Life in God's Image

In April 2021 our denomination passed a new resolution (#21-08) on Human Dignity, specifically addressing prior resolutions regarding abortion. The new resolution says in part:

“Be it, therefore resolved that this delegate body affirms that all human beings are made in the image of God and thereby possess unassailable dignity and worth according to the design of their Creator, irrespective of their race, gender, abilities, age, social class, or the circumstances of their conception…

“Be it further resolved that we mourn the loss of any human life, especially under murderous circumstances, and that we mourn all suffering caused by unjust discrimination…”

If we are to take this resolution seriously, I believe we also need to apply the same reasoning to the topic of capital punishment.* Many Christians justify the death penalty based Scriptures such as Genesis 9:6, “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in His own image,” and Romans 13:4, “But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer.” At one time, I would have counted myself among them; however, further study has changed my mind. In particular, I found the arguments in Shane Claiborne’s book, Executing Grace, to be compelling. Although I don’t have room to include all the pages of quotes I pulled out, here are some of his points.

The Old Testament law was actually a limit

“Here’s the key: the ‘eye for an eye’ law was intended to be a limit to retaliation—not a license for it. The goal was to stop the cycle of violence rather than validate or escalate it. Prior to the Old Testament laws and the guidance of God, there was unregulated violence… There are laws of mandate and laws of limitation. Mandate means you must; limitation means you can. …The punishment should never exceed the crime… The fact that it’s legal doesn’t mean it’s right” (ch. 4).

Scripture moves us toward life and love

“Throughout the Bible there is a movement away from violence, toward ‘beating swords into plows’ (Isa. 2:4), transforming the instruments of death into tools that can cultivate life. The climax of this is the cross” (ch. 3).

“Jesus takes us even farther. Return evil with good. Do not fight fire with fire. Jesus admonishes us not to engage in retaliatory violence at all—not to take an eye or a tooth or a limb, ever. In essence, Jesus brings us a new law… and he does it without negating the old law, but by moving beyond it. In replacing ‘an eye for an eye’ with ‘love your enemies,’ Jesus teaches us to wear evil down with love” (ch. 4, see also John 8:1-7).

The early church was against death in any form

“[Ron Sider in] The Early Church on Killing… points out that the early Christians had a consistent ethic of life when it came to abortion, capital punishment, military service, and other issues. For the early Christians, people were created by God, made in the image of God, and no mortal had the right to kill another person; not even Caesar had the right to take life… No Christian writing before Constantine in the fourth century argued that there is any circumstance under which a Christian may kill” (ch. 6).

The death penalty is racially biased

“Eight in ten lynchings that occurred in the United States from 1889 to 1918 occurred in the South. Now (since 1976) eight in ten executions are in the South. In other words, the places that were most inclined to unofficial execution by lynching a hundred years ago are drawn to official execution today… To this day, even though African Americans make up only 13 percent of the nation’s population, 42 percent of death row inmates are black, and 34 percent of those executed since 1976 have been black” (ch. 8).

Wrongful convictions and executions are more common than you may think

“[About] one person for every nine executed has been proven to be wrongfully convicted, sentenced to death, and later exonerated and released from death row… A recent study estimates one in twenty-five folks on death row has been wrongly convicted and is likely innocent, reminding us undoubtedly that innocent people have also been killed” (ch. 11).

There are better ways to deal with violent crimes

“The U.S. legal system is designed as an adversarial one… prosecution versus defendant. The model seen in scripture and attempted in many communities throughout history and around the world is, in contrast, communal… Restorative justice is… about humanizing harm rather than systematizing punishment. It is about being concerned for all people—victim, offender, and community” (ch. 13).

“It is a well-established fact that it costs more to kill someone than to keep someone in prison for life” (ch. 14).

Christians and others are working for change

“In 1996, 78 percent of Americans were in favor of the death penalty for people convicted of murder… A 2013 Pew study shows that that number had dropped farther, to 55 percent” (ch. 7).

“Pope John Paul II [revised] the Catholic stance on the death penalty to say even more strongly that in contemporary society we have sufficient ways to render someone ‘inoffensive’ without executing that person and ‘without depriving him definitively of the possibility of redeeming himself’” (ch. 10).

“[In 2015] the National Association of Evangelicals… issued a new resolution on capital punishment. Their pro-death penalty statement had not changed since it was written in 1973—until now” (ch. 14; see NAE site).

From my perspective

Jesus did modify the application of the Old Testament law, but the question is how much? Did He intend for death penalties to be entirely removed? Does the role of governing authorities sustain the right to put people to death for the lives that those people have taken? Even if they have that right, is that the best solution available?

One thing that is alarming to me is that the United States is one of only a few First World nations (along with Japan and Singapore) that has not abolished the death penalty, and in 2020 ranked 6th in the world in the number of executions—behind China, Iran, Egypt, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia (per Wikipedia). In many countries, religious activities are reason for capital punishment, and yet Christians are often strong supporters of the death penalty in the U.S. That is incongruous to say the least.

Our legal system has many problems. Wrongful convictions and racially biased sentencing are significant. We live in a culture that is increasingly anti-authority, and laws are broken with impunity. We need law enforcement (and Christians serving there) to deter the increasingly anarchic atmosphere. But the death penalty is not a solution. Killing people in order to prove that killing is wrong is not going to lead to a more righteous or just country.

I don’t believe Christians should be involved in seeking or carrying out the death sentence. We of all people should realize that as long as there is life there is hope for repentance and salvation of all men. Some of those executed have become our brothers and sisters in Christ before they died. To claim we are pro-life should not simply mean that we are anti-abortion. Every person is created in the image of God, and therefore denying anyone the right to live is an affront to God. If those who conduct executions are, in Claiborne’s words, “haunted” by the requirement to take lives, shouldn’t Christians also be haunted by supporting such a system? Death originated with Satan’s deception of Adam and Eve. Should we not be instruments of life in any way we possibly can?

“For if, because of one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one Man Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:17).

“The last enemy to be destroyed is death” (1 Cor. 15:26).

*A.C. Resolution #81-35 on Capital Punishment concluded, “A study of the Bible does not resolve the debate, thereby leaving the issue to individual conscience and interpretation.” Considering that our Declaration of Principles has a statement that “our influence should be used against” war, I would contend that we should also be using our influence against capital punishment.

© 2021 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture are ESV and all images are copyright free from pixabay.com. The opinions stated do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or employer.

Made for More

One of the books I bought for my sabbatical is Made for More: An Invitation to Life in God’s Image, by Hannah Anderson. The following are several quotes that caught my attention.

64-65- But faith teaches us that we will never be more truly ourselves than as we are conformed to God’s nature through Christ. Faith teaches us to forgo a superficial authenticity in order to find a deeper, more authentic sense of self. Faith teaches us that we are made to reflect the heart of God... He is calling you to faith. Faith to believe that He made you to be so much more than your momentary desires. Faith to believe that He made you to be more than your brokenness, more than your sin. Faith to believe that authenticity means faithfulness to the deepest part of His nature. Faith to believe that you were made for glory.

93- One of the most powerful things about grace is that it gives us a vision for who we could be. In the midst of our brokenness, it gives us hope. When God extends Himself to us, He is not so much expressing a belief in our ability to change, but in His ability to change us. He is confirming that we are not beyond redemption; we are not lost causes. If He was willing to sacrifice Himself for us, He must have a plan to make us more than we presently are. He must have a plan to bring us to glory.

120- Ultimately working imago dei [in the image of God] means understanding that all work is sacred, all ground, holy; not because of what the task is but because of who we are imaging. [Footnote:] Sometimes, in response to those who dismiss mundane work as unimportant, we respond by elevating the task or specific calling. The danger of this is that it simply shifts the reference point from one type of work to another. Work is holy, not because of what it accomplishes or whether we value the result, but because of who it images—God Himself.

153- I suspect that most of us feel the same way that little Velveteen Rabbit did. When it comes to finding identity imago dei, we long to be Real—to finally be who we were made to be—but that process often takes much longer and hurts much more than we could have ever predicted. Even as we understand that our identity comes from God, even as we begin to pursue relationship with Him and others, even as we submit to the life He has ordained for us, we must still actually live that life. We must endure its bumps and scrapes, its joys and sorrows, its victories and defeats.

155- You can wait in hope and patience because God is actively pursuing your transformation... Your being made like Him will happen because He promises it. And so you can trust Him. You can take hope. And because you have hope, you can continue on. You can persevere. You can keep going because this work is His work and He will do it.

157- As God transforms you to be more like Him, as your heart mirrors His more perfectly, you can expect two different things: (1) You should experience the ability to increasingly live as you were created to live and (2) You should also feel deeper pain when you do not. And it is this very pain that confirms that you are in the process of changing. This pain helps you remember that you are no longer the person you once were. Even on our worst days, then, even on those days when you feel so out of sorts that you hardly know yourself, you must remember that this discomfort, these growing pains assure that you are made for more.

166- We must find identity in the one thing that remains the same. We must find identity in the Great I Am.

Thought provoking and well worth reading.

Made for More © 2014 Hannah Anderson, Moody Publishers. Image courtesy of Amazon.com.

Imago Dei

The image of God. It’s a phrase we may hear quite often in the church, but I’m not sure how well we understand it. There are a few Scriptures that can help.

Genesis 1:26-27 (ESV)- “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’ So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”

The image of God is therefore not gender specific—both men and women are made in His image. And the primary role of all mankind is to have dominion over creation, just as God exercised dominion in creating the world. The image of God is also not isolated or singular. God Himself is in community, and He created us for community. “It is not good for man to be alone.”

Colossians 1:15- “[Jesus] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.”

Hebrews 1:3- “[Jesus] is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His nature, and He upholds the universe by the word of His power...”

In Jesus Christ we see the most perfect example of God’s image. While the image of God may be obscured to varying degrees in mankind, Jesus reflects the Father perfectly. I would contend that Jesus was therefore more fully human than any of us.

Romans 8:29-30- “For those whom He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, in order that He might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom He predestined He also called, and those whom He called He also justified, and those whom He justified He also glorified.”

Being conformed to the image of Jesus is a process of recovering the full image of God.

2 Corinthians 3:18- “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.”

The image of God is one of glory, but that glory is not always evident in mankind. Only those who are chosen by God for redemption will eventually experience that full glory.

I’ve wrestled with these concepts for a few reasons. While it is clear that all mankind is made in the image of God, and therefore all people have inherent value, it is also clear that we live in a fallen world. So how do we reconcile these truths? Everything from genes to the environment has somehow been affected by sin and corruption. Paul says that the whole creation awaits freedom from corruption and futility (Romans 8). Every person is guilty of sin and struggles with various types of temptations. Our sin nature is obviously not part of the image of God. At the same time, the vast majority of people are unhappy with their physical bodies in some way, so we have the rise of diets, exercise, medications, and surgery to fix whatever is wrong (both real and imagined defects). So the homo sapiens body can’t be the sole indicator of the image of God, although the fact that Jesus came as a man suggests that that is part of the image. Even mental capacity can’t be a conclusive sign if we agree that every person is made in God’s image. (The Nazis certainly tried to put limits on who qualified to be called human.) And although mankind was made for community, relationships are often difficult, and some people are more successful at living in community than others. Sin has impacted our ability to relate to one another as we should.

The conclusion I come to is that even though we were all made in God’s image, that image will not be fully revealed until the end of time. As we grow in our relationship with Christ, becoming more Christlike, we are also growing in the image of God. As we are conformed to His image, we begin to develop more of the Fruit of the Spirit, which are characteristic of the image of God. “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known” (1 Corinthians 13:12). Right now we are poor mirrors for reflecting God’s image—only Jesus was a perfect reflection. But one day our transformation will be complete and we will see God and see ourselves as God already sees us.

I see the implications for today as threefold: 1) We should learn to be more content with who we are right now—physically, mentally, emotionally, etc. We are all in process and we need to give ourselves a little grace. 2) We should pursue our relationship with God, learning more about who He is and who He has called us to be. He is the One who can transform us and conform us to the image of Jesus Christ. 3) We should look forward with hopeful anticipation of the Day of the Lord, when all will be made right and we will see everything as it is meant to be.

“Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming day of God... But according to His promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Peter 3:11-13).