The Image of God

The Image of God

Colossians 1:13-23

            One of my seminary professors said that if the only task Jesus had to perform was to die for our sins, God could have dropped him from heaven onto the cross.  Jesus didn’t have to live thirty-some years on earth just to die.  There must have been a reason for him to have been born as a baby, live his life on earth, and go through the torture of Maundy Thursday and Good Friday.  There must have been some other work that Jesus had to accomplish in addition to his death and resurrection.

            Paul makes it clear in his letter to the Colossians that redemption and reconciliation were necessary.  Not just our individual sin, but the corporate sin of the world had separated us from God.  However we look at Christ’s death, whether as sacrifice, or substitution, or whatever other theology of the cross we espouse, Jesus Christ was sent to redeem us and reconcile us to God.  But, as my professor said, that didn’t take thirty-plus years.  Why did Jesus go through the complete human life cycle from birth to death?

            Paul gives us at least part of the answer in v. 15:  “[Jesus] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.”  God is invisible to us.  No one has seen God at any time.  Probably that’s a good thing, since we know what happened to Moses, who came the closest of anyone to seeing God.  You may remember that when he came down from Mt. Sinai his face glowed.  This frightened the Israelites so much that he was forced to wear a veil.  That was the  only way they would come near him. 

I remember another of my instructors saying that visions were something else you didn’t want to have happen to you. She said visions were the only way God could get some people’s attention—including hers.  For her, at least, it wasn’t a pleasant experience.  Encountering God firsthand seems to be something we’d be better off avoiding.

            So God chose another solution.  God sent Jesus, the “firstborn of all creation.”  Jesus came so that we might see what redemption and reconciliation looked like.  He came so that we could see God—as much of God as we would be able to comprehend.  If God is love, then Jesus was God’s love in action—love in practical terms:  God’s love in a way we could understand.

            The problem is that we often don’t want to see God’s love in action.  When we look at the way Jesus lived we see the folly of our own lives.  We see how little we love, and how poor our service is.  We see how frequently we are preoccupied with our own salvation and how seldom we are concerned with sharing God’s love with those around us.  Remember, Jesus never talked to anyone about being saved; he talked to people about being salt, about being light, about being God’s love in the world.

            Jesus came to show us how to live.  His life was as much a sacrifice as his death.  We will probably not be called on to die for someone as Jesus did for all humankind; but we are called every day to live as Jesus lived—for all humankind. 

            Jesus was not only the firstborn of all creation (v. 15), but also the beginning of something new:  the firstborn from the dead.  In Jesus’ resurrection we have the hope of our own resurrection.  But first we have to learn to live as Jesus lived.  “For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell.”  If we say we belong to Jesus, and Jesus lives within us, we ought to live in the same self-sacrificing way Jesus lived.  Being redeemed by God through Jesus’ death on the cross means our lives are lived in the stability and steadfastness of active faith.  Being reconciled with God means we live our lives in love—as Jesus did.