Bally's For The Mind

Lengthy, I know - but it really was a thought provoker and encouragement to me this morning. From the Reformation Study Bible study notes at Isaiah 66.


The Spiritual Nature Of God

"God is Spirit", said Jesus to the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4:24). Though fully personal, God does not live in and through a body as we do, and so is not subject to the limits of space and time. Although nothing created can be omnipresent, God is everywhere in His fullness continually. All created things are limited by time, but for God there is no "present moment" into which He is locked as we are.

Theologians refer to God's freedom from limits and bounds as His infinity and His immensity (I Kings 8:27; Isaiah 40:12-26; 66:1). God upholds everything in being, and He has everything everywhere always before His mind, in its own relation to His all-inclusive plan and purpose for every thing and every person in His world (Daniel 4:34-35; Ephesians 1:11).

God is immutable, or unchangeable. Nothing can increase or diminish God's perfection, and He does not change for the better or the worse. Because He is not in time He is not subject to change as creatures are (II Peter 3:8). Yet He is active in His world all the time, constantly making new things spring forth (Isaiah 42:9; II Corinthians 5:17; Revelation 21:5). In all His works He expresses His perfect character with perfect consistency. True to His unchangeable character, He will fulfill every word He has spoken and the plans He has made (Numbers 23:19; Psalm 33:11; Malachi 3:6; James 1:16-18). His immutability explains why, when people change their attitude to Him, He changes His attitude to them (Genesis 6:5-7; Exodus 32:9-14; I Samuel 15:11; Jonah 3:10).

God's unchangeable perfection does not mean He is impassive and unfeeling, but what He feels is a matter of His own choice, and is included in the unity of His infinite being. God is not driven by His reaction to events or the presence of feelings that arise within Him. But many scriptures represent God as having emotions, such as joy, sorrow, anger and delight. It is a great mistake to forget that God feels - though of necessity in a way that transcends a finite being's experience of emotion.

All God's thoughts and actions involve the whole of Him; He is undivided in Himself, not composed of parts. This attribute is called His simplicity. God is not distracted, divided by competing interests, or obliged to ration His attention. He simultaneously gives total and undivided attention, not just to one thing at a time, but to everything and everyone anywhere in space or time (cf. Matthew 10:29-30).

The God who is Spirit must be worshiped in spirit and in truth (John 4:24). Worship "in spirit" means worship from a heart renewed by the Holy Spirit. No rituals, ceremony, or devotional formality is true worship without a willing heart, which the Holy Spirit alone can prepare. "In truth" means on the basis of God's revelation culmination in the incarnate Word, Jesus Chirst, who is the truth (John 14:6). In the Spirit, "the Lord is near to all who call on Him, to all who call on Him in truth", wherever they may be (Psalm 145:18; cf. Hebrews 4:14-16). Through the revelation of Christ, God invites limited, sinful creatures to claim Him who is the eternal, unchangeable God, as their own God. God is committed to His people through a covenant of divine promises as sure as His own faithfulness (Hebrews 6:17,18).