In the image of The Father And The Son

Romans 1:19,20 “Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath showed it unto them. (20) For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.”

This passage in Romans tells us that there are things about God which we cannot see or witness with our own eyes. But such things, God has chosen to reveal them to us through the things which He has created. He does not only reveal Himself to us by word of mouth but He has also chosen other ways and means to do this. In the Bible, God has inserted some evidences that, when carefully read and examined, help us to know who He really is. On this occasion, we shall look at the creation of Adam and Eve and how God uses this event in history to reveal His true identity.

The Father and Son as Creators

The Bible emphatically tells us, in a number of places, that God created the world and everything in it, including our first parents – Adam and Eve – through his Son, Jesus Christ. Hebrews 1:2 is one such example.

“… by whom He made the worlds.” (Hebrews 1:2)

In Genesis chapter 1, we find an account of how God created the first man and woman. An analysis of this text reveals a startling revelation of an account of God’s relation that He has not only with the human race but more so with His Son.

Genesis 1:26,27 “And God said, Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. (27) So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them.”

When the above passage is read and carefully analysed, we can pick a few important points from it. First of all, it says that God was speaking to someone when He said that He and that someone would together create man in His image and the image of the someone He was speaking with. Those who believe and teach the doctrine of the Trinity opine that when God says “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness,” it actually means that God is a not a single individual Being but rather, He is a three part being made up of the three persons of the Godhead (Father, Son and Spirit). So according to them, it is one of these persons who spoke to the other two to make man in their image. But we have established from the Bible that God created all things only through Christ. So, it stands to reason that it is none other than God, the Father, who told Christ, the Son, to create man in Their image. The evidence to support this teaching lies in the fact that Christ alone is in the the image of the Father.

2 Corinthians 4:4 “In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.”

Colossians 1:15 “Who is the image of the invisible God.”

Hebrews 1:3 “Who being the brightness of His [Father’s] glory, and the express image of His person.”

All the three verses, say that it is Christ who is in the image of God. And speaking of image, it refers to the character of an individual, which is God’s character in this case. It is in this sense that Jesus once said that when we have seen Him, we have also seen the Father. (John 14:9). Not that we have seen the Father Himself in person but we witness His character displayed in Jesus.

Another point that we can pick from Genesis 1:26,27, is that, it seems as though God told Christ to create only Adam in Their image when it says, “Let Us make man in Our image” and “So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him”. But when we look carefully, we find that when the verse uses the word “man” it does not necessarily mean the man, Adam, only. This word actually means the human beings that God had in mind to create because the passage in Genesis then uses the phrases, “and let them have dominion”, and again, “male and female created he them.” In the former case, it says that the “them” should have dominion; and in the latter, it tells us that the “them” refers to both “male and female.” So, we can safely conclude that both Adam and Eve were created in the image of the Father and the Son.

Though I frankly admit, that in the future, there are many things that we can still learn from the creation of man, as God wishes to reveal unto us, I believe that at the present moment we can garner some vital lessons from it. I have listed a few things that I think are worthy of our scrutiny that I think should evoke discussion and re-examination of the god of the Trinity doctrine.

The Son was Begotten of the Father

The first in the list of things that we can learn is the “begotten belief.” God created Adam from the dust of the ground. But it is strange to see that God created Eve from the rib of Adam. Is God incapable of creating Eve in the same manner that He created Adam? And why did He not create both Adam and Eve at the same time? We know that God is capable of creating Eve in the same way as He created Adam; and He is capable of creating them both at the very same time. But one thing we should remember is that, God has a reason behind everything He does. God did this to send a message that He is first and Christ comes after Him and that Christ was generated or born from the Father. The Father and the Son are NOT co-eternal, that is, of the same age as the Trinity doctrine claims. Before Christ came into existence, there was only God the Father. We see this in the case of Adam and Eve.

The rib that later came to be Eve, was in Adam’s body. Which means that Eve came out of Adam. Here Adam typified God and Eve typified Christ.Just as Eve’s existence, to a certain extent, depended on Adam’s existence, even so, Christ could not have existed without God. Christ Himself declared that He came out of the Father.

John 8:42 “Jesus said unto them, If God were your Father, ye would love Me: for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of Myself,but He sent Me.”John 16:28 “I came forth from the Father..”

It is the truth that Jesus is the “only begotten Son of God.” He is not a Son by virtue of being born of Mary, but He truly is born of God. God is literally the Father of Christ and Christ is literally the Son of God. Just as Adam and Eve were created on the very same day with a difference of just a few hours between them, God also gave birth to Christ at the same period when there was yet any time,in the days of eternity.

Proverbs 8:22,23 “The LORD possessed Me in the beginning of His way, before His work of old. (23) I was set up from everlasting, or ever the earth was.”

The Divinity of the Father and the Son

Adam who was created before Eve,was a human and humanity found its origins in him. Eve came out of Adam with the same humanity that was already in Adam. But at the same time, Eve did not take away the place of Adam as one who was created by God. Though Eve came out of Adam,she is not the man, and Adam is not the woman but they both share the same humanity. In the same way, the Father is the God and divinity originated with Him. Christ who came out of God shares the same divinity that is in the Father. The “fulness of the godhead” rests on Him bodily or completely. (Colossians 2:9). Yet Christ is neither the God nor does He take away the place of the Farther as the only true God. Hence Christ is God by nature.Paul, plainly puts it in 1 Corinthians that the one God is the Father. He does not contradict Christ’s statement that the Father is the only true God. In fact, just to put it into perspective, Paul reveals in his letter to the Galatians that he preaches the gospel as per the revelation that he receives from Christ Himself.(Galatians 1:11,12)

1 Corinthians 8:6 “But to us there is but one God, the Father.”

John 17:3 “This is life eternal, that they may know thee the only true God.”

The Issue of Headship

God created Adam and Eve to be rulers over the whole world. (Genesis 1:26). God ordained that Adam would be the supreme ruler of the earth and Eve would rule together with him. But she would occupy a lower rank than him. This reflects the relation of the Father and the Son.God is the Supreme Ruler of the whole universe. Christ also rules the universe along with the Father but He subjects Himself to His will. This truth is taught by the apostle Paul in his letter to the Corinthians.

1 Corinthians 11:3 “But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is man; and the head of Christ is God.”

1 Corinthians 3:23 “And ye are Christ’s and Christ is God’s”Christ Himself declares that God is greater than Him and He always seek to do the will of the Father."

John 14:28 “… for my Father is greater than I.”

John 4:34 “Jesus said unto them,My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work.”

What Christ witnessed about Himself in relation to the Father is not only true when He was here on earth, but it is also true before He became man and after his ascension.

1 Corinthians 15:28 “And when all things shall be subdued unto Him(Christ), then shall the Son also Himself be subjected unto Him(Father) that put all things under Him (Christ), that God may be all in all.”

In this day and age, this truth is most significant and relevant. We live in a world where homosexuality and transgenderism are considered as a normal way of life. This is not only true among the secular circles of society but it is strange to know that Christian denominations across the world are pushing hard to legalise such activities within their own churches. Why this has come to pass even within the Christian community? The reason is, we are who we worship. The idea that there is no literal Father and no literal Son and that the Father can be the Son and the Son the Father at any given time, makes the people so blind that,to them, homosexuality and transgenderism are perfectly fine.The false teaching that God is a trinity does not lead people to consider homosexuality as sinful.This sin is what made God destroy the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah.

The Source and the Channel

This is the last point we are going to look at from this study. After God had created Adam and Eve, He said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply,and replenish the earth…” (Genesis 1:28). When He created Adam, God created only one life and this same life was in Eve. God had ordained that this same life was to be passed on to their children from generation to generation. Who was the source of this life? And how was this life to be passed to their descendants? This point is easy to understand. Adam was the source of this life and Eve was the channel through which this life should flow to all humanity. It was in Adam that the seed was preserved. When the seed was transported to the womb of Eve, she bore a child.

The man is the source of the seed and the woman is the channel through which the seed would develop into another human life which inherits the life of the parents. Here again, we see the difference between the man and the woman. They are different from each other in this aspect of life.The man cannot be the woman and the woman cannot be the man.

A similar relationship exists between God and His Son. The Father is the source of all things. God is the ultimate source of life, love, goodness and the like. Just as Eve receives everything from Adam, Christ receives everything from the Father,including life.

John 5:26 “For as the Father hath life in himself, so hath he given his Son to have life in himself.”

What is this “life in himself” that the Son received from the Father? It is eternal life. This life can be acquired through Christ. This life originates from the Father, which flows to the Son and through the Son it is given to His followers. We can also say that God gives us eternal life through the Son.

1 John 5:11,12 “And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.”

The power that Christ has, comes from God. He says, “All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth” (Matthew 28:18) because “The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hands.” (John 3:35).

Whatever Christ receives from the Father, He takes to give to those who believe in Him. In this sense, He is the channel or the way. He is not only the way to the Father but He is also the way that connects that Father with humanity.

1 Corinthians 8:6 “But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.”

If Christ is the God, He should have been the source of all things. But according to this verse, the Father alone is the source of all things and Christ is the channel or the way through which all things are. This is in complete agreement with what is being said from the very beginning that God created all things through Christ, His Son.

It is not a hard and difficult thing to know and be able to identify who God is. God is not a mystery as the doctrine of the trinity claims Him to be. God yearns to reveal His true identity and the identity of His Son to us because this knowledge is part of eternal life.

“And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ,whom thou hast sent.” (John 17:3)

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