The Paradox of Man

"God looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, that did seek God. Every one of them turned aside; they are altogether become corrupt. There is none that doeth good; no, not one." Ps. 53:2-3

The scriptures give some positive views of man that we must not lose in these new dark ages. One view is that man is made in the image of God (Gen. 1:27) and thus has intrinsic value (Gen. 9:6). Another is that possibility of man's future glorification (Rom. 8:18, 19). As important as these positive views are, the negative view is just as important (if not more so). Mankind is fundamentally valuable, but is also fundamentally lost. Too many modern creeds (both the religious and secular) account for only one reality or the other. Man is either a purposeless worm or a would-be god. Only the Christian doctrine captures all of the facts into one truth: man has the capacity to do good and the incapacity to be holy.
Truth is essential paradoxical, and the truth about mankind is that we are a paradox: the totally depraved image-bearer of God, an intrinsically valuable damned sinner. The modern world would rather make us a god or an animal; in either case, a dehumanization occurs, for man as man is ultimately abolished. God came to seek and to save man, because it is man who is lost and in desperate need of God's holiness and love.

-Jon Vowell

Imago Dei (or, The Artistic Conceit of Man)

"My heart is overflowing with a good matter (I speak of my works to the king); my tongue is the pen of a skillful writer." Ps. 45:1

Man's capacity for artistic creativity is the surest proof of him being the image-bearer of God. As the Creator is, so is the creation, especially those who are made to be like Him. The human ability to reflect and reveal the deeper realities of the world and themselves will always set humanity apart. There are, of course, additional capacities that make up our "mannishness" (e.g., moral motions, rationality, etc.), but the creative imagination is perhaps the most fascinating. There are some fools who try to argue that other (and lesser) creatures have an ethical code of sorts as well as reasoning capabilities, but which of the animals ever wrote a psalm for their king (or their god)? Which sparrow painted the portrait of the eagle, or which antelope wrote a poem in the night about the lion on the hunt? Let all the fools be silent before the abundant creativity of man. Whether we reflect the glories of God or the depravities of our own fallenness, we are able to see the world different from other creatures; we can (in a sense) see them like God sees them, viz., their hidden quality and character that is (at the moment of perception) beyond words and expression and yet is capable of being spoken or expressed.
I wonder if God, existing before all finite things in the eternal dance of love that is the Trinity, said to His fellow Persons concerning the coming Creation, "My heart is overflowing with a good matter; my tongue is the pen of a skillful writer," and then His tongue wrote those first words on the fabric of reality: "Let there be light." God has given us (on a smaller scale) the same ability and power, an ability that reasserts the dignity of humanity in all its variety, i.e., we are the image-bearers of Almighty God.

-Jon Vowell

"Art is the signature of man." -G.K. Chesterton