God - The Being

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By Dr. J. Rodman Williams
Theologian

II. The Being of God

In discussing the being of God, let us think of Him in the opening words of a catechism definition: "God is a spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable, in his being." Then we shall proceed with a later statement: "There are three persons Godhead: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one God, the same in substance, equal in power and in glory" (Westminster Shorter Catechism, partial answer to Question 4: "What is God?").

1. A spirit—"God is spirit" (John 4:24). God is not flesh and blood; He has no body; He is by nature spirit. References in the Bible to God’s hands, eyes, finger, etc., are accommodations to our human condition so that His reality may be more concrete. It is hard for us to think upon God without thinking of some tangible form; it is likewise difficult for God to reveal Himself to us without anthropomorphic expressions being used. The climax of this situation is realized in the Incarnation: God actually assuming human flesh ("the Word became flesh," John 1:14) that He might be known more fully.

Still God is, and remains, spirit. But what does this mean? Have we any way of comprehending such? Perhaps the best approximation to understanding is to suggest that God is most closely akin to that which is the deepest part of our nature: our spirit. Man is body, mind, and spirit—the latter is that which is our deepest and truest self. Our spirit functions through our minds and our bodies, but is to be identified with neither: it, like God, is intangible, incorporeal.

On this level of spirit God is most truly known, for here God and man may be in true communion—"God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit," (John 4:24). In the beautiful words of Tennyson—

Speak to Him thou for He hears,

Spirit with Spirit can meet-

Closer is He than breathing.

And nearer than hands and feet.

2. Infinite—God is unlimited, unbounded. Human beings are finite, confined in space. With God there is no confinement, no limitation. "Behold, heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain thee" (1 Kings 8:27). As infinite, God is everywhere present—

Whither shall I go from thy Spirit?

Or whither shall I flee from thy presence?

If I ascend to heaven, thou art there!

If I make my bed in Sheol, thou art there!

If I take the wings of the morning

And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,

Even there thy hand shall lead me,

And thy right hand shall hold me. (Psalm 139:7-10)

Hence God is both infinitely far and near: He is far beyond all His creation, but also, as the Apostle says "He is not far from each one of us, for ‘in him we live and move and have our being’" (Acts 17:27-28).

This understanding of God is important. On the one hand it avoids deism, which thinks of God as far removed from our world affairs; on the other, it stands against pantheism, which imagines God as in whole or part identical with His creation. The biblical view and understanding of God is neither deism nor pantheism, but theism, which views God as both far beyond and very near all things: He is both transcendent to and immanent in His total universe.

This appreciation of God provides true Christian perspective. God is to be worshiped as one whose "ways are not our ways" and therefore as the wholly other; but He is also one with whom fellowship may be had, and in whose presence there is joy and strength and fullness of life.

3. Eternal—God is the great "I AM." "God said to Moses, ‘I AM WHO I AM’…say this to the people of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you’" (Exodus 3:14). God is the eternal contemporary, the everlasting now. He is without beginning of days or end of years; He is not confined by the time order in which we live.

Past, present, and future are all equally real to Him, for time is His creation. Hence He knows the end from the beginning: it is all "spread out" before Him. As one from a high perspective, such as a mountaintop, may view far beyond what others below can see, infinitely more so God from the vantage point of eternity. He beholds all.

This does not mean that time is meaningless to God. Rather, He both lives in all time and beyond all time. He suffers "down among" our years—even in Christ being crucified at a certain point in time (which has split all time in two: b.c. and a.d.). He also in Christ is eternally "destined before the foundation of the world" (1 Peter 1:20).

Perhaps the greatest comfort afforded by the understanding of God as eternal is that we may have confidence about the future. The future is safe, for it is in the hands of one who knows it already: He knows it and is satisfied. God is eternal, everlasting—in this we may rejoice.

4. Unchangeable—"I the Lord do not change" (Malachi 3:6). The Scriptures constantly affirm the unchanging nature of God—the rock being the symbol often used of His abiding reality.

Occasionally there are references to God’s "changing" His mind ("repenting," for example—"the Lord repented of the evil which he thought to do to his people," Exodus 32:14), but the changing is never a fluctuation in God’s nature; it is always some different aspect of His nature being brought to bear on man’s condition. Given a certain condition of man, God invariably acts in the same manner. For example, God may seem to change from fearsome power to sacrificial love, but the seeming change is utterly dependable—He always and inevitably acts in uniform fashion. If, for example, man sins, he can expect God’s punishment; if he repents, he can depend on God’s forgiveness; if he seeks after God, he can count on God’s presence: God changes not.

In our world of time and flux, of coming into existence and passing away, of building up and tearing down, it is good to know that God does not change. He is "the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change" (James 1:17).

Change and decay in all around I see;

O Thou who changest not, abide with me.

Having considered that God is spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable, let us further note that God in His inner Being is "one God in three Persons."

One God—Christian faith holds unequivocally to the belief in one God, and one God alone. In the midst of a world that worshiped many gods, Israel proclaimed its monotheism: "Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord" (Deuteronomy 6:4). So, for example, the words from Isaiah: "I am the first and the last; besides me there is no god." (Isaiah 44:6). The New Testament conveys the same message—"There is no God but one" (1 Corinthians 8:4). Again, "There is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus" (1 Timothy 2:5).

Many names are and may be given to God: however, He is and remains one.

In three Persons—Christian faith holds equally fast to the conviction that "there are three persons in the Godhead: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost." This belief in the Trinity is expressed devotionally in the words of the hymn:

Holy, holy, holy! Merciful and mighty!

God in three persons, blessed Trinity!

Not three gods, but one God in three persons is the Christian belief. Furthermore, by "persons" is not meant "individuals" but personal self-distinctions (sometimes called "subsistences") within the divine reality. There are three "persons," which also means three modes or operations, for although the three work as one—and are one—the Scriptures show God the Father primarily as Creator, God the Son primarily as Redeemer, and God the Holy Spirit primarily as Sanctifier.

God therefore is not alone (though alone God!)—for He is within Himself the richness of personal relationship. "God is love"—and this love is eternally expressed in the love among Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: again, not as three individuals but as three personal realities. The highest form of being personal on the human level is that of love in which there is an interweaving, almost a coalescing of individuality, with resultant richer personal significance. For example, of husband and wife it is said, "the two shall become one" (Mark 10:8). And it is true in a wonderful and mysterious way that, as far as the limitations of finitude permit, they do become one, and at the same are all the richer persons for it. They are one individual in spirit, and at the same time are two very real persons. Of course, the human analogy is incomplete, since husband and wife begin as two and move toward becoming one, whereas God is, from eternity, one, and eternally expresses the essence of the personal as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. (For another analogy of man’s "trinitarian" nature in relation to God, neighbor, and self, see the next study on "Creation").

A few other comments about belief in the Trinity:

(1) The word Trinity is never used in the Bible. However the Scriptures do speak, at various times, of God as Father and as Son and as Holy Spirit. Jesus’ Great Commission in Matthew 28:19, 20 includes the words "baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." Hence God "in three persons"—yet one God—is unmistakably biblical.

(2) Other earthly analogies—in addition to the husband-and-wife illustration—may help point to the mystery of three-in-oneness. For example, again on the human level, man as man is a combination of body, mind, and spirit; yet at the same time he is one individual. Body, mind, and spirit all have their own "operations"—yet all make up one man. Or again on the inanimate level water, H20, is a good illustration. H20 may be either ice, liquid, or steam, depending on the temperature. It is the same substance, but three "subsistences" that are quite different.

Of course, both of these analogies are only very inadequate suggestions of what lies beyond our mortal minds—but they may be helpful.

(3) The belief in God as Trinity has not only its scriptural foundation but also its grounding in Christian experience. The early disciples did not begin with this belief (as one, so to speak, "handed down from heaven" that they must accept); rather, they gradually became convinced that the one God was Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. They knew already that He was the Creator Father; however, through the example and words of Jesus a fuller understanding slowly emerged. Then as time went on they came more and more to realize that however human Jesus Christ was (and of this they had no doubt), He could not be contained in human categories. He did for them things which only God could do. He had to be—however paradoxical, even contradictory, it seemed—both man and God. Likewise the Holy Spirit—promised by the Father and sent by the Son—who came in great power at Pentecost, was He not also God yet in another "person"?

So for us today the Trinity is not a speculative doctrine supported by Scripture but beyond all experience. Rather, God is one God "in three persons" as we experience Him in creation, redemption, and new life.