In this message to you, I am continuing my reflections on “Our Beliefs”—messages posted on a
webpage of our Church, The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, on the core beliefs of the
ELCA.

https://www.elca.org/about-the-elca/who-we-are/beliefs

As the congregations of Neighbors in Christ prepare to plan for the future of their ministries, I
offer these reflections for you to consider the faith and theology of our Church.

Here is one on God

Who is God?

God is the creator of the world; the giver of life; the source of wholeness,
healing and forgiveness; the champion of the poor and oppressed; the power
of new life and resurrection. Christians know God as the Holy Trinity:
Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Christians believe all people are created in
God’s image and loved by God. God’s grace is a gift, offered through Christ
and received by faith. There is nothing we do, good or bad, to earn this gift.
We call this “good news” or “the gospel.” 

Please note that our confession of God as Triune puts us in good communion with many other
Christian Churches and denominations.

I will focus briefly on this claim: “Christians believe all people are created in God’s image and
loved by God.”

In many ways we can think about our having God’s image as our having a spiritual nature and
dignity. Some would say, “A Soul.” Certainly, God thinks that we are special when we are
called Children of God several times in the New Testament.

But there may be more for us in our having the image of God When Genesis was written, the
word “image” had a special meaning when it came to Gods or Kings. There were many kings
around who wanted to reign in power over their kingdoms even if they could not be present
everywhere in their kingdom at the same time. To remind the people that there was a king with
power over them, images of the king were placed in public places and at crossroads.

We, as Christians, confess God as our King. So, we, as Christians, are those “images of God”
that God has stationed in public places and crossroads (that is, anywhere we might be at any
point in our lives) to make real the will of God for the world. Jesus being the Christ (i.e.
Messiah) was clear that will of God for this world was a world of peace and justice.

In other words, our having the image of God is our having the God-given task to bring the King
to bring peace and justice to this world.

We can thank our church, The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, to be such a rich
repository of faithful teachings to guide us in our lives.

Pastor Hummel