Day 302 · Year 1 · The Story of Scripture
Made in his image, on purpose
Your dignity is not earned. It is given in the first chapter of the Bible.
Today's passage
Genesis 1:26-28
26Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness, to rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, and over all the earth itself and every creature that crawls upon it.”
27So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.
28God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth.”
Berean Standard Bible · public domain
Reflection
Before the fall, before law, before any résumé you might build, God made humanity in his own image and blessed them. Image-bearing is not a reward for the productive; it is the floor under every person. That changes how you see yourself when you feel useless, and how you see the people who are hardest to love. The fingerprints of the Creator are still on them, even if smudged. Today, the practical question is small but heavy: who in your life have you stopped treating as someone God personally made?
From the great tradition · paraphrased
Gregory of Nyssa · Cappadocians & Alexandrians · 4th c. · Cappadocia
Gregory of Nyssa returned again and again to the image of God in every person, arguing that to honor a human being — even the lowest — is to honor the Maker whose image they bear.
Paraphrase only. Scripture, not any teacher, is the authority.
Think it through
- What two things does God do for the people he makes in verses 27–28?
- What does it mean that image-bearing is given, not earned?
- Whose dignity will you defend today because God made them?
A prayer to pray
Thank God for the dignity he gave you that you did not earn, and ask him to help you see one person today the way he sees them.