Lesson 1 In His Image

     In Genesis 1L26-28 (Amplified), "God said, Let Us (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) make mankind in Our Image, after Our Likeness, and let them have complete authority over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, the (tame) beasts, and over everything that creeps upon the earth."  Verse 27 goes on, "So God created man (the species of man) in His Own Image, in the Image and Likeness of God He created him; male and female He created them."  Verse 28 says, "And God blessed them and said to them, Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it (using all its vast resources in the service of God and man) have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and over every living creature that moves upon the earth."
    Psalm 8:4-6 (Amplified) says, "What is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of (earth born) man that You care for him? Yet You have made him but a little lower than God (or heavenly beings), and You have crowned him with glory and honor. You made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet."
     We have doubted for millenniums and have struggled in our hearts concerning the veracity of these two scriptures.  This doubt has kept us struggling over who we really are and about what our role in life is.  On one hand, we try to be humble and act like we're not significant in God's sight and on the other hand, we confess that, "He is our very own Father."
     We cannot seem to approach a place of faith where we simply walk in what God caused and made us to be.  We try being humble and speak of ourselves as being worthless, all the while we try communing with a Holy God.  It has hindered our ability to pray and perform in the supernatural form of who we truly are.  We can confess that Jesus saved and cleansed us and still confess that we're sinners abiding below what the new birth has returned us to.
     Declaring we are in His Image and Likeness while still declaring we're sinner and contaminated, is wrong.  We've mostly, walked in raw emotion and carnality and not in the Spirit in our walk with Him.  If we've been born again, then we've been birthed into the very Kind of Being that God is.
    We continue to identify more with the old "house of flesh" we were rather than with the person who live in it.  My house is where I live, but my house isn't me.  2Corinthians 5:4 (Amplified) says, "For while we are still in this tent (body), we groan under the burden and sigh deeply (weighted down, depressed, oppressed) not that we want to put off the body (the clothing of the spirit), but rather that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal (our dying body) may be swallowed up by life (after the resurrection)."
    Notice how it's our earthly body (our clothing of the spirit) that is groaning and being depressed and not the spirit that lives in it.  We are born again into God's Very Own Image.  We are like our Father.  No matter how you might look at it, this is true.  Everything on this planet is just the same.  When a woman becomes pregnant, she never wonders what she will bear.  She might wonder if she's having a boy or girl, but she doesn't wonder if it's a human being.
     Genesis 1:11-12 (Amplified) tells us, "And God said, Let the earth put forth (tender) vegetation; plants yielding seed and fruit trees yielding fruit who's seed is in itself, each according to its kind, upon the earth."  Verse 12 says, "The earth brought forth vegetation; plants yielding seed according to their own kinds and trees bearing fruit in which was their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good (suitable, admirable) and He approved it."
     We recognize how this truth has prevailed over the earth since it was created.  Apple seeds bear apples, peach seeds bear peaches, horses bear horses, dogs bear dogs, people bear people and Spirits bear spirits.  If we are born again by the seed of God, then we bear His Likeness and Image just like everything else He created.
     1Peter 1:23 (Amplified)says, "You have been regenerated (born again), not from a mortal origin (seed, sperm) but from One that is immortal by the Everliving and Lasting Word of God."  If everything bears fruit according to its original seed (and it does), then we're like the Seed Who gave us life.  The real you is the one who lives in this mortal body.  Just as the seed reproduces in itself, so does the Seed of God bring forth in His Likeness and Image and that is people (spirits) just like Him.