“Who God is…Who we are”

Genesis 1:26-27; 2 Corinthians 5:16-17

Humankind created in the image of God.

When you think of God with that text in your mind

How do you image God?

If God created us in God’s image then

God must somewhat be like us,

have attributes like us.

If we are in the image of God then

God must be in the image of us.

It is interesting how that happens.

It’s like a telescope.

It’s designed to look in one direction

But if you look in the other direction

You do see something-

But it is small and insignificant.

That’s what happens when we try to image God

Based on our understanding of human being.

God becomes small and distorted.

We may image God as a distant Father

Who wasn’t very good at showing love;

Or we may image God as a King or President

Who doesn’t seem to understand the

struggles of the most needy;

Or we might image God as an idol,

like technology that promises to but doesn’t

solve all our problems.

Whenever we image God from human back we get in trouble.

But John Calvin says we don’t have to do that because

We have a lens through which we see God in Christ

Which is the Bible.

There are all sorts of images for God in scripture

That allow us to start to understand God and then…

When we start to appreciate the God of Scripture

We can start to imagine humankind in God’s image

(and not the other way around).

Think of all the Biblical images of God

And what they tell us about God…

God as the Loving Father who welcomes the prodigal home

Tells us of the patient and forgiving nature of God

(much more patient and forgiving than

even the best of our earthly fathers).

God as the Good Shepherd who leaves the 99 sheep

In the wilderness to go and search for the lost one.

Tells us of God to whom every person matters

And who will search to the ends of the earth

To find us when we are lost.

God as the Good Samaritan.

This may be a stretch for some of you but I believe

That when Jesus told the parable of the Good Samaritan

That the despised Samaritan was symbolic of Jesus

Who bound up the wounds of the injured man,

Carried him on the donkey,

delivered him to the inn to be

cared for, paid his debt,

and will come again soon.

We are not the Good Samaritan,

God is in Jesus Christ, and so we discover

In this story we learn about the

Compassion of God who aches

For each one of us when we

Are in pain.

These are all Biblical images that describe God who is

Compassionate, forgiving and patient beyond our imagination.

But that is just the beginning.

We also understand God as Triune- three in one.

When God created humanity the text say

“Let us create humanity in our image.

In the image of God he created them,

male and female he created them.”

The triune God reinforces the love, patience and forgiveness

Of God who “so loved the world he gave his only begotten son that who whoever believed in him might be saved. God sent the son into the world, not to condemn the world but that the world might be saved through him.”

But the trinity also says that God is at once

Both personal and communal.

So we who are created in the image of God

Are at once personal and distinct humans

But also communal in our very nature

Of being created in the image of the Triune God.

And that image includes the fullness of

What it is to be male AND female

“In the image of God he created them,

male and female he created them.”

So we can piece together from the Biblical witness

Our understanding of God knowing that there are holes.

God is compassionate, forgiving, patient, personal

Yet communal and has the creativity and

nurturing we often infer to women

and the strength and stamina we often infer to men

Our picture is still incomplete and will always be

Because God is beyond our imagining and comprehension

So God chose to reveal himself to us fully in Jesus Christ.

In Jesus Christ we have a new discernment of who God is.

Karl Barth wrote a book called “The Humanity of God”

In which he speaks of God making his person

known to us in Jesus Christ.

In Christ God accommodates to us,

He reconciles the world to himself and reveals

Himself once and for all to us.

And so we do have a way to understand and imagine God

And that way, that truth, that life is Jesus.

In Jesus Christ we discover who God is

And who we are called to be.

Philippians says “though he was in the form of God

He did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped

but emptied himself taking the form of a servant.”

As God’s people we are a servant people.

As people who are created in the image of God

We don’t lord over creation we care for creation

As good stewards.

And when we realize that we are created in the image

of God, then we just might start to realize

that the other guy is also created in the

the image of God.

We remember the words of Jesus in Matthew 25

“Whenever you do this to the least of my brothers

you have done it to me.”

Who is God?

God is more loving, patient, forgiving than we can imagine.

God is personal and cares deeply about everyone of us

And yet the Triune God is communal is God’s essence

And creates us to be in community as well.

God is most fully revealed in Jesus Christ who teaches us

To love God and each other even as we see God

In the face of the stranger.

And who are we?

We are children of this God, brothers and sisters in Christ,

Who are both forgiven and forgiving, loved and loving,

Of value to God even as value others. Amen