All authority or all dried up?

Then God said, "Let us make people in our image, to be like ourselves. They will be masters over all life – the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, and all the livestock, wild animals, and small animals." So God created people in his own image; God patterned them after himself; male and female he created them. God blessed them and told them, "Multiply and fill the earth and subdue it. Be masters over the fish and birds and all the animals." ~ Genesis 1:26-28 NLV

Ann Spangler in Praying the Names of God asks, "How would your life change if you lived with the constant awareness that he created you to bear his image?"

I've often been taught that we are stewards of the earth but today this scripture made me realize that God had something greater in mind. We are made in his image and given dominion. God intended for man to have authority over all creation as if we were in on creating it.

Hold on. I'm not wacking out here. Think on this. If you lived as though you created everything - separated day from night, brought forth all forms of living creatures, made the earth to yield plants of every kind, and created others in your image - would your daily thoughts and actions be any different?

Adam and Eve gave up man's dominion when they listened to a "serpent" like a parent being persuaded by a child's deceptive attempt to control power.

Jesus reclaimed dominion for all mankind and now holds all authority (Matt. 28:18). The cool thing is that Jesus didn't reclaim dominion simply to have power over the rest of us. He prayed in John 17:21 "that all of them [believers] may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so..."

Do you live as though you are in God just as Jesus is in God? The desire of God's heart is that we be one with him - be seen as the image of God. And if we are one with him, then we must view all of creation as he does. Do you?

Do you live the life God had in mind for man or are you living a serpents life messing with the intended order of all things?

Go watch The Lion King for a good visual of what happens when order is messed up. Maybe that will help you understand why your life sometimes seems dried up.

Jesus came to set things right. Authority is much more than having control of power. I urge you with Paul to live with the authority which we have been given through Christ Jesus. This authority is a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.

Paul writes from prison in 2 Timothy 1:6-10:
I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline. So do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord, or ashamed of me his prisoner. But join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God, who has saved us and called us to a holy life--not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time, but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.