“For truly, I say to you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you belong to Christ will by no means lose his reward. 'Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea.' And if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame than with two feet to be thrown into hell. And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, ‘where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.’ For everyone will be salted with fire. Salt is good, but if the salt has lost its saltiness, how will you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”  Mark 9:41-50

The most important aspect in the life of a disciple is to see the reality of Jesus in a comprehensive and clear fashion by the power of the Holy Spirit under the authority of the Word of God.

1. Everyone is worthy of respect and Christian love because they are made in the image of God (Genesis 1:26-27).

"A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. They are all mammals.”  Ingrid Newkirk, president of the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), Washingtonian Magazine

“When one thinks coldly I see no reason for attributing to man a significance different in kind from that which belongs to a baboon or a grain of sand.”  Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr, Chief Justice (March 8, 1841 – March 6, 1935) 

“There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit.”  C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory

“With it (our speech) we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God."  James 3:9

*“We are not accidents but creations and without a belief in creation there is ultimately no good reason to treat human beings with dignity and kindness”  Tim Keller, Generous Justice (pg. 82)

2. Image Bearing Contemporary Issues:

- Race

“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”  Galatians 3:28

“You see, the founding fathers were really influenced by the Bible. The whole concept of the imago dei, as it is expressed in Latin, ‘image of God,’ is the idea that all men have something within them that God injected. Not that they have substantial unity with God, but that every man has a capacity to have fellowship with God. And this gives him a uniqueness, it gives him worth, it gives him dignity, And we must never forget this as a nation: There are no graduations in the image of God. Every man from a treble white to a bass black is significant on God’s keyboard, precisely because every man is made in the image of God. One day we will learn that. We will know one day that God made us to live together as brothers and to respect the dignity and worth of every man. This is why we must fight segregations with all of our nonviolent might.”  Martin Luther King Jr, from sermon entitled “The American Dream” (1965)

- LGBTQ+ Issues

The New City Catechism

Q4: How and why did God Create us?
A: God created us male and female in his own image to know him, love him, live with him, and glorify him. And it is right that we who were created by God should live to his glory.

Q5: What else did God create?
A: God created all things by his powerful Word, and all his creation was very good; everything flourished under his loving rule.

“Man is a special creation of God, made in his own image. He created them male and female as the crowning work of his creation. The gift of gender is thus part of the goodness of God’s creation.”  Baptist Faith and Message, Article 3: Man

- The Sanctity of Human Life

3. Right now counts forever (verse 41).

QUESTIONS:

1. Are we our brother's keeper? Do you understand that you are a “role model”?

2. What is the basis for respecting and caring for people if all creation is merely an accident of impersonal forces?

3. How do you respond to people if you believe that all people are made by a triune God who is great and glorious and has made all mankind in his image?

4. What is the startling reality of James 3:9?

5. How does Galatians 3:28 strike a decisive blow in any area of belief regarding ethnic, racial, gender, or geographical superiority?

6. How do you respond to the following quote, “A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. They are all mammals.”?