Memeology: Jesus vs. Physics?

A guy I work with shared this meme with my via text. I'm only guessing, but I believe the challenge it poses impressed him. Below is my response. Please forgive the formatting; it was texted ;)

 ________________________________

Brandon, 

First, physics, as a thing, doesn't exist. Physics is a term we use to describe

our observations of the seemingly inviolable regularities and consistencies we

discover in the material (and sometimes immaterial) aspects of our experience.

Physics, then, is a human activity, not a thing in itself.

Having better defined our terms, we can move toward an answer to the question.

Since the problem was posed in somewhat simplistic, even archaic Newtonian,

terms, I'll answer it in like.

Secondly, then, we should ask, what are the most basic attributes of the laws we

discover that govern our experience of the physical world? 1st, they are

immaterial; they don't grow on trees and you can't stub your toe on a

law--they're nonphysical entities. 2nd, they're invariable, they're immutable;

that is, they don't change. If they did, they'd not be laws. 3rd, they're

universal. For example, the so-called law of gravity, which is implicitly

invoked in this meme, it true regardless of place. 4th, they're abstract, which

is to say that, they are true apart from any physical instantiation. And

finally, laws of physics are absolute, they're irreducible.

Now that we know what we are talking about, we can ask a final question: What is

the source and ontological grounding of these laws? That is, where might we find

an entity in our experience that is immaterial, invariable, universal, abstract,

and absolute? Or better, where might laws with these attributes find residency?

Nothing in our physical experience can account for these laws. Rather, these are

many of the same attributes of God, as revealed in Christ, nature, history, and

scripture. In short, only if the God of Christian theism exists could the laws

of physics exist. So, rather than asking, If physics, how Jesus? Reality demands

the other way around: If not Jesus, then how on earth physics!?! Jesus is the

Source and necessary precondition of physics and therefore has little problem

ruling over such laws.

Does that help?

The Recent Election, Human Rights, and Pro-Abortion Rhetoric

One wonders how many of this year’s mid-term election races were won, based on the claim that the prolife candidate’s position was contrary to women’s rights, because he or she took a position against elective abortion on demand.




Sociopaths notwithstanding, we all agree that adult human beings enjoy an equal share in equal rights, which we commonly call human rights. What, though, is that property we all share that grounds our human rights?




Is it function, size, development, race, or gender that grounds human rights? No, because these criteria sometimes vary radically among people, while our claim to rights does not. Human rights do not come in degrees. Our rights are based on what we are, not what we can do.




That universal property which grounds human rights is the human nature. Human nature is not something that develops over time. Instead it’s a necessary precondition for all of our subsequent development. Therefore, human nature is prior to human development.




The continuum of human development begins at fertilization and continues to natural death. All humans, from conception onward, have an equal share in human rights, especially the right to life. Women's rights are what they are because of their more fundamental basis in human rights.




Consequently, the rhetoric that the prolife candidate or vote is one against women’s rights is absurd. Regardless of the fact that approximately half of all abortions take a tiny female’s life, women’s rights presuppose human rights, which all enjoy—almost all.  




Pro-Abortion Consistency--Making Murder Moral

What follows is an editorial from the 02/09 Roanoke Times. Its author is transparently an exponent of the functional-person view, thus parroting ethicists such as Peter Singer. The down side is that Roanoke allows its letter-writers only 200 words, including the Re: title! This makes things very difficult for those of us who have a tendency for verbosity. My letter is below, attempting to answer Miller within the confines of 200 words. My letter is still forthcoming at this point.

Inconsistency in the abortion debate

Harlan B. Miller

Miller, of Blacksburg, is a member of the Voices of the Valley panel.

In his column, "Now grant personhood to fetuses" (Jan. 27), Cal Thomas argued that the Supreme Court, having extended the rights of artificial corporate persons, should recognize the personhood of unborn humans.

The headline added to the column was a bit misleading, for Thomas' position appears to be that while the personhood of corporations is something granted, that of unborn humans is not granted but recognized. That is, that unborn humans are full-fledged persons from which legal recognition has been wrongly withheld.

The claim that the human conceptus/embryo/fetus is a person with a right to life is basic to the arguments of those who would ban abortion. Those who would permit abortion often avoid responding to it directly. But the claim shouldn't be left unchallenged, for it is false. Fetuses (I'll follow custom and use this term for all gestational stages) aren't persons.

The word "human" is sometimes used as a synonym for person, but this is unwise. On the one hand, we have a biological category, the species Homo sapiens. On the other hand, is a moral/political category: a person is one that can act, can be held responsible, has interests that are deserving of consideration, is aware of itself and so on.

Not all members of the species Homo sapiens are persons. Anecephalic neonates, the very very severely intellectually impaired, and those in true irreversible comas are members of the species, but they cannot and will not be able to function as persons. Probably there are persons who are not members of our species. Christians believe in a Trinity of three persons, at most one of whom is a member of the species Homo sapiens. Probably there are nonhuman persons on other planets, and perhaps on this one.

It is very easy to take human and person as equivalent, since (theological exceptions aside) all the persons you know are probably humans, and almost all the humans are persons. A human fetus is a potential person. That is, if all goes well, that organism will develop into a person. But a potential person is not therefore a person. Acorns are potential oak trees, but that does not make them oak trees.

In late stages of gestation, the fetus probably possesses at least some sort of awareness and can experience pain and some sort of pleasure. But no human fetus is as aware of its environment or itself as a steer or a hog. We slaughter these animals for no more important reason than our preference for certain tastes.

Abortions, in contrast, are undertaken only for very serious reasons in the lives of real, unquestioned persons. A consistent opponent of abortion should also be a strict vegetarian.
Of course few of us are consistent all the time. In fact most American opponents of abortion do not really believe that fetuses are full persons with a right to life as strong as yours or mine. It is generally agreed that a ban on abortion must have exceptions. Usually these exceptions are when abortion is necessary to save the life of the pregnant woman and when conception is the result of rape or incest.

The first of these exceptions makes sense only if the right to life of the fetus is weaker than that of the woman, and the second and third make sense only if the fetus effectively has no such right at all. Obviously the fetus is not responsible for the circumstances of its conception. A great wrong has been done, but not by the fetus.

Suppose a gang of thugs invades your house, steals and destroys your goods and horribly brutalizes you. Then as they leave they deposit one of their earlier victims, battered and bleeding, on your living room floor. You are responsible neither for her condition nor for her being in your house. But you can't just toss her out in the street. She's a person and you have to help, at the very least by calling 911.

If, in the analogous rape case, you think it is permissible to abort the fetus, then you cannot really believe that fetuses are persons. Your opposition to abortion must -- consciously or unconsciously -- be based on something else, perhaps a belief that sex is sin and women -- but not men -- deserve punishment for it.

My consistency argument does not touch those who insist on a prohibition of abortion with absolutely no exceptions. They are consistent. And they are wrong. Fortunately, they are also a decided minority.

Absolute Arbitrariness in the Abortion Debate

Re: “Inconsistency in the abortion debate” (Harlan Miller, Editorial, 02/09)

Miller admitted that his central argument is impotent against those he defined as consistent pro-lifers. As one so defined, I appreciated his demand for consistency.

Philosophically speaking, however, Miller’s position was perfectly capricious. He aborted common moral sense, insisting that not all humans are persons. The consequence? Answer: It’s never inherently wrong to kill human beings per se. Not until a human achieves or performs certain intellectual and psychological objectives, can killing him/her be morally relevant.

Humanness is a mode of personhood, however, despite there being non-human persons. For being a person is a necessary precondition for functioning as one.

Miller offers some arbitrary criteria for judging which humans he would allow person-ship. Why not skin color? There’s no consensus. Neither over how developed each function must be. Furthermore, how might we empirically test which “interests...are deserving of consideration”?!? Ad nauseam.

If Miller’s correct, then it would be morally irrelevant if your surgeon intentionally killed you while under anesthesia—you’d be a non-person. No one’s safe from being defined out of personhood, and thus killable.

Even granting that “consistent pro-lifers” are “a minority,” thankfully, we far outnumber those like Miller!


Kevin Stevenson

Big Island

Naturalistic vs. Christian Theistic Views of History

Here is a letter by my editorial-adversary, David McLoughlin. He normally attacks the faith in the Bedford Bulletin, and keeps his political morosophy restricted to the Lynchburg, VA News & Advance. Last week, however, he stepped out side the box a bit and submitted this in Lynchburg. So, of course, I couldn’t allow the opportunity to pass. As of today, my response letter is still forthcoming.

History’s ‘what-ifs’

Letter writers frequently refer to the U.S. as a “Christian nation” or declare our “exceptionalism” — neither of which is true. Our heritage is as much the result of accident as it is of our own determination. Consider just a couple of the “what ifs” of history and think how fragile the outcomes were and what might have been.

After Muhammad’s establishment of Islam, it spread rapidly across North Africa resulting in the Moors ruling Spain for 700 years. In 1492, the Moors were finally defeated at Granada and ultimately driven out. What if the Moors had won at Granada?

Soon thereafter Spain began its exploration of the New World which included both North and South America. If the Muslims rather than Christians had been in control, Islam, not Christianity, may have dominated the Americas. The Spanish influence from Mexico south is still recognizable today. Our largest minority will soon be Hispanic. While my pure speculation may be of interest only to those who recognize the fragility and accidental character of history, it does suggest that we ought not to be so smug and certain of the reasons that provide the foundation of our characteristics today. We are as much an accident of history as any other nation and, as such, should accept that our destiny might have been much different. The Middle East is the result of the English drawing lines in the sand after World War I, and we are still living with that disaster.

The U.S. is important today as much because of the rich resources we inherited and the two oceans and two friendly countries on our borders as for our own efforts. While it’s true we are predominately Christian by numbers, thankfully we are a secular nation by our Constitution. Could it have been different if the Muslims had won at Granada? Sure. Most U.S. Christians might have been Muslim just like they would have been Hindu if born in India. Imagine a Muslim Liberty University.

My point, of course, is that we are the product of our history as fragile as that is, and a more worldly view, as opposed to an ethnocentric myopia, would serve us well as we participate in a multicultural world.

If people dislike the U.S., it’s not because of our wealth, but because of our attitudes and actions toward people of other nations.

DAVID McLOUGHLIN

Historical Whatnots?

I am compelled to identify the latent comic relief in David McLoughlin’s, “History’s ‘what-ifs’ (Letters to the Editor, Wednesday, 03/10). Although his premises and conclusions had serious intentions, attempting to wed these produces some slapstick philosophy. While McLoughlin admited his “pure speculation” would likely impress only those who share his outlook, he imposed his criticisms and conclusions upon everyone.

The undercurrent of this letter is what’s known as metaphysical determinism. That is, a view of final reality that starts with a blind, undirected universe, consisting of only physical stuffs—like humans and nations. These stuffs move through history, controlled purely by fixed natural laws. Prior physical stuffs, working in accord with these fixed natural laws produce “fragile...accidental” features with no unifying, purposive beginning, meaning or end.

Mindful of this, consider McLoughlin’s central what-if: “What if the Moors had won Granada?”

If peoples and nations are simply material stuffs, aimlessly determined by impersonal natural law, then one could rightly ask, What do you mean, “What-if”? Does he mean, ‘What if’ natural law was temporarily suspended in order to bring about an alternate product to that which all the historical and physical antecedent causes had predetermined (I owe kudos to Steve for this line of criticism)? This is ironically similar to C. S. Lewis’ definition of miracles. Natural miracles, Mr. McLoughlin? Hilarious.

Historical “what-ifs” make sense only if there is an absolute-personality Who, knowing all possible choices, deliberates and governs according to His plan and purposes. Thankfully, there is. “For kingship belongs to the LORD, and he rules over the nations” (Psalm 22:28). McLoughlin’s “What-ifs” are intelligible only if the very Christianity he despises were true.

Secondly, he admitted that his observations were conjectural, but from these he goes on to insist, “we ought...we should.” These are moral terms. It is plain silliness to say that persons are the “accidental” outcome of blind historical and natural forces, and then speak of moral obligations. If McLoughlin’s correct, we may describe what “is” the case, but never prescribe what “ought” to be the case. Morality, Mr. McLoughlin? Uproarious.

Finally, McLoughlin presumes, on the one hand, that peoples’ choice of religion is sociologically determined. Nevertheless, even in making this claim, he, on the other hand, understands himself and his position free from such a morass, and thus culturally neutral. Sounds somewhat funny doesn’t it? Exactly.

McLoughlin, from his own culturally relative, predetermined social construct within a blind, impersonal historical flux, makes the moral demand that the rest of us, namely Christians, make the objective, personal, ethically meaningful choice to transcend our socially determined biases. Sidesplitting!

Only if Christianity is true, could McLoughlin’s request be performed.


KEVIN STEVENSON

THE EVOLUTIONISTS’ DILEMMA

The transition from modernity and postmodernity has involved a radical shift in epistemology. However, within both paradigms, philosophical naturalism is the dominate metaphysical assumption. Therefore, the Christian’s need to be able to aptly confront and destroy the stronghold of the evolutionary hypothesis is always a fore issue.

In my experience, a frustration would often arise. This frustration was rooted in the nonbeliever's semantic sliding between two meanings of the term evolution. One the one hand, they will try in vain to argue for evolution in its etiological sense: Evolution explains the origins and sustention of everything. On the other hand, when this premise is being battered, they will quickly invoke some observational variations in a genus or the like, and then attempt to transfer the Christian’s concession of that point back into their argument for evolution in the etiological sense, what I call meta-evolution. They then want to point out that the Christian is anti-science in their rejection of meta-evolution.

Moreover, I’ve found that it is not always the case that this is overtly intentional on the part of the nonbeliever. That is, the nonbeliever is not equivocating the concepts self-consciously. A scanting look through any public science textbook will reveal the same method of persuasion; which, on the part of the textbook contributors, we must conclude however that the use of the equivocation is programmatic. Granting the natural man’s general enmity against God’s truth, the student takes the propaganda in as a fish does water. This argument can help in educating the nonbeliever of just how futile their underlying assumptions are.

Often, then, nonbelievers who have not engaged in the tough-mindedness required to see through the smoke of the intelligentsia are simply parroting what a minimum of 12 years of direct indoctrination has given them.

The only answer to bad reasoning is truth. I’ve found that the use of the dilemma--a valid form of argument--helpful in defusing this type of rhetoric.

Formally, the dilemma has the following pattern:

1. Either P or R

2. If P, then Q

3. If R, then S

4. Therefore, either Q or S

From here, one simply demonstrates from the conclusion (4) that Q and S are either irrelevant, unhappy, or absurd.

This is exactly what I attempt to do with the argument below. In short, microevolution is irrelevant since it is empirically demonstrable and perfectly consistent with biblical teaching; meta-evolution, however, is both a philosophical assumption and philosophically absurd. Therefore, neither concept presents a threat to the biblical doctrine of creation.

The next paragraph is a general framework for how I present my challenge to the evolutionist, though each dialogue must allow for vast personal variability. The more formal argument after it is incorporates an example of a redutio ad absurdum for deconstructing the meta-evolutionary premise. But again, this also requires some flexibility for viability. I hope you find it helpful.

The Thesis:

The evolutionary exponents are either unconsciously trading on ambiguity or are guilty of intentionally equivocating the term “evolution” in order to beguile their audience. Either way, it matters very little, for whether the evolutionary exponent prefixes the term “evolution” with “micro/macro” or “meta,”[1]and their respective connotations, neither concept threatens, much less circumvents the integrity of the basic biblical doctrine of creation ex nihilo.

The Argument:

P1. When evolutionists use the term “evolution,” they are either denoting micro/macro-evolution or meta-evolution.

P2. If micro/macro-evolution is what is meant; that is, either minor or radical changes occurring within the constraints of the law of biogenesis, then surely no one is arguing, biblical creationist or otherwise.

P3. If meta-evolution is being assumed, however, then their argument is self-referentially incoherent, self-refuting; if they’re right, then they’re wrong. This premise is not only intuitively true,[2] but objectively so, for two major reasons:

If (A) “All that Is” is merely a random, impersonal, unconscious collision of atoms and their chaotic chemical interactions, then our brains are simply one minor part in this disorderly, irrational cosmic dance.

Nevertheless, if our brains are ultimately thus, then what we imagine to be “thoughts” and/or “reasoning” are only a façade, since the electro-chemical reactions occurring in our brains couldn’t have any more truth value and/or rational meaning than any other of our physiological happenings.[3]

Furthermore, if (B) matter is all that “Is,” then the fundamental laws that govern our thought—the laws of logic—could not exist. For such laws (i.e., logic, mathematics, morality, etc.) are immaterial and abstract (hence, contradicting “Matter is all there Is”); moreover they are absolute and invariable. (Thus, also contradicting the proposition the physical universe is all that exists, because the only absolute and unchanging feature of the physical universe is that it’s ever- changing, thus, never absolute!)

C1. If, therefore, meta-evolution is taken to be the case, then we have absolutely no reason for believing that it is true, since true thoughts and logical inferences would be impossible.

C2. When arguing for evolution, therefore, the proponents mean either micro/macro evolution, which no reasonable biblical creationist is arguing against; or they are promoting meta-evolution, which means that no proposition or state of affairs can honestly be called “true,” not least the proposition “Evolution is true”!

C3. Hence, the evolutionary case against biblical creationism is that a logical, reasoned case for or against anything is impossible, which is absurd.

________________________________________________

[1] By “meta”-evolution I am speaking of the Darwinian/neo-Darwinian garden variety etiology (i.e., founding myth), which is generally: something creating itself from nothing (or is eternal stuffs); then, all that “Is” must be understood and explained in terms of an eternal intercourse of matter, energy, and time, from which everything in human experience owes its origin, substance, and sustention.

[2] Numerous studies have demonstrated that even in the face of heavy indoctrination in Darwinian evolution by teachers and even parents, and apart from being exposed to the doctrine of biblical creation, children are bent toward understanding the universe to be designed and created with an ultimate telos intended by its Creator, God. That is to say, people are creationists by birth (via God’s general Self-revelation) and made to be evolutionists, as counterintuitive as that is.

[3] Note: we never stand up from the toilet and turn, point, and proclaim, “That is true!” If, then, evolutionary mythology is the case, neither should we point to any proposition about reality or any given state of affairs or concept and have the audacity to state, “That is true!”

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WORLDVIEW 102

Whether one uses the colloquial term ‘worldview,’ or Kant’s weltanschauung, ‘noetic structure’ (Alvin Plantinga), ‘plausibility structure’ (J.P. Moreland), ‘paradigm,’ or simply ‘outlook,’ all of these terms speak of a general form and structure, a framework. This is true in spite of the multiformity of the personal worldviews expressed in the culture at large.

Despite how abstract and airy fairy they may first appear, most students find the basic categories of philosophical speculation helpful for generalizing the details of a worldview’s content. These are (at least) four:

* Metaphysics (or ontology)
* Epistemology
* Ethics (or morality, axiology)
* Eschatology

There is little, if anything, in human experience that cannot be brought under one of these four headings. Metaphysics is the study of what is ultimately real, what has real existence, the nature of existent things, etc. Epistemology is the study and theory of knowledge; it attempts to examine the nature, extent and methods of knowledge and knowing. Ethics considers morals, values, duty, right and wrong. Finally, eschatology narrowly looks toward the end of history as we know it. Broadly speaking, however, eschatology actually touches all of history, including the present. Eschatology includes what postmoderns scornfully refer to as “metanarrative,” that overarching story that gives significance to every other event in that occurs within that story.

Some have sought to put things in pedestrian terms, using more concrete language and questions that beg to be filled with content. Here is a list of such questions that James Sire offers.

1. What is prime reality—the really real?
2. What is the nature of external reality?
3. What is a human being?
4. What happens to a person at death?
5. Why is it possible to know anything at all?
6. How do we know what is right and wrong?
7. What is the meaning of human history?

James Sire, The Universe Next Door, (Intervarsity Press, 1988), 18.

This is an indirect way of defining a worldview, especially helpful for discovering the content of a particular worldview, one held by some individual. In another post, we’ll look at how questions and categories like these are helpful with raising one’s self-consciousness about the content of one’s own worldview and for engaging contrary ones.

At this point, it behooves us to look at some solid positive definitions of worldview. Notice that these definitions are merely a direct statement of the questions above. Both are indispensable for roundly understanding the issue.

“[Worldview is] a network of presuppositions, which are not verified by the procedures of natural science, regarding reality (metaphysics), knowing (epistemology), and conduct (ethics), in terms of which every element of human experience is related and interpreted.”

Greg Bahnsen, per various lectures. Cf. Pushing the Antithesis, (American Vision, 2007), 244.

“In its simplest terms, a worldview is a set of beliefs about the most important issues in life...[It] is a conceptual scheme by which we consciously or unconsciously place or fit everything we believe and by which we interpret and judge reality.”

Ronald Nash, Worldviews in Conflict, (Zondervan, 1992), 16.

“A worldview is composed of a number of basic presuppositions, more or less consistent with each other, more or less consciously held, more or less true.”

James Sire, The Universe Next Door (Intervarsity Press, 1988), 17.

For some, the term “presupposition” may be new. Essentially, the term is paralleled in Nash’s definition: “beliefs about the most important issues in life.” When Nash says, “most important issues,” even this needs clarification. For so many, “the most important issues” stop short; people generally think of things such as, “Who will I marry?” “What career do I choose?” “Should I live in Chicago or Lynchburg?” (Really, that one too easy;). Presuppositions are the answers to Sire’s questions above. Thus, instead of asking “What career will I choose?” first we must ask, “Are humans active moral agents that can make meaningful choices at all or is everything pre-determined by antecedent causes?” You can sense the difference in quality and profundity.

Basically, all of our suppositions have pre-suppositions. Presuppositions are pre-theoretical and non-inferential. That is to say, presuppositions function like axioms or postulates in algebra. These provide the starting point for deduction, but they themselves cannot be proven or justified by mathematical procedure; axioms must be assumed valid and taken for granted to prove every other proposition within the system. So also presuppositions: We do not reason to them but from them. They are one’s deepest heart commitments and attitudes about how things really are. Presuppositions are first principles; the foundation stones upon which the entire edifice of one’s other beliefs are built.

Now these presuppositions do not exist independent of one another in the vacuum of our minds. Instead, they must be brought into a more or less consistent (Sire) connection with each other. Together they form a “network” (Bahnsen) or “conceptual scheme” (Nash). Collectively, then, they take on a web-like form. Presuppositions are therefore the composite properties that inevitably result in a worldview.

No one figure, since Calvin, has had a greater effect on the centrality and awareness of worldview in Christian thought than the neo-Calvinist Netherlander Abraham Kuyper (1837 – 1920). Every man cited in this post (and scores more) is, more or less directly, an heir of Kuyperian thought. And frankly, I don’t think anyone can improve on Kuyper’s definition of a worldview, from his 1898 Stone Lectures, with it’s elevated prose and organic simile.

“As truly as every plant has a root, so truly does a principle hide under every manifestation of life. These principles are interconnected, and have their common root in a fundamental principle; and from the latter is developed logically and systematically the whole complex of ruling ideas and conceptions that go to make up our life and world-view.”

Christianity: A Total World and Life System, Plymouth Rock Foundation. 1996. 113—14.

Kuyper’s is here describing the Christian worldview, but it is a fitting definition for the concept in general, and will provide a good point of departure for the next post on the subject.

IMAGO DEI: Its Meaning, Implication and Application

I. THE MEANING OF BEING MADE IN GOD’S IMAGE

A. The broader meaning of being made in God’s image lies in the simple fact that man is in a creaturely sense “like” God and “represents” God. So, in some sense man is an idol made in the image of the One who made him; a favor man has been try to reverse and return of ever since. Although man’s Fall severely defaced and distorted the image he bears, the particulars of the broader category are still residual in fallen man, every fallen man.

1. The fact that we are created “like” God means that man shares certain qualities that are similar to God himself. Such qualities may be set in three classes. Man is, in a creaturely capacity, like God metaphysically, mentally and morally. First, man is similar to God metaphysically. One factor that differentiates man from the rest of the created order is that he is a spiritual being;he is made irreversibly immortal, existing somewhere, for better of worse, forever. It is also this aspect of the image that allows us to enjoy fellowship with our Creator—loving, worshiping and sharing meaningful communication with him. This also indicates that there lies within man an immaterial reality to which he is responsible for maintaining and keeping properly orientated to and in the right relationship with God.

Second, man is similar to God in his mental capacities. For millennia man has sought to understand and explain, apart from the “image” factor, his dignifying ability to reason abstractly and discursively. From Plato’s idealism to today’s New Age “cosmic god—mind” and every philosophy and religion in between, has met utter failure in their search for the why and how of human rationality. However, Christian theism is not bankrupt in offering an answer to this question. Human reasoning, both inductive and deductive, in the biblical context makes perfect sense. The triune God of the Bible reveals himself as having all knowledge (omniscience). If, then, this God creates beings in his own image, they too would have knowledge, yet in a limited capacity—true knowledge, though not exhaustive. Also, God gives his creatures a mandate to explore and subdue the rest of created order expanding and adorning it to God’s glory, thus, man would require reasoning abilities for this task. The simplicity of the Christian’s answer for knowledge and rationality in no wise voids its profundity. Our answer is perhaps simple on the face of it, but the only other options are completely irrational, even at their deepest depths!

Lastly, man is a volitional creature sharing moral qualities with God.

Superficially, many other of God’s sentient creatures seemingly reflect some measure of morality (as many naturalistic atheists would be quick to point out). However, the actions and “decisions” of the brute creatures are not innately moral, they are learned behaviors based upon a fear of negative stimulus or in hope of the positive opposite. It is not so with man. A dog on a walk with its master does not stroll past an animal shelter and mourn the dilemma that faces dog-kind. Neither will a dog bark and growl in righteous indignation at the sight of another of the same species suffering at the end of a six foot long chain, being without food, water or shelter. Injustice means nothing to the lower animals; however, it is an aching reality in the very bosom of the image bearer. The only creature who knows and innately senses right-ness and wrong-ness is man, and the only reason is that he is “like” God morally.

In summery, the meaning of our being “God-like” has subtleties far beyond what is offered here, but most if not all may fit into these three categories: metaphysical, mental and moral.

2. The weight and responsibility of being “like” God is magnified by the fact that man is also created to “represent” God. In the historical context of the ancient Near East, the worldview into which Moses wrote, the term “image” would have communicated and “expressed the ‘presence’ of an absent lord (humanly speaking) in the sphere of his own dominion.” This observation helps us to view “image” in the way in which it would have been understood in its originally intended meaning. The trans-cultural nature of this understanding of “representative image” can be seen in Jesus’ dispute with the Pharisees and Herodians over the Roman taxation of Palestinian Jews. Jesus escapes the horns of a dilemma by first pointing out the agreed upon premise: “Whose image and inscription is this?” “Caesar’s” they answered. Therefore, that which bears the Emperor’s “image” (KJV best) reflects his authority, control and presence where ever it is found in the empire (Mt 22:15—22). Jesus escapes the horns of this dilemma by arguing a fortiori, from the lesser (Caesar’s image on the denarius) to the greater (God’s image as stamped upon every human being), thus avoiding the implications of the dilemma posed to him—either the charge of blasphemy from the Jews on the one hand, or the charge sedition from the Romans on the other. Just as Caesar’s presence is represented in his “image” on every denarius, so too God is representatively present in every creature stamped with his own “image.”

Hence, given the goodness of man’s original constitution, it is as if one could have asked the Creator, “what are you like?” and God would have been able to point the inquirer to his image bearers and say, “That is what I am like, for man is the reflection and representation of myself on the earth.” In this our parents failed, as do we all; however, One did not. It is this facet of the “image bearing” that becomes the interpretive backdrop of passages that rightly say of Jesus in his humanity, he bears, perfectly and expressedly, God’s image (Col 1:15; Heb 1:3). Moreover, the same is true when Jesus tells Thomas: “If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him” (Jn 14:7). Thus, we are also able to hear the “ring of truth” in Pilate’s proclamation: “Ecce Homo!” (“Behold, THE MAN!” Jn 19:5).

Therefore, God has given to man as part of the image bearing capacity the responsibility to represent him, the Creator. As God exercises his rule and dominion over the whole of the cosmos, God gives to man, as his viceroy, the role of reflecting that ruling glory over the earth (Gen 1:28; Ps 8:5—8; 115:16).

B. The narrow meaning of being created in the image of God speaks of the image bearing qualities lost at man’s Fall. A biblical view of man and things tells us, even if only intuitively and experientially, things are now abnormal—put out of rights with how they ought to be. Although the OT makes several allusions to ways in which the image of God has been corrupted and some capacities of it even lost when man fell, it is not until God’s revelation about man progresses to Paul’s epistles do we find the specifics.

Certainly one of the most fundamental goals of God’s plan of redeeming man is that they, individually and collectively, “be conformed into the image of his (God’s) Son” (Rom 8:29). Elsewhere, Paul tells us of three qualities which fit squarely into and mirror in a particular way the three categories mentioned above: metaphysical, mental, and moral. These would consist of “true (genuine, God-like) righteousness (moral) and holiness (metaphysical)” and “knowledge (mental) after the image of its creator” (Eph 4:24 and Col 3:10 respectively).

The language Paul uses in Eph 4; “renewed” (v. 23; cf. Col 3:10), “created,” “likeness” (v.24), as well as Col 3; “image of its creator” (v. 10), all points back to man’s originally “good” created constitution of our first parents as found in Gen 1 and 2. This is further bolstered by Paul juxtaposing the “old man” (Adamic) with the “new man” (renewed in, and like Christ). This is not to say that fallen man has utter lost all residual traces of righteousness, holiness and knowledge, for God, in his common grace and by way of man remaining in his image do still posses these characteristics, more or less given the individual, in some sense. However, unregenerate man, that is, fallen man as such, never ever bears them “in truth” (Eph 4:24, NASB), which is the only way God finds them acceptable. Hence, our regeneration in Christ, through the efficacy of the Holy Spirit, and our continued renewal and progressive conformity to Christ’s image is the integral part of God’s Great Plan to bring his whole creation back into a completely restored relationship to himself. The great joy believers know experimentally now points back to a time when things were right (Gen 1 -- 2) and forward to a time when they with be put to rights again (Rev 21 -- 22).

II. IMPLICATION AND APPLICATION

One implication of these reflections on the imago Dei is the responsibility of every image bearer to “be like...represent” God the Creator perfectly. This implication has great value and application in the task of defending and sharing the faith today.

Many of our modern evangelistic efforts are foiled by the sheer fact of our cultural/temporal setting. Our society is currently in what I call the final wave of the “Christian echo.” For instance, thirty to forty years ago a Christian could use terms such as God, sin, cross and salvation when speaking to an unbeliever because of the Christian heritage they both shared by virtue of living in a wave closer to the center of the Christian echo; thus, they shared in large measure an agreed definition of these terms. Today however, the Gospel proper; preaching sin, judgment, Christ’s death and resurrection, has little life transforming effect. This is not to say that the Gospel itself has lost effectiveness and must be changed to reach our generation. God forbid! Rather, it is to say that because most unbelievers no longer share any level of biblical literacy or the slightest understanding of the “Christian story” (the biblical plot-line; major turns in redemptive history, etc) the mere terms of the Gospel miss their mark in the heart and mind of the hearers. Allowing the sinner to translate and redefine the terms on the grounds of their own understanding of their “problem(s),” without filling those terms with biblical content and presenting them in the biblical context is a sure fire way to see hands go up and get cards signed; however, as I said, few of those lives will go on to bear any sustaining fruit of true conversion.

One Christian thinker identifies the people in this generation of the Christian echo as no longer having the “plausibility structure” in their thinking in which the Gospel terms may fit. For instance, to tell average person in America today that “Jesus died for them” might generate a response like this: “Well...that sounds really nice and all, but why would he need to go and do something like that?!?” “Well,” one might reply, “because God loves you!” Yet again, as amazing as that statement is to those of us who know man’s “real problem” and precisely how intrinsically unlovable we truly are, to the unbeliever today, they view themselves as worthy objects of God’s love by virtue of being born in America or some such thing. Attempting to hang the Gospel truths on the average unbeliever’s “plausibility structure” is like trying to drive a nail in a sheered sheet of granite. I would contend that today the terms of the Gospel must be presented in conjunction with the concepts and biblical definitions of those same terms. One such way is to begin by presenting the “Christian story” in its fullness, something that will start with the “image bearing” theme, and how that image looks today; even in their own life. Not until God’s own diagnosis of the problem is made clear in the mind of unbelievers will God’s wondrous gift of his own Son—the Solution to the image bearers problem—make real sense.

It is the image bearing capacity in man that makes sin recognizable for all its vile wickedness. If then, we are Created in God’s image and as such we are, creaturely speaking, like him and are to represent him as a dependant stand in here on earth, when we sin, even the “small ones,” its is nothing less than directly maligning of God’s name, character and holiness! Every person on earth has the responsibility to represent God in this capacity, to glorify the Creator through their rightly reflecting and representing him, thus, to sin is to tell the whole world that: “THIS IS WHAT GOD IS LIKE...HE IS A LIAR; HE HAS WICKED THOUGHTS; HE LUSTS; HE HATES WITHOUT CAUSE...ETC.” Now, this is not how we normally think of sin I know; but given the “image factor” how could it be anything less?!?

Once, therefore, this concept has found its mark in the image bearer one is attempting to evangelizing, the Gospel (God’s offer of a perfect substitute for their maligning representation of him) makes PERFECT sense!