“In the Image and Likeness of God, Part 4” by Romans
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We are continuing in our current Series that I began three weeks ago, “In the Image and Likeness of God.” We have looked at the creation of man as a separate and special creature on the earth. Yes, we breathe the same air as the animals, and human beings have similar physical and survival requirements.
Similarities in our DNA point not to any evolutionary randomness or accident, but rather, back to the Creator's original blueprints for all living things in their utilizing the same twenty amino acids in DNA's overseeing the ultra-precise assembly of proteins necessary for Life on earth. One day I will present a mind-boggling review of the absolute impossibility of the so-called “natural appearance” of Life without the benefit of a Creator.
Far from the mythical claims of Darwinian Evolution, we are not descended from primates or any other so-called “lower” animals. Each creature and species was created to be and remain the creature and species that God created them to be. The Fossil Record corroborates Moses' description in Genesis 1 of all life reproducing exclusively “after its kind.”
After Divine Consultation, we were made in the Image and after the Likeness of God with intelligence, reason, choice, and the opportunity to know, communicate and fellowship with, serve and Glorify God far above any ability or potential of the plant and animal kingdoms. And, with belief in the Son of God, the Father adopts us as sons and daughters, into the Family and Kingdom of God. No such offer was ever made to any other creatures, including the angelic realm.
We are also unlike any creatures in the physical realm. In addition to our being able to understanding that we are created beings, and able to come to know our Creator and Savior, we are also aware that God is also both Lawgiver and Judge. Along with our past and our potential future, God has also made known to us His Laws and Commandments by His prophets through His written Word.
In spite of man's propensity toward editing and and embellishing Scripture, God, and God alone, defines sin. He gave His Ten Commandments to His chosen people Israel through Moses, and established a Covenant with them, which Covenant they repeatedly broke for some thirteen centuries. He sent His Son 2,000 years ago, to be sacrificed for our sins, to build His Church, and to establish a New Covenant with His Laws written on our hearts and minds.
During the course of His three year ministry on earth, Jesus' words and teachings were given to His disciples, and written for our learning and admonition. Along with His explanation and expanding of the original Ten Commandments, expanding the Commandments by providing us with a deeper spiritual application of the Laws of God, and giving us, as we saw last week, a New Commandment, that we “love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another” (John 13:34).
Picking up where we left off last week with that New Commandment, let's look at Albert Barnes' insights into this: “A new commandment - This command he gave them as he was about to leave them, to be a badge of discipleship, by which they might be known as his friends and followers, and by which they might be distinguished from all others.
It is called new, not because there was no command before which required people to love their fellow-man, for one great precept of the law was that they should love their neighbor as themselves Leviticus 19:18; but it was new because it had never before been made that by which any class or body of people had been known and distinguished.
The Jew was known by his external rites, by his uniqueness of dress, etc.; the philosopher by some other mark of distinction; the military man by another, etc. In none of these cases had love for each other been the distinguishing and special badge by which they were known.
But in the case of Christians they were not to be known by distinctions of wealth, or learning, or fame; they were not to aspire to earthly honors; they were not to adopt any special style of dress or badge, but they were to be distinguished by tender and constant attachment to each other. This was to surmount all distinction of country, of color, of rank, of office, of sect.
Here they were to feel that they were on a level, that they had common wants, were redeemed by the same sacred blood, and were going to the same heaven. They were to befriend each other in trials; be careful of each other’s feelings and reputation; deny themselves to promote each other’s welfare...
The first disciples considered this indeed as the special law of Christ. This command or law was, moreover, new in regard to the extent to which this love was to be carried; for he immediately adds, “As I have loved you, that ye also love one another.” His love for them was strong, continued, unremitting, and he was now about to show his love for them in death.
Jesus said in John 15:13, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”
So in 1 John 3:16 it is said that “We ought also to lay down our lives for the brethren.” This was a new expression of love; and it showed the strength of attachment which we ought to have for Christians, and how ready we should be to endure hardships, to encounter dangers, and to practice self-denial, to benefit those for whom the Son of God laid down his life.”
The Apostle John confirms this as the identifying characteristic of those who are true followers of Christ. We read his words in 1 John 3:10-11: “In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother. For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another.”
In his comments, Albert Barnes also provided a list of cross-references in Paul's and Peter's epistles as to how the disciples applied this New Command to love each other to their lives as followers of Christ: I believe they are each worth of review and examination through the insights of various commentators:
First, let's consider Galatians 6:2 which says, “Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ;”
Of this, the Sermon Bible tells us, “I. Poverty is a burden which we may lighten. It cannot be reasonably questioned that poverty is a great disadvantage and constitutes a great pressure on the poor. It prevents the acquisition of knowledge; it quenches the nobler strivings; it wears the body with toil, withholds the sustenance of strength; it makes life a drudgery.
When very deep it is twin sister to famine, and behind them both are the darker forms of crime. "Lest I be poor and steal," is the argument by which the wise man’s prayer, "Give me not poverty," is sustained. No thoughtful loving man can say that that is a state in which men ought to be content or in which we ought to be content to see them. It is a great burden, and we are to bear it with them and for them.
II. Infirmity is a burden. The list of human infirmities is a very long one; the category of faults does not soon come to an end. Now, taking the more evident among them, how are we to deal with them? This passage tells us clearly. Whenever restoration is possible we are to restore in the spirit of meekness.
If a man shall fall in any measure from integrity, or from charity, or from truthfulness of speech, or from purity of behaviour, restore such a one in the spirit of meekness. Bear his burden until you bear it away, and it is his burden no longer. Go to him on the side of his infirmity, not to reproach and curse, but to heal and help.
III. The burden of trouble. All that we understand by trouble may be borne more or less by one for another. If every Christian man would put himself, according to the measure of his ability, in sympathy with all the trouble of his friends, what a lightening of that trouble there would be, what a dropping away of burdens, and what a glory cast around the burdens that remain! It would be as if the Saviour were personally present in ten thousand homes. There is, perhaps, nothing in which we are more deficient than in due readiness and fulness of Christian sympathy.
A. Raleigh, Quiet Resting Places, p. 315.
References: Gal_6:2.—F. D. Maurice, Sermons, vol. iii., p. 253; C. Kingsley, Village Sermons, p. 149; Homilist, 3rd series, vol. i., p. 343; T. M. Herbert, Sketches of Sermons, p. 86; W. J. Knox-Little, Characteristics of Christian Life, p. 140; H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. i., p. 283; T. L. Cuyler, Ibid., vol. xx., p. 33; Bishop Temple, Ibid., vol. xxxv., p. 264; E. M. Goulburn, Occasional Sermons, p. 18.”
Next we read, 1 Thessalonians 4:9: “But as touching brotherly love ye need not that I write unto you: for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another.”
Albert Barnes writes, “For ye yourselves are taught of God - The {Greek} here rendered “taught of God” - occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. It is correctly translated, and must refer here to some direct teaching of God on their own hearts, for Paul speaks of their being so taught by him as to need no special precepts in the case.
He probably refers to that influence exerted on them when, they became Christians, by which they were led to love all who bear the divine image. He calls this being “taught of God,” not because it was of the nature of revelation or inspiration, but because it was in fact the teaching of God in this case, though it was secret and silent. God has many ways of teaching people.
The lessons which we learn from his Providence are a part of his instructions. The same is true of the decisions of our own consciences, and of the secret and silent influence of his Spirit on our hearts, disposing us to love what is lovely, and to do what ought to be done.
In this manner all true Christians are taught to love those who bear the image of their Saviour. They feel that they are brethren; and such is their strong attachment to them, from the very nature of religion, that they do not need any express command of God to teach them to love them. It is one of the first - the elementary effects of religion on the soul, to lead us to love “the brethren” - and to do this is one of the evidences of piety about which there need be no danger of deception.”
We go next to 2 Thessalonians 1:3: “We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren, as it is meet, because that your faith groweth exceedingly, and the charity (agape` love) of every one of you all toward each other aboundeth;”
The Cambridge Bible writes, “We are not surprised that the Apostle adds: and the love of each one of you all toward one another aboundeth (R. V.). This is at once a consequence and cause of growth in faith. Faith and Love are the chief, sister graces of St Paul’s theology; and Hope appears in the next verse, under the guise of “patience,” to complete the trio.
In this fundamental quality of Love the Thessalonian Church excelled; (see 1 Thessalonians_4:9-10), where the Apostle, acknowledging their excellence, had exhorted them to “abound yet more in love.” This they are doing, and he is “bound to thank God” for it. He dwells on the universal prevalence of mutual love in this admirable Church—“the love of each one of you all!”
Let's look at the full text of the cross-reference given: “But as touching brotherly love ye need not that I write unto you: for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another. And indeed ye do it toward all the brethren which are in all Macedonia: but we beseech you, brethren, that ye increase more and more” (1 Thessalonians 4:9-10).
Of this, Matthew Henry writes, “In these words the apostle mentions the great duties, I. Of brotherly love. This he exhorts them to increase in yet more and more. The exhortation is introduced, not with a compliment, but with a commendation, because they were remarkable in the exercise of it, which made it less needful that he should write to them about it.
Thus by his good opinion of them he insinuated himself into their affections, and so made way for his exhortation to them. Note, We should take notice of that in others which is good, to their praise, that by so doing we may lay engagements upon them to abound therein more and more. Observe,
1. What it is that the apostle commends in them. It was not so much their own virtue as God's grace; yet he takes notice of the evidence they gave of the grace of God in them. (1.) It was God's grace that he took special notice of: that God had taught them this good lesson: You yourselves are taught of God to love one another, in 1 Thessalonians_4:9.
Whoever does that which is good is taught of God to do it, and God must have the glory. All who are savingly taught of God are taught this lesson, to love one another. This is the livery of Christ's family. Note also, The teaching of the Spirit exceeds the teaching of men; and, as no man should teach contrary to what God teaches, so none can teach so effectually as he teaches; and men's teaching is fain and useless unless God teach also.
(2.) The Thessalonians gave good evidence of their being taught of God by their love to the brethren in all Macedonia, in 1 Thessalonians 4:10. They not only loved those of their own city and society, or such as were near them and just of their own sentiments, but their love was extensive. And a true Christian's is so to all the saints, though distant from him in place, and differing from him in some opinions or practices of less moment.
2. The exhortation itself is to increase more and more in this great grace and duty of brotherly love, 1Th_4:10. Though these Thessalonians had in some sense no need of an exhortation to brotherly love, as if it were wholly wanting, yet they must be exhorted to pray for more, and labour for more. There are none on this side heaven who love in perfection. Those who are eminent in this or any other grace have need of increase therein as well as of perseverance unto the end.”
Our final original cross-reference by Albert Barnes is found in 1 Peter 1:22: “Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently:”
Matthew Henry writes, “It is not to be doubted but that every sincere Christian purifies his soul.
The apostle takes this for granted: Seeing you have, etc. To purify the soul supposes some great uncleanness and defilement which had polluted it, and that this defilement is removed. Neither the Levitical purifications under the law, nor the hypocritical purifications of the outward man, can effect this.
The word of God is the great instrument of a sinner's purification: Seeing you have purified your souls in obeying the truth. The gospel is called truth, in opposition to types and shadows, to error and falsehood. This truth is effectual to purify the soul, if it be obeyed. Many hear the truth, but are never purified by it, because they will not submit to it nor obey it.
(3.) The Spirit of God is the great agent in the purification of man's soul. The Spirit convinces the soul of its impurities, furnishes those virtues and graces that both adorn and purify, such as faith (as in Acts 15:9), hope
(in 1 John 3:3), the fear of God (in Psalm 34:9), and the love of Jesus Christ. The Spirit excites our endeavours, and makes them successful. The aid of the Spirit does not supersede our own industry; these people purified their own souls, but it was through the Spirit.
The souls of Christians must be purified before they can so much as love one another unfeignedly. There are such lusts and partialities in man's nature that without divine grace we can neither love God nor one another as we ought to do; there is no charity but out of a pure heart.
(5.) It is the duty of all Christians sincerely and fervently to love one another. Our affection to one another must be sincere and real, and it must be fervent, constant, and extensive.
2. He further presses upon Christians the duty of loving one another with a pure heart fervently from the consideration of their spiritual relation; they are all born again, not of corruptible seed, but incorruptible, etc. Hence we may learn, (1.) That all Christians are born again. The apostle speaks of it as what is common to all serious Christians, and by this they are brought into a new and a near relation to one another, they become brethren by their new birth.
(2.) The word of God is the great means of regeneration. The grace of regeneration is conveyed by the gospel. (3.) This new and second birth is much more desirable and excellent than the first. This the apostle teaches by preferring the incorruptible to the corruptible seed.
By the one we become the children of men, by the other the sons and daughters of the Most High. The word of God being compared to seed teaches us that though it is little in appearance, yet it is wonderful in operation, though it lies hid awhile, yet it grows up and produces excellent fruit at last.
(4.) Those that are regenerate should love one another with a pure heart fervently. Brethren by nature are bound to love one another; but the obligation is double where there is a spiritual relation: they are under the same government, partake of the same privileges, and have embarked in the same interest.
(5.) The word of God lives and abides for ever. This word is a living word, or a lively word, (See Hebrews 4:12). It is a means of spiritual life, to begin it and preserve in it, animating and exciting us in our duty, till it brings us to eternal life: and it is abiding; it remains eternally true, and abides in the hearts of the regenerate for ever.”
God is love. We were made in the Image and Likeness of God. In the Greek, love is the word, “agape`.”
It is the same word the Apostle Paul used (translated in the King James as “charity”) in 1 Corinthians 13, when he wrote that if even we have all faith, and all knowledge, and understand all prophecies and mysteries, even if we give all we own to the poor, and give our bodies to be burned, but we have not agape` love, we are nothing. To be followers of Jesus Christ is to follow His example of agape` love toward each other, toward our families, toward our our neighbors and toward our enemies.
We can accomplish this, but only through the Gift of the Holy Spirit Who indwells us, and Guides us, and enables us to live a life that brings glory and honor to God: “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:7).
As we proceed, tonight about our being in the Image and after the Likeness of God, I want to focus on Jesus' words in John 9:5: “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” I find Jesus' introduction into His being the Light of the world very interesting: He said, “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” And what of that Light after His departure? Was the world to be doomed to darkness?
In His Sermon on the Mount, I believe He tells us very clearly who can and will be the light of the world after He returned to Heaven. He said in Matthew 5:14: “Ye are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hid.”
Albert Barnes writes of this: “As the sun is the natural light of the world, even while it sinks away to the west, so am I, although my days are drawing to a close, the light of the spiritual world. What a sublime description is this! Jesus occupied the same place, filled the same space, shed his beams as far, in the moral world, as the sun does on natural objects;
and as all is dark when that sun sinks to the west, so when he withdraws from the souls of men all is midnight and gloom. When we look on the sun in the firmament or in the west, let us remember that such is the great Sun of Righteousness in regard to our souls; that his shining is as necessary, and his beams as mild and lovely on the soul, as is the shining of the natural sun to illumine the material creation.”
The Sermon Bible adds, “Contemplate the Christian man as light in himself. Notice some of the instances in Scripture in which light is spoken of in reference to the people of God. (1) The Psalmist says, "Light is sown for the righteous, and gladness for the upright in heart."
Here light is viewed as something distinct from the righteous, as something which he may possess and which he may enjoy, just as the husbandman enjoys the fruits of the earth of which he has cast in the seeds. (2) The Apostle, in addressing Christians, says, "Ye are the children of the light." Here we are conducted to a still higher view of the believer’s privileged condition and estate.
There is not only light sown for him that he may reap and enjoy, he is himself a child or son of light—a Hebraistic mode of strongly expressing the luminosity that completely suffuses, as it were, the Christian man. (3) But to a still higher reach we are conducted by the Apostle when he says to believers, "Ye are light in the Lord." Here they are identified with the light itself; and just as God is said to be a light, so are His people in their measure and in their degree said to be a light.
II. "Ye are the light of the world." Our Saviour seems to say to His people, "Not only have ye light for yourselves, not only has God in His grace given you light and made you to be light; but you are to be the light by which others are to be spiritually illuminated and guided for their souls’ salvation." We do not need to make efforts to make the light shine, it shines of its own accord. Christianity is essentially diffusive. Its light cannot be confined. Its law is the law of beneficence.
It has freely received, and it freely gives. The light with which the true Christian has to shine is (1) the light of Divine knowledge, (2) the light of moral purity. If Christian people would be true benefactors of the world, they must let their light shine, that men seeing their good works may glorify their Father who is in heaven.
L. Alexander, Penny Pulpit, New Series, No. 524
I. We read of a time when this earth, so full of fair shapes and wonderful provisions, was without form and void. The Lord that giveth life was pleased to summon out of this confusion the arrangements and the capacities of a world. But before all this His work one word was uttered—one element called into being—which was necessary for every function of created nature.
God said, "Let there be light, and there was light;" and from that first day to this the natural light of this world has never failed. There must be light in nature, or the plant will dwindle, the animal will pine, the world will become joyless and waste; there must be light, too, in the world of spirits, or discord and confusion will reign where harmony and order ought to be. And man’s spirit had light, even the only light which can light it to its well-being—the light of the consciousness of God.
II. Let this conformity with God’s appointment be established in nature, and as long as nature lasts God will be glorified. But in the higher world of spirits there is another necessary condition which nature has not. Wherever there is spirit there must be responsibility, and there cannot be responsibility without free will. Nature, in her lower and more rigidly prescribed arrangements, cannot extinguish the light of her world; but man’s spirit may extinguish the light of his. And man’s spirit did extinguish that light, and the spiritual world became anarchy and confusion.
III. If nature decays, she possesses no power of self-renewal. Her extinct tribes she may not recall; her faded flowers she cannot recover. Not thus did God create His more wonderful spiritual world. That the spirit should, by His aid, struggle upwards through darkness into the recovery of light, was His own purpose respecting us.
In God’s good time the Light which was to lighten every man came into the world. Now, the whole passage of man’s life, from the cradle to the grave, is full of light. According to our place in life, so God expects from us that we should shine out in the darkness of the world which yet knows not Him.
H. Alford, Sermons, vol. iii., p. 406.
Matthew 5:14: There is little difficulty in fixing the dominant idea contained in the metaphor. The city upon a hill is the landmark for all the country round. It is at once the crown of the district and the central point round which the life of the neighbourhood turns. It is visible afar off; it overtops the lower country, so that the people cannot, if they wish, shut their eyes and refuse to see it.”
Finally, Adam Clarke tells us, “Ye are the light of the world --- That is, the instruments which God chooses to make use of to illuminate the minds of men; as he uses the sun (to which probably he pointed) to enlighten the world. Light of the world, was a title applied to the most eminent rabbis. Christ transfers the title from these, and gives it to his own disciples, who, by the doctrines that he taught them, were to be the means of diffusing the light of life throughout the universe.”
This concludes this evening's Discussion, “In the Image and Likeness of God, Part 4.”
This Discussion was presented “live” on February 9th, 2022
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