Clear Bible Answers

Question 22

If God made man in His own image then how do we have different races and colors of people?

In the beginning God created just two people-Adam and

Eve-in His own image.

So God created man in his own image, in the image of

God created he him; male and female created he them.

(Genesis 1:27)

Adam and Eve were made perfect. But that, unfortunately, is not the

whole story. Sin entered the world and everything changed.

The animals-for example-were vegetarians then. The Bible

record declares:

And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the

air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth,

wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for

meat: and it was so. (Genesis 1:30)

After sin entered the world that order changed-There were drastic

changes in the animal kingdom, plant kingdom, in the climate, and

in the very body of man.

Even when we look at man from the physical perspective we

see a lot of changes that have taken place since the fall. For example

Moses talks about a giant who was sleeping on the bed size of thirteen-

and-a-half feet. And the bed was made of iron!

For only Og king of Bashan remained of the remnant of

giants; behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron; is it

not in Rabbath of the children of Ammon? nine cubits

was the length thereof, and four cubits the breadth of it,

after the cubit of a man. (Deuteronomy 3:11)

As time passed on the very structure of man started changing

dramatically. Today's man is less than six feet on an average. And

before the flood man's life span was nine hundred plus years (See

Genesis Chapter 5). But now the average lifespan is sixty years!

If Sin could hit man's physical height and age, it should not

surprise us that sin has touched the very genes of man.

We know from the book of Genesis the history of the different

languages we have in our world today. It was not so in the beginning.

There was only one language initially. At the tower of Babel

we see the beginning of different languages and the segregation of

the people.

And the whole earth was of one language, and of one

speech... the LORD did there confound the language of

all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them

abroad upon the face of all the earth. (Genesis 11:1, 9)

And it was at this point of time the segregation began. The

people started to group themselves and that is how races began. The

marked differences in color in the different races would not have

existed in the beginning but as time passed on the very fabric of

man's system within was getting affected.

The Bible says,

All have sin and come short of the glory of God. (Romans

3:23)

Yes we have come short in many things. The original pattern

has changed. Even the skin colors and the physical structures have

changed. It might be very hard to tell which the original color was,

but we can be sure it was absolutely beautiful in the beginning.

We thank God that the plan of salvation will restore this too, the

original pattern that God designed for us. When Jesus comes, the

Bible declares, our mortal bodies will put on immortality.

For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this

mortal must put on immortality. (1 Corinthians 15:53)

And as we partake of the fruit of the tree of life and of the leaves

of that tree we will be restored fully, by and by, to the original

pattern of God. The leaves of the tree of life heal, or restore, us to

the original pattern which was at the beginning.

The tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and

yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree

were for the healing of the nations. (Revelation 22:2)

The Gospel of Jesus is for "Every nation, and kindred, and tongue,

and people" (Revelation 14:6). All races and colors are involved in

His plan. And it is written:

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond

nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all

one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:28)