The Being Of God
THE DOCTRINE OF GOD AND HIS
CREATION
THE BEING OF GOD
THE ESSENTIAL NATURE OF GOD
A. The knowledge of (respecting) God. The possibility of knowing God has been denied on several different grounds. In some cases, however, this denial is simply equivalent to the assertion that man cannot comprehend God. And this is, of course, very true. It is not possible for man to know God with an absolutely all-comprehensive knowledge, to fathom the infinite depths of the divine being. But while we can know God only in part, his knowledge is nevertheless real and true knowledge. Man's knowledge of God is generally said to be twofold:
1. INNATE OR INBORN KNOWLEDGE. The statement that man has an innate knowledge of God does not merely mean that he has an inborn capacity to know God. It indicates something more than that.
At the same time it does not imply that man at birth brings a certain knowledge of God with him into the world. The innate knowledge of God is inborn in the sense that, under normal conditions, it develops spontaneously in man as soon as he comes in contact with God's revelation. It is a knowledge which man, as he is constituted, develops of necessity and not as the result of any choice on his part.
Naturally such knowledge is of a rather general nature.
2. ACQUIRED KNOWLEDGE. Acquired knowledge, on the other hand, is derived from God's general and special revelation. It does not arise spontaneously in the mind, but results from the conscious
and sustained pursuit of knowledge. It can be obtained only by the wearisome process of perception and reflection, reasoning and argumentation, and therefore depends on the voluntary direction of the will and on the persistent efforts of man. While it is possible only because man is born with the capacity to know God, it carries him far beyond the limits of his innate knowledge of God.
It is sometimes said that our knowledge of God is limited to the relations in which He stands to His creatures, and does not extend to His essential being; but this is hardly correct. It would not even be possible to know these relations without knowing something of the very nature of God and man. In virtue of God's self-revelation it is possible for man to have true and real knowledge of the being of God, though this knowledge is necessarily limited.
B. The being of God as known from God's revelation. While it is not possible to give a definition of God in the strict sense of the word, it is possible to give a general description of His being. Many so-called definitions have been given of God, but it is perhaps best to describe
Him simply as a pure Spirit of infinite perfections. This description contains the following elements:
1. GOD IS A PURE SPIRIT. The Bible does not attempt to define the being of God. The nearest approach to anything like it is found in the word of Christ to the Samaritan woman: "God is spirit," John 4:24.
This means that He is essentially spirit, so that all the qualities which belong to the perfect idea of spirit are necessarily found in Him; that He is a self-conscious and self-determining being. The fact that He is pure spirit of necessity excludes the notion of the early Gnostics and medieval Mystics, that He has some sort of an ethereal or refined body. It also rules out the idea that He is visible and can be discerned by the bodily senses.
2. GOD IS PERSONAL. The fact that God is spirit also involves his personality, for a spirit is an intelligent and moral being, and when we ascribe personality to God, we mean exactly that He is a rational being capable of self-determination. In the present day many deny the personality of God and speak of Him as the unconscious cause of all existing things, as the all-pervasive principle of the world, or as the all-inclusive purpose of the universe. The personality of God is clearly indicated, however, in the traces of intelligent and purposeful action in the world; in the rational, moral, and religious nature of man, all of which can only be the product of a personal God; and above all in the representations of God in Scripture. The presence of God, as it is described in the Old and New Testament, is clearly a personal presence. He is represented as a personal God, who comes and goes, with whom men can converse, whom they can trust, who enters into their experiences, who sustains them in their trials and difficulties, and who fills their hearts with the joy of victory.
Moreover, the highest revelation of God in the New Testament is a personal revelation. Jesus Christ reveals the Father in such a perfect way that He could say to Philip: "He who hath seen me hath seen the Father," John 14:9.
3. GOD IS INFINITELY PERFECT. God is distinguished from all His creatures by infinite perfection. He possesses His being and His virtues without any limitation or imperfection. As the infinitely perfect God, He is not only boundless or limitless, but is exalted above all His creatures in grand sublimity and in ineffable majesty.
This infinity is characteristic of all the divine perfections, and distinguishes these from the attributes of all creatures, however exalted they may be. It is extolled in the song of Moses at the Red
Sea: "Who is like unto thee, O Jehovah, among the gods? Who is like thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders," Ex.
15:11. Further references to it are found in such passages as 1 Kings