The Image of God in the Mirror

Don’t you just hate people that go on and on about their grandkids?  Or even worse, they make you scroll through their photo gallery while narrating what little Johnny was doing when this picture was taken.

People like that drive me crazy! 

Oh yea… I just remembered… sorry… I am one.

This has been a tough week for more reasons than you want to hear about.  When I have a week like this, one of the most therapeutic things I can do is look into the face of a child.  (And honestly, my grandson’s faces work better than yours.  Again… sorry.)

In the book of Genesis we read the ancient Israelite account of the creation of the world and everything in it.  The Spirit of God “moved” over the face of the waters.  The word translated “moved” means “to brood, to grieve.”  I don’t know; maybe it's not too far off to think of God grieving over primordial emptiness.

So God begins to speak and creation begins to unfold.  It’s a beautiful image, don’t you think?  God, the “uncaused first cause,” finds joy in creating day and night, sky and sea, land and vegetation; the sun, the moon and the stars.  And then wildlife.  God delights in filling the newly created sky with birds and the sea with fish.  And on recently exposed land, cattle and creeping things appear.

And then God creates human beings.  The writer says that God created them “in his image. In the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” (Genesis 1:27)  In chapter two we listen in on a more poetic version; a word picture of God scooping up dirt, forming the first human being and then breathing into his nostrils the breath of life.  “And the man became a living soul.” (Genesis 2:7)

Imagine an old Jewish grandfather sitting by the fire at twilight telling his wide eyed grandson the story of a God who bends, who stoops, who kneels down to form the first human.  Imagine that grandfather cupping the face of that grandson in his old calloused hands and telling him, “You were created in the image of God.”  Pretty heady stuff, don’t you think?

Imagine how that little grandson would feel about himself.  To know that he bears the image – that he is an icon – of God.  And that old grandfather looks into that little beaming face and sees mirrored in that face, the face of God. 

Here’s the deal.  However imperfect, however broken, however sinful you and I are; we carry the image of God.  The pips, the pushers and the prostitutes; the thieves, the thugs and the theologians; Washington senators, Wall Street executives and soccer moms; whoever you are, whatever you have done or failed to do, no matter how much you feel like a sinner or a saint; central to the message of the sacred Scriptures is that every human being ever conceived bears the image of his or her creator!

You may think of yourself as a true naturalist (a person who can’t embrace the idea of an external cause in the process of creation).  And if so, I respect that.  It’s hard, I know to imagine a God who could and would create the universe and everything in it.  It’s hard, I know to imagine that same God creating and caring about every human being that lives on one tiny planet in that vast universe.  It is even harder to think that you are included in that list of human beings and it is even harder to believe that in your very being, you carry around the image of that creator.

Yet, if I had to take a guess I would guess that there is also something deep inside you that intuitively knows, it is actually true.  When you look in the mirror, however blemished, you see the image of God.  Maybe the image comes into clearer focus when you look into the face of a child.    

I’ve got to be honest with you.  After the week I’ve had I need to be like that old Jewish grandfather.  I need to take the face of one of my grandsons into my hands.  I need to look deep into those beautiful blue eyes and once again be reminded that there is a God in heaven.