Man – Like the Angel of the Lord … God created man in his own image … You have made him a little lower than God [elohim, or: the angels] and you crowned him with glory and honor! (Psa 8:5).
Creation of man
Gen 2:7 And Jehovah Elohim formed Man, dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul [nefesh].
1 Cor 15:45 So also it is written, The first man, Adam, became a living soul. The last Adam [Christ] became a life-giving spirit.
Everyone knows that Adam and Eve lived in paradise. What did the new people look like? Just ordinary human beings? No, God created them in his own image. God says Gen 1:27 God created man in his own image. In God’s image he created him; male and female he created them. – In the previous verse God says yet:
… Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the sky, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.
God gave all creation for man to rule: You make him ruler over the works of your hands. You have put all things under his feet: (Psa 8:6; Strong’s H4910 to rule, have dominion, reign).
On the last day, Jerusalem will be a key issue for the peoples around: Zec 12:2 Behold, I am going to make Jerusalem a cup that causes reeling to all the peoples around; and when the siege is against Jerusalem, it will also be against Judah. – Verse 8 describes how God defends its people and how the family of David uses divine power and is like God himself or God’s angel in front of their persecutors. 8 In that day Yahweh will defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem. He who is feeble among them at that day will be like David, and the house of David will be like God, like the angel of Yahweh before them.
What does it mean that man was created in God’s image? It means that the human qualities of man are the same as God’s. They can be found in Gal. 5: 22-23, for example, the fruits of the Holy Spirit. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control”
– There will also be great physical qualities and powers in man. They are ultimately spiritual, faith-dependent. Jesus’ testimony of this has been recorded in Mat 17:20 And He said to them, Because of the littleness of your faith; for truly I say to you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible to you.”
When we speak of a human being in the Bible, we use the words spirit, soul, body, flesh, heart. When God created man in his own image, word man refers to the whole human personality, not just the so-called inner person (spirit, soul, heart). Spirit, soul, and body depict people from different sides, but often the words are chosen in a way which we cannot always explain.
