(to Jack G) When considering the character or attributes of God, it is so easy to focus on one thing like love, and wonder why there seems to be a conflct in His nature. How can finite minds understand an Infinite mind? All we as humans see about us is frail, fickle, finite and fallible humans - even the very best of mankind is still subject to those 4 things.
But God is not so as man is.
As regards God being a "loving God", what do you define love to be? Are you using your standard of love to define God's love?
The only way that we can begin to understand the character of God is by submitting to Him and His will. We need to get to know Him through faith in His Son, Jesus Christ and to have that 'born again' experience Jesus spoke about in John 3.
When endeavouring to understand about God's love, we must consider the length the Father went to prove that love through sending His Son to humanity and all that Jesus submitted to for the sake of His Father's will for us.
His love cannot be separated from His justice, or His holiness, or His wrath, or His impartiality, and so on. All of the characteristics and qualities and attributes of God are entwined and cannot be separated as a man separates an egg or dissects all the parts of a cabbage.
He creates physical realities as an expression of His wisdom, and righteousness, and Sovereign power. Some Jewish sages see the Name of God as an attribvute of His Justice - as the Ruler, the Lawgiver, the Judge. As I think about the specfic details mentioned in chapters 1 and 2 of Genesis, those things do fit very much under those headings. God did not at first reveal Himself as the God who loves - though we know that His motiovation was His love - even as it says in 1 Corinthians - If I have not love, then I have become a troublesome disscordant noise (paraphrase); or in 1 Cor 16:14 - Do all things in love. This is how God works as our Father. Always has and always will.
God is holy. He separates Himself from all sin and evil. He is set apart from creation. He works within His creation but is not part of it. He
is altogether pure and righteous. His Presence is unapproachable to sinful humans. We are unable to live or stand in His Presence. This is why we can only bring the righteousness of Jesus before God and not ours. Jesus is wholly righteous, sinless, uncorrupted, and perfect in obedience to the Father. On the cross, paradoxically, Jesus took upon Himself the guilt of the sins of all of humanity, and The Father judged that sin in Jesus, pouring out His wrath on Jesus until His wrath was satisfied. Jesus brought victory over this sin by His resurrection and, having removed our sin from us believers, covers us with His righteousness forever.
God is the perfect Judge and and will exercise His wrath on unbelievers and all evil beings in Hell forever. There are two sides to His justice- justifying those who believe and are saved in Christ-and condemning unbelievers and all evil beings, executing Hos judgement through His eternal wrath. This is the magnitude that He hates sin, both in giving His beloved Son as a holy and sufficient sacrifice for our sins to redeems us who believe-and in everlasting damnation for those who do not believe and all evil doers.
God is perfectly righteous and just. He always acts according to what is right since He Himself is the final standard for what is right. His moral character is without flaw or defect in degree. He is totally eternally righteous in all
His ways. Therefore, He is completely right in all of His judgments.
God is transcendent; no creature can ascend to God to inquire of Him or meet Him. No, in Christ In humility, He descended to the level of mankind, to be one of us and show us what God is like in ways we, as human creatures can understand. It was His will to redeem mankind from sin and thus enable us to be with God.
Our God is so great and amazing. He deserves our all.
I have been studying Hod's essence and attributes for the past month or so again, as I have done so in the past.
How please my heart is to be reminded of how wonderful He is.
I have purposely not cited Scripture verses for these thoughts because I would hope that those who want them would read up on this subject and find Scriptures cited by many who have written more extensively on this matter on a number of sites. These writers have done the work of searching the Scriptures for us. We would need to read the the whole Bible to get this knowledge. But, thankfully, others have done so, and we can read their findings and check out the Scripture verses to see if what is said in other their writings and Scripture align. I encourage people to do their own inquiry. They will be blessed. Having a truer view of who God really is is profitable to believers. In fact Jesus said that "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only True God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent."
God never had a conflict within Himself, nor a true contradiction. He is completely true within Himself. His self-knowledge is complete. There is nothing about Himsrlf He does not know in full.
He knows all of the thoughts, plans, and actions of the all spiritual beings-those of the angels and heavenly hosts-and those of Satan and the hosts that rebelled against God.
He can never fool God or out maneuver Him.
We can ever hide anything from God. He knows us thoroughly through and through. Therefore, we may as well confess our sins, doubts, and failings to Hom because He already knows and He has determned that it is in our repentance and confession that He forgives us and works in us to overcome these things, having put each one to death in Christ eternally. We are often blinded to our sins and real motives, intentions, and contributing factors to our choices. We need the illumination of the Holy Spirit to reveal to us what is truly within us and what is faulty about our thinking or reasoning. The Spirit is in charge of maturing us spiritually, correcting our thinking, convicting us of sin, and changing us to be more and more like Jesus.
God is good because all goodness resides in Him. He will never do evil. He is the only and final determiner of what is good in His creatures.
He is the ultimate source of all goodness, therefore He will always give good things to those who ask of Him.
God is love and His love within the Trinity is everlasting and unchanging. God loves His creation. His love towards His creatures never ceases. Grace and mercy are manifestations of His love and goodness. He gives us what we don't deserve in grace. He did not offer grace to Satan and His followers. He does not give us what we justly deserve (His wrath and eternal separation from Him) in His mercy. He does not show mercy to Satan and His followers. Along with all of His attributes, His grace and mercy is fathomless.
Whatever God wills will happen; His purposes and intent cannot be thwarted or overruled as He is the Sovereign over all creation. Therefore, He is all-powerful (omnipotent). There is no being or invention of man or Satan that can withstand Him and overcome Him. He created and sustains the universe and all creatures, natural laws, and forces by His power. Without Him, nothing else would exist or have life.
He is invisible, not made of any created substance, has no matter within Him. Therefore, He cannot be weighed because He is without mass. He is Spirit of the purest and uncontainable way. He does not take up space, but instead, He fills up all the universe with His Presence. He is not localized in one place, but can manifest His Presence as He wills. When this happens He is 100% present in the manifestation and at the same time 100% everwhere present (omni-present). This is how the Holy Spirit can be present in individuals in a full way and is not divided between us. He is 100% in each believer and 100% everywhere present at the same time. There is no limit to the number of believers He can fill with His presence, He is given to believers without measure.
God is all-wise; He does not lack any wisdom that anyone can give Him. He knows all things past, present, and future. (Omniscient) nothing can surprise Him. He knows all the thoughts, intentions, words, and actions every person will ever make. Yet, in His wisdom, He created mankind with freedom, therefore, He does not force anyone to do as He wishes, He just knows all and before time began He knew all and dyer mined His will according to His perfect and full knowledge of everything. He directs the course of history by His power, wisdom, and knowledge. Yet, we can pray and trust Him to bring perfect answers. Because He has perfect knowledge and wisdom, He is Truth. There is no falsehood in Him. He cannot say something to be true and later need to correct Himself. He knows every fact.... More later
God is all love, all just, all righteous, all, good, all wrath etc. He is the perfect Being and , although we speak of His attributes separately, they do not constitute individually "parts" of God. He is a perfect unity of all of His attributes as His One Essence. His Being is infinite, eternal, life in the most perfect way. His Being cannot be measured or quantified. As the source of all things, living and non, visible and invisible and all life comes from Him, God is the only absolutely necessary Being. We need Him, but He does not need anything or anyone, as He is perfectly complete, self-sustaining and sel-satisfied within Himself. Nothing can be added or subtracted to His Being; it is exclusive and cannot be multiplied, communicated, transferred, or, acquired by any other creature. His Being cannot be divided, broken into parts because it is not made of particles but is pure Spirit.
God's Being is Three Persons, not three gods, and each Person is 100% God. They live as a unity and all share equally the same divine essence to the fullest. For all eternity, these Persons are perfectly satisfied and fulfilled in their relationship within the Godhead. There is no power, attribute, nor will outside of God that He draws from or that compels Him, as He is completely free from outside authority, morality, or law that causes Him to act. He is completely independent of anyone or anything outside of Himself. He is absolutely pure and holy; there is no variation in His attributes; as He is always operating in all of them at once, even though in His with creation manifest certain attributes as viewed by His creatures. He does not increase or decrease His love or wrath at anytime, as that would indicate a change in His inherrent nature, but He executes his love and wrath according to the situation in time and space. He cannot change in His essential nature as any change would indicate a lack of perfection in His attributes... More later
I'd like to add some of what I believe. God is love , but not at the expense of His Holiness, or His Justice or righteousness .
That why He sent Jesus as the Christ to meet His standards of Holiness , righteousness, Justice , under the law , He fulfilled the law that we all broke and we violated Gods Holiness , righteousness, and Justice. Which separates us from God .
But God is not so as man is.
As regards God being a "loving God", what do you define love to be? Are you using your standard of love to define God's love?
The only way that we can begin to understand the character of God is by submitting to Him and His will. We need to get to know Him through faith in His Son, Jesus Christ and to have that 'born again' experience Jesus spoke about in John 3.
When endeavouring to understand about God's love, we must consider the length the Father went to prove that love through sending His Son to humanity and all that Jesus submitted to for the sake of His Father's will for us.
His love cannot be separated from His justice, or His holiness, or His wrath, or His impartiality, and so on. All of the characteristics and qualities and attributes of God are entwined and cannot be separated as a man separates an egg or dissects all the parts of a cabbage.
He creates physical realities as an expression of His wisdom, and righteousness, and Sovereign power. Some Jewish sages see the Name of God as an attribvute of His Justice - as the Ruler, the Lawgiver, the Judge. As I think about the specfic details mentioned in chapters 1 and 2 of Genesis, those things do fit very much under those headings. God did not at first reveal Himself as the God who loves - though we know that His motiovation was His love - even as it says in 1 Corinthians - If I have not love, then I have become a troublesome disscordant noise (paraphrase); or in 1 Cor 16:14 - Do all things in love. This is how God works as our Father. Always has and always will.
....continued part 4
God is holy. He separates Himself from all sin and evil. He is set apart from creation. He works within His creation but is not part of it. He
is altogether pure and righteous. His Presence is unapproachable to sinful humans. We are unable to live or stand in His Presence. This is why we can only bring the righteousness of Jesus before God and not ours. Jesus is wholly righteous, sinless, uncorrupted, and perfect in obedience to the Father. On the cross, paradoxically, Jesus took upon Himself the guilt of the sins of all of humanity, and The Father judged that sin in Jesus, pouring out His wrath on Jesus until His wrath was satisfied. Jesus brought victory over this sin by His resurrection and, having removed our sin from us believers, covers us with His righteousness forever.
God is the perfect Judge and and will exercise His wrath on unbelievers and all evil beings in Hell forever. There are two sides to His justice- justifying those who believe and are saved in Christ-and condemning unbelievers and all evil beings, executing Hos judgement through His eternal wrath. This is the magnitude that He hates sin, both in giving His beloved Son as a holy and sufficient sacrifice for our sins to redeems us who believe-and in everlasting damnation for those who do not believe and all evil doers.
God is perfectly righteous and just. He always acts according to what is right since He Himself is the final standard for what is right. His moral character is without flaw or defect in degree. He is totally eternally righteous in all
His ways. Therefore, He is completely right in all of His judgments.
God is transcendent; no creature can ascend to God to inquire of Him or meet Him. No, in Christ In humility, He descended to the level of mankind, to be one of us and show us what God is like in ways we, as human creatures can understand. It was His will to redeem mankind from sin and thus enable us to be with God.
I think this is enough for now.
Our God is so great and amazing. He deserves our all.
I have been studying Hod's essence and attributes for the past month or so again, as I have done so in the past.
How please my heart is to be reminded of how wonderful He is.
I have purposely not cited Scripture verses for these thoughts because I would hope that those who want them would read up on this subject and find Scriptures cited by many who have written more extensively on this matter on a number of sites. These writers have done the work of searching the Scriptures for us. We would need to read the the whole Bible to get this knowledge. But, thankfully, others have done so, and we can read their findings and check out the Scripture verses to see if what is said in other their writings and Scripture align. I encourage people to do their own inquiry. They will be blessed. Having a truer view of who God really is is profitable to believers. In fact Jesus said that "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only True God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent."
John 17:3
God never had a conflict within Himself, nor a true contradiction. He is completely true within Himself. His self-knowledge is complete. There is nothing about Himsrlf He does not know in full.
He knows all of the thoughts, plans, and actions of the all spiritual beings-those of the angels and heavenly hosts-and those of Satan and the hosts that rebelled against God.
He can never fool God or out maneuver Him.
We can ever hide anything from God. He knows us thoroughly through and through. Therefore, we may as well confess our sins, doubts, and failings to Hom because He already knows and He has determned that it is in our repentance and confession that He forgives us and works in us to overcome these things, having put each one to death in Christ eternally. We are often blinded to our sins and real motives, intentions, and contributing factors to our choices. We need the illumination of the Holy Spirit to reveal to us what is truly within us and what is faulty about our thinking or reasoning. The Spirit is in charge of maturing us spiritually, correcting our thinking, convicting us of sin, and changing us to be more and more like Jesus.
God is good because all goodness resides in Him. He will never do evil. He is the only and final determiner of what is good in His creatures.
He is the ultimate source of all goodness, therefore He will always give good things to those who ask of Him.
God is love and His love within the Trinity is everlasting and unchanging. God loves His creation. His love towards His creatures never ceases. Grace and mercy are manifestations of His love and goodness. He gives us what we don't deserve in grace. He did not offer grace to Satan and His followers. He does not give us what we justly deserve (His wrath and eternal separation from Him) in His mercy. He does not show mercy to Satan and His followers. Along with all of His attributes, His grace and mercy is fathomless.
....more later
Whatever God wills will happen; His purposes and intent cannot be thwarted or overruled as He is the Sovereign over all creation. Therefore, He is all-powerful (omnipotent). There is no being or invention of man or Satan that can withstand Him and overcome Him. He created and sustains the universe and all creatures, natural laws, and forces by His power. Without Him, nothing else would exist or have life.
He is invisible, not made of any created substance, has no matter within Him. Therefore, He cannot be weighed because He is without mass. He is Spirit of the purest and uncontainable way. He does not take up space, but instead, He fills up all the universe with His Presence. He is not localized in one place, but can manifest His Presence as He wills. When this happens He is 100% present in the manifestation and at the same time 100% everwhere present (omni-present). This is how the Holy Spirit can be present in individuals in a full way and is not divided between us. He is 100% in each believer and 100% everywhere present at the same time. There is no limit to the number of believers He can fill with His presence, He is given to believers without measure.
God is all-wise; He does not lack any wisdom that anyone can give Him. He knows all things past, present, and future. (Omniscient) nothing can surprise Him. He knows all the thoughts, intentions, words, and actions every person will ever make. Yet, in His wisdom, He created mankind with freedom, therefore, He does not force anyone to do as He wishes, He just knows all and before time began He knew all and dyer mined His will according to His perfect and full knowledge of everything. He directs the course of history by His power, wisdom, and knowledge. Yet, we can pray and trust Him to bring perfect answers. Because He has perfect knowledge and wisdom, He is Truth. There is no falsehood in Him. He cannot say something to be true and later need to correct Himself. He knows every fact.... More later
You are correct.
God is all love, all just, all righteous, all, good, all wrath etc. He is the perfect Being and , although we speak of His attributes separately, they do not constitute individually "parts" of God. He is a perfect unity of all of His attributes as His One Essence. His Being is infinite, eternal, life in the most perfect way. His Being cannot be measured or quantified. As the source of all things, living and non, visible and invisible and all life comes from Him, God is the only absolutely necessary Being. We need Him, but He does not need anything or anyone, as He is perfectly complete, self-sustaining and sel-satisfied within Himself. Nothing can be added or subtracted to His Being; it is exclusive and cannot be multiplied, communicated, transferred, or, acquired by any other creature. His Being cannot be divided, broken into parts because it is not made of particles but is pure Spirit.
God's Being is Three Persons, not three gods, and each Person is 100% God. They live as a unity and all share equally the same divine essence to the fullest. For all eternity, these Persons are perfectly satisfied and fulfilled in their relationship within the Godhead. There is no power, attribute, nor will outside of God that He draws from or that compels Him, as He is completely free from outside authority, morality, or law that causes Him to act. He is completely independent of anyone or anything outside of Himself. He is absolutely pure and holy; there is no variation in His attributes; as He is always operating in all of them at once, even though in His with creation manifest certain attributes as viewed by His creatures. He does not increase or decrease His love or wrath at anytime, as that would indicate a change in His inherrent nature, but He executes his love and wrath according to the situation in time and space. He cannot change in His essential nature as any change would indicate a lack of perfection in His attributes... More later
I'd like to add some of what I believe. God is love , but not at the expense of His Holiness, or His Justice or righteousness .
That why He sent Jesus as the Christ to meet His standards of Holiness , righteousness, Justice , under the law , He fulfilled the law that we all broke and we violated Gods Holiness , righteousness, and Justice. Which separates us from God .
For God so loved the world that He sent His Son
I'm sure there is so much more that could be said
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