Made in His Image
“So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.”
Genesis 1:27 (NIV)
Have you ever stopped to consider what it actually means that you were made in the image of God?
It is one of the most important sentences in Scripture, and it appears remarkably early: “So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.”
Theologians call this the imago Dei, Latin for the image of God. It is the foundation of the Bible’s entire understanding of human worth, and it is worth taking slowly.
First, notice the literary form. Genesis 1:27 is written as Hebrew poetry, three parallel lines in the middle of a prose chapter. The author slows down and shifts register at exactly this point. Everything else in the chapter is spoken into existence and called good; here, uniquely, God deliberates first (“Let us make mankind in our image,” verse 26) and then creates something that images Him.
Second, notice the words. The Hebrew tselem means image, likeness, representation, and it is often used of a statue. Demut means resemblance. In the ancient Near East, a king would place a statue of himself in a distant province to represent his rule where he was not physically present. Genesis takes that royal language and does something revolutionary with it: instead of one king bearing the divine image, every human being does. In a world where only the pharaoh was said to bear the image of the gods, Genesis says the labourer, the widow and the foreigner bear it too.
That conviction has changed history. In 1787 the Staffordshire potter Josiah Wedgwood made a small medallion for the campaign against the slave trade. It showed a kneeling man in chains and the words “Am I not a man and a brother?” It was worn on bracelets and hairpins across Britain, and the question behind it goes straight back to Genesis 1: if he bears the image of God, how can he be bought and sold?
Third, notice the scope. “Male and female he created them.” Both, equally, fully. There is no hierarchy of image-bearing in this verse. Whatever else Scripture says about roles, it never says one sex bears God’s image more truly than the other.
So what does image-bearing actually involve? Theologians have historically pointed to three overlapping dimensions.
There is a functional dimension: we represent God’s rule, which is why verse 28 immediately speaks of stewarding creation. There is a relational dimension: we are made for relationship with God and with one another, mirroring the God who exists eternally as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And there is a substantial dimension: we possess capacities that reflect Him, such as reason, moral awareness, creativity, language, and the capacity to know Him.
I want to be clear about this. Being made in God’s image does not make us divine. It does not make us equal with God, and it does not mean we contain a spark of deity. We are creatures, and the distance between Creator and creature is infinite. The image is a reflection, not a share of the substance.
But it does mean your life was never designed to be meaningless or accidental. You were created with dignity, purpose, creativity, responsibility, and the capacity to know Him.
And this has enormous practical consequences that Scripture spells out. Genesis 9:6 grounds the seriousness of murder in the image. James 3:9 rebukes us for cursing people “who have been made in God’s likeness” with the same mouth we use to praise God. Every person you will meet today, including the difficult ones, the ones who irritate you, and the ones who can do nothing for you, is a bearer of the divine image. Your treatment of them is not a neutral matter.
Now, the fall. Sin damaged the image but did not erase it, which is why Genesis 9 and James 3 can still appeal to it after the fall. What sin did was distort the reflection, like a mirror cracked and tarnished.
And here is where the gospel comes in with astonishing precision. Colossians 1:15 says Christ “is the image of the invisible God.” He is not a damaged reflection; He is the perfect one. And what does God do with those who are in Him? Romans 8:29 says we are “predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son.” 2 Corinthians 3:18 says we are “being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory.” Colossians 3:10 speaks of the new self “being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.”
So the whole storyline runs: created in the image, damaged by sin, restored in Christ, and one day perfected. “We know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him” (1 John 3:2).
This matters enormously for identity, because most of us build ours somewhere else. On what we do, so that a lost job feels like a lost self. On what people say about us, so that criticism destabilises us for a week. On what went wrong in our past, so that an old failure keeps issuing statements about who we are.
Your deepest identity begins with your Creator and is secured by your Redeemer. Neither of those can be revised by your employer, your critics, or your history.
So as you begin today, remember that you represent God wherever you go. In the way you speak, work, lead, serve, create, forgive and treat people, your life either reflects Him clearly or obscures Him. There is no neutral setting.
And do not spend today trying to become somebody important. You already carry a dignity you did not earn. Let the Holy Spirit shape you instead into someone who reflects Jesus well.
One more consequence of this doctrine, and it may be the most practical of all.
If every person bears God’s image, then how you treat people is a theological act, not merely an ethical one. James makes the connection explicitly: with the same tongue “we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness” (James 3:9).
That reframes ordinary interactions considerably. The colleague who irritates you, the person who serves you at a counter, the relative whose politics you find intolerable, the stranger you will never see again: each one carries the divine image.
You cannot honour God while despising His portrait.
You were created in God’s image and redeemed to reflect Christ. Walk into today knowing your life has dignity, purpose, and a reason to shine.
Reflection
1. Where have you built your identity on what you do, what people say, or what went wrong? What would change if you built it on being made and remade by God?
2. Who will you meet today whom you find difficult? How does knowing they bear God’s image change the way you should treat them?
Prayer
Father, thank You that I am not an accident. You made me in Your image, with dignity and purpose I did not earn and cannot lose. Forgive me for building my sense of self on my achievements, on other people’s opinions, or on my past failures. Thank You that Jesus is the perfect image of the invisible God, and that You are conforming me to Him. Help me today to reflect You in how I speak, work and treat people, especially the people I find hardest. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Declaration
I bear the image of God and I am being conformed to the image of His Son. My life has dignity, purpose and a reason to shine.
Pastor Ras
All Nations Community Church
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