THE DOWNSIDE OF BEING CREATED IN GOD’S IMAGE
What we need to keep foremost in mind is that if God is holy, everything he does is holy. We would not want to say that some things he does are secular and some things are holy. It would be a great underestimation of God to suggest that some of his works are only for natural purposes having nothing to do with his spiritual purposes. And yet, when most people think about the first six days of creation, they think about the natural things (i.e. heaven, earth, day, night, sky, man, etc.). God did indeed create these natural objects that can be seen and touched, but he did not do that just for fun or to exercise his creative powers. He had definite spiritual purposes for everything he created. 

A very brief summary of those purposes is that God created the entire natural world, including man, to bring praise, honor and glory to himself. If that is true for God and everything he created in the six days of creation, then it is also true for us in every day of our existence — not just the Sabbath day. We know this to be true from his statement that God made man in his image. Obviously God did not mean that man was made in the physical image of God because God is spirit and man has a physical body. What is meant by being created in God’s image is that we are made in his character.

Looking at God’s spiritual handiwork in creation, we assume that part of his character is the will and power to create things that can be seen and touched ( (i.e. heaven, earth, day, night, sky, man, etc.). But this is a wrong assumption because God, being spirit, prefers to emphasize his creative spiritual work. This is how he conforms people to his spiritual image.

Thus, man has a built-in character tendency to create natural things that will bring praise, honor and glory to himself from those who will observe the things he has created. Furthermore, man has the will and ability to create all kinds of physical things, including religion, just as God has the will and ability to create spiritual things (i. e. New Covenant disciples). Man has limits that God does not have on what he can create, but we only need to look at the history of man and the many religions he has created to see that he has fulfilled that part of God’s character quite well. And we don’t need to look far to find examples of people who create things, even good things, in order to earn praise, glory and income for themselves.

That ability to create, however, has some downsides as well as upsides. Just as God created natural things to reflect his glory to the world, men have a tendency to create natural things for their own glory. God allows a certain amount of glory to accrue to men for their creations but he does put limits on the amount of glory they may receive.  Those limits apply when it comes to religious activities for which God says he will share his glory with no man. Thus, when men use their creative ability to gain glory for themselves through religious activities in which they promote themselves. That is when they come into conflict with God.