Created in the Image of God

Good morning to everybody. So glad to see you this morning. I know that as I was walking around here, I have both in the last worship gathering and in this worship gathering, I've seen a lot of Josh Allen jerseys that were on today. And I would say to you, Josh Allen, we need you at the stadium soon because you've got some business to take care of Josh Allen. So make sure that you arrive there in proper time and get warmed up. Speaking of stadiums, I was in one in New Orleans a bunch of years ago at the New Orleans Superdome. Some of you have seen that stadium before. And I was there as a young minister at the particular denomination. It was a Baptist denomination, and they were having their national conference there. This would've been in June of 1996. And while a young man, and again, I mean this is June of 96, I mean, I've got a whole row of people here that weren't even born in 96 that are sitting right down front, right? I've got socks as old as some of them, and it's freaking me out right now, you know? I'm like, whoa, what is happening? When I was there, when I was younger, I had still had a little bit of that mischievous in me, you know, even though I was a minister now and all that kind of stuff. But I was young and still had a little bit of that mischief in me. And some of you are not young and still have some of that mischief in you, I know who you are, some of you I see right now I'm looking at you, and as my eyes are combing through here, more and more are starting to go, yep, they are too. Here's what I did. I was in the Superdome, it doesn't really matter how I got there, but I ended up in the bowels of the Superdome on a golf cart driving around. It doesn't matter how I got there, it's really not important, it's immaterial to the conversation, but just know this, I was in the bowels of New Orleans Superdome and I was driving around on a golf cart. And when I got to the place where I saw that it was the green room for all of the speakers at this national convention, I of course stopped and I decided I was gonna go up there and I saw there was a little table that had name tags on it and didn't have any pictures. And I thought to myself, you've made a terrible mistake not putting those people's pictures on there with their names, because there's gonna be idiots like me who are gonna come up here and I'm going to somehow work my way into the bowels of the Superdome on a golf cart, and I'm gonna get one of these IDs and I'm gonna put it right here on my lapel and I'm gonna walk right in this green room and I'm gonna have a lot of snacks. And that's what I did. I had a lot of snacks, it was a nice spread for all the speakers. And I was just in there with, literally, I'll just say this, some you remember the name Jerry Falwell from back in the day. My name's Jerry. I put his name tag on and I just started walking around in there and people were just looking at me. And the problem was he had a son named Jerry. And so they didn't really know what to do, they weren't sure was it me, was it not me, whatever. So nobody bothered me. I just ate snacks and then I was coming back and forth. So what I started doing is collecting a bunch of these name tags and I was putting on the inside of my jacket, kind of like those salesmen in New York that are walking around on the street with, you know, watches and stuff, you know, what do you wanna buy? So I had 'em all in here, and eventually as I was coming back and forth, finally this security guard lady who was really, really nice, but she finally just stopped me and she said, you know, I've seen you coming back and forth and I just wanna ask a question. And I'm like, what is it? And she said, who are you? And I opened up my jacket like this, and I said, who you want me to be? It was a good moment. Who are you? That's a pretty fundamental question, isn't it? Who are you? I mean, if we're gonna ask and answer a question in our lives, I think that's a fair one to ask and answer. And I'll be honest with you, it comes up more frequently at this time of year because we've got goals, and we've got resolutions and we've got a brand new year and it causes us a little bit of tension because we're trying to decide who we want to be. That's what we're doing at this time of the year. We're trying to decide who we want to be. But maybe instead of just thinking about who you might want to be, maybe I would encourage you to give some consideration to who you actually are and maybe even what you were made for. Some of us have built who we are on what people want us to be. Just like when the lady asked me, who are you? And I said, who do you want me to be, right? Some of us have actually gone through life that way, that we've just allowed our stories to be told about ourselves, or maybe we've even decided that we're gonna make up stories or create stories that we tell ourselves as to who we are. And I want you to understand something, friends, stories are powerful. Stories are how we make sense of the world. This is literally how we've done it all along in our lives. Stories are powerful. And I don't know what story you've embraced for who you are. Maybe it's been placed upon you, maybe you tried to place it upon yourself, maybe you've always been the pretty one and you've feel like you've gotta continue living up to that somehow. Or maybe you've been known as the strong one or the smart one, or the dumb one was a label that was placed on you and it's been hard to get out from under that. Or maybe you're the funny one or the responsible one, or you're the rich one or the poor one, or the successful one, or the failing one. Or maybe you're the brave one, or maybe you are the fearful one. I don't know exactly what it may be for you, but let me just say this, whatever that may be or may not be, whatever truth there is or is not in any of these stories that have been placed on you or that you've created for yourselves, I wanna remind you, they're not the whole story. They're just a small part of a bigger story that you need to pay attention to. And that's why every single one of us needs a grounding story, needs a foundational story to shape who we are and to shape what we do, every single one of us. And it's the story of God that is the actual grounding story or foundational story from which every other story gets its meaning. This is what we have to be able to wrap our heads around. Now, in the opening book of the story of God, one that we call beginnings or origins or maybe what's printed in your Bible, Genesis, right? We talked last week how this story begins to take shape in chapter one. And I actually would tell you that in the first two chapters, this story, story of God, really begins to take shape and so that we can understand who we are. Now, I know that Jonathan said last week that we were gonna go from cover to cover, telling the great story of God over the series, but that he assured you that that didn't mean we were going through every single chapter. Well, John covered chapter one last week, and I'm gonna still be in chapter one and into chapter two. So we are progressing at a snails pace. Here I am telling you that John was lying to you and that we will not finish this series until the year 2045 when we go through every single chapter. It's not true. Now, last week in Genesis one, here's what we discovered. We discovered a beautiful poetic description of creation. Its structure, Genesis one's structure is both literal and literary at the same time. And it uses repetition, it uses correlation, it uses pairing, it uses structures of order to demonstrate to the reader the glory of God and the beauty of his creation. Now, what you see in chapter one is that there's a building crescendo of six days, each day building and filling with a new creation and a new creature to fill each new realm that has been described. And as the momentum builds on that sixth day, there's only one creature remaining to be presented, humans. It's clear from the form and the structure of chapter one that the creation of humanity is the pinnacle of this great creator's creations. And then we run into this powerful and beautiful and rich verse toward the end of chapter one in verse number 27, as we saw last week. So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God, he created them, male and female, he created them. You see, previously to this statement that was made here by God, previously God had spoken each realm and each creature into existence. But here God speaks to himself and deliberates before the heavenly host at the greatness and beauty of this creation that is called humanity. All the other creatures made that were made before humanity find their places in respect to their domains. In other words, birds have air, fish have sea, trees have soil or ground, right? But humans find their place differently. Their place is designed in respect to the relationship they have to God the creator. Now, when God uses this term, will make them in image and likeness, what does he mean when he says he will create humans in his image and his likeness? Some of you may have heard that phrase before, image and likeness. Maybe if you follow college sports, in college sports, it used to be that when you were an athlete that you went to school and you could get a scholarship for going to school, but the school could make tons and tons and tons and tons of money if you were a really great athlete, right? I mean, I know this because both of my boys played college ball. And here's the thing, baseball players don't get near the love. Football players, basketball players, they get all the love, right? Sometimes gymnasts that are, you know, TikTok champions can also get all the love, right? But here's the thing with name, image and likeness now, it's a law that these students can profit off their own name, image and likeness. So if you've got a superstar player at a particular university, the university can't sell all these jerseys with their number on it, and that student not get paid something for that. This is a part of what this means. So it's good, they get, you know, because for so long these athletes were told that they were students but treated like employees. And so now they get to profit a bit off of what they're bringing to the school. I'm fine with it, I think it's great, but at the end of the day, it's their name, image and likeness that they're profiting from. But let me ask you a question. What if, what if your name, image and likeness was given to you and wasn't yours? What if it was given to you? Well, that's exactly the story that we're reading about in Genesis chapter one and Genesis chapter two, because God creates humanity in his image and likeness. Now, the text itself is not concerned with explaining it really any further. It just tells us that, he created humanity in his image and likeness. But when we understand the words and how they were used at that time, we can understand it a little bit better. For instance, the Hebrew word for image, Tzelem, it actually means to carve out or to cut out. That's the idea behind the word in Hebrew. Now, for instance, if you were a potter and what was said is that you were creating an image, you would be carving out or cutting out or shaping something that reflected what you wanted to reflect, right? Or a metal worker, they would be cutting out or carving out or shaping something into the image that they wanted it to reflect. What's interesting here is that this is used of God and it is God who is actually shaping us, carving us out, making us into his image. Now, if you understand this properly, it's actually a picture of royalty. This is royal talk of what God has done. You see, Genesis one is the picture of a great king who has a cosmic temple. That's the overarching picture of Genesis chapter one. And within that cosmic temple, this great king actually carves out some representatives that are going to reflect him. They are image bearers of his. And then he says, not only are they create him in my image, but also in my likeness. That word likeness in the Hebrew also stresses the same idea. It has to do with resemblance. So to be made in God's image, it's at least in part to be a royal representative that shows off a resemblance of the great king and the great creator. Now, when I talk about resemblance, I'm not talking about physical resemblance, right? That doesn't make any sense. We already know from Genesis one, God is spirit, right? And so our physical resemblance is not necessarily what we're talking about when we talk about, when we talk about likeness to God. Instead, it's how we're made. We're made with a morality that would reflect God. We're made with reasoning that reflects God. We're made with creativity because we serve a creator and we're made as people who are meant to rule well like God rules well. This is all a part of what it means, isn't it a great thought to think about being made in the image and likeness of God? But as we leave Genesis one and we move into Genesis two, we see how that image actually plays out and maybe what it means for our lives as image bearers, pick up with me as the narrative of Genesis one ends, and it actually goes into the first three verses of Genesis two. Here's how it picks up in Genesis two, beginning in verse four. This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, when the Lord God made the earth and the heavens. Now no shrub had yet appeared on the earth and no plant had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no one to work the ground. But streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground. Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east in Eden, and there he put the man he had formed. You see what chapter two does is it gives us a second account of creation. Notice that's how verse four begins. It actually says, this is an account of how the earth, the creation of the heavens and the earth. And while I tell you that this is now a second account of this creation, I am also going to give you my additional reminder as Jonathan did last week, that you are not reading a science document and you shouldn't read it like one. Now hear me. I didn't say that Genesis one and two has no impact on scientific knowledge. It certainly does because philosophically, we have to understand the foundation of it all. But this is not meant to be written or read like it was written from a Western scientific framework. Because to be honest with you, if you put chapter one and chapter two right next to each other, they're not the same and they're not the same order. And guess what? Not the point. See, we're missing the point when we start to impose that upon the text. See, in chapter one, like if you were reading it, water comes first, then land, then plants, then animals, then humans. But in chapter two, we're first introduced to land, then water, then man, then plants, then animals, then woman, not the same and not the point. Everybody with me? It's imperative that you understand that, even the name used for God is different in chapter one. Elohim is what's used in chapter one, but when you get to chapter two, it's a compound name, Yahweh Elohim. And then when you get to chapter three, going forward after chapter three, it's just Yahweh, the covenant name of God. See, it's just another evidence that chapter one and chapter two are different literary structures yet are joined as couplets. And this is not the first time in scripture that this has happened. I'm not gonna go there, but just for your knowledge, like in the book of Exodus, after the crossing of the Red Sea, there's the detailing of the journey of the crossing of the Red Sea, and then there's this great song that's about the crossing of the Red Sea. Those are couplets, they go together. They're not meant to try and be laid side by side like they're scientific and we're like, oh, wait a minute, they said this and they, no, no, no. They're couplets, they go together. The book of Judges, when Deborah had led Israel in war, there's heard, there's the account of leading in war, and then there's this great poetic picture of what the war was like. The stars fought for us, it said. That's not literally true. The stars do not have arms and they can't literally, stop it, read it how it's supposed to be read, stop being weird. Like that's sometimes that's how I teach hermeneutics to people, stop being weird. You're imposing things on the text that it's not actually doing. But see, maybe you could think about the couplet of chapter one and chapter two this way. It's actually two different focuses or foci, if I really wanted to say it properly. It's two different focuses. I like focuses better, don't you? Foci, you just go, what? What are you saying? Just what are you trying to be funny? All right, watch Genesis one and Genesis two, okay? In Genesis one, this is cosmic. This is talking about the creation of the heavens and the earth. This is everything everywhere, every universe, everything, right? It's cosmic. Genesis two, it's specific. It's actually just talking about focused on the earth, like what's happening here? What does this look like? What are we doing in this story here that we know? Not the cosmic story, but this story. In chapter one, it's about God's transcendence. God spoke and everything happened and God said, and God said, and God said, and God said, but in Genesis two, it's about God's imminence. Now listen carefully. There are a number of words that you pronounce imminent and they are spelled differently than the other ones. And it's important that you get this one right, because they don't all mean the same thing. This is talking about God's nearness and this is where God, listen, in chapter two, God's making. See in chapter one, it's about his transcendence. He speaks and everything happens. But in chapter two, he makes, right? This is the beauty of this picture. And then you could actually look at Genesis one as call and Genesis two as response. That's the couplet. In Genesis one, God calls everything into existence, and in Genesis two, we see the response of creation, Genesis two and forward. We see the response of creation to all that. Now, if that's the case, what are we to understand about ourselves in light of the story of God? What's the joint truth of chapter one and chapter two of this great story of God that we are gonna use as the grounding story of who we are? What do we need to grab a hold of so that we don't miss it and know that this is what we can build our lives on? Lemme give you something to consider. People are made by God on purpose and with purpose. This is how I would summarize in Genesis one and two, kind of this joint truth that we all need to understand. That is the grounding story for our very lives when we're asking the question, who are we? Well, what we are is we're people made by God on purpose and with purpose. Lemme take each of those in turn, all right? People are made by God on purpose. What am I saying when I say that? Well, watch what the text does in Genesis chapter two, verse number seven to begin, here's what it says, then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and the man became a living being, and then watch this with the woman later on in verse number 21 and 22. So the Lord God, who did this? So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man's ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man and he brought her to the man. People are made by God on purpose, whether it was the unique creation of man or the unique creation of woman, what jumps out in Genesis two is that God is the initiator here, the Great Creator does what he does with intention. In other words, humanity is not some cosmic accident that emerged because of chance from some primordial soup. You have a creator who is all knowing, all powerful, everywhere present, this being chose by his own will to create people in his image and in his likeness. People were made on purpose by a God of purpose. What a great grounding story for all of us. People were made by God on purpose, by a God of purpose. What a beautiful picture. And that truth carries with it some implications for our lives. Here's the first implication. If this is true, people are made by God on purpose and it is. That means every human life has value, every human life has value. See, this is why as Genesis progresses, and we'll see this over the course of time because remember, we're going literally chapter by chapter until the year 2045. We're not. But as Genesis progresses, what you see is you see people who've been marred by sin and watch this, you see one image bearer killing another image bearer. You see one image bearer taking the life of another image bearer, and God sees this as an affront, and in fact, he actually gave this instruction to Noah in Genesis chapter nine is they're going to reestablish life on the Earth. Here's what it says in Genesis nine, verse six, whoever sheds human blood by humans shall their blood be shed. Why? For in the image of God has God made mankind. You see, this is how serious God is about all this, about the value of human life. God was giving a grace to humanity that if someone is going to foolishly begin to kill other people, then their life must be snuffed out as a mercy so that that would not be happening to other people. Why? Because the value of life is so high. It's why murder of life was such an affront to the God who made life and who made people his image bearers. And yes, by the way, that translates to those who are in the womb and who are out of the womb. So listen carefully to me. You are valuable. This is a part of your grounding story as a human being, you are valuable. Let me give you a second corollary to that. You are not an accident. Whatever else you hear, hear that because of God who has made you on purpose, does so because you are of great value. You're made in the image and likeness of God, and as a result, that means that you are valuable and you were never an accident. So every human life has value. But another implication of this truth is that every human life has dignity. Every human life has dignity. Watch what the text says. Verse number seven. We read it a moment ago. It says, then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and the man became a living being. What a beautiful picture this is, this idea of being created from the dust was something that demonstrated dignity, believe it or not. You're like, wait, what? Dust people are somehow dignified? Well, yeah, I mean because it actually, in the ancient world, it would signify royalty. This picture that's being given here. Dr. Victor Hamilton does a great job because he matches Genesis one's narrative of royalty by showing in Genesis two, this creation from the dust, because it's a picture of this royalty being brought up above the dust to rule over it. It's actually a picture of royalty that God himself breathed life into the nostrils of humans is significant. Royal breath into royal image bearers. That's why we should treat everyone with dignity. Yes, some actions are evil. Yes, some people have done some very bad things, but here's what we're to remember, that in making humans with God's divine image, that confers upon every single human being, dignity, whether rich or poor, whether educated or uneducated, doesn't matter. And that's why by the way, James, in the New Testament, the half brother of Jesus, he picks up on this truth as he correlates it to the way that we speak about people. Here's what James said in fact, with the tongue, we praise our Lord and Father and with it we curse human beings who have been made in God's likeness. You see, this matters for the way that we actually live our lives. We have to have this truth, this story shape who we are. We aren't people who disparage or demonize or dehumanize other people, but instead we realize that they're worthy of dignity because they were made in the image and likeness of God. Maybe that's in part why C.S. Lewis in the Weight of Glory wrote these words. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities. It is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them that we should conduct all our dealings with one another. All friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. You see, what he understood is that he knew the souls of image bearers meant that they could be destined for such glory that we could never imagine it or destined for such horror that we could never fully understand it, but we should show people dignity because they've been made in the image and likeness of God. You were made by God on purpose. You see what he understood is that he knew the souls of image bearers meant that they could be destined for such glory that we could never imagine it or destined for such horror that we could never fully understand it, but we should show people dignity because they've been made in the image and likeness of God. You were made by God on purpose, but you were also made by God with purpose. It's a wonderful, wonderful grounding story that we're living in here. Verse 15 of chapter two says it this way, the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to do what? To work it and to take care of it. I'm gonna give you kind of two understandings of what it means to understand that we're made by God with purpose. The first is this, it's representation. You see what we read in verse number 15 was an indicator that God had said, I want you humans, I want you to work and to take care of and to steward my creation. He gives them dominion over other created things, and they are caretakers and stewards who are representing him. In other words, we are to represent God to the earth and represent God on the earth. This is a part of the grounding story. By the way, this is another royal reminder in this text. We are royal representatives who are working in concert with God, who are cooperating with God. That is a part of how we represent him. We're cooperating with him. You're like, how do we cooperate with God? What does that really look like? Let me show you real quick in the text, in this agrarian construct here that we're reading about in the garden narrative. Watch in verse number five. Now, no shrub had yet appeared on the earth and no plant had yet sprung up for who? What does this say here for who? The Lord God had not what? Sent rain. All right, so the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no one to do what? To work the ground. So isn't it interesting that the creation of Adam, what we're reminded of is that God is a rain sender, but not an earth tiller. Adam is an earth tiller, but he could never be a rain sender. This is the representation, we work with God in the world that we were in to let God do what only God can do, and we do what God's assigned us to do so that we might be able to bring glory and goodness and beauty and abundance everywhere we are. Just as Adam was to expand the garden everywhere the river flowed, it talks about that in chapter two, where the river was going. The implication is that he was supposed to expand the beauty and abundance of God into all the places the river flowed. We too are supposed to expand the garden, so to speak, by representing God in all that we do and all that we have stewardship over, but we don't always, we don't just represent God to the earth, so to speak. We also represent God to other people. I hope we understand that. Though everyone has the capacity to know God because they're image bearers. See, this is the great thing. Only humans have the capacity to know God because we've been made in his image and likeness. No other species, no other anything, just us. But not everyone has come to know him, right? Not everyone has come to know him. Maybe that's why Charles Spurgeon wrote in this great sermon that he titled God our portion and his word, our treasure. He said this, man was made in the image of God and nothing will satisfy man but God in whose image he was made. He is exactly right. How many of us know somebody? How many of us know somebody that doesn't know God? Put your up in the air. Yeah, that's everybody, right? We all know people who do not know God. Every person has the capacity to know God because they are an image bearer. They've been made in God's image and likeness, so they have a capacity to be able to know God, but as representatives, we've gotta be people who share with them how they can know God, to tell them how they can know God, but it's not just about being a representative. Also, it's about relationship. That part of our purpose that we're made by God with purpose. It's to be representatives of his, but it's also about relationship. Fundamentally, we're made for relationship with God and we're made for relationship with others. I find it astounding when I'm reading through Genesis chapter one, it's astounding me that when God made, you know, like the birds, he blessed them. But with humanity, it's a different thing. God actually speaks to them. It's a different thing altogether. I mean, God spoke everything into existence, but with Adam, he made him face to face, so to speak, spoke everything else into existence, made Adam face to face. It's a remarkable thing. We above all things, above everything, we are made for relationship with God, unlike any other created thing. It's like this. I'm not the first to say this of course, but when God wanted to make fish, he spoke to the sea. When God wanted to make trees, he spoke to the soil. But when God wanted to make humans, he spoke to himself. Why is that? Because God, for humans is our natural habitat. See, you take fish out of the sea and they what? They die. You take trees out of the ground and they what? They die. You take a human and disconnect them from their maker. What do they do? They die. Now, it doesn't take anything away from God. Just like if you take a fish out of the sea, the sea still is the sea. The fish is just nothing at that point, you take a tree out of the soil, the soil is still the soil, the tree is nothing at that point. You take a human out of God. God is still God, but it's we that are nothing. You see, God, listen, God is our natural environment. We have been made for him. The domain we've been assigned is relationship to God, but we also have relationship with one another in order to serve God. Look with me carefully at verse number 18 in Genesis two, it said, then the Lord God said, it is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him. Now we can pull that verse out and talk about man or husband was lonely and you know, needed companionship and so God made a woman or wife for him to share life with, and that may be true in part actually, but here's what we should remember. Adam wasn't actually issuing a complaint to the Lord when God did this. Adam was not going, you know, God, I'm lonely. Can you help a brother out? That was my translation of the Hebrew, right? In fact, Adam had not said anything to this point recorded in scripture, nothing, and this is where you see the couplet of chapter one and chapter two. In chapter one, it was good. It was good. It was good. It was good. It was good. It was very good. And then in chapter two, it's not good. Why did God say, and it was God, not Adam complaining it was God. Why God say this? Because this was all God. God determined it wasn't good that Adam was alone. Why? Well, maybe yeah, companionship, sure. Intimacy, yes, procreation, absolutely. To fulfill the mandate that he'd given to be fruitful and multiply. Of course, all of those things, yes, a thousand times over, of course, but maybe it's also because he had assigned so great a task and that task could not be completed all by himself. Adam could not by himself extend the garden everywhere it was supposed to go. He needed someone with him. See, here's what I'm trying to help us understand. Our relationships don't exist independent of God. They exist to glorify and to serve God. Sir, ma'am, your marriage is not just so you've got great companionship. What an awesome benefit of marriage though, isn't it? Intimacy, what a tremendous benefit of marriage. Procreation, what a tremendous, glorious, beautiful characteristic of marriage, but do you know why you are together? It is to glorify and to serve God. It is for the purpose of extending the glory and the abundance and the beauty and the goodness of God everywhere you are. Those friendships that you have, that relationship's not just so you've got somebody to text at 2:00 AM when you can't sleep and you had too much pizza. It's not just those guys that you just, you know, kind of hammer on, hey, hey, are you up? Let's play Fortnite, or whatever the new game is. I don't even have any idea, right? It's not just that. Is that a great benefit? Sure, it's an awesome benefit. We've got friends, man, I tell people all the time, Jesus has said very clearly, like we sung about earlier, Jesus said, I am the way, that's a direction, that's a road. That's a traveling place that we go on. Jesus is the way, but isn't it beautiful that he's given us friends as walking sticks to help us along the way? It's a glorious thing, but listen, it's not just for our comfort. It's not just for our convenience. It's not just so we don't feel lonely. It's not just so that when we've got fomo, we can, you know, text somebody and figure out what's going on and where's everything happening and all that stuff. It's not just for those things, even though that's a great side product, it's for the purpose of pointing one another to the fact that we only exist properly in God, that our great habitat is in him. That life isn't really life unless it's life in him. This is what we're trying to understand. Now, this is what it means to be made in the image of God. We were made on purpose and we were made with purpose, for representation and for relationship. Now, as you know, we all know that image of God, that fingerprint of God on our life, smudged in your life and in mine, didn't it? Sin has wreaked havoc, and we'll look at that next week in Genesis chapter three. Again, we're crawling at a snail's pace at this point, and the only solution to that marred image in our lives is if somehow was another human that was perfect and that could somehow restore the full image of God back to us. Well, thank God there is, Jesus the Christ, the sinless Son of God, born of a virgin who lived a sinless life, who also, by the way, put on flesh, that means that he existed prior to that flesh. Jesus existed before Bethlehem in eternity past as the second person of the Godhead, God the Son. He was the agent of creation itself. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the word was God, and the word became flesh and made his dwelling among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory of the only begotten of God, full of grace and truth. This is the glorious story of the gospel. That's why Paul helps us to understand that when he says these brilliant and Holy Spirit inspired words in Colossians chapter one, the Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him, all things were created, things in heaven. Sometimes it gets on the preacher too, right? Like you're out there going, yeah, yeah. For in him, all things were created, things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities, all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him, all things hold together. You see, only Jesus, only Jesus can perfectly image the Father and bring us back to a place where we are held together now in the image of God. Wow, your story only makes sense in God's story. Who we are is only truly understood when we understand who we are from God's view, and this is the truth. You were made by God on purpose and you were made by God with purpose. So maybe, maybe instead of in this New year only thinking about who you want to be, an actor or actress, a husband or a wife, a broker, a teacher, an athlete, whatever it may be, instead of just thinking about that, and it's fine to think about those things, think about who you are. Whatever your job, whatever your role, whatever it's you're doing, you are a representative of God, so do your job well, steward your role well for the glory and the goodness and the beauty of God's name, and also remember that you were made to have relationship with God and show others how to do so. Listen to me, this is not just a nice teaching point. You were made to show others the glory of who God is. Let me ask you a question. When is the last time, when is the last time? Every one of us, how many of us know somebody who's doesn't know God? Right? That was all of us, right? When is the last time that you talked to one of those somebodies about how they could know God? When's the last time? Because if the mission God has given his church is that every man, woman, and child have repeated opportunities to hear and see the gospel of Jesus Christ and respond to the good news of Jesus, the only way that happens is if each person in the body of Christ who's been renewed in the image of God through Jesus Christ now takes seriously that they are a representative of God and that they are sharing and showing to other people how they can know him through Christ. When's the last time you did it? When's the last time I did? It's not fair for me to just stand up here and talk lecture. I have to participate in this. You're like, well, that's not really fair, Jerry. You're like a, this is like your job. You do this all the time. People come, they make appointments and they talk to you, and you get to tell 'em about Jesus. That's true. Let's take that out of it. What about my regular life? Christmas Eve, I got on a late flight to go back to Atlanta to hang with my family after preaching what felt like 700 services here on that day. It was awesome, it was incredible. I had to get an Uber from the Atlanta airport to my house. That's about an hour, and you know what I did with my Uber driver? About 30 minutes into the drive, because I heard a podcast he was listening to that wasn't a Christian podcast, but I picked up on something and I started a conversation and I got to talk to this guy about Jesus, and guess what? He couldn't go anywhere. I was literally paying this man to listen to me talk about Jesus, but whatever, right? Whatever. And then just a couple of nights ago, I was out with some other colleagues who had flown in for some meetings that we were having in Atlanta and we were talking to our waitress about Jesus. She happened to be, we found out she was a sister in Christ, which was awesome, but listen, I've got this responsibility just like you've got this responsibility, even though this is my job per se, I've also got places where nobody knows who I am. Nobody knows what my job is. Fundamentally though, I'm a representative, it's not about a title. It's not about my job description. It's about who I am. It's fundamentally the grounding story of who we are. When's the last time, when's the last time you talked to somebody as a representative of God, how they could know who God is through Jesus Christ? So just please, whatever lane you run in, don't miss the story that grounds us. You were made by God on purpose and you were made by God with purpose. Walk in that. Let's bow our heads together. In a moment, we're dismissed, and I would simply say this to you, if you're here and you have not yet put your faith in Jesus, I want you to know something, God so loved you that he sent his son on your behalf, who would live a sinless life, die on a cross to pay the penalty for our sin so that by faith in him and his resurrection from the dead, we could now be restored to God, sins forgiven, image restored. It's beautiful. If that's never happened in your life and you want that to be today, God is drawing you to himself. Here's what we'd ask. There'll be a few men and women that'll be down front. They're making their way down here in just a moment, and just take one of 'em by the hand and simply say, I wanna receive Jesus. I want my life to be made new. We'd love to be able to share that with you. Talk with you about that. As these men and women are standing down front, or maybe you just need somebody to pray with because you know there's some people in your life you want to talk to about Jesus and you need somebody to pray with you. Pray that God would give the courage and the right moment and the right time, well come on down. Take one of these folks by the hand, they would love to take a moment and just pray with you along that line, there's men and women down here. Feel free. We would love for that to be the case. We want to be a praying people. Father, I pray that we would all do what you put in our hearts to do. You'd write this on our hearts. You'd help us to live out of the grounding, foundational story of what you said we are, not what other people have put on us or maybe what we tried to create or curate for ourselves, but what you say we are, help us to live out of that so people around us might see us as representatives of the beauty of who you are and how they can live in relationship with you as well. We pray this in Christ's name, amen.