The Divine Image

Book excerpt: Theologian Ian McFarland claims that Christians have mainly misappropriated the "image of God" language for 2000 years and thereby missed a rich resource for our knowledge of God. What, then, does it mean to say that we are made in God's image, or that Christ is the very image or prototype of God? Rather than referring to some germinal divine element in humans, such as reason, McFarland claims that the image of God in us tells us something about God and how we know God. It tells us that God, though not identical with us, communicates Godself to us in creative love, in a way that offers precious clues about God's transcendence, immanence, triune life, self-disclosure, incarnation, and intentions for human life. Too, we "learn from Jesus something new about God." Gathered as Christ's body, the church too images God and sets us on a quest to discern the image of God in Christ's incarnate body. McFarland's careful and exacting work builds from this kernel a powerful Christian vision of God's life and our own destiny in Christ.