Nearly everyone believes there is a God. Only the fool has said in his heart, "there is no God." But, what is God like? Not every god worshipped by men can be the true God. Even among professing Christians there are different "gods." There is only one source of truth concerning the character of God, and that is the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. What sort of God do the Scriptures present?
The nature of God is incomprehensible to us. Paul writes that God dwells, "in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see." (1 Tim. 6:16) This should not surprise us, for how could a creature ever understand his Creator. A god that men can understand is no god at all. But, even though we cannot comprehend God, there are some things we can know about God.
As to God's essential nature, the Lord Jesus said, "God is Spirit." (John 4:24) What is spirit? It is absolute person-ness. The God of the Bible is a Person, not a mere force or influence. Nor is He merely the sum total of all creation as some of the Eastern religions would say. Being a person, He has will, purpose, and action. His will forms His purpose, which dictates His actions. Being a Person, He can speak and be spoken to and can enter into relationships with other persons.
What are the primary characteristics of this Person? The Book of Psalms mentions two things essential to the concept of God. 1) That He is Creator, "For all the gods of the nations are idols: but the LORD made the heavens." (Psalm 96:5) The Bible begins with declaring the creative acts of God, emphasizing the importance of this truth. Over the last 150 years, there has been a concerted effort to use the tools of human science to overthrow this basic Scriptural truth, that God made the heavens and the earth. We will leave the scientific aspects of this debate to scientists, but the Scriptures say, "Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear." (Heb. 11:3) God simply spoke and things came into being. The book of Genesis says that creation took place in six days, and there is no reason to believe otherwise. Even in the law of the Sabbath day it is declared, "For in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is." Since the Lord was setting up a weekly calendar in this passage, we must assume that the first week of Genesis is a normal week, as we know it. To deny the Createrhood of God is to deny the God of the Bible and to declare that He is nothing more than an idol.
2.) The Psalms also assert that absolute sovereignty is necessary to the understanding of God: "Wherefore should the heathen say, 'Where is now their God?' But our God is in the heavens: he hath done whatsoever he hath pleased." (Ps. 115:2,3) We often fail in our purposes due to lack of strength or wisdom. But God is lacking in neither of these qualities. He has the power and the right to do as He wills, and no one even has the right to call Him into question over His works, "And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, 'What doest thou?'" (Dan 4:35) He sovereignly rules over all things from the largest to the smallest events, from the orbits of planets to the orbits of sub-atomic particles. He even rules over salvation: "He is gracious to whom He will be gracious." To deny the absolute sovereignty of God in all things is to deny the God of the Bible. This is the God we worship at Grace Community Church.
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