The Next Generation - In The Image Of God
" Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made man." Genesis 9: 6
"Come on son, act like a man." Were you ever told this when you were growing up? That statement seems almost embedded in our minds. It is one of those statements most of us will recall hearing so much as we were growing up that it is memorized in our conscious. The only problem, however, we heard it told to us, but in most cases, no one ever told us what it meant to be a man.
In the last several years our culture and the progression of the liberal agenda has bombarded us with a false definition of what it means to be a man in today's world. There is a scene in my favorite movie, Lonesome Dove, where one of the main characters has been on a long journey to bring back his wayward wife. The journey takes him halfway across the country and he arrives at the home of a well known lady in Nebraska. After explaining why hs is there, the lady invites him in for a meal, and in that conversation around the table, she reveals that his wife was just there a couple of days earlier. Tired and weary from his travels, he is overcome with emotion to the point of tears. One of the lady's young daughters ask - "Why is that man crying? Men don't cry."
When God created a man, He created a strange person. We will wonder around for hours lost in our journey before we finally give in and ask for directions. If we have to stop for a rest, we are constantly looking to see if we can catch up with the cars when we left the highway. There is just something rugged and manly about using a tree in the woods as out pit stop. No question, when God created a man, He created an interesting creature. He gave us the responsibility to love and care for our family. Thus, we must be tender in certain situations - we cry. We are willing to travel halfway across the country in order to keep our family together. God also had to create us with the natural gifts to take care of the world He had created. He built in us a desire to achieve, to conquer and to pursue a challenge in order that we might better complete our work. All this in order to accomplish His purpose for man and creation. When we reach the point of looking back over our life, we can feel that we have achieved that natural God given hunger for significance. Our lives have counted for something.
That drive for significance creates in us a pride that makes us want to be remembered. We want a legacy to leave. For some, that comes out as we grow older and we begin to take a look at what our life has been all about. For other men, this can come at an early age and sets them on a course to achieve the goal for their life. What goes into that goal will determine the man we will become, and thus, sets our legacy. It will be the thing we most want to be remembered by, but may not be how others actually will remember us. It will be what we pass on to the next generation.
Ephesians 2: 10 tells us - " We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." In other words, God has created us and He has given to each of us a certain unmeasurable value. Our value is determined, not by what others think of us, but in the fact that God created us in His image and to be like Him. At the end of our days when folks are gathered together to share their blessings of comfort upon our death, it will not be the success and possessions we have achieved that will determine our true value as a man. It will be those things that God has determined are the plans and purpose for our life. It will not be the opinions of others that will have everlasting value, but the opinion of the One who created us.
Would it not be wonderful if all men based who they were as a man on the values set out for us in Christ? We are a creation of God himself. He has formed each and everyone of us individually. Genesis tells us that when God created us He looked at what he had done and said it was VERY good. Who are we? We are His masterpiece.
