God’s preeminent revelation to man is in the person of His beloved Son.
In human experience it is both joyful and humbling to see our personalities expressed in our children. They share our genes, character traits, and mannerisms. There are many of which it can be expressed “I know who your parents are” or “it’s obvious who you belong to.” As much as there is similarity, children are unique in that they share in the gene pool of two individuals. They may well be like their parents, but they are still uniquely their own selves in terms of character and personality. The word “image” or “likeness” may be used of them, but not in the way, or to the extent, that these words are applied to Christ in relation to His Father.
Of the Lord Jesus it could be said He is “the image of the invisible God” (Col. 1:15). He is “the image of God” (2 Cor. 4:4) and “the express image of His person” (Heb. 1:3). The word implies far more than likeness; “it implies there is a prototype and that the image is the revealed reality.” 1. As “the image of God,” Christ is the representation of God for man and the revelation of God to man. The Lord Jesus revealed invisibility and declared incommunicability. The English word “image” translates two different Greek words. In Colossians and 1 Corinthians, it supplies our word “icon” and in Hebrews it is “character.” “Icon” means a pictorial representation while “character” is a graphic symbol. In both cases it is an image that conveys information.
Representation
The Lord Jesus is the express image of the invisible God. Express in that He is in the very form of God, as indicated in Philippians 2:6. Vincent says “Here the essential being of God is conceived as setting its distinctive stamp on Christ, coming into definite and characteristic expression in His person, so that the Son bears the exact impress of the divine nature and character.” 2 Thus, it is true of the Lord Jesus, not only in time but also in eternity, that He is the image of the invisible God. Moule in quoting Ellicott says, “Christian antiquity has ever regarded the expression ‘image of God’ as denoting the eternal Son’s perfect equality with the Father in respect of His substance, power, and eternity … the Son is the Father’s image in all things save only in being the Father.” 3
This perfect equality is seen in the earthly experience of the Lord Jesus. At His birth He was called Emmanuel, “God with us.” John could say “we beheld His glory, the glory of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth” (Jn. 1:14). Jesus shared divine names such as God (Elohim), Lord (Jehovah and Adonai), Saviour, the mighty God, and the everlasting Father. He shares in divine activities such as creating, sustaining, giving life, raising the dead, forgiving sins, and judging mankind. He displays divine prerogatives again in forgiving sin and in revealing prophetic events. Certainly He displays divine compassion. His sympathy, expressions of concern, action, and words reveal the very heart of God. The Jews realized that He asserted equality with the Father. This equality is evidenced in His acceptance of Thomas’ exclamation “My Lord and my God” (Jn. 19:28). Furthermore, Jesus could say to Phillip, “he who has seen Me has seen the Father” (Jn. 14:9). He claimed equal honor with the Father, accepted the worship of man, and will be worshipped by angels.
This equality is currently displayed in the present position and activity of the Lord Jesus. Both He and the Father are said to send the Spirit and to dispense gifts to the church. The Lord Jesus is addressed as God and Lord in Hebrews 1. And not only now, but even in eternity, the Father will reveal Himself in Christ.
Revelation
The parallel passage to Colossians 1:15 is John 1:1-3, 14-18. There the Lord Jesus is declared to be the eternally existent Word. Though not specifically mentioned in Colossians 1, the idea of Christ as the Word underlies the passage. According to Wuest, the Greek word logos implies a revelation that involved both reason and speech. “As His reason, it denoted His purpose or design; as His speech it implied His revelation.” 4
A word is the visible and verbal expression of invisible thought. What a person is thinking, his or her ideas, opinions, and even personality can only be revealed through communication. God’s thoughts and will are revealed in both the written and the living Word. His preeminent revelation to man is in the person of His beloved Son.
As the Word, the Lord Jesus has revealed to man what was otherwise unknowable in reference to God. So much so that John, in his first epistle, could say they had seen the invisible, contemplated the inscrutable, and touched the intangible (1 Jn. 1:1-3). In his gospel, John writes of Christ: “the only begotten who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him” (Jn. 1:18). “Declared” is the root for our word “exegesis” which means “to interpret.” The Lord Jesus brought to our understanding the eternal, invisible God.
This same thought is implicit in Hebrews 1:1-4. God’s message to man has been delivered at “various times and in different ways” through Old Testament history. That is, God spoke through the prophets by means of dreams, visions, proclamation, and acts of nature, to name some of the different ways. But God’s final and fullest revelation was through His Son. The Creator and Heir of all is the eternal Son. The word “Son” in verse 2 appears without a definite article. An article is supplied by the translator, as it would be awkward to render the phrase as “spoken to us by Son.” The intention of the writer is to present the Lord Jesus as not only the messenger, but as the message. Thus the Son, by virtue of His person, position, and purpose is the ultimate message of God to man.
The Lord Jesus is supremely qualified to be this message as He is the “express image of His person” (Heb. 1:3). He is identical to the Father in substance and in nature. If man would know what God thinks and what God would say, they need only look at and listen to the Lord Jesus.
Conclusions
The statement “image of God” is of importance doctrinally to the understanding and defense of the deity of the Lord Jesus. “For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (Col. 2:9) and “He is the brightness of His glory” (Heb. 1:3). Of no other but Christ could it be said that he is the express image of God.
Doctrine should lead to duty and belief affects behavior. In Colossians 1, Paul is declaring the truth of the deity of Christ. In chapters 3 and 4, he tells us that we should demonstrate the preeminence of the Lord Jesus in our lives. The world will see a representation of the person of God as His Son lives in us and through us. This is particularly true in our relationships with others. This truth is also central to the proclamation of the gospel. The world needs to see the “light of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” (2 Cor. 4:4). Christ, and Christ crucified, must remain our focus in the presentation of the gospel.
This wonderful truth should also cause us to worship as we think of Christ as God manifest. The glorious and gracious revelation of the very heart of God is seen in the person of His only begotten Son. Well might God’s people respond with the words of Jennings’ hymn:
“Worthy of the sweetest praise,
That my ransomed heart can raise,
Is that Man in whom alone,
God Himself is fully known”
If man would know what God thinks and what God would say, they need only look at and listen to the Lord Jesus.
1 Lewis Sperry Chafer, Systematic Theology, V, (Dallas, TX: Dallas Seminary Press, 1947-48), p.11.
2 Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament, IV, (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1946), p.385.
3 H.C.G. Moule, Studies in Colossians and Philemon, (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 1977), p.77.
4 Kenneth S. Wuest, Word Studies in the Greek New Testament, (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1966), p.182.