The View from the West Mesa

In Luke 6, Jesus tells us that he is "Lord of the Sabbath." Now the purpose of the Sabbath is given as two seemingly different reasons. First, because God worked six days and rested on the seventh, so should we rest on the Sabbath. The second reason is that YHWH had brought Israel out of Egypt - they had been saved and had now been released. The Sabbath then, pictured rest and release from oppression. It is not a large stretch to say then that the Sabbath means life, healing, release for the people of God. Jesus tells us that he is Lord of the Sabbath. What did he mean? A number of meanings have been suggested but, in it's simplest form, it means that he as the Son of Man can best interpret it; that he can illustrate what it means to observe the Sabbath. He has to say this because he has been just accosted by those who objected to his followers "working" on the Sabbath by "harvesting grain," and walking through the fields. The Sabbath, they knew wa...

What does it mean to be the image of God? This question has been debated and still is in various quarters. Scripture doesn't give us a clear statement as to what this means for us. Some ideas that have been suggested include that we are spiritual beings, that we are persons, that we are creative, that we are a triune being, and that we have free will, among others. Some have suggested that Adam was created in the image of God, but that after the Fall, he produced offspring in his own, presumably fallen and corrupted image. To be honest, Scripture does say that Adam produced children after his image, but it doesn't add that that image was corrupt or fallen. What are we to do with this; are people today the image of God or not? Do we even need to spend time on this question if Adam has so messed us up that any image we might bear is unrecognizable? God Creating Man As His Image (Sistine Chapel) I don't know that Adam caused such a change in the image we bear and he likely d...