Communal Image of God
One of the paramount questions we as a society can ask is what it means to be human. The answer to that question informs us of how we relate to God and interact with each other. One of the most fundamental yet most challenging aspects of being human is how we relate to one another. God has indeed created us to be relational, but why must it be so complicated sometimes?
Moving away from the usual conversation of being made in the image of God and what that means for the individual, let us take the conversation a step further to ask the question: what does it mean for a community to be made in the image of God?
How we relate to God and each other speaks directly to what Jesus called us to do when he gave us the greatest commandment: to love God and others. (Matthew 22.36-39) Most often, when people talk about human nature, they start with creation and being made in the image of God. This is a great place to start, and it is the right place to start. If you want a deeper dive into being made in the image of God, listen to this sermon on our Imago Dei.
For this conversation, we will start with Jesus’ words to the Pharisees about the most important relationships we can have as humans and how those relationships reflect the image of God.
To set the scene, there was a group of religious leaders who came to Jesus to test him, hoping to catch him in any way that might give them grounds to do away with Jesus and get their lives back to normal. The group that challenged Jesus was known as the Sadducees. Some may be familiar with this group, but just in case you are not up to date on your first-century Jewish Sects, let's quickly review.
The Sadducees: They interpreted the Mosaic Law; these are the laws found starting with the Ten Commandments and working through the rest of the 600 or so laws. So much so that they only noted the books of Moses as the canonical scripture. They believed there was no resurrection or a future life.
The Pharisees: This group exercised strict piety under the Mosaic Law. They believed in the afterlife, and the focus of their teaching leaned more toward the ethical rather than the theological.
The Essenes: They were an isolated group or community that was focused on communal ownership, mutual responsibility, and a strict observance of the purity laws of the Torah.
The Zealots: They were a group of passionate, devout people with exclusive devotion to God. They opposed the payment of taxes to the Roman Empire. They were fiercely loyal to Jewish traditions, and they were strictly opposed to the use of the Greek language in the Holy Land.
That was a gross oversimplification of four very complicated groups within the Jewish community, but in doing so, we have a better understanding of who is questioning Jesus.
In this section of Matthew, the Sadducees were questioning Jesus about resurrection and death. If you remember, this group did not believe in resurrection or the afterlife. This question and Jesus’ answer are fascinating and worth reading on your own time, but they are irrelevant to our conversation today. (Matthew 22.23-33)
Where we want to focus on today is in the latter part of this section. (Matthew 22.34-40) In this section, we find Jesus speaking about the communal image of God.
Jesus had just stunned the Sadducees with his talk of the resurrection and afterlife. At this point, the Pharisees came into the conversation to try to trap Jesus. When I read a story like this, I think of my childhood watching professional wrestling and the tag team partners on the ropes. The one in the match is stunned on the ground, rolling around, and the other partner is outside the ring, begging to get tagged in to beat the opponent. In the wrestling world, sometimes those moments go well for the team on the ropes, but in this case, with Jesus, it does not go well for them.
The Pharisees jumped into the conversation and wanted to know the greatest commandment of the Law and Prophets. They, like the Sadducees, wanted to test Jesus in an attempt to trap him and discredit him with his followers. This would have been an important question to answer because, looking at over 600 Mosaic Laws, often the debate was about which ones were more important than others.[1] Any time a teacher answers this question, it changes how people view the teacher. It is clear from the language that this question is meant to trap Jesus in a situation that, hopefully, for the religious leaders, would cause people to stop following him.
In a move that only Jesus could accomplish, he takes the totality of the Hebrew Scriptures, often referred to as the Law and Prophets, and narrows them down to two distinct answers—in doing so, presents the entirety of what these religious leaders know as two basic commands.[2] To love God and to love one’s neighbor are placed on equal footing in the eyes of Jesus. How can you love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and might (Deut 6.5) without loving your neighbor? Jesus even stated that he had come to fulfill the law and prophets. (Matthew 5.17) Radically, as is the nature of Jesus, he surmises the entirety of love through the relational love of God and others.
This strictly Jewish audience would have thought of fellow Israelites when speaking about their neighbors, and it is echoed in the Hebrew Scriptures. (Leviticus 19)
Leviticus 19:18 (NASB 2020)
18 You shall not take vengeance, nor hold any grudge against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself; I am the Lord.
We know that Jesus came to change how we relate to others. In the context of the first-century believer, he called the people to love both Jews and Gentiles. The Apostle Paul stated it best:
Galatians 3:26–29 (NASB 2020)
26 For you are all sons and daughters of God through faith in Christ Jesus. 27 For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to promise.
What Jesus is calling us to do at this moment is an exercise in loving God, others, and ourselves. These may seem like three distinct callings by Jesus, but in reality, they are all a single call to be the reflection of Jesus in the world. Jesus was embodied during his time here on earth. (John 1.14) How we use our embodiment is of great importance, and it starts with how we relate to the creation around us. To be the full embodiment we were called to directly relates to our relationships.
How we relate to God is important.
How we relate to others is important.
How we relate to ourselves is important.
A thriving community is one centered around healthy relationships. When I talk about community, I am referring not only to the church body but also to the broader community, which we are all called to reflect the image of God. In our nature, we are naturally resistant to the idea of these communal relationships–it is something that needs to be proclaimed over and over in a grace-filled community.[3] Relationships are messy and even harder when they involve people with different ideals and values. But genuinely seeing another person and valuing them as an image of God calls us to grace, which is only possible through the Holy Spirit. Jesus embodied the notion of seeing people as valuable. The hope of holiness is that we are transformed and renewed into the image of Christ daily. We pray for grace when we make mistakes, but are we quick to show the same grace to others when they fall short? When we foster a grace-filled community, we inspire our communal relationships to be a community where people are seen as true image-bearers of Christ.
[1] R. T. France, The Gospel of Matthew, The New International Commentary on the New Testament, (Grand Rapids, Mich: Eerdmans, 2007), Book. https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=sso&db=nlebk&AN=1058550&authtype=sso&custid=s8876267&site=ehost-live&scope=site&custid=s8876267&profile=ehost&scope=site. 418.[2] Cynthia A. Jarvis and E. Elizabeth Johnson, Feasting on the Gospels--Matthew, Volume 2 : A Feasting on the Word Commentary (Louisville, KY, UNITED STATES: Westminster John Knox Press, 2013). http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/indwes/detail.action?docID=4417160. 205.[3] Jarvis and Johnson, Feasting on the Gospels--Matthew, Volume 2 : A Feasting on the Word Commentary. 204.