God created Man to bear His Image and Likeness and rule the world with Him as His perfect sons.
When Man fell from Grace, we maintained His Image but lost His likeness. The fullness of God’s plan was to send His Son Jesus to bear witness to His likeness to a broken world that it might be redeemed through His goodness. As His Spirit takes hold of us, we are being made perfect through Christ and crowned as sons in inheritance, kings and priests in position, but still fully embedded in a broken worldly reality. We daily are transformed more and more into the glory and likeness of God, which will not be perfected until the end of time. We follow after the Way of Jesus, representing the power and authority of God to a broken world in the only way this love-starved world can receive – by the giving of ourselves for them.
Eph 1:3-6 [NIV]3Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. 4For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love 5he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will– 6to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.
2 Co 4:18-5:5 [NIV]18So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
1Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. 2Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, 3because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. 4For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. 5Now it is God who has made us for this very purpose and has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.
Heb 2:10-13 [NIV]
10In bringing many sons to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering. 11Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers. 12He says,
“I will declare your name to my brothers;
in the presence of the congregation I will sing your praises.”
13And again,
“I will put my trust in him.”
And again he says,
“Here am I, and the children God has given
me.”
This post is _Part 7_ in a series on God’s image and likeness. To continue with this series, click on Part 8. To use this as a growth tool to better understand your own calling, you might start by reading the explanation of this series and then read Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5 and Part 6.
Photo credit: jabez