T. Austin-Sparks · 1 of 6

Representation a Principle with God

"And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness..." (Gen. 1:26).

"Christ... who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation" (Col. 1:15).

"...in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should not dawn upon them." (2 Cor. 4:4).

"For whom he foreknew, he also foreordained to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren." (Rom. 8:29).

"And have put on the new man, that is being renewed unto knowledge after the image of him that created him: where there cannot be Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bondman, freeman; but Christ is all, and in all." (Col. 3:10-11).

Reading: Eph. 4:13,15-16; 5:22-32; John 20:21-23; Acts 1:8.

In the first and second series of passages, there is one word common to them all, as you will have noticed. It is the word "image".

"And God said, Let us make man in our image." "...who is the image of the invisible God." "Christ, who is the image of God." "...conformed to the image of his Son." "...the new man... renewed... after the image of him that created him."

Our English word has behind it in the New Testament two Greek words - idol and ikon. Heb. 1:3 - "the very image of his person". Rotherham translates, "the exact representation of his image" or "of his substance". It is that word "representation" which has taken hold of me, and which seems to be the key to our meditation.

Representation an Eternal Principle

You will at once see that in the passages which we have read, that is the governing idea; firstly as to the Lord Jesus, representation of God. He is said to be the image of God, the image of the invisible God. Then the thought is transferred to the , the Church, foreordained to be conformed to the image of His Son, a new man renewed after the image of Him that created him; and alongside of that, passages in which the actual word does not occur, but where the thought is still the dominant thought - "the measure of the stature of Christ", "a fullgrown man" (Eph. 4:13). That with reference to the Church, the Lord's people - representation.

Then those final passages bring it into a very practical realm - "As the Father hath sent me, even so send I you" - placing the emphasis upon the "as". Then, with the question which must arise, "Who is sufficient for these things?" the answer is, "Ye shall receive power, when the Holy Spirit is come upon you: and ye shall be my witnesses", the latter word of which is only another word for representatives.

(a) Before Creation

This, then, is an eternal thought, a thought which has come out of eternity, God purposing to be represented in His universe, to have representation in man, and that eternal thought lies behind everything. It is before creation, before the fall, and therefore before . It is the pure thought of God unclouded at all by sin and sin's consequences and sin's necessities. It stands back there as governing all the thought of God projected into the future. It is as though God decided He would have representation of Himself, the invisible God, in visible form, in man form, that He would be seen, be known, be understood; and, more than that, He would constitute upon a basis of fellowship, living relationship, in terms of representation, that which would represent Him not merely officially but in nature, after His own heart. By that means He would make Himself known, would give Himself, and would bring the creation into something more than mechanical obedience and response to His will; into agreeable, desired, loving fellowship with Himself, with His own heart, along the line of consent, and not of compulsion. That is what representation means in brief. It is exactly what it means in the case of the Lord Jesus being the image of the invisible God, and exactly what it means that the Church is conformed to the image of His Son. The thought, I say again, lies behind everything, goes before creation, and then governs creation.

(b) In Creation

The creation is brought into being by this one governing thought of God, that the whole creation should, in a variety of ways, express Him, represent Him, speak of Him, and all the of heaven and earth as established by God, and all the relationships in creation, should in some way represent God's thoughts. If we had eyes to see, we should see Divine thoughts in all that God has done. The whole creation is the embodiment of this desire of God to be represented.

But not only so, for when we come on to the matter of redemption, it is the same thing. Of God's dealing with the necessity which has arisen, representation is at the heart of it, and the representation in redemption is twofold, it has two sides. By reason of what has happened to the creation, and of the judgment pronounced upon it even unto death, there is a nullification of that order of things. If that sentence is carried out nakedly, barely and utterly, creation will be dismissed from God's universe, there will be nothing left. But representation again is the way of redemption, and in the person of His Son a representative position is taken under judgment, condemnation, and death, and in Him representatively the creation passes out, dies. We today surely do come afresh upon this aspect of things with new gratitude, that is, that you and I are saved from the awful fulness of judgment upon the creation because One has been our representative in that judgment. He representatively died as a cursed and judged and doomed creation because of sin. He died for us and as us, and we died in Him. That is a simple and very familiar truth.

But there is the other side in redemption. In resurrection, exaltation in glory, He is our representative. The Divine thought of representation is taken up again, not now in despair but in hope. "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again to a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead" (1 Pet. 1:3). In resurrection He is our representative, in glory He is our representative, and just as truly as in His death we died in Him, we were included in death, so now we are included in Him in glory, in exaltation. As the "Captain of our salvation" He is bringing "many sons to glory", where He is as their representative.

Bearing upon that, the leaving out of two words which have been introduced into our translation, but which do not occur in the original, give added emphasis. I mean in Rom. 8:29. "Whom he foreknew, he also foreordained to be conformed to the image of his Son." They have introduced the two little words - "to be". Those words do not occur at all, they ought not to be there. They were put in because it sounds blunt and awkward to leave them out, and just say, foreordained conformed to his Son. Before the world was we were so, in the thought and purpose and power of God Who is not of time. There is no past, present and future with Him. All future is with Him in one moment. When He determined it, it was then done in Him. You and I may be undergoing a process of conforming to the image, but that is only on our side. From God's side it is all finished, it is eternally accomplished before ever we started, These are mighty foundations for faith that, so far as God is concerned, there is no hap or chance about this. It is all an accomplished fact. "Foreordained conformed to the image..." So you see this Divine thought, this eternal thought of representation, does lie behind everything; creation, redemption, death, resurrection, glory.

(d) In the Church

But it comes right into the very centre of our lives as the Lord's people who have believed. The Divine thought concerning us is just this, that we are here for one purpose in the thought of God - to represent Him. The Church is constituted for that one purpose - to represent Him. All the dealings of God with us have that one thing in view, the perfection of representation. That is but to say in another way that the discipline, the chastening, the dealings of God with us are to perfect our representation of Him; that is, to make us more like Him, not just as a thing in itself, but because He has ordained this to be the agency of His self-revelation, His self-manifestation. "The image of the invisible God". That with reference to Christ. The image, we might say, of the invisible Christ is the Divine thought for the Church and all its members.

It seems to me that is the very essence of this idea - "the church which is his body". Well, there is such a thing, of course, as reading one another's spirit, but even that is exceedingly difficult without their bodies! What we know of one another inwardly, we so largely know through our bodies. Even our personalities are expressed very largely through our bodies. If we are familiar with a person, more or less it is by some physical expression that we know who they are. A little child indoors knows daddy is coming down the road. Why? Because he or she knows daddy's step. You may be in one room and certain people in another, and you hear them speaking and you are able to say, There is so-and-so, I know their voice! There are doubles, perhaps, in that, but you are not often mistaken. You know they are there because that voice is their's. We are known by some physical expression. We watch one another, we touch one another, and we read and register one another's inner life by a look in the eye, a look on the face, a tone of voice, a mere gesture, a mere grunt! Yes, and a history lies in the slightest physical indication if we are alive to one another.

The Church which is His Body stands in relation to Him in that sense, and He, by His Spirit being present, indwelling, is indicated by means of His members. The purpose of the Church as His Body is to represent Him, and this is the very essence, of all - shall we say - missionary work, all ministry, all service. The dominating idea of all service or ministry is representation; not first of all things said, preached, proclaimed, but what we are, what is conveyed of Christ by our being. In the case of the Lord Jesus that was predominant. It was His presence which registered the Divine impact upon this earth; sometimes His silence was more terrible than His words. When He, on that Good Friday, that first Good Friday, was silent, that was an awful silence which men could not bear, under which they writhed and would by any means make Him speak and break that silence. He came into the country of the Gerasenes and, without a word from Him, those possessed with demons cried out. His presence! It is representation.

What a mighty thing this is if it is there in the power of the Holy Spirit. You do not always have to begin to preach. If you are a Spirit-filled man or woman, your presence will make sinners uncomfortable and happy. What I am trying for the moment to emphasise is the truth, the principle, the law, that of representation.

With regard to this matter of representation, I would have you pre-eminently occupied with it in relation to the Lord Jesus Himself. He is the sum of all Divine thoughts, and the is the supreme expression of this one thought of God to be truly, adequately, fully, perfectly represented; so that it was possible for the Lord Jesus to say, "He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father"(John 14:9). There is the mystery of Christ.

What is the mystery of Christ? The mystery of Christ is God veiled in this Representative. You say, A representative of God, and yet God veiled? - a contradiction! No, no contradiction; not necessarily veiled, for a New Testament or a Scriptural mystery is not something which cannot be known, but something which, for certain reasons, has not been known but can be known. When those reasons are set aside, this which has been a mystery, a hidden thing, is a mystery no longer, but it remains a mystery while those things obtain.

You can see it in the days of His flesh. Here is God in representation, but how many saw Him? "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father". But I think that word "seen" means something very much more than just looking upon Him as a man. "He that hath seen me..." "Whom do men say that I am?" Some said this and some said that. Peter said, "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God." And He said, "Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jonah: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father who is in heaven" (Matt. 16:13-17). That is what it means to see; it is by revelation. It is that which is the mystery. The fact is there, the true representation or representative of God in person, yet unrecognised, unseen. "The God of this world hath blinded the minds of them that believe not, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them" (2 Cor. 4:4). The mystery is men's inability to see a great fact, or a great fact present still undisclosed.

Now, the Resurrection and Pentecost seem to me to have meant just this one thing - the seeing of Christ. You remember when He was considered dead and buried, even disciples were in black despair and eclipse of faith and hope, and some went on the way to Emmaus very sad indeed, and their words were, "We hoped that it was he who should redeem Israel" (Luke 24:21). But before the end of that episode was reached, we are told that He opened their understanding that they might know the Scriptures. Having taken up the Scriptures right from the beginning and spoken to them things concerning Himself, He opened their understanding, and it was just that that was marking His appearances during the forty days after His resurrection. They were in some altogether new way coming to see Him. Oh no, not now physically merely, that He was alive, that He had a body; it was not merely this that was being borne in upon them very powerfully. They were seeing Him, Who He was; the mystery of His Person was breaking down. They were seeing Him, and the day of Pentecost seemed to bring that through to full birth. The forty days were moving up to that day, and then on that day by the coming of the Holy Spirit the thing was consummated, and in the full blaze of Who He was the Church was born. It seems to me that the Church was born - yes, by the Holy Spirit, but by the Holy Spirit's breaking open to men Who Jesus was after all. It seems to me that is how every one came into the Church. They saw by an operation of the Holy Spirit Who Jesus was. That is how Paul came in on the Damascus road; he saw who Jesus of Nazareth was. On the day of Pentecost, Peter stood up with the eleven, as under the power of the Holy Spirit they opened their mouths, and the spontaneous declaration was all about Who Jesus was, and they are men in a new revelation.