JESUS: THE FIRST MAN MADE IN GOD’S IMAGE

Monday 18 November

Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” Genesis 1:26 (NKJV)

who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, Hebrews 1:3 (NKJV)

There are so many Christians who believe that Adam was the original man created in the image and likeness of God in Genesis 1:26 but it’s not true. It was Jesus.

Hebrews 1:3 tells us that Jesus is the brightness of the Father’s glory and the express image of his person, not Adam.

Colossians 1:15-17 confirms this. ‘He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.’

Notice 3 important things here. Jesus is the visible image of the invisible God. Jesus is the firstborn of all creation and Jesus is before all things.

This means He is before anything created including Adam and He was and is before all things. Think about this for a moment. Creation is a function of time therefore Jesus was the image of God before time began.

Ephesians 1:4 says ‘just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love,’

What does this tell us? Jesus was never God’s backup plan, He was God’s original plan from the beginning.

Romans 5:14 confirms this

‘Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who had not sinned according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam, who is a TYPE of Him who was to come.’

Did you see that? Adam was only a type or a figure of the ‘prototokos’ or prototype, Jesus Christ who was to come.

So when God said let US make man in our image after our likeness He was referring to the divine counsel of the godhead who were all inside the Father at that time.

Remember the Word who became flesh came from the Father and the Holy Spirit proceeded from the Father. God only became Father, Son and Holy Spirit after the fall of man to reach man. This is His redemptive work.

In Genesis 1:26 when it goes on to say ‘let them have’ this is a reference to Adam and Eve. They were to take dominion and have authority over all creation and they achieved this until ‘the transgression’ where Adam operated his authority and dominion outside the sovereignty of God. This is called sin.

Adam who was made in the likeness of Jesus was meant to accept the gospel of but he rejected it and began to have children in his image and after his likeness (Genesis 5:3) which was after the image and likeness of fallen man and not the heavenly man, Jesus Christ.

This is why we needed to be cut off from the first Adam to ‘put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him,’ and be restored back to the image and likeness of God in Christ.

He is the firstborn of all creation and the firstborn of every new creation in Christ.

Make no mistake about it. The man Christ Jesus is the visibility of the invisible God not Adam. God only has one image. In Him, we ‘bear the image of the heavenly’.