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This is the sermon audio podcast of Sam Jones Methodist Church located in Cartersville, Georgia.
Even sweeter today. I didn't know if we would be able to be together in person or if we would be watching from home. I know we may have some folks watching from home, so we're glad that you're here. Enjoying some some warmth and maybe the last little bit of this snow day, you know, for a preacher, snow on Friday is about the second or third worst thing you could ever hear. The next is snow on Saturday and then snow on Sunday, right?
Lathem Postell:And just glad that it was not too bad that we're here. For those that normally come to 08:30 that might be here, glad you made it over here. It was a little icy this morning. We had some folks out here doing some, scraping up just to make sure. And so we just didn't want it to be too slippery on your way.
Lathem Postell:So So we're glad that you're able to be here with us, and and hopefully, that was the last bit of snow. Not in general, because my daughter Evie loved the snow, but maybe just not near a Sunday. That would be be my preference at least. Also good to to have Pastor Mark here. I know that you got to see him a little bit.
Lathem Postell:As he gave us the announcements and led us in our pastoral prayer this morning. I'm so excited. He's here with us at Sam. I hope that if you don't know him already, you'll get a chance to know him. He said he'll be here Wednesday night.
Lathem Postell:So just greet him. He's going to be a great addition to our staff, a great addition to our I'm thankful to know him, and I know that you'll think that way too. So please give him a warm welcome, or I guess a warm, welcome back, since it has history here at the if you don't know, we're going throughout this year, talking about this sermon series called The Whole Story. We are looking at we are covenanting together to to spend all of 2025 in scripture. Hopefully, you're going through the reading plan.
Lathem Postell:I'll keep saying it here at the beginning. If you haven't started or if you're just just now hearing about it for some reason, maybe this is your first Sunday with us and we're glad that you're here. It's still not too late to catch up. If you wait till April, it's gonna be hard to catch back up. So if you haven't started a routine now, you can still catch up to us.
Lathem Postell:That's the Bible recap is what we're using. We have reading plans in the back of the room. There's also a resource that you can Amazon, things like that. And, just a great way to to stay in God's word throughout this year. But but here on Sunday mornings, we're we're kind of going slowly, fifty two weeks, of some of the high points find is sometimes we're going to be in in line with what we're reading on our own, but other times we're going to have to slow down, other times we're going to have to speed up in
Lathem Postell:order to really understand fully the the narrative, of scripture. This is one of those weeks where we're going
Lathem Postell:to slow down, if scripture. This is one of those weeks where we're going to slow down. If you're reading along with us, you know that we're in Job. And we're going to come back a little bit, to to Genesis chapter one. Because I think if we miss what we find here at the end of chapter one, well then we're going to miss what God is doing later and what he's trying to to show us.
Lathem Postell:So we need to pay attention to this. Last week, if you weren't here, we started with the the beginning, the overarching story of God's creation. You'll remember that that first word, Beresheet. We remember. It reminds us.
Lathem Postell:It tells us from the very beginning. It does not let us kind of get our feet wet. It starts hard with theological truth that God himself was the one who was there before anything existed. It's a reminder to us that there is nothing higher, nothing greater, nothing more powerful than the one who created the very world in which we live. And then he shows us his character slowly over the course of six days, seven if we include the Sabbath.
Lathem Postell:Right? Over these six days, we walked through how methodically God pays attention to his creation. He takes interest in it. He plans everything out to the detail. Right?
Lathem Postell:He brings one of my favorite words. Mark jokes about this. We know each other pretty well and he knows this is kind of my wheelhouse. Right? This is where I really love God.
Lathem Postell:This idea of God being the one that brings order out of chaos. That's what we see in Genesis chapter one. It's good news for us that God is the one that brings order out of chaos. And so I want us to go back to to day six, because if we miss what God does in day six, we're not going to understand what he does throughout the rest of the bible. And in the first chapter of Genesis.
Lathem Postell:He tells us this. Then God said, let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish and the sea and the birds and the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground. So God created mankind in His own image. In the image of God, He created them. Male and female, He created them.
Lathem Postell:God blessed them and said to them, be fruitful and increase in number. Fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish and the sea and the birds and the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground. Then God said, I give you every seed bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food.
Lathem Postell:And to all the beasts of the earth, and all the birds in the sky, and all the creatures that move along the ground, everything that has the breath of life in it, I give every green plant for food. And it was so. God saw all that he had made, and it was
Lathem Postell:very good. And there was evening, and there was
Lathem Postell:morning, the sixth day. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day. Will you pray with me? Loving and gracious God, we're so thankful for the gift of your scripture, for the gift of this time that we can simply worship you, Lord, for the next twenty minutes. Help us to focus on you and you alone, putting aside all the distractions of the world that we might come to look more like you and your son Jesus.
Lathem Postell:For it's in his name that we pray. Amen. So I want you to remember a key point from last week that's gonna be true for the rest of what we read in scripture. It's simple. Right?
Lathem Postell:Scripture is not about us. That needs to always be forefront in our minds. Scripture is not about us. God is the main character in the story. God was there at the very beginning.
Lathem Postell:He'll be there at the very end. He's the only one that can say that he was there for the whole story. We we don't need to get that fact twisted. Right? Scripture is not about us.
Lathem Postell:But it's also important to remember that scripture was written for us. I actually heard on a podcast here recently. I like to listen to podcast. The person on there actually added a bit to it that I like. Right?
Lathem Postell:Scripture is not written about us. It's not written to us. So we need to understand the context in which scripture was written, but it surely was written for us. God gave us the scriptures to be our guide. And and through it, if we'll live in it, God will teach us about himself and he'll also teach us a little bit about ourselves.
Lathem Postell:And here, even in Genesis one, this story about the goodness of God, the the majesty of him and his creation, He he includes us in the story. We show up on day six. He's filling up. You'll remember, he's filling up the heavens and the earth that he created on day one, two, and three. And so on on day four, the sun, moon, and stars are created.
Lathem Postell:On day five, we get the birds of the sky and the fish of the sea. On day six, where we show up, the first half of that are all the creatures that crawl along the ground, the livestock, the wild animals. But then, on that last half, God does something different. Something that he hasn't done the very first five and a half days of creation. It tells us that he creates this interesting unique creature called humans.
Lathem Postell:And this creature is different than everything else in all of creation, because God says, he will create humans in his own image, in the likeness of God. They're not gods themselves, for there is only one God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But instead they are images or reflections of the one God himself. And he sends them out with a divine directive. Right?
Lathem Postell:These image bearers would be given the task and the function to go into this wonderful creation that God has created, and to rule over it, to have dominion, to be his stewards on earth. We're told to participate in this act of creation that was started by God. Be fruitful and multiply, it says. Go out in the earth and subdue it. Yes.
Lathem Postell:It it has some some directions for us. Right? We're to have families. We're to have children. We're to literally fill the earth.
Lathem Postell:But I think there's more to it than that. And if you have a creative mind, you know this inside of you. And Genesis chapter one is actually describing it for you. It's not just go and fill the earth, but it's subdue it. Right?
Lathem Postell:He's saying, take this beautiful canvas that I've given you, all of the natural resources that I have provided, take it and use it. Make wonderful things as I have. You're like me. Be a part of creation. And so he gives us this divine directive.
Lathem Postell:He creates humans. He gives us within us his own image. And he looks out on everything that he's done in six days. And he looks and says, wow, this is very good. Note, if you'll remember last week, days one through five, up until that point he's looked out at it and said, yeah, this is pretty good.
Lathem Postell:This is good. But it's on day six that he looks and says it is very good. When he looks out and sees his image in the world, there's something different. And it's here that I want us to focus this morning because if we move past this I've already said it already. If we move past this important passage of scripture, we're not going to understand what God is doing for the rest of the story.
Lathem Postell:If we want to understand God's salvific mission in the world that's gonna come to the fullness of completion in the person of Jesus later in the New Testament, then we need to spend a little bit of time here. What does it mean for us to claim that humans are made in the image of God? We might take that claim for granted. We say it so often that it can lose its meaning. I mean, it's a bold claim to say that humans, each and every human in fact, is made in the image of God.
Lathem Postell:Even if this is your first time in church or maybe it's your first time in a long time. Right? Maybe church hasn't been a thing you've been a part of. Maybe you're you're you don't read the Bible very often and you're just stepping into it for the first time. This is probably language that you're familiar with, that God has created people in the image of God.
Lathem Postell:What what does it mean when we say that? Well, if we're we'll get into it. Right? The Hebrew word translated here as image is, 'selem'. T s e l e m, selem.
Lathem Postell:It's translated as image or resemblance, even sometimes as idols. And and for us, this language is not familiar. We live two thousand years after Jesus. We live after the development of most religions which are monotheistic and and try to push against the creation of idols or images. Right?
Lathem Postell:But for those living in the early days of scripture, those who live two thousand, three thousand years ago, this this language of idols, of images, of selems would have been common for them. It wouldn't been abstract like it is for us. Almost every king that lived two thousand, three thousand years ago, whether they were a Syrian, Egyptian, it didn't really matter who they were. Almost all of them claimed some sort of divine authority for their rule. They said, look, God has put me here in charge of you and of the world.
Lathem Postell:Some of them would even go so far as to say, it's not just that God put me in charge of the world, that they would say, I am God in the world. Others that didn't go that far might would say that they're the living image of God, that they are the reflection of the God above. They're on earth to rule and dwell. And hopefully, that language as we talk about it is a little familiar for you. But they did this, right, as a way to have power.
Lathem Postell:I'm God. You can't challenge me. You can't challenge my rule. I'm divinely appointed for this task. Yeah.
Lathem Postell:Your life might not be very good, but I'm here for a reason. And so what they would do, these kings, literally, they would build religions, and we see this in Egypt and Assyria and so many others. Right? They build these religions based upon their divinity, and so they'd make these little tiny figurines, idols, as we would call them in scripture, and they would place them in their temples. And so as the people of their kingdom would go to worship, they would see the representation of their king in the temple as a reminder of who they were and why they were there.
Lathem Postell:The images were there to point people to something bigger. It gets a bad rap in the Bible for good reason. We're told God commands us not to make false images or idols. We often do. We're not a good job of following that command or really any of them, right?
Lathem Postell:Complex. Sure. We're not to create these idols because we tend to worship them. But there's another reason here in Genesis chapter one. Already made his image in the world, and he looked at them and called them humans and said they were very good.
Lathem Postell:God created a salum, to use the Hebrew word. He created an image in his likeness, not identical to him, not exactly like him, not equal to him, not to be worshipped like him, but he created an image, a representation in the earth of who he is. He created us. He is still ultimately the one in charge of creation, but he has created an image of himself in the world that's to go out and work in it. He's the one that ultimately has full and ultimate dominion over the birds, and the fish, and the livestock.
Lathem Postell:But he sent out his image to do his work in the world. He has created and continues to create millions upon millions upon billions of image bearers sent forth into the world to show the glory and majesty of God. Now, we'll talk next week about how we do a really bad job of that. That's Genesis chapter three. We do a really bad job of carrying that image.
Lathem Postell:We distort it. We break it. We cast it aside. And that's why we need Jesus in the New Testament. Right?
Lathem Postell:But at the end of the day, God created you for a singular purpose which was to be his image in the world. And as I thought about this, right, I truly honestly believe, even though Genesis chapter one feels like it was so long ago, and and sometimes we read these old passages and they they just feel like they don't connect to today. I I think the truth here in the scriptures we read is a truth that the entire world desperately needs to hear. Identity crisis. People have identity crises.
Lathem Postell:We don't know what our purpose is, or why we're here. And we could go on for for probably more than we should about why that might be. I'm not an expert in that. Right? Is it social media?
Lathem Postell:Is it our ability now to be more connected than ever before, but to have those connections be shallow rather than deep? Right? Is is it technology? Is it What Whatever it might be. Right?
Lathem Postell:And you may have your own theories on that. That that really doesn't matter why. The truth is that our world and the people living in it are more disconnected. They're more out of touch. They have these identity crisis more now than ever.
Lathem Postell:We're confused. We're scared. We're uncertain. People walk around asking, we've done it forever. Right?
Lathem Postell:So don't think this is a new thing, but it's certainly true today and and probably at a height now. We ask those questions like, what's my purpose? Why am I here? The age old question, right? What is the meaning of life?
Lathem Postell:And the reality is, we can talk about it on a 30,000 foot view as well. But for many of us, we're asking the same questions. We don't necessarily know who we are. Those identity crises that we see on other people, well, they're true for us also. Maybe for some of us in this room, those watching online, even the most put together people in the world, sometimes, if you dig into their heart, ask those questions of, well, who am I?
Lathem Postell:What's my purpose? What value do I have? You can fill in the blank for whatever your job is. We feel like we reduce ourselves to our occupation, our profession. Am I just a doctor?
Lathem Postell:Am I just a teacher? Right? We we play these important functions in the world, but we realize we're more than just that. Right? But often when people see us, that's what they see.
Lathem Postell:We we can even go further. Am I just this in my relationship? Right? If you're married, am I am I just a husband? Am I just a wife?
Lathem Postell:Right? I love my wife tremendously. Everybody look at her, right? No. No.
Lathem Postell:Please don't. I want to stay married, because I love her. Right? But I know that I'm I'm more than her husband, and she's more than my wife. Right?
Lathem Postell:We can reduce ourselves, or other people can reduce us to the relationships we have, but we know deep down we're more than just that. Certainly, we are those things, but we're more than that. And so as a result, we have these crises. We don't know what to do. We struggle.
Lathem Postell:We stress. We don't know where to go. And so, as a result, we have these crises. We don't know where to go. We don't know where to go.
Lathem Postell:If that's you this morning, and I know that some of it some of us it is. Here the good news in the very first chapter of the Bible. And the very first chapter of the Bible, God addresses the most unique human question of all. The most significant question of our existence, what's the meaning of life? God answers it.
Lathem Postell:What he's showing us is it's less this question about what we are, and it's more a question of why, and then, too, and that's a sermon for another day. Some of the characteristics that make us like the image of God, the freedom of our will, the mind and intellect that we have. We could get into all of that, but what I want you to focus on this morning is not what we are, but why we are. And the purpose that God gives you. And the purpose
Lathem Postell:that God gives you. And the purpose that God gives you. And the purpose that God gives you. And the purpose
Lathem Postell:ability to be like God, To bear the likeness and image of God in the world. By your very existence, something you didn't choose, by your very existence, God has called you to a holy purpose. Nursery, right? And every person that's in between. Your purpose is to bear the image and likeness of God in the world.
Lathem Postell:To go out and demonstrate what it means to be loved by God. That was your original purpose and it's never changed. To go back to the old language, right? You are God's selum. Like the little figurines that were placed in early temples to remind people of the goodness of of whoever it represents.
Lathem Postell:Right? You have been created to be the image and representation of God in the world. What a holy calling. Have you ever thought about that? That that's your purpose.
Lathem Postell:That's that's why God created you. Beginning of time, God looked at you and called you very good. Not because of anything you had done. Don't get that wrong. You uniquely very good because of the part of himself that he placed in you.
Lathem Postell:And he specifically took you, this creation that was very good, and placed you in the earth where you are, so that you might go about the business of telling others about When people look at you, they see the majesty and glory and power of I can think I've thought about it a lot. I can think of nothing higher or greater than that. The God who created all the stuff we talked about last week, this beautiful world we live in, mountains and oceans, even this week, right, we saw the beauty of snowfall. The God who was there before all of us. You are his image bearer.
Lathem Postell:There's a part of him that lives on in you. The question just is whether we're going to accept the mantle of that. I don't want to get too far ahead. Like I said, we're going to talk about that next week. But trust me, you were created on purpose.
Lathem Postell:Genesis shows us that long before you ever had the chance to choose God, he chose you. You were created for a reason. You're not here by chance. You're not here on accident. There is no question whether or not there is a why in your existence because Genesis chapter one leaves no doubt.
Lathem Postell:Yeah. Created you for a reason. Here at all? If you ever wonder about your life, prove to you that that image within you needs to be restored and that he loves you enough to actually do it. You were called to a divine purpose.
Lathem Postell:To carry God into the world. People. Right. And scripture, we get this image of the body of Christ. How some of us have this function, others have this function.
Lathem Postell:That's true in the church and
Lathem Postell:it's true in the world.
Lathem Postell:But there is one But there is one purpose to point to the head to point to God. I know many of you, most of you, maybe not all of you. But I know one thing about each of you. If you're breathing and alive here in this room today, you were made in God's image. It's why what we're going to do this year is so important.
Lathem Postell:You're made to be the image of God in the world. What mirror can reflect something that it's never seen? How can you carry the image of God in the world if you don't know what he looks like? Friends, if you're searching for your purpose, if you're lost, I can tell you where to be found. Within the words of this, we find what God looks like.
Lathem Postell:Spend time in it. Spend all sorts of time in it. And what you'll find is they'll begin to create you a new you have to be with God to reflect God.
Lathem Postell:Go
Lathem Postell:forth today, never questioning why you're here, never questioning God's love for you. He He demonstrated it at the very beginning. He's going to demonstrate it time and time again. You were made in God's image. Let us pray.
Lathem Postell:Loving and gracious, Laura, we just thank you so much. That there's more than we could ever thank you for, but God, we just with with all the sincerity of our hearts, say thank you. Thank you for creating us. You didn't have to, but you did. Thank you for for loving us.
Lathem Postell:Lord, there's so many times that we've gone astray, but yet you still love us. Lord, we thank you for making us in your image, for there is no image greater, higher, or more powerful. Next week, God, but we already know it. That far too often, the image of you within us is broken, distorted, destroyed. We know that more than not, Lord, when people look at us, they don't see you.
Lathem Postell:They see a broken person. We're thankful that you take those broken people and you restore them. But we ask today that you start in us, if you haven't already, this restoration of you within us. Lord, we know that it takes a while. We know that you can do it.
Lathem Postell:Plant within each and every one of us a sincere belief and trust in the words that you said to us here in Genesis chapter one. When the days get long, when the questions come back of why am I here, what's the point in all of this, Lord remind us that you gave us the point. And that point is to to be your image, to be your representative, to be your worshipper out in the world. We want folks, God, when they see us, to not see us, but to see you. Place us where you've already placed us, as those little selems, as outposts, as as figurines, as people who point people back to you.
Lathem Postell:Because we know that what you've done for us, you want to do for all of your children. Help us, oh God, to see them in the same way that you see us, as image bearers prepared to be restored. Lord, we thank you for it's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen.