Hello everyone and welcome back to Leaving Lesser. I’m so glad that you are here! Today we are going to be talking about the image of God. Genesis 1:27 (NIV) says, “So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” I have a confession to make. I always thought that God made us in His image or likeness, meaning that He created us to look like Him. I don’t necessarily think that’s the whole meaning of that verse.
I have another confession to make, I have a problem with feeling emotions that I don’t always like to feel, like jealousy, or anger, or hurt (you know, all of those negative feelings that we try to hide all the time) so I’ve been talking to God about this recently and tonight I believe He gave me a little insight. When He said “let us make them in our image, in our likeness” I’ve realized that He wasn’t necessarily saying that He made us to look like Him and be like Him as rulers of all of the other creatures, but that He also made us to feel like Him. He gave us His emotions. I think that many people think that God doesn’t have feelings, that He’s just the man upstairs making all the decisions and doing all the things but that’s not entirely true. God absolutely has emotions, and a lot of them! Just like we have feelings. There are many places in the Bible that state that God is a jealous god (Exodus 20:5), and that He felt anger (Psalm 78:31), and that He grieves with us and for us (Genesis 6:6), and that He loves us (John 3:16). It also states that He forgives us, and is patient, and kind (which we may not always be but most of us strive to be). I’m currently reading through Exodus with my family, on my own, and with a women’s Bible study group. There are a lot of God’s big emotions mentioned in the book of Exodus and it has really got me thinking about how personal God really is and how much like Him we really are. He created us to be that way so that we can relate to Him and understand His ways better. Now, it is important to remember that, just because we have emotions like God, doesn’t mean that they are always correct. Because of our fallen nature, our emotions tend to deceive us at times, and drive us to do things that are not Christ-like. God, in his infinite righteousness, is always correct. His emotions are always righteous, ours are not. Just like everything in life, there is a balance. We have to make sure our emotions, and our actions that go with them are aligned with what God wants, not what we want. God is the ultimate source of truth, not our feelings. I thank Him for that! I pray that this has encouraged someone today and that you have felt the presence of God surrounding you as you read this. I pray that this has helped you to feel closer to the Lord Almighty and understand His ways a little deeper. I pray that this has helped you leave a little bit of the lesser you behind to grow closer to God. Thank you for joining me in studying about what God’s word says about His image. I hope that you have a blessed day!
~Love and prayers, NadeneP.S. please feel free to leave any comments or testimonies in the comments below. I look forward to hearing from you.