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“Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness”—Gen. 1:26:
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In the Bible there is a mysterious thought concerning the relationship between God and man—v. 26; Ezek. 1:26; 1 John 3:2b; Rev. 4:3a; 21:11b:
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God's desire is to become the same as man is and to make man the same as He is—1 John 3:2b.
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God's intention is to work Himself in Christ into us, making Himself the same as we are and making us the same as He is—Eph. 3:17a.
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Let Us make man reveals that a council was held among the three of the Godhead regarding the creation of man—Gen. 1:26a:
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The decision to create man was made in eternity past, indicating that the creation of man was for the eternal purpose of the Triune God—Eph. 3:9-11.
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God's intention in creating man was to carry out His divine economy for the dispensing of Himself into man—1 Tim. 1:4; Rom. 8:11.
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God created man in His own image, according to His likeness—Gen. 1:26a:
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God's image, referring to God's inner being, is the expression of the inward essence of God's attributes, the most prominent of which are love (1 John 4:8), light (1:5), holiness (Rev. 4:8), and righteousness (Jer. 23:6).
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God's likeness, referring to God's form (Phil. 2:6), is the expression of the essence and nature of God's person.
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God created man to be a duplication of Himself so that man may have the capacity to contain God and express Him—2 Cor. 4:6-7; 3:18.
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God created man in His image and according to His likeness because His intention is to come into man and to be one with man—Eph. 3:17a.
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God created man in His own image so that through His economy man may receive His life and nature and thereby become His expression—1 Tim. 1:4; John 3:16; 2 Pet. 1:4; 2 Cor. 3:18:
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Because we were created according to God's kind, our human virtues have the capacity to contain the divine attributes—10:1; 11:10.
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For God to create man in His image means that God created man with the intention that man would become a duplicate of God, the reproduction of God, for His corporate expression; this reproduction makes God happy because it looks like Him, speaks like Him, and lives like Him—John 12:24; Rom. 8:29; Heb. 2:10; 1 John 3:1-2.
Morning Nourishment
Gen. 1:26 And God said, Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness…Rom. 8:29 Because those whom He foreknew, He also predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the Firstborn among many brothers.
Man was created by the Triune God in Their (inward) image. All human beings bear the expression, the image, of God. God is love, and we also have a kind of love. Our love is a copy of God's love. God's love is the real love, and our love is a photograph of God's love. Human beings are pictures, figures, or photographs, of God in His attributes. God is also light. We as human beings also have some amount of light. We also like light and hate to be in the dark. When we do something in darkness, we do not like to let people know. But when we do something in the light, we surely like people to see that we are bright and of the light. We also like to be holy; that is, we do not like to be common. We like to be separated from the common things. We also like to be righteous and to do things right. We do not like to cheat people, even though at times we may steal from others because of our fallen nature. Even before we were saved, we all liked to be loving, bright, holy, and righteous. In our nature we wanted to love our parents, yet very often we did not. We realized that this was not good. This proves that we have a copy of God's attributes. Hence, we bear God's image. (CWWL, 1991-1992, vol. 1, “The Central Line of the Divine Revelation,” pp. 366-367)
Today's Reading
Man was made in God's image and according to His likeness. God created man in such a way as a preparation for His dispensing of Himself into man for the fulfillment of His divine economy, His divine plan. Man was created in the image and likeness of God so that he can express God. Man is a photograph of God. A photograph taken of a certain person is for expression. In the same way, man was created for God's expression.The first item of God's positive intention in His economy is to have man in His image and according to His likeness for man to be one with Him that He may express Himself in humanity (Gen. 1:26a). As a man on this earth, Jesus was made, or created, in God's image and according to God's likeness. Christ was not only born but also created. When He entered into a human womb, Christ joined Himself with the created man, Adam. Hence, Christ was created in God's image and according to God's likeness. As human beings, we all were begotten of our parents. But we were not only begotten; we were also created. We were created when Adam was created. Our birth caused us merely to participate in that creation. In the same way, Christ was created in God's image and according to God's likeness to be one with man and one with God.
Man was made in God's image and according to His likeness so that God could express Himself in humanity. God expressed Himself in the humanity of Jesus while He was on the earth for thirty-three and a half years. John 1:18 says, “No one has ever seen God; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.” When He wept, Jesus expressed God. When He was angry with the Pharisees, He expressed God. He did everything to express God in His humanity.
Although God was seen in the humanity of the one man Jesus, this was not sufficient. The man Jesus had to be duplicated, mass-produced. In Christ's incarnation God entered into only one man, but in Christ's becoming the life-giving Spirit, God entered into millions of people. On the day of Pentecost three thousand were produced at one time (Acts 2:41). All these believers were made small “Christs”; that is, they were the mass production of Christ. (CWWL, 1991-1992, vol. 1, “The Central Line of the Divine Revelation,” pp. 376, 408)
Further Reading: CWWL, 1991-1992, vol. 1, “The Central Line of the Divine Revelation,” chs. 5-6, 9; CWWL, 1970, vol. 1, pp. 94-107; CWWL, 1985, vol. 5, “The Mystery of the Universe and the Meaning of Human Life,” ch. 1