Mothers in the Image of God

Genesis 2:18-25

Jim Davis

Somebody said it takes about six weeks to get back to normal after you've had a baby ............
Somebody doesn't know that once you're a mother, "Normal," is history.

Somebody said you learn how to be a mother by instinct ... 
Somebody never took a three-year-old shopping. 

Somebody said being a mother is boring ...... 
Somebody never rode in a car driven by a teenager with a driver's permit.

Somebody said if you're a "good" mother, your child will "turn out good." 
Somebody thinks a child comes with directions and a guarantee.

Somebody said "good" mothers never raise their voices ..... 
Somebody never came out the back door just in time to see her child hit a golf ball through the neighbor's kitchen window.
 
Somebody said you don't need an education to be a mother. 
Somebody never helped a fourth grader with her math.

Somebody said you can't love the third child as much as you love the first. 
Somebody doesn't have three children.

Somebody said a mother can find all the answers to her child-rearing questions in the books ........ 
Somebody never had a child stuff beans up his nose or in his ears.

Somebody said the hardest part of being a mother is labor and delivery ....... 
Somebody never watched her "baby" get on the bus for the first day of kindergarten. . . . or on a plane headed for military "boot camp."

Somebody said a mother can do her job with her eyes closed and one hand tied behind her back ....... 
Somebody never organized  giggling daisys, brownies, juniors, cadetts and seniors to sell cookies.

Somebody said a mother can stop worrying after her child gets married ....
Somebody doesn't know that marriage adds a new son or daughter-in-law to a mother's heartstrings.

Somebody said a mother's job is done when her last child leaves home
Somebody never had grandchildren.

Somebody said your mother knows you love her, so you don't need to tell her .........  
Somebody isn't a mother. (The source for the information above is unknown by me.)

It is difficult to think of mothers or fathers---the family-- without thinking about how families are deteriorating. Single-family one-parent homes are becoming the norm. Many homes have been abandoned by one parent or in too many cases by both parents. 

The misery of today’s Me Generation has opened up huge cracks in our culture. Things like meaning, purpose, fellowship, community and family have fallen through the cracks. The very things created to give us meaning and purpose has been lost in our contemporary society. Families are becoming nothing more than people sharing the same roof and the same television set while each pursue his or her detached and separate life.

When marriage partners recognize they are made in the image of God it puts an entirely different perspective on the family. When we live up to God’s image of us it puts an entirely different perspective on our lives. It takes us back to the beginning when God created man and woman and commissioned them to subdue the earth together as one.

Marriages are made in heaven, but it takes a lot of work on earth to make them what heaven desires them to be. There are many enemies to healthy marriages. Personal conflicts, individualism, materialism, two little time, infidelity and drugs are all extremely powerful distractions. Marriages whither and die because God has been left out. 

Life is About Personal Communion

Personal communion is what the image of God is about—not only communion between Man and God, but between Man and the rest of his environment, especially his fellow human beings. We were created as relational beings because this is what being made in the image of God is all about. 

God created us to love and to be loved and to discover our self-worth in our pursuit of a relationship with him and our fellowman. John states that God is love—it is who he is. The image of God is created in our minds as we see him moving into a relationship with his creation. We see God saying, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness.” The statement reveals God’s relationship with those working with him in creation. It is God’s love for us that defines the purpose of those who created us in his image. This is why salvation is about the Godhead working to restore our communion with God.

God summed it up by saying, “It is not good that man should be alone.” God said this after Adam had named all the animals—after he had seemingly been involved in the work for which God created him. It’s as if God lets Adam work with His creation until Adam realized there was something missing in his life—until he realized he was alone. Adam came to terms with his loneliness.

Genesis 2:19-25
19 Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field.

But for Adam no suitable helper was found. 21 So the LORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man's ribs and closed up the place with flesh. 22 Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. 

23 The man said,

"This is now bone of my bones 
and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called 'woman,'
for she was taken out of man." 

24 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. 

25 The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame. NIV

You have probably heard someone say, “If it weren’t for people the world would be a very nice place.” That’s not how Adam felt about life without people. In this zoological parade Adam realized in all of God’s creation he didn’t have an equal. God took a rib from his side and made a helper to match his eminence. Eve was flesh of his flesh and bone of his bones. They were one flesh—it was the basis of their fellowship with one another and God. 

Dian Foosey was a girl who turned her back on people to go off and live among the gorillas. She said, “When you learn about the dignity of gorillas, you don’t want to be around people.” 

However, some of those gorillas turned on Dian and killed her. When she needed protection the gorillas made no effort to defend her. When she lay wounded and dying, no gorillas came to administer medical treatment or to pray for her. They didn’t come to hold her hand or comfort her. What Dian needed most in her final moments was some of those good people she didn’t want around.

When God made Adam a “suitable helper” she was someone who was to have a special relationship with Adam. They were made for one another. It wasn’t that Eve was made for Adam, but Adam was also made for Eve. This is no afterthought with God. God wanted to bring Adam to the realization of his need for woman. 

The woman is often thought of as inferior; after all she was created last. Eve being made last had to do with God’s good timing. They were to live in communion with one another and God. It had more to do with equality than with rank. In the Hebrew language a “suitable helper” carried with it the idea of someone with equal eminence. Too often we see man and woman’s relationship in terms of whom out ranks the other. Much of the difficulties in the home and society have revolved around this issue.

The roles God gave Adam and Eve in the beginning was the means to maintaining communion with one another and with God. They were suitable helpmeets for each other. Man was created as a man and woman was created as woman. Each had a specific place in God’s order. Neither was inferior. Adam was created to till the ground—to be one who enjoyed accomplishments and achievement. Eve was created to be the mother of all the living. “Adam named his wife Eve, because she would become the mother of all the living” (Genesis 3:20). However, both were created to live in communion as a family.

Genesis 2:24
24 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. NIV
 
Families flourish when father and mother give God glory by living according to the principles laid down from the very beginning of human history. When man and woman regard each other as being truly made in the image of God, commissioned to subdue the earth together, there is a stable basis for marriage and family. (D. Stuart Briscoe, Genesis, The Communicator’s Commentary, Word Books, Waco, Texas. pg. 235.)

The Value of Parental Relationships

So much was riding on Adam and Eve living up to God’s plan for the family. The first six chapters of Genesis briefly describe what happens when husbands and wives fail to accept God’s mission for the family. These chapters cover about 1200 years. Life begins in paradise and the world is destroyed in the flood with only Noah’s family surviving.

Failure in Eden was the failure of two people to live in communion with each other. It is a brief story from creation of the flood. God wants us to realize to realize the catastrophic results when communion fails. There was a sudden sense of loss and aloneness that was in sharp contrast to the depth of completeness and intimacy they had enjoyed up to that point. Since that day loneliness and alienation has ruled. Life has never been the same.

In age when the family is minimized, maybe we need to remember Mr. & Mrs. Noah’s heroic efforts to save their family. Because of them we are here today. God continues to place tremendous responsibility on the home. 

1 Timothy 5:1-8
5:1 Do not rebuke an older man harshly, but exhort him as if he were your father. Treat younger men as brothers, 2 older women as mothers, and younger women as sisters, with absolute purity. 

3 Give proper recognition to those widows who are really in need. 4 But if a widow has children or grandchildren, these should learn first of all to put their religion into practice by caring for their own family and so repaying their parents and grandparents, for this is pleasing to God. 5 The widow who is really in need and left all alone puts her hope in God and continues night and day to pray and to ask God for help. 6 But the widow who lives for pleasure is dead even while she lives. 7 Give the people these instructions, too, so that no one may be open to blame. 8 If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for his immediate family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever. NIV

Titus 2:3-5
3 Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. 4 Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, 5 to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God. NIV

The story of the beginning in Genesis is all about relationships. When man writes about his story or should we say History, he speaks of his accomplishments. When God writes His Story He speaks of it in terms of relationships. Genesis is about relationships. God gave Adam everything his heart could desire in Eden except an equal and it was not good. He needed a relationship with some who was his equal. Adam’s relationship with God was not sufficient until Eve was created. You have to have God and you have to have people to make life complete. Without either the other becomes meaningless.

Mothers and fathers have the responsibility of teaching children the importance of maintaining and sustaining relationships. It is tough living around people. John Drakeford said, “By people we are broken, and by people we are put together again.” Why do you think the New Testament is called the gospel of reconciliation? Christ came to tear down that wall between man and God and man and man. The only way it can be done is through coming into relationship with one another through the working of God, Christ and the Holy Spirit in our hearts. The apostle pleads with us to become reconciled to God and to one another (2 Corinthians 5:18-20). It’s the only way to build a home as God intended.

Who do you think commands the most respect in the family, or who has the most authority? Who do football players say “Hi” to on TV? That’s right—it’s Mom. But why?  It is because she is the one who leads the family function as a community.

No one compares to mom when it comes to details, intuition and relationships. Mom cooks and cleans. Mom gets up at night with the kids when they are sick, and takes the kids to the doctor. She shops, and taxis the kids, and goes to all the sporting events, and helps at all the school parties. She pays attention to our likes and dislikes. This is what makes mom such an authority in the home. No man in his right mind would make a decision without first asking mom. It’s because mom is more in touch with what the family needs and desires. Mom leads the home because she is in a unique relationship with each member of the family. She knows how to make decision that is best for everyone. Mom’s have a way of putting the family in touch with one another in a relational manner. 

Conclusion: 

The Lord tells us that when we lose our lives for others, then we will find life. You don’t find life by being overbearing, but by serving. 

Lives were meant to be molded in the context of family. Many families are failing in this respect. The greatest gift a family can give to the world is a family that seeks to live in communion with God and others.

If you didn’t have or don’t have this kind of family, the church can become your family where you can enter into communion with God and others. 

Bible Study Questions

1.	How does the average American family measure up to God’s idea of family?
2.	What are the greatest enemies to the family?
3.	Why did God create Eve last?
4.	What does it mean when Eve is spoken of as a “suitable helper”?
5.	How did Adam feel about life without people?
6.	What are the draw backs of a single parent home? 
7.	How can families flourish today?
8.	How do the first six chapters of Genesis explain the result of the demise of the family?
9.	How does Noah’s family reveal the importance of the family?
10.	Where do children learn how to maintain and sustain relationships?
11.	Why do moms have the most respect in the family?
12.	How do moms set the tone for relationships within the family?