Jesus The Image of God

This name is used by St. Paul of Christ in 2 Corinthians 4:4, where He is said to be "the Image of God", and in Colossians 1:15 in the fuller phrase, "the image of the invisible God".  An analogous expression, "the very stamp of his essence", is found in Hebrews 1:3.  

We shall entirely misapprehend the meaning of the word used in these passages if we think of an image as the faint copy of an original.  This meaning is quite different.  St. Paul uses the Greek word with meant more than "likeness"; rather the word described the essential nature of a thing.  Lightfoot explains the word as both a "manifestation" and a "representation" of the reality or archetype; it is the reality itself coming to expression.  It may be that in using the word Paul was responsive to prevailing currents of Hellenistic religious thought; but as his own words show, in main indebtedness was to Genesis 1:26.    This teaching appears to have included the idea of the restoration or renewal of Adam's divine attributes in Messianic times, and as it is used and adapted by Paul, it implies the conception of Christ as the Second Adam, without the use of the name.

In using the name "the Image of God" Paul was attempting to say who Christ is; and his conviction is that He is not merely a reflection of God, but that in Him, so to speak, God comes to light and is expressed.   This is a conscious attempt to answer the question, "Who do you say that I am?".  The answer is that He is the representation and the manifestation of the divine glory.  In his face we see the Shekinah present in visible form.

-excerpt was adapted from The Names of Jesus by Vincent Taylor pg 124-28.

Jesus The Image of God - Pt 2

He is the Image, the Representation, the Unveiling, the Manifestation of the invisible God, Who has no manifestation save through Him. The declaration is not that He became the Image of God; but that He is the Image of God; He is always the Image of God. . . .He was the Image of God long ere time began, ere creation came into being; He will be the Image of God in all the ages yet to come; He is the One through Whom God is always manifest to created beings. Whether they be principalities or powers in the heavenly places; or things of time and sense; whoever they may be, and whenever they may exist, and wherever their habitation may be, God is revealed to them through this Person. . . He is indeed, therefore, "KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS," absolute and supreme. . . .

This Lord Jesus Christ is the Image of God, the Manifestation of God; He is the originating Creator, and the sustaining might in the universe; He is the One Who came back out of the experience of death . . . He is the Lord of all, and is declared to be so with power by the Resurrection from among the dead. . . .

"We were reconciled to God," "God Who hath reconciled us to Himself," "Reconciling the world unto Himself," "Be ye reconciled to God," "That He might reconcile both unto God," "To reconcile all things unto Himself," "You . . . now hath He reconciled . . . . to present you . . . . before Him." In the New Testament it is not that through the death of Christ, God may be turned back to the sinner; it is that through the death of Christ the sinner may be turned back to God. This is quite radical and important. . . . God never turned His back upon the sinner. . . God never turned His face away from man. . . . God has never, never turned His back upon a sinner. . . . Man has turned his back upon God. Man has set his face toward the far country. It is for him to turn his face toward God. It is man who needs reconciliation to God. . . . Man cannot be reconciled to God in his sin. What is needed is not God's reconciliation to man, but man's reconciliation to God, and that is impossible while he is still living in sin. . . .

Do we understand that our only right is that of eternal banishment from God's presence? . . . The right of every self-centered soul who has sinned against heaven is banishment from God. Yet God's mightiest work, His greatest concern, is that men should be reconciled to Him.

The reconciliation of God was the result of His own action as revealed in Christ. . . .

"You . . . hath He"--the Image of God, the Creator of worlds, the Head of His Church--"reconciled in the body of His flesh through death." Not that He reconciled God to man, for He was God Himself; but that He through that death has made possible the reception to Himself of sinning men, and that through that death He makes His great appeal to man in his rebellion, calling him to turn back to God.

-excerpt taken from The Bible and the Cross by G. Campbell Morgan, pp. 49-60

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