Estimated reading time: 8 minutes
The person beyond the picture
Imagine hearing laughter over a picture you have not seen. Someone has edited a classmate's face, and the group is deciding who should receive it next. From the sender's point of view, it may seem like a moment's amusement. From the other side, there is a person whose name, body and relationships are being treated as material for a joke.
Before we discuss the harms people can do with images, we need a reason to care about the person beyond the picture. That reason cannot depend on whether they are attractive, talented, friendly towards us or able to answer back. Open Genesis 1:26–31. Notice what God says about humanity before any human achievement is described.
Genesis begins with God giving life, before anyone can prove their usefulness. That order is easy to forget when we are impressed by achievement or irritated by dependence. We may never say that a person has to earn dignity, yet our patience can suggest otherwise. The creation account asks us to begin again with God's judgement of the human being in front of us.
A gift before an achievement
To be made in God's image is to receive both an honour and a responsibility. Humanity is called to represent His rule within creation, caring for what He has made as creatures who answer to Him. The gift is therefore no excuse for domination. If another person also bears His image, my calling cannot authorise me to make their life a tool for mine.
The passage does not define image-bearing by a person's intelligence score, strength, productivity or independence. Those measurements cannot become entrance requirements for dignity. A newborn, a frail neighbour, a person with a disability and someone who needs substantial help are human beings made by God. Their need for care does not reduce the responsibility of others to honour them.
Male and female share this image-bearing humanity. Neither receives worth as a reward from the other. The distinction between them is part of God's good creation, not a ranking of whose life matters more. A later lesson considers that difference more closely. Here the emphasis is shared dignity and responsibility.
Real people with real bodies
Genesis speaks of people living bodily in God's world: receiving food, caring for creation, forming relationships and taking up the tasks God gives. The body is part of human life as God made it. We should not treat it as a disposable wrapper around the only part of a person that matters.
Psalm 139:13–16 speaks personally about God's care in forming a human life. Psalm 8 joins wonder at human smallness with the honour and responsibility God gives. These passages encourage gratitude and humility together. A body is not an advertising project that must be perfected before its owner deserves kindness.
That can be difficult to receive when bodily life brings pain, unwanted attention or limitations you did not choose. You do not have to call the suffering easy in order to honour your Maker. Genesis gives us the goodness of His original creation; the Bible will also explain the brokenness of our present world. Both truths make room for honest grief and necessary care.
Listen, then, to the small judgements you make about weight, ageing, skin or athletic ability. A casual remark can reveal which scale of worth we are using. If you recognise a cruel standard in your own speech, you can stop, acknowledge it and learn to speak differently. The person deserves that care before they become more attractive, capable or convenient to you.
Dignity survives our dislike
It is easy to affirm the value of people we enjoy. The harder test comes with someone who annoys us, holds a view we reject or has treated us wrongly. Image-bearing does not mean that every belief or action is good. It means that disagreement and accountability must still recognise the person as human.
James 3:9–10 applies this directly to speech. Praising God and cursing people made in His likeness do not belong together. Notice that James addresses a world already marked by sin. Human wrongdoing has not made the image-bearing reason for careful speech disappear. We do not have to approve a person's conduct to refuse contempt.
The same reasoning reaches people we never meet. A photograph may show only a moment, but its subject is not merely a face, a body part or a source of excitement. Pornography treats people as available for another person's use. This series will examine that wrong more fully. Here we establish why the people involved cannot be reduced to content.
That also means we must not blame a person who has been mocked, exploited or had an image used against them. Their appearance does not transfer responsibility from the person doing harm. A lesson on dignity must give practical room for protection and help, including when a harmful image is fabricated.
What a picture does not give you
Seeing a picture does not give you ownership of its subject. You may have the technical ability to save, edit or forward something and still have no good reason to do it. Ask what sharing would do to the person and the people around them. The capacity of a device is not permission to ignore love of neighbour.
Consider the fictional classroom picture. A dignifying response might be to refuse to forward it, speak against the mockery without repeating the insult, and seek a trusted adult's help if someone is being targeted. Supporting the person need not involve obtaining a copy or circulating the image to explain your concern.
When sexual images or threats are involved, do not ask a child to show you material or send it on as proof. Seek appropriate help under actual safeguarding arrangements. Our responsibility to protect people includes care over what we ask them to do in seeking protection.
There are quieter applications too. Introduce someone by their name rather than an unkind nickname. Make room for a person whose pace is different. Listen to someone whose experience you do not share. These are ordinary ways to acknowledge that the person before you has a life and calling that do not revolve around your convenience.
God's gift of responsibility also corrects the idea that power makes exploitation acceptable. Humanity's rule over other creatures is received from the Creator and exercised before Him. It is not a grant of ownership over another person's dignity. At home, authority should make an adult more attentive to a child's needs, not less willing to hear them. In a friendship, greater confidence or influence should be used to include and protect rather than to decide who may be mocked.
There is room here for patient learning. You may recognise words you have used carelessly without having intended to hurt someone. Begin by listening rather than insisting that your intention settles the matter. You can acknowledge an unkind remark, stop repeating it and choose better words. The other person does not owe you immediate reassurance. Taking responsibility honours their humanity and lets the lesson reach beyond an answer given with an open Bible.
Your own worth before God
Now receive the same truth personally. You do not need to earn the right to be treated decently through your appearance, success or usefulness. Another person's rejection cannot undo God's work as your Maker. This does not answer every struggle in how you see yourself, but it gives a firmer starting point than a changing audience.
Being made in God's image is not the same as already being reconciled to Him. We have sinned and need salvation. The gospel tells us that Jesus Christ died for sins and rose again (1 Corinthians 15:3–4). Turning from sin and trusting Him is not a project of making ourselves valuable enough to deserve rescue.
Perhaps you recognise yourself as the person laughing over the picture. Christ's mercy gives you a reason to admit what the laughter concealed: someone else's humiliation had become your amusement. You can refuse to pass it on and seek to put right what you have done. If you were the person being mocked or used, the truth meets you differently. The offender's choice did not take away the dignity God gave you.
Consider one relationship in that light. What would change if you listened for a life beyond what the person provides for you? It might mean learning their name, hearing a concern without dismissing it, or refusing a familiar joke. You need not solve every injustice to begin treating this neighbour as someone made by God.
When that relationship involves exploitation or betrayal, kindness includes seeking appropriate protection and help. A person who has been harmed is not responsible for making the offender repent, and no group is owed their private history. Return to the picture at the beginning: there was always a whole person on the other side. Their worth—and yours—rests in the Creator's gift, beyond the audience's changing judgement.
Read in context: Genesis 1:26–31; Psalm 8; Psalm 139:13–16; James 3:7–12; 1 Corinthians 15:3–4. Illustrative situations are imaginary.
Scripture quotations marked CSB have been taken from the Christian Standard Bible®, Copyright © 2017 by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission. Christian Standard Bible® and CSB® are federally registered trademarks of Holman Bible Publishers.