The Image Of God?

Q

I’ve been reading your site for a couple of years now and it (and you) have greatly contributed to my spiritual growth. May God richly bless you.

What does it mean in Genesis 1:26 & 27 were it says that “God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him: male and female he created them”? What is the “image of God?” What makes man so special (as opposed to angels) that we can be forgiven of our insurrection against God and they cannot.

A

First of all, let me say that I don’t think it means that we were created to look like God. When God became a man, He chose to look like us.

I do believe that God’s plan, after He had created all the angels, all the plants and animals, and all the fish in the sea, was to create someone He could enjoy His creation with. Someone who was like Him and with whom He could have fellowship. Someone with similar interests and the intellectual capacity to explore them with Him.

And most of all, He wanted someone who would want to be His friend, who would spend time with Him by choice, not because he had no other option.

When you stop to think about, it our fellowship is the only thing we can offer God. And all the effort He’s gone to since the Fall, including the shedding of His own blood, is simply designed to make it possible for us to dwell with Him in peace, with nothing between us that would impede His desire for fellowship with us.

Angels were created to be God’s servants, and ours. We were created to be God’s family.