In the Image

I just started a new book. It's called Who is This Man? The Unpredictable Impact of the Inescapable Jesus by John Ortberg.

Image what it was like to live in the time of Herod the Great. Read this quote:
"The king was divine, or semi-divine. The king was understood to be made in the image of the god who created him. Only the king was made in the image of the god....This is the Dignity Gap."

And then this one: "Imagine what it did to the hearts of the dregs of humanity to be told that not just the king but they too were created in the image of the one great God."

What happened? Jesus happened.

"There are gradations of talent, strength, intelligence and beauty. Martin Luther King, Jr. said, 'There are no gradations of the image of God.'"

What does it do to our lives to see all others as made in the image of God? What did it do to society -- this influence that the inescapable Jesus had? Women became human beings. It became wrong to leave unwanted children on the dung heap to die. The downtrodden were finally seen as having worth -- the same worth as the king.

That worth is not gained because of the family into which we are born or by the amount of money we have or by our gender, race, faith, orientation, age or career. We have worth because God has given it to us. Each of us. All of us.

How does that change how we see each other? How should it change how we treat each other?