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Saturday 7 July 2018

"What Is Your Image Of God"



July 8, 2018  Galatians 3: 23-28, John 4:23-26
John Calvin, writes in his book “Institutes of the Christian Religion Book I, and I quote “For though the divine glory is displayed in man’s outward appearance, it cannot be doubted that the proper image of God can only be found in Spirit.”   In Calvin’s eyes we were created man and women, yet God is Spirit and we are all one in Spirit with God.  In Galatians 3:28  We hear the Apostle Paul stating:  “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.  We are of one mind, body and one spirit.” When discussing man being made in the image and likeness of God we need to understand: Genesis 1:26-27 Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals,[a] and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” So God created humankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them. 
May I suggest we need to comprehend just how important a good understanding of this truth is.   We were made equally both male and female, and we were made to be like God.   Equality here does not mean that our bodies would be equal in proportion, nor does it mean that our physical strength would be equal for we were all made to be unique, each with special gifts and qualities.   May I suggest that it means that all aspects of our spirit are the same and they are equal in every way.  This may disturb some but our human orientation {sexuality, race, or color} has no place in this equality.  There is no male or female when we are one in spirit with God in Christ.   Do you know the lyrics to “We Are One In The Spirit”  check them out. 
In order to be like God and in the image of God, we would need to have within our human physical bodies something of God.  That something is our spirit, something that is equal in all aspects of equality and it is only that which is eternal.  I believe that this is what the writer meant when he says we are made in the image and likeness of God.  Unfortunately the continual use of a male reference within the scriptures made it far to easy for men to discount the female as somehow inferior.  The use of the Parental name Father was never meant for that purpose either.  The male reference of God in the scriptures has been a problem over the centuries and continues to be in many modern day religions perspectives.  Sorry gentlemen but God is not a man.  Sorry ladies but God is not a woman either.   Therefore God being neither male nor female but SPIRIT, God then can represent for us an all-encompassing parent, from whom we have inherited the creators parenting attributes, which include love, forgiveness, humility, compassion, peace, joy, justice and hope.  All these inherit attributes are in need of cultivation.  That is why we were given “the word” both in print and in the flesh.   Study of the word and putting its teachings into action develops a reverence for God that inflames our gratitude.
Gratitude becomes the soil which cultivates faith.  We were made human, but with a Spirit in likeness and in the image of God’s all-encompassing love.   God’s unconditional love is why I believe God will never for sake or leave you.  God loves us so much that God gave us the nature of the spirit, which is the God given factor within you.  It is our spiritual nature that finds it kinship in the Son.  Jesus said you in me, and I in the Father make us united as one. 1 Corinthians 6:17    A good question that could be asked here is: If we are all one in spirit then who is your spirits neighbor?  Why it is your humanness, your human nature and your physical body.  Your spirit wants you to love and respect it just as the Spirit loves itself "which is the God in you."   Without the Spirits attribute of humility, you would not have the power or the strength to love your human nature and your physical self without falling prey to the worldly ways of the EGO.  
Jesus said in John 4:24  “God is Spirit”.   Throughout the Old Testament, the Spirit of God repeatedly appears, beginning in Genesis 1:2  and let us be clear it does not say he or she hovered over the waters, it states The "Spirit" of God hovered over the waters.  
The Spirit is that which gave us life and when ignited in ordinary people, it anoints them to act as God’s voice, to speak out for injustice among the poor and marginalized.  To act as God’s hands as we serve one another with love and compassion and to act as God’s feet as we spread his attributes all over our world.   We can hear this in 2 Samuel 23:2 and I quote “ The spirit of the Lord spoke through me; his word was on my tongue”.  Through God’s Spirit, the way is shown to us, the plans, purposes and desires of God are revealed to us, then through us, to others.

When God created humankind by breathing Spirt into us, Genesis 2:7.   God set us apart 

as unique among all creation. At conception we were given life, but our roadmap was not 

yet made clear to us.  

Ecclesiastes 11:5 states:  Even now we do not know the path of the wind 

or how the body is formed in a mother’s womb, often we cannot understand 

the works of God, the maker of all things.”   We are given a physical body, it comes with 

the gift of life and yet it cannot be the image of God, for it returns to the dust from which it 

was formed.  Yet we were created in Spirit and it is that which lives forever and returns 

home to its source.  Conformation of this truth is found in Ecclesiastes: 7  “and the dust 

returns to the ground it come from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it”   We 

are spiritual beings temporally housed in an earthly body and we were given an eternal 

spirit that will never die, only to return to its creator.   Thanks be to God






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