The Image of God in Christ
Written by: Andy Steen
This is the final post of a three-part series on the Image of God:
As we’ve seen in the past two posts, God made humans distinct by creating them in his image, bestowing upon us both great status and great responsibility. Adam and Eve showed by their disobedience that they could not be the type of rulers God desired. In spite of their sin God remained committed to his plan, promising the serpent that some day one of Eve’s offspring would crush his head (Genesis 3:15). Indeed, God’s promised Son would do much more than that.
God has always had something even greater than the Garden of Eden in store for his people. Adam and Eve were originally sent on a mission, not to sit in the Garden but to rule over the earth, spreading God’s glory by cultivating his creation and literally giving birth to more image bearers. But their disobedience and expulsion from God’s holy presence made this impossible. The very earth became cursed because of them. God’s plan, however, hasn’t changed. He still means to fill the earth with his glory, a glory reflected by his image-bearers! Jesus Christ, God’s own Son, became like us in order to renew God’s image in us.
Yes, Jesus died on the cross for our sins. But this is only the beginning of what he accomplished. Colossians 1:18 refers to Christ as “the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.” And Romans 8:29 says that “those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.” Jesus perfectly images God, not only by who he is but also by what he has done. He is the firstborn of a new creation but not the last; all who believe are born again in his likeness, united to him and part of his new family. A Christian’s salvation involves not just the removal of sin but a growing conformity to the image of God, now renewed in Christ. We are now called to consciously clothe ourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ each day (Romans 13:14), reminding ourselves that our goal is not just to follow him but to be like him.
Just as God charged Adam and Eve with continuing the work he began at creation, so now all who are part of the new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17) begun in Christ are again called to continue God’s work. As those who are being conformed to Christ we are now to carry on Christ’s work: “we are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us” (2 Corinthians 5:20). Jesus says to his disciples “as the Father has sent me, I am sending you” (John 20:21). Like Adam and Eve, we are given the task of helping to spread God’s glory over all the earth, no longer by birth, but by new birth in Christ. All those who are born again “reflect the Lord’s glory,” and “are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:18).
What a mission, and what a privilege to be a part of it! But that’s not all God has in store for those who are renewed in his image. In 2 Timothy 2:12 Paul writes “if we died with him, we will also live with him; if we endure, we will also reign with him.” We will reign with Jesus! Just as Adam and Eve were originally given the honor of ruling over creation, believers will be given the greater honor of ruling with Christ over the new creation! The saints in Revelation 5:9-10 echo this in their song to the Lamb: “with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people and nation. You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth.” We will no longer bear the fallen image passed down from Adam, but “we will bear the likeness of the man from heaven” (1 Corinthians 15:49), which includes a renewed glorified body in a perfect, sinless re-creation.
It’s wonderful that God created us in his image, but how awesome it is to comprehend that he sent his son Jesus to restore that image after our fall into sin. That’s how important God’s image is to him. That’s how important you are to him! And believers don’t have to wait until the new creation to begin to reflect God’s glory; we are being transformed with ever increasing glory now, into the renewed image of Christ, as the Holy Spirit sanctifies us. “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6). God desires that we let that reflected glory shine now into the world around us. Let it shine right out of your heart, and into your world.