Is gender a social construct? And what does it mean to bear God’s image? And how are the two related? The earliest pages of our Bible begin to answer these questions, as we watch our origin story unfold in Genesis 1-3. I’m so thankful to have my friend Kelly Needham back with us to talk through some of the most weighty questions of our day. Kelly brings such wisdom and clarity to this conversation about gender in Genesis.
Guest: Kelly Needham
Bible Passage: Genesis 1:26-31
Get your Freebie: The Live Like It’s True Workbook
Recommended Resources: Amazon Storefront for the Genesis Series
Mentioned Resources:
-
- Let Me Be a Woman by Elizabeth Elliot (story about sailboats on the sand)
- Listening to the Language of the Bible – co-authored by Lois Tverberg (quote about king minting coins)
- True Story on the Roof – episode one with Kelly Needham
- Jimmy Needham’s sermon: Gender in Genesis
Transcript: Read the Full Transcript
Music: Cade Popkin Music
Producer: Maria Lyons
Kelly Needham
- Friendish (Book) – Reclaiming Real Friendship in a Culture of Confusion
- Purposefooled (Upcoming book) – Why Chasing Our Dreams, Finding Our Calling and Reaching for Greatness Fails Us and What We’re Really Meant to Live For.
- Clearly (Upcoming Podcast) – IF IT’S COMPLEX, CONFUSING OR CONTROVERSIAL, IT’S COVERED HERE. Jimmy and Kelly Needham help demystify the Bible and give you the tools to get out of the fog and see God for yourself.
Connect with Kelly
Culture's view of gender is actually far more narrow than God's view of Gender - Kelly Needham Share on XGod’s Self-Portrait
There are boys and there are girls. There are men and there are women. And something about that is tied to: We are in the image of God.
In a sermon Kelly’s husband, Jimmy Needham, preached, he used an illustration of self-portraits.
Artists often create self-portraits, and add different elements into the portrait to portray themselves. They are intentionally communicating something about themselves.
So in Genesis, God is creating a self-portrait. He’s creating a representation of his likeness and the way that he does that is by creating two canvases. Since God is a plural being, he must use two canvases to portray his plurality. Those two self-portraits are male and female.
So God doesn’t just create one gendered humanity. Instead, he chose two gender that are distinct from one another (when a baby is born it’s easy to tell whether they are a boy or a girl) and yet complementary. Even thought men and women are different, we are distinct. You can line a bunch of creatures up and easily tell the difference between a person and an animal. We know that there is one humanity, but within that humanity there is diversity. So there is unity and diversity—and it’s the same with God.
God is one God. Unity. But he is also diverse. He’s three persons. This is one of the key reasons that the genders are important. Together, they represent that unity and diversity of humanity. This is part of God’s self-portrait. It’s part of the way God wants to make himself known to the world.
There are boys and there are girls. There are men and there are women. And something about that is tied to: We are in the image of God. Share on X
