I am going to review the section I previously posted on Eve, and possibly some others, so they are still available to those who did not read them previously. Feel free to pass this along and I look forward to comments and discussion. I do want to make the caveat that our discussion is founded in the Word of God and not just our opinions and what we have been taught. Part 1 - Image of God Genesis 1:26-28 26Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth." 27God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28God blessed them; and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth." Why did I start with man (Adam) when this is a discussion about woman (Eve)? Because it is necessary to see how God made man in Chapter 1 of Genesis, differently from the rest of creation, to fully understand the creation of woman. Also, as you see in vs. 27, male and female both are made in the “image of God” and they were both given the dominion to “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it”. This week we will look at the first aspect of this, the “image of God” and next week look at what is called the “Dominion Mandate.” So to begin let’s take a look at vs. 26 and God’s statement “Let Us make man in Our image”. God makes this distinction between animals and man, in that it was a divine decision to make man after His own image. What does this mean? What is the “image” of God? Does this mean man was a demi-god as some would say? A minor god himself? No, to bear an image of a thing, the image is not the same as the thing. On a human level think of the image in a mirror – it reflects back to the viewer an image of self, but is not the actual viewer. So can we take that weak concept and say the man reflects back to God Himself? Not really, but we do reflect back some of the character of God. Some of the aspects of God that man bore before the fall were a copy of the holiness and blessedness of the divine life. This is shattered with the fall and sin, and can only be restored through the transforming power of Christ in salvation. (See Col. 3:10 and Eph. 4:24). Before sin marred the image of God in man, man was capable of making rational true decisions. Man had the ability and freedom to choose to do good and obey God, but they were able to choose to disobey and thus sin. As Dr. Morecraft states in his Authentic Christianity Series, Volume 1, “Originally the will of Adam and Eve were in conformity with the will of God. They knew what He demanded of them, and they had the ability and the desire to do what He commanded. Their affections were holy and pure, but their will was created by God in such a way that they were free to act according to their holy inclinations or to choose evil. They could freely choose good or evil; they were capable of falling from a sinless condition in God’s favor to a sinful condition under His curse.” (p. 565). A second point I would like to make is that God discussed this creation over – with whom? The angels? I doubt, because the angels were a separate being from God. So who? Many theologians believe this is referencing the trinity of the Godhead. That He counsels with Himself, in the Godhead there are three separate persons. So God takes counsel with the Father, Son and Spirit in deciding to create Man in “Our” image. I will not get into all the details this brings to mind of whether man has three aspects, the physical, spiritual, and intellectual, as some have thought. That is beyond what I want to discuss today. But the point I would like to make is that before God creates man, He makes this decision. I will refer you to Dr. Morecraft’s work previously quoted, on page 558ff, he gives an excellent discussion of this matter. Man is the final act of God’s creation, the crown of the creation and the most personal act of God. All other aspects of creation were by the spoken word of God. God said and it was so. But man (and woman) both were personally created by God in an intimate manner. Unlike all the other creatures, God made man from the earth and formed his being, then breathed the breath of God that gave him life. Woman is made from man as we will see in more detail in Chapter 2, not as an afterthought, but as God’s plan because when God takes counsel of the creation of man He does speak in the plural. This holds several implications for woman. 1. She was thought of before in the mind of God and bears the image of God as man does. 2. She was created after man and from man, so she owes her being to man just as man now comes from woman and owes his existence to her. (See I Cor. 11:7-9 and 12) 3. She was created for a purpose that is dependent on man’s purpose. Man was given the command to subdue the earth and fill it; woman was created to help man in that task. I will end this with a quote from Matthew Henry on the “male and female He created them” of this verse. “That man was made male and female, and blessed with the blessing of fruitfulness and increase. God said, Let us make man, and immediately it follows, So God created man; he performed what he resolved. With us saying and doing are two things; but they are not so with God. He created him male and female, Adam and Eve—Adam first, out of earth, and Eve out of his side, Ch. 2. “It should seem that of the rest of the creatures God made many couples, but of man did not he make one? (Mal. 2:15), though he had the residue of the Spirit, whence Christ gathers an argument against divorce, Mt. 19:4, 5. Our first father, Adam, was confined to one wife; and, if he had put her away, there was no other for him to marry, which plainly intimated that the bond of marriage was not to be dissolved at pleasure. “Angels were not made male and female, for they were not to propagate their kind (Lu. 20:34–36); but man was made so, that the nature might be propagated and the race continued. .. God made but one male and one female, that all the nations of men might know themselves to be made of one blood, descendants from one common stock, and might thereby be induced to love one another.” (I divided this section to be more easily read.) Let me leave some points for consideration: 1. Man’s creation was a personal act of a loving God, and different from that of the creation of all the other animals. 2. Man in his original form bore an image of God that remains even though marred by the sin of man. 3. Woman was also in the mind of God, but made for man, and therefore is to be under man’s headship. I welcome all your comments and observations.
Posted on: Fri, 05 Jul 2013 13:37:21 +0000
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