Chapter 7: The Creation C: We Were Given a Unique Role Among God's Creations

We were created in the image of God. This has been talked about several times now in different sections and chapters of this study guide. Clearly, it is very important that we understand that we are the children of our Heavenly Father in a very literal sense.

And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle and over all the earth, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
Genesis 1:26-27

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, basing its belief on divine revelation, ancient and modern, proclaims man to be the direct and lineal offspring of Deity. God Himself is an exalted man, perfected, enthroned, and supreme. By His almighty power He organized the earth, and all that it contains, from spirit and element, which exist co-eternally with Himself. He formed every plant that grows, and every animal that breathes, each after its own kind, spiritually and temporally-'that which is spritual being in the likenss of that which is temporal, and that which is temporal in the likeness of that which is spritual." He made the tadpole and the ape, the lion and the lephant, but He did not make them in His own image, nor endow them with Godlike reason and intelligence. Nevertheless, the whole animal creation will be perfected and peretuated in the Hereafter, each class in its "distinct order or spher," and will enjoy "eternal felicity." That fact has been made plain in this dispensation (Doctrine and Covenants, 77:3).
Man is the child of God, formed in the divine image and endowed with divien attributes, and even as the infant son of an earthly father and mother is capable in due time of becoming a man, so the undeveloped offspring of celestial parentage is capable, by experience through ages and aeons, of evolving into a God.
The First Presidency [Jospeh . Smith, John R. Winder, and Anthon H. Lund], in James R. Clark, comp. Messages of the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 4:205-6

We know that Jehovah-Christ, assisted by "many of the noble and great one" (Abr. 3:22), of whom Michael is but the illustration, did in fact create the earth and all forms of plant and animal life on the face thereof. But when it came to placing man on earth, there was a change in Creators. That is, the Father himself became personally involved. All things were created by the Son, using the power delegated by the Father, except man. In the spirit and again in the flesh, man was created by the Father. There was no delegation of authority where the crowning creature of creation was concerned.
Bruce R. McConkie, The Promised Messiah, 62

Woman was created as a help meet to man; an equal partner. Several parts of the creation account indicate they were created to be equal - she was created from his rib, to stand at his side, she and he were not complete until there was both, and so on. It is only afterward that we see women being treated as number two, not by God, but by fallen man.

And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will him an help meet for him. And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
Genesis 2:18, 21-24

And I God, blessed them, and said unto them: Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it, and have domion over the fish of the sa, and over the fowl of the air, and ove every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
Moses 2:28

It is written:
"And I, God, created man in mine own image, in the image of mine Only Begotten created I him; male and female created I them. (The story of the rib, of course, is figurative.)
And, I, God, blessed them (Man here is always in the plural. It was plural from the beginning.) and said unto them: Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it, and have dominion over (it)." (Moses 2:27-28)
And the scripture says,
"And I, God, said unto mine Only Begotten, which was with me from the beginning: Let us make man (not a separate man, but a complete man, which is husband and wife) in our image, after our likeness; and it was so." (Moses 2:26) What a beautiful partnership! Adam and Eve were married for eternity by the Lord. . . .
"Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam (Mr. and Mrs. Adam, I suppose, or Brother and Sister Adam), in the day when they were created." (Genesis 5:1-2)
This is a partnership. Then when they had created them in the image of God, to them was given the eternal command, "Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it" (Gen 1:28), and as they completed this magnificent creation, they looked it over and pronounced it "good, very good"-- something that isn't to be improved upon by our modern intellectuals; the male to till the ground, support the family, to give proper leadership; the woman to cooperate, to bear the children, and to rear and teach them. It was "good, very good."
And that is the way the Lord organized it. This wasn't an experiment. He knew what he was doing.
Spencer W. Kimball, "The Blessing and Responsibilities of Womanhood," Ensign, Mar. 1976, 71)

The purpose of the earth's creation was for us to be tested. Thus, everything in the earth is created for our good. We know how vital it is to have a whole ecosystem in order to support life - that man could never live as a sole species. And, over all this we are the stewards. It is my personal belief and interpretation that we will be held accountable for how we have acted as stewards over the earth, and thus we should treat it with respect.

What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and hohour. Thou madest him to have dominon over the works fo thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet: Al sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field; The fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas.
Psalms 8:4-8

Verily I say, that inasmuch as ye do this, the fulness of the earth is yours, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, and that which climbeth upon the trees and walketh upon the earth; Yea, and the herb, adn the good things wich come of the earth,m whether for food or for raiment, ro for houses, or for barns, or for orchards, or for gardens, or for vineyards; Yea, all thing which come of the earth, in the season thereof, are made for the benefit and the use of man, both to please the eye and to gladden the heart; Yea, for food and for raiment, for taste and for smell, to strengthen the body and to enliven the soul. And it pleaseth God that he hath given all these things unto man; for unto this end were they made to boe used, with judgment, not to excess, neither by extortion.
D&C 59:16-20

The whole object of the creation of this world is to exalt the intelligences that are placed upon it, that they may live, endure, and increase for ever and ever.
Brigham Young, Discourse of Brigham Young, 57