6.1 - God’s living imprints
What does it mean to be made in the image of a God who has no image and forbids us to ascribe any visible representation to Him? How do we reflect the imageless One, whose name is ineffable? Is it as a blip in evolution’s history; as genetic expressions of a DNA strand that weaves into circumstances and experiences; or as the maturation process of individual attributes - such as looks, talents, abilities and deficits - that God’s image is seen? God, who is unique, intends every aspect of His creation to be a unique design of His special making. Even the countless stars are individually created with distinct names (Isaiah 40:26; Psalm 147:4). How much more surely does God uniquely create every one of the billion human lives that have walked the earth. Not one is redundant. Not one is replaceable. Each has been given a special name by Him. God who is unique has impressed uniqueness in all He makes
How do we uniquely reflect God? How does His image fit with the nature and nurture we are born into? All that we are and have is made by our Creator’s unique grace. All we are born into reflects the Giver more truly than we who receive. This truth compares to our own giving. Anything I give of my time or care or resources is expressing me, the giver, to the one I give to. My gifts express me to the recipient. So, too, is God as Giver reflected in who we are and what we have. Of all that we have been given by God, what most directly reflects His divine image is our freedom to respond and give back to Him. This freedom can be called our personal will. The will is as the root of a person’s being which can be attended to and nourished or forgotten and dried up. Regardless of how we attend to it, our will never goes away. The will’s nature eludes any clear and precise definition. It is always engaging life’s circumstances but is never determined by them. Its dynamics cannot be isolated or separated from all that occupies it in this world of givens. It has no physical location. Not only is it unseen and its boundaries elusive but it is hidden so deep within us, it is incapable of being found and validated by anyone, not even by our own self. Yet, though it’s existence can’t be proven, we each most surely possess a personal will, whether it is as small as a mustard seed or large as an oak tree
The quality of being human is greatly informed by this will which alone has the potential for freedom in this world of givens. This freedom is experienced to the extent that we freely receive all we are given so that we can freely respond in the fullest potential of both our will and what we are given. A bird is most free when it receives and expresses its unique nature in its circumstances and doesn’t try to imitate a lion in another forest or a table in a dining room. If a bird were to try to be what it isn’t and where it isn’t, it would become entangled in the frustrating dilemma of denying what is for the sake of what can never be. Living within the unique realm of all we are and have been given is the arena where our freedom is found and flourishes
We discover our will’s freedom in its relation to what we have. Our will isn’t more free when we have more riches and things to choose from. We are not more free when we are smarter and have more abilities. Wealth, talent and opportunities offer more choices but human freedom is not ultimately defined by the number of available choices. The quality and extent of freedom are best purified and enlarged by the way we receive and respond to the composition of our personal life. Even when there is only one apparent option available -- a prisoner who can only have one type of food in one cell with one roommate while doing one prison time -- the will can choose how to receive and respond to every one of those single available choices. Nelson Mandela was a prisoner for twenty-seven years in South Africa. He had few choices in prison life but he could choose how to respond to his deprived conditions. After he was eventually freed, the world saw a man who was less defined by his imprisonment than by his character that was free to blossom in prison. His freedom to choose did not originate from his givens. Mr. Mandela responded to his prison time in the freedom of his will, and the world witnessed the unique value of his life
Asceticism is an ancient practice used by different faiths to help free one’s will from life’s circumstances. Its word comes from the Greek for practice, training or exercise. It usually refers to the demanding practice of abstaining from material possessions and activities that overly depend on the world’s resources. Withdrawing from people, comforts or food are examples of ascetic practices. A central purpose of this discipline is to exercise and strengthen one’s will by becoming as independent as possible from circumstances and things. The ascetic does this by denying personal appetites so that his will is less compelled by them and more free to choose whether to satisfy them and how. The practice of asceticism tries to address a very important concern in all life journeys, both spiritual and psychological: how to best live in this material world without being controlled and defined by it. How do we live freely in relation to the cosmic order that orders how we must live?
Distinguishing life’s givens from our personal will is an essential part of psychological and spiritual growth because it increases the freedom to receive and respond to life’s intention and circumstances. As our will grows in freedom, we find it assuming a dignity and quality of life that no circumstance can give or take away. Our will’s freedom is at its fullest when face to face with God, when we fully reflect Him and respond in the freedom He gives. When we live more fully in the nature we have been freely given, our will can thrive in its freedom. What is our true nature? Its essence is that all we are and have is freely given to us. Living by this truth that nothing originates from us, frees us to be who we are created to be, not experiencing life as a constraint because of what we judge it should be or as a frustration because of what of what we judge it shouldn’t be. When a will is clear in its nature as a gift and is united to receive and respond to the Giver and to all it is given, it is able to exercise the profound challenge of its freedom to grow. Whether we use our will’s freedom or not is for us to choose. In the following chapter we will look at life as a relational response to all God gives and the paradox of an identity that becomes more clear and real the more fully it reflects God, our holy Other. For now, we can say the human will is the most personal expression of our unique identity, by which our character and spirit mature or wither
Our abilities to rule, to be creative, generous, sacrificial and loving all reflect something of God’s image but in the Garden of Eden, it was Adam and Eve’s betrayal of God that most clearly expressed God’s imprint. Satan offered them a choice between him and God, to take what he was offering them or what God had already given them. Who would they choose to trust? What did they want to receive? How would they respond? They decided to trust Satan and his promises. After this choice, their will retained the freedom to respond in this world but no longer as God had given it to them. Adam and Eve lost the freedom to know God and His will in all that He had given them
Once they ate from the tree, they were caught in an inextricable bind that grips us to this day. By choosing to trust someone who cannot be trusted, they became blind to the One who can be trusted with the life He gave them. Their blindness to God banished their freedom as God made them, naked and in open communion with Him. They turned from the truth of their life to the work of their own devises. “Cursed is the ground,” God said, “because of you; in toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. . . By the sweat of your face you will eat bread, till you return to the ground” (Genesis 3:17, 19). God exiled them from the Garden and His presence and doomed them to a life of labor, toil and sweat. As with all aspects of our self that reflect God, when we turn from the One we reflect, the Spirit of the One we reflect no longer informs His image in us. Instead, we labor in collaboration with others to substantiate our life and form a self image. When we reflect God’s image, however, we rest in the substance of His freedom and goodness that is uniquely His to give