The Image of God Restored Part II

Order of Service

• Hymn of Preparation (read by pastor) — Come, Holy Spirit, Heavenly Dove
• Call to Worship — Hebrews 10:19-25
• Hymn — It Is Well with My Soul
• Prayer of Invocation
• Confession of Sin
• Assurance of Pardon
• Confession of Faith — Westminster Shorter Catechism (on the Trinity)
• Scripture Reading — Ezra 8:15-23
• Hymn — What a Friend We Have in Jesus
• Pastoral Prayer
• Offering
• Prayer of Dedication
• Hymn of Preparation — Come, Holy Spirit, Heavenly Dove
• Sermon
• Hymn — Fairest Lord Jesus
• Benediction
• Doxology

---

Sermon Title: The Image of God Restored Part II

Scripture: 1 Corinthians 2:6-16

I. The Restoration of the Image Through the Revelation of God the Father

A. Two wisdoms and two ages in 1 Corinthians 2:6-9

1. God's wisdom belongs to the age to come — eschatological, eternal, permanent (cf. 2 Corinthians 3)
2. The wisdom of "this age" is passing away and belongs to rulers who crucified the Lord of glory
3. God's wisdom is "secret and hidden," decreed before the ages for our glory — it cannot be attained through human reason

B. The noetic effects of the fall (Romans 1)

1. Fallen man retains intellectual capacity but his mind stops at creation, exchanging the glory of the Creator for the creature
2. The restored image means the mind moves upward from creation to glorify the triune God from whom all truth derives

C. Adam as the "newborn adult" — the mature universe illustration

1. Adam was created mature yet entirely dependent on God's revelation, like a child on his father's word
2. The fall: Adam pursued the wisdom of this age — knowing good and evil independently of God
3. The image is restored as Christ makes us newborn children again, living on every word from the mouth of God
4. Irony: the "mature" ones (v. 6) are those childlike and dependent on the Father's revelation — cf. Matthew 18:3

II. The Restoration of the Image Through the Interpretation of God the Spirit

A. The Spirit as the self-knowledge of God (1 Corinthians 2:10-13)

1. Paul argues from lesser to greater: as a person's spirit alone knows that person's inner thoughts, so the Spirit alone comprehends the depths of God
2. Richard Gaffin: the Spirit is "omnicompetent" — he has the capacity to probe all things, even the deep things of God
3. God grants us his Spirit — the very self-knowledge of God — so we understand the things freely given to us

B. The Spirit grants true, eschatological knowledge

1. 1 Corinthians 2:9 (quoting Isaiah 64:4): what no eye has seen nor ear heard nor the heart of man imagined — what God has prepared for those who love him
2. The Spirit is the down payment of glory, giving a foretaste of the new heavens and new earth; we know in part now but shall know fully
3. This Spirit-wrought knowledge is true knowledge — anticipatory, expectant, now-but-not-yet knowledge

C. Direction of the restored image: forward and upward

1. Adam's sin sent him backward — from dust to dust
2. The Spirit restores the image, moving the soul forward and upward toward Mount Zion where Christ is seated at the Father's right hand
3. Practical test: obedience moves toward the permanent age; disobedience clings to an age passing away

III. The Restoration of the Image Through the Mind of God the Son Incarnate

A. The spiritual person and the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:15-16)

1. The spiritual person "judges all things" — not freedom from proper authority, but freedom from judgment according to merely human wisdom
2. All truth — philosophy, mathematics, science — is subservient to and derivative of the triune God, from whom all truth flows

B. Christ as the telos of all wisdom

1. The Greek word telos (mature, v. 6) was used in philosophy for the chief aim and goal; Paul declares that telos is Christ crucified, risen, and ascended
2. Isaiah 11:1-2: the Spirit of knowledge and wisdom rests upon him
3. 1 Corinthians 1:24: Christ is the wisdom and power of God; the very mind of him who is wisdom incarnate now transforms our minds

C. Gaffin's conclusion: saving revelation as the indispensable key

1. The saving revelation of God in Christ, taught by the Spirit, is the key to rightly understanding God and all of creation
2. All other knowledge, however functionally productive, is essentially misunderstanding apart from this
3. Adam's original mandate: every discovery was to draw his heart upward to the God who made him; the image restored in Christ fulfills that mandate
4. Colossians 3:10: "Put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator" — put on the mind of Christ