BLOG POSTING, WEEK OF APR 29, 2024:   IMAGE

The Lord seems to have given me one main message in my life, and that is the simple truth that His Image is about what He wanted right from the beginning to show us about Himself, not about us.  In digging, researching, and crying out to Him I have also been forced to see a lot of other little things that Christians think and say which simply are not true.  Is God’s “IMAGE” a show stopping, salvation requirement?  No.  But it certainly does offer an antidote to some of the Christian-Not-So-True-isms; and absolutely pictures God the Father as loving us, wanting us, and motivated to move heaven and earth to get us, versus some of the religiosity that pushes God off in some super-holy-otherness that tolerates us only because of Jesus and some unfathomable altruism.  So, let me try again....

I consistently hear Pastors of many flavors emphasize that you are in God’s image, you are in God’s image, you....  And this is almost exclusively within the confines of some New Testament teaching.  So, if this is that important and linked to the New Testament, it behooves me to look in the New Testament for the accurate definition of exactly WHAT that image is!  I looked!  Guess what?  IT IS NOT THERE!  Here are all the N.T. scriptures containing “image” (I left out the ones on idols and Revelation beasts):

Romans 8:29  the image of his Son
1 Corinthians 11:7  a man… is the image and glory of God,
but woman is the glory of man.
1 Corinthians 15:49  we shall also bear the image of the man in heaven
2 Corinthians 3:18  are being transformed into the same image
2 Corinthians 4:4  Christ, who is the image of God
Colossians 1:15  He is the image of the invisible God
Colossians 3:10  new self, is being renewed after the image of its creator

It looks like a consistent definition is NOT there!  Some even conflict.  “Like Christ” gets close, but still does not define Image!  Definitely not for those before Jesus.  Especially not for those that misunderstand who the Christ is with respect to the Father!  And for the other scriptures: How exactly is a man the glory of God?  Or: we are now? versus not yet? versus are becoming? versus will be?  Is it Man, all men, not women?  I dare you, give me from these scriptures one consistent definition of “image.”  If it is that important to God and you can’t...

Could our theologians be encouraging us to look in the wrong place?

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