Podcast Episode 4: In His Image

This is a transcript of Saturday's podcast. To subscribe to the podcast using iTunes, please click here. To listen to the podcast without iTunes, please follow this link.

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
-Genesis 1:26-27

A brand, for good or bad, is something that means something to us. We see a brand, whether on clothing, food, or even cattle, and we understand it. It brings up certain emotions and ideas. I, for one, avoid certainly clothing brands like the plague. The reason is very simple: I bought clothes with that brand and they fell apart. Other brands I trust quite a bit more.

We brand things to tell something of their source. A movie studio will put its brand at the beginning of each movie to let you know who was behind it. Even the title of this podcast, Christian Pilgrimage, is a brand of sorts. It is the same name we use for the written blog, and the same as our website, www.christianpilgrimage.org, because we want you to know where these come from, that they are connected.

It is fascinating to me that God put His brand on us, in a way. He made us in His image and likeness. He set us apart from the rest of the Creation as His own. Of everything we see and touch and smell in this world, no matter how wonderful, nothing else has the spark of the eternal as man does.

And we can see the quality of His workmanship in ourselves. So intricate are the organs and systems that make us work.

Yet one thing amazes me: how we image-bearers of God can so abuse the honor. We were given the world, and we have trashed it! We were given minds that can conceive of wonderful things, and we use them to wallow in filth. We abuse each other with violence, sin against one another sexually, lie and steal. We are self-promoting and egotistical. We are selfish and greedy. We have everything, and our response is to hoard it. I grow so disappointed in my own failings, friends. I have been given such a great gift in His image and likeness, and I have fallen so often.

If the owner of a company finds out that his cherished brand name is being abused at a certain factory, that they are making shoddy products and running his name into the mud, what will he do? He will go to the factory and fix the problem. This is exactly what Jesus did. The Son of God came to us to guide us back to where we belong. To restore us.

This is the great thing about this story. We were made in the image and likeness of God, but we went astray in sin. So Jesus comes in the image and likeness of us, and yet without sin, to bring us home.

Jesus told a story of a landowner who sends his servants and finally his son to his property to deal with some wayward renters. The renters kill the son, they were so drunk off their own power. That is what we did with Jesus. The created thing did not even recognize the Creator, and we killed Him.

Does that mean it’s too late for us? God’s Son is dead, so is that the end? Does He quit and leave us to our own devices? No, because God loves us. On the Cross, Jesus bore the punishment for our sins, and then He rose again to insure our place in eternity.

If we repent and believe in Him, we will be forgiven. We will be raised up like Jesus and given a place with God forever. We will be restored to what we were always meant to be.

We are His image-bearers, after all.