For the month of January at DGCC, we are considering together as a family the wonderful reality of man being made in God’s image. This glorious doctrine makes clear who God created us to be as humans. Humanity is the crown of God’s creation meant to reflect and represent God. Since man, then, is made in God’s image, it follows that man cannot properly reflect and represent God unless his also knows God. Therefore, essential to man being made in God’s image is the reality that God made man alone to be in special relationship with him. Being made in God’s image means that man alone reflects God, represents God, and is in loving relationship with God. So, again, man cannot properly know himself and be himself if he does know God. To know God is to know who he created us to be, namely whole-hearted, lovers and worshipers of him as beneficiaries of his boundless love.[1] We can see this image of God in Mark 12:28–34.

In Mark 12:28–34, a scribe asks Jesus what the most important commandment is. Jesus responds in Mark 12:29–30 saying, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” Jesus points to Deuteronomy 6:4–5 which Moses proclaimed to Israel when they were on the cusp of the Promised Land. In this command, God calls on his people to love him. Why? Well, if we look closely at the text, we can discern two reasons: (1) God is one, and (2) God is their God.

God Is One: Love God Only and Wholly

First, they should love God because of who he is, namely, he is one. In the original context in Deuteronomy, God’s people are about to enter into the land of Canaan, which is a land of many “gods,” who are really not gods at all. God alone is God. He says so himself, “I am the Lord, and there is no other, besides me there is no God” (Isaiah 45:5). So God makes clear in this command to his people that he is the only God, therefore he should be the only God they love. They should not give their affections and love to the many idols and false gods they will encounter in the Promised Land. They should love God alone because he is the only God. To love God in this way is to reflect and represent God. But there is more to God being one than just his uniqueness.

Notice the entire command. According to Jesus in Mark 12:29–30, God commands his people to love him [the Lord your God] “with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all you strength. You could translate this “love the Lord your God from your whole heart, and from your whole soul, and from your whole mind, and from your whole strength.” The command is to not simply love God only but to love God wholly, with your whole being. The command is to be completely undivided in your love for God. Why? Because he is one. Because God is undivided in himself. God, the only and the one God, is perfectly united in his affection for himself. He is completely satisfied in himself and has no need of anyone or anything. He loves himself with a whole, undivided love. Indeed, if he needed another he would not be God. And, if he were to love another more than himself he would either not be God or he would be an idolater. We are to love God wholly because God is one, undivided in himself. Therefore, to love God in this way is to reflect and represent God. We often don’t do either of these (loving God only and wholly) very well, though.

Sinful man expertly divides his love. In our sinfulness we don’t want to give our love only and wholly to God. We’d rather divide our loves between God and other gods whether it is work, a hobby, a relationship, a particular vice, or any other idol we make in our image. Indeed, all of our divided loves have one thing in common: they serve the god of self. We divide our love amongst other things because we want to love ourselves only and wholly. In truth, then, divided love for God is not love for God at all. It is love for self, and God simply becomes another self-serving idol that we recreate in our image to meet our desires. What we ultimately find when we divide our loves in this way, is that nothing we set our affections on gives us any life or love in return. Rather, all of these things ultimately steal our life from us. Indeed, we can only rightly love and enjoy the things of earth when our loves are ordered correctly. Only when God alone receives our whole love can we truly begin to enjoy and love his gifts in creation. This is because we were made not to be loved by and love ourselves. Rather, we were made to be loved by and love God. This leads to the second reason we should love God in this command.

God Is Their God: Love the God Who Loved You

The second reason built into the command to love God in Deuteronomy 6:4–5 that Jesus quotes is this: God is their God. “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God” (Deuteronomy 6:4–5). These pronouns, our and your are important. Recall again, this command was first given to Israel after God had saved them. God is their God because he redeemed Israel out of slavery in Egypt, covenanted with them, made them his own, and loved them. God is their God because he invited their pagan forefather, Abram, into loving covenant with him (Genesis 12:1–3). They are to love God because he has first loved them and brought them into relationship with him by his grace. This OT reality points to what we celebrate in the new covenant. God redeemed us through the gospel of Jesus while we were his enemies. Through Jesus, God showers his love on us and brings us into loving relationship with himself. And the proper response is to be who he made us to be, lovers and worshipers of him wholly and only—ones who reflect, represent, and are in loving relationship with him.

The Image of God: Loved By and Loving God

God made us in his image to reflect and represent him. But we cannot do this until we realize that we were made to be loved by and to love God only and wholly. We are the beneficiaries of the one, undivided, self-sufficient, needless God’s love. In Christ, God loves us first so that we can wholly love him once again. We not only reflect and represent God, but we are in loving relationship with him. God made us to be whole-hearted lovers and worshipers of him, the one God, as beneficiaries of his boundless, undivided love. This is man, made in the image of God.

[1] See Hoekema’s robust discussion of man being made in God’s image in order to reflect, represent, and be in loving, covenantal relationship with God. Anthony A. Hoekema, Created in God’s Image, 1st ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994).