Genesis 2:4–17 —

Lesson #2 Creation and the Worship of God

Paul J. Bucknell

MAN: IN THE IMAGE OF GOD

Adam himself lies now scattered on the whole surface of the earth. Formerly concentrated in one place, he has fallen; having been broken to pieces, as it were, he has filled the universe with his debris. However, God's mercy has gathered together from everywhere his fragments and by fusing them in the fire of his charity, has reconstituted their broken unity.

St. Augustine in the City of God

The Christian ideal changed and reversed everything so that, as the gospel puts it, "That which was exalted among men has become . an abomination in the sight of God." The ideal is no longer the greatness of Pharaoh or of a Roman emperor, not the beauty of a ' Greek nor the wealth of Phoenicia, but humility, purity, compassion, love. The hero is ! no longer Dives, but Lazarus the beggar; not Mary Magdalene in the day of her beauty, but the day of her repentance; not those who acquire wealth, but those who have abandoned it; not those who dwell in palaces, but of those who dwell in catacombs and huts; not those who rule over others, but those who acknowledge no authority but God's.

Leo Tostoy _

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Man as Creature
Animals cannot learn, plan ahead, cannot conceptualize, use or make tools or have no language nor can count; they have no artistic sense and lack all ethical sense. These assertions are wrong or are debatable. Most of these differences are differences of degree. Darwin says man came from monkeys; God says from dust. Philosophy: only God keeps man from not being an 'animal'.

Insignificant: the cell consists of matter ... composed chiefly of carbon with hydrogen, nitrogen and sulfur.
Inmaterial: Earth is one speck in one of hundreds of millions of planetary systems. Ours alone has hundred-thousand light-year diameter. The universe holds some 10 trillion galaxies, each numbering about 100 billion stars, making the total number of stars 1024 (1 with 24 zeroes).
(Total number of grains of sand in the oceans is also 1024 ).
Orphan of chance ... half billion cells in a single ejaculation.

Man in God's Image....Sovereignty (Ps 8:5-6)
(Milne ) (Houston)
Rational Power Capacity for thought and speech
Capacity to think abstractly
Tool-making ability
Pursuit of Beauty
Use of Language Conservation of memory and culture
Fear of Extinction
Spiritual Perception Self-consciousness
Sense of uniqueness
Self-knowledge
Moral Awareness Search for truth
Ethical aspirations
Concern for moral values
Others are original moral perfection and immortality.

Diverse interpretations to imago dei have arisen through church history especially when image and likeness (1:26) is understood to be different.

Irenaeus (c.130-200) Image was the human reason and moral freedom.
Likeness was the original righteousness (only this lost in Fall).
Middle Agers: Image is natural aptitude despite the Fall.
Likeness can only be restored supernaturally after the Fall.
Reformers: (this medieval distinction was rejected by reformers)
Calvin: Image inherent in all men because sustained by the Word, recognizing their being in the glory and goodness of God.
Luther: Image is God's intention for man, regained by believers, but not by nature or reason, but only by faith.

New Testament: The NT uses the phrase of Jesus Christ (II Cor 4:4; Col 1:15; Heb 1:3)
and Christian believers are destined to share the divine image through their union with Christ (Rom 8:29; I Cor 15:49b, Col 3:10).

Modern: Brunner sees the 'image' as the formal material image1.
So we cannot agree there was a total loss of this image from the Fall (see Gen 9:6, I Cor 11:7, Ja 3:9). So Calvin speaks of the 'relics' of the image of God in fallen man which still distinguish him the brute creation and undoubed gifts and achievements of non-Christians. The full biblical perspective, however, recognizes the image of God will be fully restored in all who believe p.96

Man is different from animals and hominids
1) has a detailed moral code written within (conscience)
2) experiences concern over his eventual death and possibility of life after death
3) aware of a higher being
4) desires to worship and to communicate with a higher being
5) has an ability to recognize and a drove to discover absolutes or basic truths.

These early types of man (hominids) have simply died out; in that case the variety of races now on earth all descend from one stock, homo sapiens (Acts 17:26).

Chapter 2 (other notes)
1. Earth became focus point for history.
2. Names Jehovah Elohim used to emphasize Jehovah the visitor to the garden is Creator.

In the story of creation there is no hint whatever that there are inferior or superior forms of existence. He created them all good. He gave them the power of continued existence, of fulfillment of their purpose, so that in their creative energy they would display ever greater diversity and multiformity. No other religion or philosophy has been able to ascribe such significance and power to matter as Christianity (16).

Man has the mandate to change the landscape of the world according to the landscape of his mind. Because man is out of joint, we now face the environmental crisis. Earth has reached its limits (sewage in water, air).

Man's present ambition is to lose himself in the unity of all things; he seems to have given up the goal of finding meaning in things (secularism).
However, the world is the arena of God's self-disclosure.

1I Believe in the Creator, on the image of God.

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