Once, I visited the home of the renowned Australian painter the late Pro Hart. ‘I’ll give you a painting to take home with you,’ he offered.

So he took me to his back yard to a large old corrugated iron shed, cluttered with used paint tins and tools and pieces of timber. Spider webs dangled from the ceiling and a thick film of dust covered everything. He rummaged among some sheets of chipboard and pulled one out.

From one side it looked exactly what it was–a piece of pressed wood, worth no more than a few dollars. But on the other side was a painting of the swagman in the Australian folk song ‘Waltzing Matilda’.

This painting totally transformed the worth of the chipboard. It was now an object of considerable value. Today, it is cleaned up and tastefully framed–a masterpiece.

Many of us are like that. Although made in God’s image, we may seem to be of little account. Further, our time in this dusty world has left us in need of restoration.

God does this for us in Christ Jesus. It is a new creative process. ‘We are God’s workmanship,’ says Paul, ‘created in Christ Jesus to do good works…’ (Ephesians 2:10.

When I realise who I am I can rejoice in what I am.

To read more on this topic see Living in the Image of God, Barry Chant (Miranda: Tabor, 2012 available in eBook and Paperback) from which this edited extract is taken.

When God created humankind, he said that his creation was ‘very good’. The Hebrew word for ‘good’ can also mean ‘beautiful’. It is used, for instance of the lovely Bathsheba, who is described as ‘very beautiful’ (2 Samuel 11:2).

In his ‘Ode on a Grecian Urn’, the poet John Keats wrote, ‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty…’ That is important. Truth is beautiful.

It is clear that God intended us to have a feeling of both goodness and beauty about ourselves. He wanted us to be able to look in the mirror and like what we see. He wanted us to have a sense of dignity.

The immediate effect of sin is interesting. The first thing that the keepers of the Garden wanted to do was to hide themselves. They no longer liked the way they looked. They were embarrassed and guilty. Instead of standing tall and straight before God, they shrank back into the shadows.

In simple terms, they were no longer beautiful. In their own eyes at least, they had become ugly.

When Jesus told a woman caught in the act of adultery to go and sin no more, he was saying, in effect, ‘I am giving you another chance. You can hold your head up high again. You can have a restored sense of dignity.’

To read more on this topic see Living in the Image of God, Barry Chant (Miranda: Tabor, 2012 available in eBook and Paperback) from which this edited extract is taken.