What does Tribe teach about image of god?
Drawn from the messages where it was actually addressed: the words said from the front, the passages taught, and where to hear the whole thing.
At Tribe, the teaching on identity starts with a simple but anchoring claim: only the creator has the authority to define his creation. Brian Hunter brought this out through Isaiah 29:16 and the image of clay that does not get to tell the potter what it is. The point is not abstract. It cuts against the instinct to build a sense of self from personal history, family opinion, cultural pressure, or even an honest look at personal weakness. If God made humanity as image bearers, then the definition of a human being belongs to God, and no other source carries that authority.
Brian used Gideon in Judges 6 to press this home. Gideon is hiding in a winepress, threshing wheat underground where the wind cannot even do its job, because he is terrified of the Midianites. His self-assessment is accurate by every visible measure: weakest clan, least in the family, no resume. Then God addresses him as a mighty man of valor before he has done a single thing to earn it. Brian says, "God comes along and says, Gideon, mighty man of valor. Are there two of us named Gideon in here?" The point is that both things were true at once. Gideon's smallness was real. But God was operating at a higher level of truth, the way lift overrides gravity without gravity ever switching off.
The teaching also connects identity to the gifts and calling God places on a person's life. Before a tool can be sharpened and used well, the person holding it has to know who they are. Brian draws on passages like Ephesians 1:4-5, 2 Corinthians 5:17, and Romans 8:37 to show that God's word over a person, deeply loved, chosen, more than a conqueror, is not encouragement built on performance. It is the creator speaking the truth about his creation. That settled identity is the ground from which a person can operate in the Spirit rather than the flesh, the difference that determines whether a gift produces anything at all.
Taught from Isaiah 29:16 · Ephesians 1:4-5 · 2 Corinthians 5:17 · Romans 8:37 · Romans 8:15
“Only the creator has the authority to define his creation.”
From Identity
The passage taught · 1 John 3:1
1 See how great a love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God! For this cause the world doesn’t know us, because it didn’t know him.
World English Bible
Messages that go deeper
- May 18, 2026 Identity Brian Hunter walks through Judges 6 to show how God named Gideon a mighty warrior before he had done anything, and what that means for how we see ourselves.
- May 18, 2026 Only the Creator Has Authority to Define His Creation Brian Hunter explores identity through Gideon's story, showing how God names us before we've earned it and why only the Creator has authority to define His creation.