Imago Dei should impact our theology more

Years ago when I taught in a Christian high school in Oregon, one of my students came up to me and asked me how come a person could be good if they weren’t Christians.  This student had internalized a theology of humanity that argued that only those who follow Jesus have the capacity to be good.  Yet she also recognized the inconsistency of that claim because in our very secular part of the country, she had encountered kind, generous, loving people who had no interest in Jesus.  Whether intentionally or through thoughtless preaching she had come to see people outside the Christian faith as dark and depraved creatures.

In the very first chapter of Genesis sits a monumental piece of theology.  It’s easy to miss it, especially since claims about the nature of biblical inspiration have been given more energy and attention in evangelical culture. Even before Adam and Eve, the very first chapter declares that humans were created in God’s image, male and female.  In our desire to be faithful we’ve chosen to focus on the parts of a passage that we think speak most loudly to today’s concerns and gloss over other parts.  While that’s normal, we want the Bible to lead our beliefs and actions, we also want to pay attention to the passages that feel less urgent. 

In all the discussion about how to faithfully understand the creation accounts in Genesis 1 and 2, we’ve lost a discussion about the imago Dei, the statement that humans were made bearing God’s image.  That all humans reflect the image of God should be a bedrock of our understanding of ourselves and creation.  It’s much easier to draw a line between faithful and unfaithful people based on whether or not we believe the creation account.  It’s messier and more difficult to understand faithfulness in terms of the imago Dei, in terms of how we treat each other.  What would happen if we elevated kindness as a measure of faithfulness?  Jesus said as much when he rendered the entire law into two commands: love God, love your neighbor.

Without imago Dei, the scriptures make less sense.  Why would God spend so much of human history trying to move us into greater righteousness?  Why would God send us Immanuel and the Holy Spirit unless there was something divinely precious about us humans, even the ones who don’t have any belief?  We sing in Sunday School and forget it by youth group: Jesus loves all the little children of the world.  There is something inherently precious about humans.

The doctrine of imago Dei serves as a check on our understanding of sin and human nature.  In our region especially, Calvin’s doctrine of total depravity informs our understanding of human nature.  Taken to an extreme, it teaches that sin has so damaged humanity that there’s nothing left that’s good.  For my student, that didn’t make sense.  If that’s true, how can there be good people?  I replied that the imago Dei was something too big, too much a part of God’s intention for humans to fully erase.  We’re definitely broken, we definitely need redemption, but as humans we don’t have the power to completely undo God’s work.  Muck it up?  Yes.  Undo it?  No.  Through grace we can continually pursue a more perfect reflection of God’s image.

If we elevated the imago Dei in our popular theology, so much of how we relate to other humans would change.  We wouldn’t tolerate or repeat rhetoric that dehumanizes others, that assigns value according to how much they can contribute or how closely they align with our identity or priorities.  The inherent value of all who bear God’s image should inform how we treat all people, from those we love best to those we most mistrust.  It means we have to carry ourselves as people of grace.  It means we think carefully about our concept of what makes a person deserving and how we treat those who’ve caused harm.  If our language strips people of the imago Dei, we’ve betrayed ourselves as holding a theology of convenience, of selfishness. 

Paul’s letter to the Galatians offers another way to think about all this.  There are many who despair that their loved ones aren’t following Jesus, especially when the predominant theology says humanity is worthless apart from God.  I believe that God’s presence is all around us, whispering to us calling us to better things.  N.T. Wright calls it the echo of a voice, the part of our nature that remembers that we’re made of and for different stuff.  There’s evidence of God’s image in the folks we love in the fruits of God’s indelible nature.  Some of the most loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful people do not profess to follow Jesus.  A gracious theology sees God’s fingerprints on everyone. 

Learning to look for and honor the imago Dei isn’t a peripheral theological exercise, it’s central to who God wants us to be and how we are to live.  It doesn’t mean we ignore sin; the imago Dei sparks our longing for things to be whole. It’s grace echoing in the core of our being to awaken a longing for redemption and holiness.  It helps us make sense of the beautiful and the ugly, the hurtful and the hopeful; of all the glorious mess that is humanity. 

Mary Beth Eberle is the pastor at Grace UMC Jackson and the Director of the Wesley Foundation at UM Lambuth. Contact her at freerangepastors@gmail.com.