Last month, I wrote to my dad’s retired Pastor Tracy Hearnsberger and
asked him if he could write another blog message for me to post to you reader.
Pastor Tracy graciously accepted and wrote:
A favorite
life slogan
Andre
Agassi was a famous tennis start back in the 1990’s and did a Canon camera
commercial in 1990 in which he said, “Image is everything.” The pitch was clear (pun intended): Buy this camera and your pictures, your
images, will look more like the subject of the pictures than any from any other
camera. This saying has since been used
by many entities whose purpose is to produce images that best reflect the
original subject. It also became one of
my “life slogans” a couple of years ago and is still one of my favorites for
life. I agree with Andre Agassi. I also agree with…
Original
intent
1. Genesis 1:26, 27 (NASB): 26 Then God said,
"Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule
over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and
over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the
earth." 27 God created man in His own image, in the image of God He
created him; male and female He created them.
2. Genesis 2:22-25 (NASB): 22 The LORD God
fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her
to the man. 23 The man said, "This is now bone of my bones, And flesh of
my flesh; She shall be called Woman, Because she was taken out of Man." 24
For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to
his wife; and they shall become one flesh. 25 And the man and his wife were
both naked and were not ashamed.
God’s
creation of man in His image, His creation of the genders of male and female,
and then His declaration, “for this reason a man shall leave his father and his
mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh” is found in
Genesis 1 and 2 which of course comes before Genesis 3 where we have recorded
the fall of man into sin. God’s original
intent and purpose for every human being is to bear, reveal, show, and express
His image so He can be “seen” in the earth.
God decided His image would be seen distinctively as male and female and
then His image would be seen when a man leaves his father and mother and is
joined to his wife to become one flesh which reunites together male and female
as one.
Blurred image
restored
This beautiful, original, and intentional
purpose and plan found in Genesis 1 and 2 became “blurred,” “warped,” and
“distorted” in the fall of man into sin which is found recorded in Genesis
3. We see many examples of this every
day all around us. Yet, Jesus came to
“restore” the image of God. (Please read
Romans 8:29, 1 Corinthians 15:49, and 2 Corinthians 3:18.) “We were created in God’s own image, now in
Christ to be transformed into the same image, so that we might bear His image.”
(Another of my favorite life slogans.)
Jesus came, lived, died, and rose again to restore all things back to
their original condition, especially all things concerning the image of
God. In Colossians 3:10 we are
instructed to “put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according
to the image of the One who created him--…” 
Image
understood
To
understand a thing one must understand the origin, the beginning, of the thing
and understand the conclusion, the end, of the thing. Genesis 2:24 is found 3 times in the Bible in
Genesis 2:24, Matthew 19:5 and Ephesians 5:31.
Again, “For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and
be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.”
Genesis
2:24 gives us God’s original, created, intent and purpose for marriage. (See above.)
Jesus Himself quotes this verse in Matthew 19:5 when answering the
Pharisees’ question about divorce and remarriage. In Matthew 19:4 He even says, "Have you
not read that He who created them from the beginning MADE THEM MALE AND FEMALE,”
and then in Matthew 19:8, concerning divorce, He says, “…but from the beginning
it has not been this way.” Jesus was
getting everyone back to “the beginning.”
It is “in the beginning” where we find what we must understand and
believe about the image of God; the creation of man; the creation of gender
distinctiveness as male and female; and the intent, purpose, and plan of the
marriage of one man and one woman.
Let's continue Pastor Tracy's great message; "Image is Everything" tomorrow.
In Christ, Brian
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