1.1 Letter to my son David
I found your letter sitting on the kitchen table this morning, I am sorry for my tardy reply. I noticed in the letter that your roommate has been having trouble with the Dormitory Monitor because of his poor attitude. This is unfortunate. I will pray that God’s wisdom prevails over the circumstances. In your letter I found two questions from you in the letter. The first one was ‘what is a man?’ Then you asked – is there value reading early Christian writers?
The Remembrance… recall when I was living in a ‘dormitory’ in my early military days. We had many rules that seemed a bit over the top. One of the guys I shared a room with had a difficult time keeping his clothes picked up. We were constantly receiving notes from an inspection team about not maintaining federal property in a proper manner. He would grumble, pick up his clothes for a few days and then fall back into the same pattern.
I was friends with my roomie; we played a lot of billiards (8 ball pool) together to consume the weekends. Using a pool table was free on the military base. My roomie was a friendly guy, always willing to help others get things done. We spent time repairing people’s cars (neither of us had a car at this point). We found things to do. But he had this one thing – this one point of contention. He did not like cleaning up his-half of the room we shared. This single issue set him at odds with the people assigned to keep good order in the military dorm.
I recall how my roomie would claim it was beneath his dignity to pick up his clothes. My roomie wondered aloud, ‘How could he be a man if he yielded to the pressure?’ Picking up clothes was his mom’s task. He would shout out in the hallway – ‘What is a man? A mere servant? I am too good for this kind of work.’ Yes, he was a bit of a dinosaur in the modern world. But he was my roomie.
Then, one afternoon, our first sergeant came by and took my roomie to the chow hall for a cup of coffee. I am not sure what they talked about, but my roomie clearly got the message. He never left his clothes on the floor again. Later, I asked him what changed. He simply said – I cannot afford to replace my uniforms, the First Sergeant told me he ever found them on the floor again, he would pick my clothes up for me and donate them to Goodwill. He learned from my First Sergeant that being a man includes being in control of your mouth and being accountable your actions.
Was my roomie a man? Yes. Do men pick up their clothes? Yes. Was it his responsibility to keep his portion of the room nice and neat? Yes. Did it change his DNA (make him something other than a man) to pick up his clothes? No. Was he accountable to a larger rule of order? Yes. Had he thought out the implications of the trip hazard he created in the middle of the night? No. Was he teachable? Yes. It just took the right person with the right message. Our ‘image’ is designed to understand abstract things like rules, honor, love, responsibility, and accountability. He just needed to be reminded of the situation. What did I learn? Approach people the right way, get the desired result. Selah.
We speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit taught words. (1 Corinthians 2:10-13)
First Question — What is a Man? We are created in the image of God. It is my feeling as a believer in Jesus our image is gradually being renewed into the image of our creator. As our faith matures, our image is transformed from one degree of godliness to the next until, after death, we are standing before Jesus.
I don’t think the image of God refers to the physical attributes of our frame. I am aware that Moses spoke about seeing the back of God, and there are references to his arms and his hands, and his mouth, his eyes. These references could push us in the direction of wanting God to look like us. But I think God is much different than us. God made those appearances to assure us that God was present. Moses saw his glory (a thin veil of Glory that filtered his holiness), but Moses did not see God in his fulness, his splendor and majesty.
From my viewpoint, our ability to perceive the use of language and creativity are difficult to achieve without a body, God chose to use these descriptors. But God is not bound by the same rules that we’re bound by. So, I would not jump on the observations of Moses to drive your thinking about how God looks without careful study of context and intent.
I think our God-like-image centers on our moral capacity, creative ability, and other areas such as our ability to think, speak, and communicate. These are ethereal not physical attributes. I do not think it is wise to focus on the physical attributes (check out the first chapter of Ezekiel for a closer look at what God might look like).
Our sovereign God is incredibly personal, he is aware, he is present, and he is compassionately involved in every details of our life.
Our image is like a receptor or a computer interface created to receive and use the attributes of God to his advantage. Consider this from Paul — This is what we speak, not in words taught to us by human wisdom but in words taught to us by the Holy Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words. (see 1 Corinthians 2: 10-13)
This image (receptor), the embodiment we were created in, is a gift from God. We are not required to allow God to work through us. But when we choose to embrace the things of God, then cool things happen, we are transformed and able to have limited access to the mind of Christ. I am not alluding to a mystical thing, rather I am suggesting our essence, our presence is formed in the image of God.
Paul says — The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, for, who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ. (1 Corinthians 2: 14-16)
We are made to be filled by the Holy Spirit. This infilling is key to understanding the nature of our image. Our response to Grace triggers (initiates) the infilling by the Holy Spirit. Our sovereign God is incredibly personal, he is aware, he is present, and he is compassionately involved in every detail of our life. God hears us when we think, when we speak, he faithfully keeps his promise to be close to us, to comfort our broken hearts, and to love us unconditionally. After all, he created us to reflect him, to thrive within the image he provided. There is much more that could be said, but it seemed best to stop here. I have included a few essays from my personal journal with this letter to help you consider those ideas and develop your Scripture-based framework.
Second Question – Is it valuable to review the early church letters? I presumed you were not talking about Scriptures; rather you were talking about writers such as Justin Martyr and Polycarp. There is a collection of books known as the Ante-Nicene Christian Library (ANCL) that might be helpful. This 10 volume ANCL presents a solid collection of non-Scripture letters that are part of early church history. The ANCL covers the period from about AD100 to the General council at Nice in AD325 (Nicaean Creed).
My son, I really need to emphasize the ANCL is not Scripture. They are fallible. However, if you want to understand how doctrine became what it is and explore the counterpoints that were floating about the church, it is sometimes helpful to review these early writings when preparing your school papers. Any reasonable local library will have this set on hand. Additionally, they can be found in PDF form that is searchable on the internet.
I trust this provides you with some useful insight. In addition to this brief response, I have included four essays from my personal journal to assist with your quest to define the ‘image of God’ and who man is.
May God bless you and keep you, may he place his countenance upon you, may He give you peace.
I love you, son.
Your Father, Dan