For my birthday one year, an intern of ours who was an exceptional artist presented me with a beautiful picture she had painted. It’s really a lovely painting, but as lovely as it was, it was unsigned. So, I asked her to please sign it. Her signature said it was indeed her work and finished. A true artist won’t sign a painting if somebody else does the work on his or her painting.

God signed the tabernacle and the temple with His glory. God’s glory is His signature on the work of art He has created!

When God created the world, He didn’t use what already existed on earth as a pattern. He created things that had never existed before by His Word. When it came to making man, God didn’t use a pattern of anything He had made previously on any other day of creation. The pattern God used to make man was Himself. “God said, ‘Let us make human beings in our image to be like us.”

The two dwelling places God commissioned to be built in the Old Testament illustrate the fact that God did not use earthly patterns. We also see that God is very specific about what He wants and how He wants it.

Acts 7:44 says that the Tabernacle was constructed according to the pattern God showed Moses. It wasn’t constructed according to any design that Moses had seen in Egypt. Moses didn’t use Egyptian architecture to build the tabernacle. It was a new plan. It came from heaven—not from Egypt. God gave Moses this warning in Exodus 25:40, “Be sure that you make everything according to the pattern I have shown you….” In Egypt? No! “…on the mountain.”

The tabernacle was not some kind of concoction that emerged from a group discussion or a special committee assigned to come up with what it should look like. No, God took Moses away from every other influence, up onto the mountain of God, and there, God gave him the pattern of the original that came from heaven itself. God had a pattern in Himself, and He showed it to Moses.

Solomon’s temple, like the tabernacle, was built exactly according to the specs and design that came from God. God was just as precise about it.

As a result, both were filled with the glory of God upon their completion. God never fills man’s plans with His glory. Man may even dedicate his plan to God. Still, He won’t fill it with His glory. The only thing that God fills with His glory is what comes from Him. If man does the work, God won’t take the credit (Psalm 127:1).

One primary reason we know that man didn’t evolve from any other type of life created earlier is that God very plainly said four times in Genesis 1 that the pattern He used to make man was Himself. The pattern was not from something He made some other time in His creation. No, the Word makes it abundantly clear. God Himself is the pattern in the creation of man.

Adam was made to represent, resemble, reflect, and image God like a mirror. God was the pattern for man. Man and woman were perfect visible images of the invisible God. Like a mirror is not a person but images or reflects a person, Adam and Eve were made to image and reflect God. You couldn’t see God, but you could see man. In other words, if you could see man, there wouldn’t be any confusion about what God was like. Man was created to reflect God’s likeness. And He will fill His creation with His glory!

God’s glory is His signature on the work of art He has created!

Do you want the glory of God on your life as well?

It comes on a life that represents and reflects Him – a life made in the image of God Himself.