About Our Worship March 7, 2010

Mar 07, 2010
John Moore

“When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. Male and female he created them, and he blessed them and named them Man when they were created.”                 -Genesis 5:1b, 2

The clear teaching of Scripture is that God created man and woman in His own image, so that human beings are like God as no other earthly creatures are.  This special dignity means that we can reflect and reproduce in our own limited way the holy ways of God.  Our humanity is most fulfilled when we do just that.

The full scope of God’s image in humanity is not given in Genesis 1:26, 27, but the context of Genesis 1 helps to define it.  In Genesis 1, we see God as a personal, rational, morally admirable, creative Being who rules over the world He has made.  Obviously, God’s image reflects these qualities.  In verses 28-30 God blesses the newly created human beings and sets them to rule over creation as His representatives.  The ability to communicate and relate to both God and other humans is another facet of man bearing the image of God.

God’s image in man can be summarized in this way: (a) man exists as a “soul” (Gen. 2:7), who is personal and self-conscious, with a God-like capacity for knowledge, thought, and action; (b) man was created morally upright, a quality lost in the Fall but which is even now being progressively restored in Christ (Eph. 4:24; Col. 3:10); (c) man has dominion over the environment; (d) man has a body through which he experiences reality, expresses himself, and exercises dominion; and (e) man has the God-given capacity for eternal life.

The Fall has greatly diminished God’s image in man, not only in Adam and Eve, but in the whole human race. While we still retain God’s image structurally (we are still human beings), functionally, we are now slaves to sin, unable to mirror God’s holiness.  Even those who have been regenerated - believers in Christ – must wait until their complete sanctification and glorification to reflect God perfectly in thought and action as they were made to do and as the incarnate Son of God in His humanity actually did (John 4:34; 5:30; 6:38; 8:29, 46).

Pastor Drew is continuing his sermon series on Genesis as he considers how we are made in God’s image.  Because God is our Creator, and because we bear His image, we can find inner peace and love for God even in the midst of personal tragedy.

Horatio Spafford experienced heart-rending tragedy in his life, and yet was able to write It Is Well with My Soul, our Hymn of the Month.  Although Spafford was a successful attorney in Chicago, he decided to go to Great Britain to accompany Dwight L. Moody and Ira Sankey for an evangelistic campaign.  Spafford was detained by urgent business and sent his wife and four daughters ahead on the S.S. Ville du Harve, planning to join them shortly after. Halfway across the Atlantic, their ship collided with an English vessel and sank in 12 minutes.  All four of Spafford’s daughters drowned, and Mrs. Spafford was among the few who were miraculously saved.

Spafford sailed to rejoin his grieving wife in Cardiff, Wales, shortly after. When his ship passed by the approximate place where his daughters had drowned, Spafford received sustaining comfort from God that enabled him to write, “When sorrows like sea billows roll…It is well with my soul.” Can we truthfully say, “It is well with my soul,” no matter what circumstances we are surrounded by?  This is a statement of trust and love for God our Creator.  Join us as we worship Him and sing:

“When peace, like a river attendeth my way, when sorrows like sea billows roll – Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say, It is well with my soul!”

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