Understanding The Implications of Being Made in God's Image

This is an excerpt from Genesis: Storyteller Bible Study Book by Lifeway Adults.

While the creation account of Genesis 1 may not be scientific, it is direct and clear. Straight away, we are forced to reckon with divine truths that shape our view of the world. Namely, the whole world was created by the will and word of the God of the Bible. To do this, He purposefully turned chaos into order. He alone is the Creator who has great freedom and power to speak matter into existence out of nothing. Prior to this, He alone existed. He co-exists with this world only because He chose to create it. This is not a deity who goes to battle with other so-called gods or with any aspects of His creation like we might find in other ancient origin stories. As the apostle Paul told those gathered in Areopagus centuries later, “The God who made the world and everything in it—he is Lord of heaven and earth—does not live in shrines made by hands. Neither is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives everyone life and breath and all things” (Acts 17:24-25).

This God made the heavens and the earth. To believe the earth exists due to God’s speech is one thing, but to believe that the heavens are His creative handiwork as well is quite another. This is not merely a reference to what we might call our atmosphere and the universe’s many wonders—this also includes the unseen spiritual realm where God and the angels dwell. God spoke His own realm into reality. God created time itself. This alone should lead us to wonder. Though God has no beginning, His creation does. Time is the first of God’s chosen tools for bringing order out of chaos. With the creation of periods of light and darkness, chaos is given its first boundaries, and we are given yet another reason to marvel.  

Whereas Genesis 1:1-5 establishes God as the Creator and His creation of time as the first function of bringing order to chaos, verses 6-13 introduce two other major functions of creation that further His ordering work: weather and agriculture. God intentionally designed the world so that plants bear seeds and seeds grow into new plants, and the waters are the precipitation that plays such a crucial role in sustaining and promoting life. He is not only the Creator of life—He is also the Sustainer of life. Individuals who have spent a significant amount of time living in more rural environments likely have a better understanding of what it is like to “live with the land.” To wake with the sunrise and rest with the sunset in every season, to plant and harvest crops and eat what is available in those seasons, to pray for rain and against famine—such is life for those who farm and provide food for the world. God saw what He had made and called it “good.” The shifting of seasons and of time and the rhythms of life inherent to the natural world are irrefutably good. That God saw that all of this was good means it all operates according to the purpose of His design. Everything God does and everything God makes is good because He good. And we can see that in the very first days of the world. The cycle of life and growth are already identifiable and traceable here at the beginning. These verses compel us to reflect on the pace and rhythms of our life as well as the One who gave us life. 

We can’t read Genesis 1:24-31 without wondering at its implications for human beings. This passage is one of the most insightful texts in all of Scripture and serves as a foundational building block for understanding the God who created us and what it means to be a human being. First we learn that human beings are made in the image of God, which tells us something about ourselves and something about God. Notice the use of the plural in verse 26: “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”

Understanding what it means to be made in God’s image in some ways hinges on whether the writer of Genesis and his audience were already aware of some type of plurality in the person of God—what we now know as the Trinity. A closer reading of verse 27 seems to support the idea that the writer did have such a belief. Twice he tells us that human beings were created in God’s image, and at the third mention, he highlighted their being created “male and female.” The single human being (for we are all human) is created as a plurality that reflects God’s own singularity and plurality. Gender is more than biology; it reflects the very nature of God. Second, God gave human beings a task. Like the creatures made before us, we are also blessed to reproduce but also to serve as caretakers over the other living creatures blessed to grow in number. Human beings are to possess a love for all forms of life and treasure the whole earth. Through their care, God provides the food needed for human beings to thrive. Human beings subdue and rule the earth but not in a domineering or flippant way. We are to image God by bringing order and functioning as sub-creators. We are to loving tend the world God made as His representatives.