“I did an awesome job.”
That would be a loose translation of what God said when he looked around at the newly created earth.
Or as Genesis 1:31 puts it, everything was “very good.”
The first not-good aspect of reality shows up in the middle of chapter two: “The Lord God said, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone’” (Genesis 2:18). Solitude was never God’s intention for humanity. “I will make a helper suitable for him.”
It’s worth noting that in Hebrew there’s no difference between the name Adam and the words “the man.” Because Adam is “the man” or “the human,” a number of theologians believe that at this point he isn’t simply male. Adam comprises all of potential humanity – undifferentiated gender – wrapped up in one being.
So what kind of helper is suitable for Adam?
The word “helper” does not mean administrative assistant, gofer, or someone-who-will-cook-and-clean-up-after-me. As author and pastor John Ortberg points out, “helper” is used most often in the Bible to refer to God. It is therefore a word of great dignity.
What follows is the account of Adam encountering numerous animals and discovering that none of them is qualified to be his helper. We can assume that Adam declines all of the animals—except for the cat, who presumably declines Adam.
God’s next step is extraordinary. Part of Adam’s side is taken to form a second being.
Human maleness and femaleness are thus dramatically differentiated. This means that every time men and women come together, it isn’t just a union. It’s a reunion.
When Adam the male sees Eve the female in Genesis 2:22, the very first love poem springs from his mouth: “This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh. She shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man.”
That sentence, in the original Hebrew, begins with a small, untranslatable particle. It’s not a word, exactly. It’s more like a catch in the throat. Some scholars translate it “wow.”
Wow. That is Adam’s first response when he sees his true partner. People who love each other have been saying “wow” since the beginning of the human story.
Nevertheless, as that story, as reported in Genesis, slips away from the public consciousness in our increasingly secularized society, much of the wonder associated with being made in God’s image has slipped away as well.
What does it mean to be human? How should we classify the species called Homo Sapiens?
How we choose to answer that question will largely define the character of civilization in the 21st century.
With regard to our physical selves, classification is fairly straightforward. We are biological organisms. That means that from one perspective we are associated with everything else that has protoplasm. About half the chemical functions that take place in an average piece of fruit – like an avocado or a grape – take place inside our bodies.
About 90% of your genome is identical to that of a mouse. Right now you have the genes to grow a tail; it’s just that that part of your DNA has not been activated.
Materialists – those who believe that the sum total of reality is particles – would suggest that human beings are complex arrangements of molecules. You and your loved ones are chemical assemblages. In the provocative words of Richard Dawkins, today’s most celebrated evolutionary biologist, “We are survival machines – robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules (of DNA) known as genes.”
In other words, the only purpose of human life is DNA survival. A person is just DNA’s roundabout way of making more DNA. Life is matter and only matter – which means that, as persons, we don’t really matter.
Some materialists decry “speciesism,” the arrogant assumption that somehow the human species is more significant than slime molds or stink bugs.
It’s not a shock that when people are declared to be animals or machines, we start treating each other like animals or machines.
In the end, the character of a civilization is revealed by how it treats its weakest members. If there’s nothing special about human life, then the weak, the frail, and the unproductive among us will inevitably be compromised. They will slowly but surely be pushed away from life’s table.
The Judeo-Christian understanding of the Bible’s first book has led to a profoundly different take on reality.
Looking to Genesis 1:27-28, we find the Bible’s assertion that human beings are made in God’s image. Most agree that while that statement is inherently mysterious – we cannot fully comprehend the depth of its meaning – its ramifications are remarkable.
At the very least, being made in God’s image means that we are far more than just animals. Because God specifically endowed human beings with the stamp of his own character and personhood, our lives have infinite value.
That means that people are valuable even when they cannot contribute.
It makes sense that people of faith have historically resisted both abortion and euthanasia. Christians have opened hospitals, tenaciously battled diseases, pioneered ministries to the incarcerated, cared for the physically challenged, and loved those who are mentally and emotionally broken.
Human lives matter. No human life is trivial.
Every time we see another human being, we are gazing at someone who bears the stamp of God’s own being.
Which ought to prompt us to say, “Wow! God did an awesome job.”
Even if he chose not to endow us with stylish tails.
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