By Laura K. Springer, Th.M., Ph.D.
Key Passage: Genesis 1:26-31
Additional Passages: Genesis 5:1; 9:6; Psalm 8:5; Romans 1:20
The Mona Lisa. The Golden Gate Bridge. The Mars rovers. Virus vaccinations. Helping someone across the street.
All these have something in common: they are examples of good work. They also reflect God’s glory.
Human identity. God chose humanity to bear his image. Now, Scripture does not spell out what this means, so we must look to parallel ideas. Speaking of Jesus, the author of Hebrews places God’s image and the glory of God in parallel. From this parallel, we can see that just as Jesus is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact imprint of the Father’s essence, so does humanity reflect God’s glory as we bear God’s image. We have been given the duty to reflect God’s glory as a conscious choice. Of course, humanity’s decision to rebel against God in the garden of Eden damaged our capacity to fulfill this duty. But the duty remains. As humans, we are responsible for doing good work that glorifies the Creator and Lord of the universe.
Human duty. Managing God’s creation with care, filling the earth, and shaping its resources in new ways are human activities that display God’s glory and portray his image. As humanity does good in the world, we display God’s goodness for all to see. This display of goodness declares God’s glory even when distorted by sin, for God’s glory is that powerful. God designed humanity to explain something of what glory is and why it matters through our descriptions of the material and immaterial world. These descriptive creations unpack creation’s reflection of God’s divinity and power and clarify the contrast between God’s glory and the way things are under the sun.
What now? Despite the stain of sin, humanity still has the duty to display God’s character and describe his glory before creation. Christians are no exception. As the new humanity in Christ, Christians bear a double responsibility, having been created to bear God’s image and commanded to be conformed to the image of Christ. We of all humankind ought to be the ones who make God’s glory evident and clear. So, let us do good work and thereby glorify our Father in heaven.
