Back in the mid 1960s TIME magazine’s cover stated that God was dead. Yet God stubbornly refuses to show any signs of rigor mortis. Over 30 years after TIME magazine’s obituary of God, 95% of Americans said that they still believe in the existence of God.
But when it comes to defining exactly what kind of God it is that we’re talking about, things get much more complicated. Some people think of God as "the force" from Star Wars, with both a good side and a dark side. Others picture God as an enormous man in heaven, showing an uncanny resemblance to George Burns, or more recently perhaps Alanis Morresset from the movie "Dogma." Some see God as a celestial highway patrolman setting up speed traps to capture people. Still other people believe the universe is God, and still others believe themselves to be gods.
So although atheism has never really gained popular acceptance, the real confusing comes when we try to describe exactly what kind of God it is that we’re talking about.
This series is called WHAT DO CHRISTIANS THINK? It is designed to cover the basics beliefs of the Christian faith in a relevant way that people investigaging the Christian faith can understand. You see the Christian faith is a coherent belief system that seeks to make sense out of life, what we call a worldview. It’s fashionable today to pick and choose beliefs from various religions and philosophies. But this is a dangerous approach because every religious belief system presents a comprehensive and interrelated way of making sense of reality, and mixing and matching ideas from different sources results in a world view that lacks internal coherence. It would be like taking 10 puzzle pieces from ten different puzzles, and then trying to piece them all together. Even if used a knife to make the pieces fit, the picture wouldn’t make any kind of sense. In a similar way, mixing and matching conflicting beliefs from different religions and philosophies results in a nonsensical and incoherent view of life.
In this series I’ll be sharing eight basic areas of Christian belief that are essential to the Christian worldview. But before we start, I need to say that it would be a mistake to think that the Christian faith is merely about having the right beliefs. The heart of the Christian faith is not a set of ideas or a catalog of concepts but it’s a personal love relationship with God through faith in Jesus Christ. The ideas and concepts we’ll be talking about flow from this personal relationship with God, they’re not a substitute for it.
Now if you’re reading this and you’ve been a Christian for a while, you might be thinking that this series will be too basic for you. But before you tune me out, let me suggest that many Christians don’t really believe what they say they believe. You really see what a person believes by watching his or her lifestyle, because the way we actually live reveals what we actually believe about life. If I honestly believe that my wife is trying to poison me, that will effect the way I live. I’d probably suggest that we eat out a lot more often, I’d probably carefully watch her while she cooks my meals, and so forth. If I really believe something, I can’t help but live consistently with my belief system. Throughout this series I’ll be asking whether our lives reflect genuine belief in these fundamental basics of the Christian faith.
Today we’re going to look at what Christians believe about God. Now God is such a huge topic that I feel like I’m trying to fit an ocean into a thimble, because there’s so much that can be said about God. But today I’ll be limiting myself to five key concepts that are critical to the Christian concept of God.
1. GOD IS FOR REAL (Genesis 1:1)
We start with the very first phrase from the Bible: "In the beginning God..." (Gen 1:1). The Bible never attempts to prove God’s existence, but it merely assumes that God exists. This is because no one in the ancient world questioned the existence of God...the debate back then was over what God was like and how to relate to God.
Now in response to the rise of atheism in western culture, some Chistians have tried to prove the existence of God using various logical arguments. The medieval Roman Catholic theologian Thomas Aquinus articulated four arguments to prove that God exists. In more recent times C. S. Lewis engaged in the same sort of attempt in his writings. Some people have found arguments helpful to their spiritual journey into Christian faith, but their usefulness has been pretty limited. This is because the goal of the Christian faith has never been to persuade people to accept the concept or idea of God, but instead it’s been to introduce people to a love relationship with God. So philosophical arguments about God’s existence can end up being like a rather tedious game of chess. Now if you’re interested in these classical arguments, I’ve listed a few of them on your Growth Guide for you to think about during the week. But in the end both atheism and Christianity are ultimately matters of faith. Since the honest atheist doesn’t claim to have unlimited knowledge of the universe, he or she really can’t claim to know for sure that God doesn’t exist. All an honest atheist can do is say that he or she hasn’t yet found enough evidence to believe that God exists...which is really agnosticism not atheism.
Now Christians obviously believe that God is real. This means that Christians believe that God has objective existence in the real world, that God isn’t merely wish fulfillment as Sigmund Freud suggested. There are good, solid reasons to believe this is the case, but ultimately it’s a matter of faith.
This brings us to our first key concept. SINCE GOD IS REAL, WE ARE NEVER REALLY ALONE.
If God is indeed real, there’s nowhere in the universe a person can go to escape God’s presence. The first verse of the Bible says that before anything else existed--in the beginning--there was God. This means that God is the only self-existent being in the universe. We depend on other things for life, like oxygen, food, water, sleep and so forth. If you take any of these things away we die because our lives are contingent on them, making us more vulnerable and dependant than we like to admit. But God is self existent, needing nothing exterior to himself to exist, which is why one of the Bible’s favorite titles for God is "the Living God."
Now, if you believe that God is real, let me ask you a question: Do you believe that you’re never really alone? Let’s try a little experiment to find out: When do you talk to God? Do you only talk to God at church? Or before family meals? Or at Bible study? If we believe that God is real and therefore always present with us, then it makes sense that we’d talk to him throughout our day, no matter where we are and what we’re doing, just like we’d talk to a friend we’re spending a day with. If you find that you never talk to God, or that you only talk to God at church, then maybe it’s time to ask yourself if you really believe God is real.
If God is for real we’re never really alone.
2. GOD IS SPIRIT(John 4:24)
All this talk about a being who can be present everywhere sounds strange, after all, what kind of entity is this God anyway? In John 4:24, Jesus claimed, "God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth" (NIV).
What does it mean to say that God is spirit? It means that God is not composed of matter, that he doesn’t have physical properties like size, shape, weight and color. God in his essence is not perceivable by our five senses, and although God can and does make his presence known through the physical world of matter, his essence or nature is pure spirit. We as humans are both physical and spiritual creatures, which means that we have a physical body, but we also have a soul and a mind, so there’s an interplay between the material and the non-material components of our nature.
The second part of Jesus’ statement tells us that how we approach God must be in harmony with what God is like. Since God is spirit--non-physical, not composed of matter--our approach to God must be consistent with this reality. This phrase "spirit and truth" carries a lot of meaning, but at its very least it means that people who would come to God must approach God in a way that is appropriate and corresponds to what God is like.
Here’s the second key concept. SINCE GOD IS SPIRIT, OUR APPROACH TO HIM MUST BE SPIRITUAL.
The door to discovering God is a spiritual door. Theology, philosophy and science can teach us certain things about God, but if we really want to know God as a person and not merely as a concept or idea, then we must come to God spiritually, as worshippers. This is the spiritual door to the spiritual God.
Here’s a question to find out if you really believe this is true: Who’s terms are you approaching God on, your terms or his? The person who stands on a hill shaking his fist in defiance and daring God to zap him with a bolt of lightening isn’t coming to God on God’s terms. The person who bargains with God to get him off the hook isn’t coming to God on God’s terms. God’s nature is spirit, and that means our approach to God must be a spiritual one.
3. GOD REVEALS HIMSELF(1 John 1:5)
Now even if God is real and he exists as spirit, how can we know anything for sure about him? If we can’t see or touch God, if God isn’t composed of matter, how can we say anything definitive about God? This is where 1 John 1:5 comes in: "This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all" (NIV).
There’s a lot we could say about that phrase "God is light" but I want to focus in on just one element. Just like it’s the nature of light to shine, so it’s the nature of God to communicate himself to others. To speak of God as light is to speak of God communicating what he’s like to people.
Here’s the third key concept. SINCE GOD REVEALS HIMSELF, WE ARE NEVER FAR FROM HIS VOICE.
Long before Ronald Reagan, God has always been the great communicator. God revealed himself with finality through Jesus Christ, which we’ll talk about in a few weeks, but for now I just want to focus on the fact that God does communicate himself.
There are many different ways God reveals himself to us. Psalm 19:1 says, "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands" (NIV). This tells us that the world of nature--the universe God created--actively communicates who God is. We can look at the universe on a macro level using a high powered telescope, and as we look at the galaxies, stars and planets they tell us about God. We can look using a microscope to study the human cell and it tells us about God. Or we can just look with our own eyes to see a breathtaking sunset, a snow capped mountain, or a beautiful ocean, and we catch the wonder of God shining his light in our world.
Now do you really believe that you’re never far from God’s voice? Here’s a way to find out: When you face a problem in life, where’s the first place you look for a solution? Do you consult God, seeking his voice to guide you to the right solution? If God is light, then God’s voice is never far from us, and he speaks with authority on the problems we face in life. A few years ago we bought a special kind of night light for our kids, the kind that only lights up when it senses movement. So if no one’s moving, it doesn’t light up. But if it senses movement it lights up. God’s voice is like that, if we draw near to consult God on the problems were facing, suddenly his light will shine and we’ll hear his voice giving us the solution to our problem.
So God reveals himself--he’s light.
4. GOD IS PERSONAL (1 John 4:16)
Let’s look at 1 John 4:16: "And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love..." (NIV).
Now this does NOT say that love is God, as if somehow the feeling of love is to be equated with God. This also doesn’t mean that God is loving, as if God arbitrarily chooses to love like I might choose to play golf or eat brussel sprouts. This statement means that love lies at the core essence of what God is like (Morris, "Testaments of Love" 136). Everything God does--even his judgment against sin--is motivated by his love, because love is the core attribute of God.
Now this means that God is a person, not in the sense of being human, but in the sense of having personality.
This is in different than Eastern religions like Hinduism and Buddhism, because they view God as impersonal, like a vague force. The God of the Christian faith is personal by nature. You see for love to exist there must be both a subject--the person doing the loving--and an object--the person being loved. God’s nature to love as a personal being also implies that there’s a plurality within the structure of God’s essence. You see, if God is love by nature, that means that even before God created anything, he was love. Before there was any created thing to love, God’s essence was still love, which means there must be a subject and object to that love for it to make any sense. This implies that within the structure of God’s essence there must be some sort of plurality of persons that enabled God to love as both subject and object, even when nothing else existed but God. If this plurality within God’s essence doesn’t exist, then God isn’t truly be personal, and as a consequence he’s not love, because it would mean that God is only personal and loving in relation to his creation. This plurality of persons within God’s nature is what Christians call the trinity, the idea that within the nature of the one true God there exists a plurality of persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Let’s look at another verse that emphasizes this plurality of love: "The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in his hands" (John 3:35). This statement of the Father’s love for the Son has been true for all eternity, even before the universe was created God existed in perfect a community of love.
This brings us to our fourth key concept. Since God is personal, we are never far from his care.
This is what 1 John 4:16 means by knowing and relying on God’s love, that the disclosure that God’s nature is love is an open invitation for us to draw near to God’s heart so we personally know and rely on that loving care for our lives. God is not like the imperfect parent who withholds love because the child hasn’t performed, but God’s love is unconditional and infinite in measure. Jesus said that God knows the number of the hair on our head--which isn’t too hard for some people-- that God knows your deepest needs, your secret dreams, your deepest longings, that God knows you even better than you know yourself...and he still loves you infinitely.
Now again I ask if you really believe this? Here’s a question to find out: Where do you turn to most for love and acceptance? Is it to your parents or your friends, to your spouse or your co-workers? If God is not the primary source of love and acceptance in your life, I wonder if you really believe this. If God’s opened his heart to us, that his very nature is to love, then God has given us access to an infinite source of love and acceptance for our lives, if we’ll only know and rely on that love. God’s very nature is to love, and this personal God has opened his heart to us.
5. GOD IS AWESOME(1 Chronicles 29:11)
This passage is part of David’s prayer at the end of his life:
"Yours, O LORD, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, O LORD, is the kingdom; you are exalted as head over all" (1 Chronicles 29:11 NIV).
God possesses all greatness, which is the quality of being most important and significant in comparison to others, God is in a class by himself to which nothing else can be compared. God also has all power, which is the capacity to do and to will anything he wants to do that’s in accordance with his character and nature. God has all glory, which refers to God’s transcendent beauty, radiance and magnificence. We’re impressed by a beautiful sunset or an inspiring painting, but God is the source from which all true beauty flows, so the most beautiful things in creation are but a dim reflection of his beauty. God has all majesty, which refers to God’s grandeur and dignity as the ruler of the universe. God has all splendor, which refers to the brightness and brilliance of his being, that he shines brighter than any star. Because of this, everything belongs to God, he owns the universe, he’s exalted as the one who’s over everything.
This incredible statement about God brings us to our final key concept. SINCE GOD IS AWESOME, WE ARE NEVER BEYOND HIS REACH.
God is on the throne, he’s in control as the awesome ruler over the entire universe. Words fail us when we try to describe God, they become clumsy and inadequate to describe a reality that’s far greater than words could ever describe. But do you really believe this? Let me ask you a question: When you face an impossible situation, where do you go for help? When the biopsy comes back as cancer, when your business fails, when your marriage is crumbling, where do you turn for help? For if God is a awesome as we say we believe he is, his hand is not too far to reach us, we are never beyond the effective power of God. It’s like the song we sing, "I now that there’s no river so wide, no mountain so high, no ocean so deep that God can’t part the sea." Just like the awesome God parted the Red Sea for the Israelites to escape their captivity, this same awesome God is able to intervene in our lives as well.
Conclusion
There’s so much more than could be said about God. But for today I present these five key concepts as basic to the Christian belief about God: That God is real, God is spirit, God reveals himself, God is personal, and God is awesome. What an incredible difference these five concepts can make in our lives if we really believe them, that we’re never alone, we’re invited to approach God spiritually, we’re never far from God’s voice, God’s care, and God’s reach.
The Christian faith is not about collecting data about God so we have an encyclopedic knowledge of correct concepts about God. The Christian faith is about personally encountering this very God, about knowing Him in a way that transforms our everyday lives. Christianity is about worshipping this God, and in the context of our worship experience, being changed and made whole because we’re doing that which we were created to do: To know God.
