Inter-Varsity Press

Contents

Introduction

Part One: Seven days of glory

1 Where are we?
2 What are we like?
3 The First Great Commission
4 A day of failure
5 The glory of God comes down to us
6 Days of perfect glory

Part Two: Glory days

7 Two Great Commissions and Two Great Commandments
8 Glory days at work
9 Christian citizens
10 Called to be myself
11 All callings good, some callings better
12 Loving God with all your mind
13 Creativity and the arts
14 Enjoying God’s gifts
15 Glory days under the lordship of Christ

Extract from ... Introduction

This book is written from a deep conviction that Jesus Christ is to be Lord of all. (And all includes football and friendship, food and fun, church meetings and local party politics). That human culture is an inherently good, God-given enterprise that has been tragically corrupted by human rebellion but which will be transformed by Jesus. That though we are citizens of heaven, it does not mean we should not strive to be good citizens on earth as well, living out our faith in Jesus in the society we find ourselves in. That every part of our lives – even eating and drinking – can and should be lived for the glory of God (‘whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God’, 1 Corinthians 10:31).

My fear is that for the best possible reasons, Christians can be too unworldly, have a false view of what is really ‘spiritual’ and what is not. They can even give evangelism, Bible study and prayer too high a priority (with the result that none of them is as real or effective as they should be). My hope is that this book will communicate something of the excitement of the Transforming Vision (to borrow the title of one of the books listed for further reading at the end) of Christian presence in the world.

Extract from ... Chapter 2: What are we like?

To understand what we’re here for, we need to realize what we’re like. You might say: ‘Well, I’m a bit like my mum and dad – I seem to have got her nose and his fear of spiders.’ And of course that’s right but I want to show you something much more profound about you and me. Because the answer to the question is simply stunning. We are like God:
Then God said: ‘Let us make man in our image, in our likeness . . . ’

So God created man
in his own image,
in the image of God
he created him;
male and female
he created them.
(Genesis 1:26–27)

If you want a good fireworks show, ask two ministers in the same room what the image of God actually means, stand back and enjoy the fun. There are so many different ideas, it almost feels like a blank word-processing document that theologians just write their own ideas down on.

What just about everyone is agreed on is that it doesn’t mean we look like God! God has no material existence and doesn’t have eyelashes, big toes, and all the other bits that make our bodies what they are. There are three basic ways of understanding the image of God which we all have.

Minds and morals
The first is that we are like him in having minds and morals. We can think and reason and argue. I know that chimpanzees can be taught to say a few words and squirrels can work out how to get the food you’ve so carefully put out for birds. But neither comes anywhere close to the verbal or reasoning ability of a five-year-old child. And it’s more than having a mind,we have morality hardwired into our souls.We have the capacity for right and wrong in a way that just isn’t true for animals.

Made to relate
The second is that we are like him in being made for relationships. God is not just one person but three, Father, Son and Spirit. They relate to one another in perfect love. We are made to relate to God and to each other. We were not made to be hermits. We were made to realize our potential in relationships – in groups, in marriages, in friendships,in families.

Made to care
The third way we are like God is that we are made to look after the world for God. He is the Creator of theworld but he delegates looking after his world to us. This is probably the meaning most centrally in the viewfinder in Genesis  because thewhole verse actually reads:
Then God said:

‘Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.
(Genesis 1:26)

Made for work
When God had made us, it wasn’t for a life on a lilo in a swimming pool. There was work to be done. Creation was good but the end of God’s creating work was the beginning of humanity’s work. We’ll see what that means in the next chapter.

God made humanity with a specific set of tasks. In Genesis 1:28 and 2:15 he tells us what those tasks are. Together they amount to a job description for the human race: they answer the Big Question: what am I on planet Earth for?

Before we look at that in more detail, we need to note something very important. Being made by God and being made like God means we were made to have a relationship with God. Being like him means we can relate to him, can know him.

Made to know God
Genesis portrays Adam and Eve in love with God. In Genesis 3 God comes walking in the garden in the cool part of the day, looking for Adam and Eve. It sounds as though that’s a pattern for their lives, like a family meeting for supper after a day at work and school, or house-mates sitting down for hot chocolate just before bed. There was a relationship there. The way they were to show their love for God was by serving him in the world he’d made for
them. They weren’t made to find their way in life on their own: they were made to live in the love of God, under his protection, direction and affection.

BIBLE STUDY

Read Genesis 1:26–27
1. What is the essential difference between people and animals? How is this under threat today?
2. What ways have people understood the image of God in human beings? How do these affect the way you think about yourself?
3. Man and woman are both made in the image of God. What does this say to cultures which see women as inferior?
4. If everyone is made in the image of God, how should this affect our attitude to people who are different from us in race, ability, temperament etc?
5. What can we do to allow the doctrine of the image of God to change ourselves, our church or CU, our society?