Few things could be more important today: what is a human?

‘What is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?’ (Ps. 8:4).

When you meet another human being, what are you encountering? As you look into the eyes of a friend, or a parent, or a child, what is it that you see? Is an encounter with another human being different from an encounter with a mouse, or a goldfish, or your pet dog? Is it different from an encounter with an AI Chatbot? Intuitively we think it probably is. But why?

In the early church, the most important questions that Christians had to work through were ‘Who is God?’ (the doctrine of the Trinity), and ‘Who is Jesus?’ (God and man). At the time of the Reformation, the central questions were ‘How can we know God and His will for our lives?’ (the supreme authority and sufficiency of Scripture), and ‘How can sinners be made right with God?’ (justification by faith alone).