genesis 1:26-27)
Consultation within the Godhead resulted in the creation of humanity in God’s image. (This can be understood as the first prayer among the Persons of the Trinity recorded in the Bible.) If humanity is made in the image of the Triune God, then humanity is intended to reveal something about God. And we would not expect to understand humanity without knowing this God. If we no longer know the God in whose image we were made, then how can we truly know ourselves, our identity, our significance, our purpose as a race?
Being created in God’s image means enjoying the glory of love, the unity of variety. There is one God whose being is three distinct Persons: Father, Son, and Spirit. This God made humanity, one race in two sexes: male and female. Humanity is not expressed fully in an individual, in just one of the sexes. Humanity is a corporate, relational reality. “In its basic form, humanity is fellow-humanity… Humanity which is not fellow-humanity is inhumanity” (Karl Barth). This means that you, as an individual, cannot reflect God’s image on your own. You need others.
In our self-love we violate our created nature and purpose. One is not “doing humanity” well when one is absolutely independent, self-sufficient. (Have you ever confessed the sin of being “a high-capacity individual” who doesn’t need others?) Strangely, when one ceases to live for God and others, and one becomes absorbed with oneself, one ceases to be able to truly know oneself. We may truly know ourselves only in relationship to the Triune God in whose image we are made. The “human” individual who is characterized by self-love is, at best, a distorted image of the God who is love. We can no longer look at self-absorbed, individualistic “humanity” and know what we’re meant to know about God. (This is why it’s impossible for us to reason or imagine our way to the true God. If we think God is like us, we’ll come up with religions that portray God as supremely self-centered—more like the devil than the Triune God.)
Jesus Christ is the true image of the invisible God, not just because he is God the Son himself, the Creator, “of one substance with the Father,” but because he is also the true Human, in his created nature reflecting the image of God as originally intended. He took our humanity and restored it to its original brilliance, so that we can look at God the Son in his humanity and know what God is like. Now, when you look at Jesus, you see the glory of the love of God. You see that true deity and true humanity are gloriously compatible.
In and of ourselves, we “have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). But in Christ we are “conformed to the image of his Son,” and God has glorified us (Romans 8:29-30). He has given us his own glory, the glory of love (John 17:22-24). In Christ we have a “new self,” and “new humanity,” which is “being renewed… after the image of its creator” (Colossians 3:10), “created after the likeness of God in true holiness and righteousness” (Ephesians 4:24). “We all… beholding the glory of the Lord [Jesus], are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:17-18). In our spiritual union with the Human who is the true image of God, as we behold the glory of love in him, we are renewed to reflect the glory of love again. Our nature, identity, and purpose as humanity created in God’s image are recovered and rediscovered in Jesus Christ.
Now, in Christ, you can know the Triune God and join him in communing prayer and love. You can engage with fellow-humanity as originally intended, enjoying the glory of love, the unity of variety. You can see God’s image in other people, treating even the least of all people—the hungry, thirsty, estranged, naked, sick, and imprisoned—as you would treat Jesus Christ himself (Matthew 25:31ff), with honor and service. You can stop living just for yourself or your family or your tribe, and truly love your neighbor, whomever that might be. You can give yourself to community, to the church, without fear of losing your identity. You can allow others their places in the community. You can even allow others to serve you, because you can’t do this “humanity” thing all on your own.
