Imago Dei

We had our second monthly meeting of the Redeemer Pipe Club, a fellowship of believers that enjoy fine pipe tobacco and excellent conversation, last night and it was lovely. The room was filled with fragrant smoke, cool dudes (and one cool dudette in the form of my wife who doesn’t smoke but enjoys the odor), and shared ideas. We also consumed Sam Adams Imperial White (very good) as we chatted.

Jason, Founder and Benevolent Dictator For Life, posited that God’s first act was to create and as image bearers of God it is the act of creation that sets us apart. Aaron, non-attender of our church, but welcome indeed, had taught a Sunday School lesson on that very idea earlier that morning. He said that while some animals might create a sharpened stick to use as a tool they wouldn’t collect a bunch of sticks with the sole purpose being to admire said collection.

Telling stories, painting pictures, sculpting, all of this is part of being made in the image of God. Here are the questions I pose as a result of those thoughts. Is that creative drive the purpose/one of the purposes of us being created in that image or is it a by-product? What does it mean to you to be made in the image of God and how are you bearing that image?

  • Scott
    @ pink - A reply well worth waiting for! I agree with your FiL, there is a disconnect that needs to be addressed both in the general teachings of most Christian churches and in the lives of most believers.
  • Scott
    @DKT - Telling stories can certainly be an act of worship. Convenient or not it's true.
    I do think everyone has a "creative" drive. I put a pretty broad tent over that word though. Having children is certainly "creative" as is cooking, writing, playing music, making mud pies. Not all of that is artistic, but it all has that potential to be worship and it all comes out of our nature.

  • Taking all the assumptions in stride, I believe that our creativity is a by-product of being created in his image. Being created in his image is being a spiritual creature, like God. God is spirit (John 4:24). Unlike God, man has a physical body, but man also has a spirit (implied I Corinthians 2:11, Eccl 12:7). Having a spirit within us allows us, amongst other things, to make moral choices, to emote, to imagine, to reason, and to be self-aware.


    One aspect of God is that of creator. In Genesis, we see the story of God creating the universe, presumably according to a specific design. After creating the animals, he then passed on to Adam the act of creating names for all the animals. Throughout Genesis and recorded history, mankind has been creating ever since.


    Mankind, like God, can create a mental image of something that has never existed. Unlike God, we can’t speak something into existence. (Okay, a voice-recognition system hooked up to a RepRap is about as close as we can get for now.) Our creation tool is our own body, a complex multi-purpose tool whose capacities are still largely unexplored. While I’m not certain there is an imperative to create, I believe we all have the capacity to create in one or more diverse ways.


    How do I bear that image? I am a spiritual creature like God. In some ways, all mankind bears the image of God. As far as what that means for me as a matter of faith, it means that I strive to be like God as manifested in his Son.


    My father-in-law does not believe in Christianity, or religion as a whole, really. His main concern with Christianity is that many that wear the name Christian do not even follow half of Jesus’ teaching. (This is generous on his part, he doesn’t even get into OT issues despite his Jewish heritage.) As someone that has read the Gospels, he doesn’t understand the disconnect between the Jesus he reads about and the people that claim to follow him. In fact, in some ways he embodies Jesus’ teaching better than some Christians I know.


    I consider this a valid criticism. As such, I want to be someone that follows what Jesus actually said. I do not like hypocrisy either, but that will not change with all my blogging, meetings, emails, letters to the powers-that-appear-to-be, etc. Hypocrisy changes when I change my own.

  • DKT
    That sounds like a really cool gathering!
    I'd like to believe that since God is a storyteller, telling stories must be the ultimate act of worship. But I don't know. It seems awfully convenient :)
    I don't know if our creative drives our a by-product of being made in God's image. Maybe. But does everyone have a creative drive? I do kind of dig the idea that people in general are so engaged with art as a result of being created, as a reflection on God. I hadn't thought of it quite like that before. So thanks! (I'm using art as a catchphrase for anything creative or artistic endeavor.)
  • Scott
    You don't have to be talented to be creative or creative to be talented. When my daughters paint they are creative but it's still clumsy. I'm still pleased by it as are they.
  • Sure, but there's a difference between talent and creativity, right? I'm a talented programmer (of a kind), but I'm probably not a creative one.
  • Scott
    Listen to Snurp. He's smart.
  • Sid, don't sell yourself short on creativity. As far as I'm concerned, creativity need have nothing to do with artistic talent. Can't a philosopher be creative, for instance, in forming an interesting new logical system, even if there's nothing aesthetically pleasing about it? What about an engineer who develops a new and efficient building method, even if it restricts the variety in buildings built through it? A programmer who creates a clean new program for running a bank's computer system? Creativity need have nothing to do with art (nor with volume or frequency of productivity, for that matter).
    And frankly, the ability to engender creative ability in others is no mean feat. Not many are good at it.
  • It is, but the reason it takes so damn long for me to release something new is that I'm not all that creative. You wouldn't believe the number of duds I've had. I write something new and find it unoriginal, uninspired and just plain boring. That lack of creativity also discourages me from trying.
  • Scott
    That's more or less the question. If you feel that creativity is of God, as I do, then yeah I'd think that you would believe that it would carry moral weight. Of course you would only be "obligated" to the point of your talent.
    Your music is creative isn't it?
  • The assumptions may or may not be illogical. The fallacy is from assuming things not granted by the person(s) being asked in the framing of the question. Of course, you weren't really asking me, so my comment wasn't really fair.
    But stripping the question of its religious connotations, aren't you just asking how people are expressing their creativity? Is tying it to God, are you suggesting that there is moral duty to exercise one's creativity? I suppose not if you think creativity is a byproduct.
    My talents tend not to be all that creative. I'm better at helping and enhancing others' creativity. I'm even better at enjoying and critiquing others' creativity.
  • Scott

    That's true, or creative drive might have nothing to do with God, but the question assumes a) that we were created by God and that b) we were created "in his image". Assuming those things are true I assume that we were given our creative nature by God. Lot's of assumptions there but they're logical enough I think.


    Even you are an image bearer Shawn.

  • Hello Scott,


    That sounds like it was a truly lovely evening. Though these questions were not meant for people such as myself, I'd like to offer my thoughts on them:


    Is that creative drive the purpose/one of the purposes of us being created in [God's] image or is it a by-product?

    Merely asking this is committing the fallacy of the complex question. Our creative drive could have absolutely nothing to do with God.


    What does it mean to you to be made in the image of God and how are you bearing that image?

    It means our souls are just like God - not really there.

  • Scott

    Hi Alejandro! Sure that's possible. It's my belief that humanity has created any number of gods over the millennia. I also happen to believe that there is an actual god who actually created the universe.

  • Alejandro Vega

    Perhaps it is humanity--the only living thing capable of such creativity--that conceived the notion of a god to begin with. A chicken-or-egg situation.


    If so, then of course we are like the god we imagine. God is defined (and bound) by our own creative explanation. Thus you can have an angry god that smites his enemies... a kind god that saves his children... and a creative god who formed the world as his own "artistic" expression.


    It's what we would do, right?


    (Now try replacing "god" in my second paragraph with "Zeus". Same thing.)


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