In His Image

This episode was made from the following programs:

"Creation Shows God's Steadfast Love"

"Designed by God"

"Male and Female in God's Image"

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Dannah Gresh: My friend, Mary Kassian, has something for you to ponder.

Mary Kassian: If we truly understood the value that God places on us in terms of being image bearers of the Almighty God, I think that we would live differently. 

Dannah: Today we’re talking about why God created women.

Welcome to Revive Our Hearts Weekend, I’m Dannah Gresh.

I don't know about you, but I love these warm months! It does something to me to be able to be outside andfeel the gentle breeze. It's been a busy week. One thing that calms my soul is to sit in nature and just look at God’s creation. 

I’m sitting on my deck and I'm joined by Napoleon and Bono, my peacocks. They come to my back deck every morning and night for peanuts, and sometimes they grace me with a magnifient show—their tail feathers. Every single time, no matter how many times I've seen it, I am totally amazed at the beauty and colors.

God’s creation never fails to amaze me. Today I want to talk about His creation, specifically His creation of us, women. But let’s start at the beginning—Genesis 1:1.

 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

Just sit there for a bit. Think, there was nothing, and He created everything out of nothing. God is the Master Artist!

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth spent time in Psalm 136, and she reminded us that this world is not random. That speaks to my soul as I look at my peacocks. They aren’t by chance. God intended them to look exactly the way they do. 

Listen to Psalm 136:5–9:

[Give thanks] to him who by understanding made the heavens,
  for his steadfast love endures forever;
to him who spread out the earth above the waters,
  for his steadfast love endures forever;
to him who made the great lights,
  for his steadfast love endures forever;
the sun to rule over the day,
  for his steadfast love endures forever;
the moon and stars to rule over the night,
  for his steadfast love endures forever (Ps. 136:5–9).

Here’s Nancy sharing how creation shows God’s love and goodness.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: This is something I’ve been pondering in recent weeks. We know God created; we’re going to talk about that, but how does God’s creation show us His steadfast love? Before we go there, this passage takes us back to Genesis 1:1, that tells us, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” 

And then you remember on the third day, God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear” (Gen. 1:9). Now, what I’m reading here is summarized in one phrase in Psalm 136:5–6, where it says He made the heavens and He, “spread out the earth above the waters.” That’s a poetic way of saying what we read in Genesis 1.

God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good (Gen. 1:9–10). 

And then we come to the fourth day of creation and we read a description of what we’ve just seen in Psalm 136:8–9: He made the great lights, the sun to rule over the day, the moon and stars to rule over the night” (see Gen 1:16). The psalmist didn’t make this up. We read this in the record of Genesis 1:14–15, where God said, 

Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth (Gen.1:14–15). 

These are things we know the sun, the moon and the stars do, as God ordered them to do.

And it was so. And God made the two great lights—the greater light [the sun] to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars. [He made all of these by the word of His mouth!] And God set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good (Gen. 1:15–19) 

Why is it good? Because God is good! “Give thanks to the Lord for He is good; His steadfast love endures forever!”

Of course it was good; whatever God makes is good! It’s a reflection of Himself, of His own character, of His own heart.

The earth, the sun, the moon, and the stars are a great wonder that none but the Lord could have made. A few things you know about these bodies of light that God set into the sky: the sun gives light. Without the sun, the earth would be completely dark. And the sun is a source of life. Without the sun, no plants could grow on the earth.

Without vegetation, there would be no oxygen generated. Animals and people would not be able to breathe. If the sun went out, within a few weeks there would be no life left on Earth. Without the sun’s rays, the temperature would be around . . . Do you want to guess? I asked Robert this yesterday (he’s my guesser; he’s almost always really close on guessing. But neither of us guessed this one).

If there were no sun, no rays of the sun, what would the temperature on earth be? On average around the world, it would be minus 460 degrees Fahrenheit! Brrr! You think it’s cold today—that’s cold! 

The sun evaporates water from the surface of the earth, and it keeps the oceans from overflowing. So many things the sun does! One website I found is accuweather.com. Let me read you a little bit of what it says about the sun, the stars, and the moon. 

No other known planet is quite like Earth. It is covered in liquid water, sits within a habitable proximity to the warm glow of a sun and still retains an atmosphere capable of sustaining life. 

How do you think that happened? There’s none like the One who does great wonders. Right? 

This website goes on to say, 

The stars of the night sky have astonished humanity, dating back to the earliest civilizations, even dictating religious beliefs, societal norms, and architecture. These heavenly bodies have also inspired philosophers [and] provided direction to weary travelers navigating long journeys. No other star is more important to life on earth than our sun, the star that warms the planet and holds the solar system together.

Now, what holds the sun together? We know the answer; accuweather.com doesn’t. And then it says, 

In addition to the earth’s proximity to the sun and its mass, the Blue planet [that is the earth] also has a moon that offers unique protection from dramatic shifts in climate. This planet travels on an elliptical orbit at a twenty-three-point-five degree tilt from the sun [how did God know to do that?], which is responsible for Earth’s change in seasons. As the earth spins, it wobbles like a top. One astronomer from Penn State University said the moon dampens that wobble. The moon influences the earth’s tides . . . But according to this astronomer, the moon also protects the earth from more drastic temperature fluctuations by stabilizing the wobble of Earth’s spin. 

When you get onto Google and start looking, you will find amazing things about sun, moon, stars and the earth and how they all work together, and the impact and the influence, implications, and ramifications that they all have. 

Everything would be different if there were even just a little degree of difference in that earth’s tilt. Twenty-three-point-five . . . what if it were twenty-three-point-six? What difference would that make? A lot of difference! These are the things that mark days and seasons and nights and cold and warmth.

So how did all these great wonders come to be? Well, accuweather.com says it this way: 

Nearly fourteen billion years ago, all matter, energy, space and time were unified as one, exploding outward in a violent, chaotic expansion at a rate that challenges comprehension. 

And it goes on to give a very natural explanation, the best that they can come up with, as to how these great wonders came to be. The fact is, they have no idea. They don’t know! But the Scripture gives us an entirely different explanation—not a natural one, but a supernatural explanation for how all this came to be. 

The earth, the sun, the moon, the stars, all working together in a way that is hospitable to human life. How did this come to be? Psalm 24:1–2 tells us, 

The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein, for he has founded it [the earth] upon the seas and established it upon the rivers. 

God was the original, primary cause for whom there was no cause! Out of nothing—“ex nihilo”—He created the earth, the sun, the moon, the stars. All of this He founded, He created it. Proverbs 3:19 says, “The Lord by wisdom founded the earth; by understanding he established the heavens.” That’s what Psalm 136:5 tells us: “to him who by understanding made the heavens.”

Dannah: Oh, the beauty of God. Our good creator God. Everything that He created was good. We’ve been listening to Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth helping us see the beauty of His creation, from Psalm 136.

On Day 5 He created the water animals and creatures that fly—like my peacocks. And on Day 6 He created the animals that walk on earth, and He made human beings, us. Of course He started with Adam. But then listen to Genesis 2:18–25:

The Lord God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him." Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 

So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field. But for Adam no suitable helper was found. So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and closed up the place with flesh. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.

The man said, "This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called 'woman,' for she was taken out of man." For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.

Here is pastor and author Alistair Begg to help us understand the significance of when God made Adam and Eve.

Pastor Alistair Begg: In the sequence of thought in Genesis, when it says that “God created man, He made man, and then male and female He created them.” So when the word “man” is used, which is the word “Adam,” it is speaking of the creation of humanity. And the plural defines man as male and female—two components of a single reality.

So you cannot conceive of humanity except that you understand it in a bi-sexual frame of reference. That sounds dangerous, doesn’t it? Don’t go out saying, “Everybody’s bi-sexual. We heard it at the conference.” No. When God made man, when He made humanity, He made man bi-sexual, humanity, bi-sexual. He created man. Male and female, He made them. So that the image of God is revealed, not in a man and then woman tags along, but the image of God is revealed in man—man being male and female.

That is, of course, of vital importance. But in the notion of creation, God has formed with love and with care, and, if you like, with imagination and with dedication. Man doesn’t just happen, but God breathes him into being. And that is the result of the activity of God. There’s no place in our thinking for the idea that we’re just here as a result of the mutation of the gene of some other animal.

Now the lady stands up, you remember, and she asks the question: “Well, in defense of evolutionary thought,” she says, essentially, “aren’t you prepared to accept, Sir, that there is a close genetic affinity between the man and the chimpanzee?”

That’s a good question. I don’t really remember the answer, but I would still think about how good a question it was. And I thought how easy it would be for some of us to say, “Oh, no, no, no, no there isn’t!” And how wrong it would be for us to say that because there is clearly a strong genetic affinity between man—not your husband now (laughter)—man, male and female and the chimpanzee.

You say, “This is even worse than I thought it was going to be. It’s getting worse by the minute.” (laughter)

No, this poses no problem to the Bible’s explanation of things. There is a close anatomical affinity between the man and the ape. And there are close physiological affinities between man and the pig and man and the dog. And you only need to look in your children’s bedrooms to understand that if there was no other indication of it. (laughter) If you don’t think there’s a definite physiological dimension between man and the pig, go back to your teenage son’s room and have another look at it.

But the fact is we would expect there to be affinities, wouldn’t there? We would expect there would be affinities between man and the other creatures. Don’t you think it would be very wise of God to act in such a way as to make possible animal tests that would be relevant and helpful to human medicine? Don’t you think it would be wonderful on the part of God so to constitute the cardiac structure of a pig as to make possible the use of pig bowels in human transplantation?

None of the notions of this great anatomical, physiological comparison between one dimension of living things and the uniqueness of man by creation precludes what the Bible is saying. What the Bible precludes is the idea that man—male and female—exists as a result of evolution, an evolution that has been guided by natural selection, taking place by minute chance occurrences and variations over millions of years.

No, says the Bible. Man—male and female—is the express product of divine activity. And the similarities that we find between ourselves and chimpanzees are not there because man is a development from the chimp, but because God, as Creator, is free to duplicate His systems in more than one form of His creation.

Doesn’t that make sense, that He who created can use a gigantic chunk of the process in putting together a chimpanzee that He used to put you and I together? Because, think about—and this actually is my simplistic analysis of the whole business—I think chimpanzees were put there as something of a divine joke for when you see these things coming down the road. You say, “That looks a tremendous amount like my brother-in-law, Bill. There is an uncanny resemblance there to that character.” (laughter)

And I think that’s exactly it. I think, in part, what God is saying is, “Take a look at them and look at what you would be like if I had not made you in My image.” Frankly, you’re close to that in some of your habits and the way you walk is very similar to that. And, of course, man looks at that, and he says, “Well, it’s obvious that the reason we are where we are is because it just keeps jumping and bumping along.”

No, says the Bible. God did all of that, and yet uniquely, He put you together.

Listen, ladies, you are not the product of some chance happenstance, says the Bible. Your fingerprints are unique. They are not the same as anyone else’s in the room. Your DNA is unique. It is not the same as anyone else’s in the room. Indeed, in the whole world it is unique, as a result of God’s explicit design for you as an individual, and “God don’t make no junk.”

So He has fashioned you intricately in your mother’s womb, forming your unseen substance, putting you together in an awareness of all that that would mean for you as an individual. In the living of your life, in dealing with your physically, in dealing with your sexuality, in dealing with your emotions, in dealing with your rationality, in dealing with your role in life and everything else, God has purposefully organized that.

And until a woman comes to the awareness of this vast and immense notion, then, like a man, you will be left looking at the magazines to try and find out who you are and where you’re from and why you exist, and another twenty-four reasons from Cosmopolitan Magazine to give significance to your life and structure to your marriage and hope to everything else that goes along with it, and if it’s not there, we’ll go to one of the other ones. I don’t mean to be dismissive.

You’re thinking, people. You need to think this out. God said, “Let us make man in our image.” If you like, He said, “Let’s make a look-alike.” In what sense, then, are we made in the image of God? In what way is God’s design patterned in our life? Well, that’s the stuff of systematic theology. You can buy a book through the shop, and you can get all this, but I’ll just give you a start on it.

Our rationality, our ability to think, to reason, to think logically, sets us apart from the animal world. I know somebody immediately puts up their hand and says, “Well, I have a Labrador. It’s a very smart Labrador, a very thoughtful Labrador. I’m not so sure that this rationality thing works.” Well, I have never yet seen a group of Labradors sitting around in Starbucks and discussing the doctrine of the Trinity. (laughter)

Dannah: That’s Alistair Begg reminding me, and you, that as much as I enjoy spending time with my animals, God created us humans differently. We can think, we can reason. We can have a job, to be fruitful and multiply and have dominion over the earth.

Napoleon and Bono—who by the way is a nickname for Bonaparte—are amazing creatures and beautiful peacocks. But God created me differently, and that’s a very good thing.

Alistair touched on the differences between men and women. But I want to spend some time helping you specifically think through why women were created. This brings us to an interesting topic. You know, sometimes when women hear the term "helper"—as in Eve was created to be Adam's helper—that can be confusing and maybe even frustrating.

Mary Kassian has been studying the differences between men and women for many years. She's here to help us clarify things.

Mary Kassian: I think that what it means in here to be created for the man, to be a helper for the man—first of all, to be created for someone means that a woman is a highly relational being. A woman draws her identity from relationship in a way that man does not. Men draw their identity from work in way a woman does not; women draw their identity from relationship. Women are highly relational; they are drawn to connection, drawn to intimacy, drawn to relationship. Men are also, but in a different way. I think women are drawn to relationship. We see that when women go to the washroom. We go to the washroom to relate and to connect and to interact. We often draw our sense of identity from our relationships more than we do from what we do. We do also from what we do, but more so from our relationships.

Also, it begs the question, what was woman created to help man do? I think the answer to that question is what women were created to be a helper in terms of fulfilling man’s ultimate goal, which is to bring glory to God. So, woman plus man glorifies God, helps Him glorify God in a way that man could not do were he to be alone. Woman plus man glorifies God, brings God glory in a way that man cannot do by himself. Woman plus man in a marriage relationship produces fruit, it produces children, it creates life. One could say that the New Testament equivalent of that is Christ plus the Church produces life. It produces new life, it produces new children for the family of God. So woman was created as a helper to help man glorify God. She was created for man, and that means that she’s a highly relational being. She’s the relater, responder that has a soft spot in her heart that yearns to be filled. That’s who God created woman to be when He created her for relationship.

God created woman to be a helper fit for him, and that term “fit for him” is also really interesting, because it means like, corresponding. It’s almost like mirror image, as in like opposites. She’s equal, and yet she’s not exactly the same. She’s corresponding to him. I think that’s where the term “complementarity” comes in. She complements him, that a woman bears the image of God fully and completely in who she is as a woman; a man bears the image of God fully and completely in who he is as a man. A woman doesn’t need a man in order to be an image bearer of God. She’s not a half image bearer, she is a full image bearer. Yet there is a complementarity.

I always like to use the illustration of camera angles, because it’s the same image. It’s the full image, and yet different angles that male and female will bring to the table of the image and the glory of God.

If we truly understood the value that God places on us in terms of being image bearers of the Almighty God, I think that we would live differently. I think that we would treat each other with far more love and kindness and respect; that men would treat women with much more respect, that women would treat men likewise with more respect; that there would be a sense of awe that we are image bearers of the most holy God. There would be a lot more reflection, perhaps, care given in terms of the way we live.

If I truly believe that I am bearing the image of God, that my life is to tell the story of God, and that stepping into that for me brings me wholeness and joy, then I would live differently. I would treat people differently. I think that that would make an incredible impact in the world.

One of the things that my husband and I seek to do is to live out who we are as male and female, but who we are in our marriage, even, as an image and reflection of God. We’ve found over the years that people have been attracted to Christ because they have been attracted to what they see through us in our relationship, what they see in us individually; that we are the image, we are the picture of God that draws them to Jesus. They go, “Wow, that is so attractive! Wow, that’s amazing! Wow, that’s beautiful! I want that.”

That’s the way to change the world, is by living out who we are as image bearers of Christ. That will make an impact in our communities, in our cities, and in our nation.

Dannah: What a beautiful way Mary Kassian explained womanhood and who we were created to be. God in His infinite wisdom and knowledge formed and fashioned humans to impact the world, and He crafted men and women differently to even further picture who He is. 

Did you catch the last thing Mary said? “The way to change the world is by living out who we are as image bearers of Christ.” 

Change the world. Live the way God intended you to live as an image bearer of Jesus Christ.

A great way to learn about being an image bearer of Christ is to join me and Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth and many of our friends for True Woman '22. Mary Kassian, herself, will be there. It’s a three-day conference for women. We’ll be worshipping together, talking together, and listening to God’s Word together. I can’t wait. Would you consider joining us in Indianapolis September 22–24 for True Woman '22. We have more information at our website, or you can call us at 1-800-569-5959. The web address is ReviveOurHearts.com; we have all the answers to your questions right there. Register today. I hope to see you there.

Next week, we’ll spend some time talking about what the heart of compassion really looks like. Thanks for listening today. Thanks to our team: Phil Krause, Blake Bratton, Rebekah Krause, Justin Converse, Michelle Hill, and for Revive Our Hearts Weekend, I’m Dannah Gresh.

Revive Our Hearts is calling women to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

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