Who is Your God?
Someone once said that our view of God determines who we are. If we picture God as harsh and judgmental, uninterested in the value of human beings, then that will be our modus operandi in life. So if God is the centre of our life and work, what does that make us? We have all heard some pretty terrible things about what people have done because they thought God was in it. Sept. 11 has demonstrated to the world what religious zealots can do, but I am not interested in that kind of extremism—an extremism that is just as much at home in Christianity as it is in Islam or Hinduism or any other religion you can think of.
The centre that I am interested in focuses on what God is like, not on the actions of some of His misguided and self-deceived followers. The Psalmist advises us not to trust in the arm of flesh, and that we are fools if we do. But if we are to trust God as a basis for our present existence and future security, what sort of God is He? You have all thought about this, but have any of us exhausted it?
Let me share some insights from two Biblical accounts that paint God in an incredible light. One from the OT and one from the New.
The first two chapters of Genesis have provided theologians with a lot of material to debate over the centuries, not least of which is the significance of the names of God. When Julius Wellhausen united and popularised many drifting theories of the time and developed the JEDP strands of the documentary hypothesis, his main inspiration was the 2 different names for God in Genesis 1 and Genesis 2.
In chapter 1 we meet Elohim, who creates by speaking things into existence:
1. Light
2. Firmament
3. Land/Sea/Plants
4. Sun/Moon/Stars
5. Water life/Birds
6. Animals/Humans
7. Sabbath
He also creates by dividing and separating:
1. Light from darkness – by proving night and day
2. Waters from waters – by providing a “firmament”
3. Dry land from the seas – by providing Earth
4. Plants, grasses, tress – by providing each their “kind”
5. Lights in the heavens to separate day from night – provided sun, moon, and stars
6. Water creatures and birds – according to their kinds
7. Livestock, swarming things, wild animals – according to their kinds
8. Separated man from the creatures – by giving him dominion over them
9. Food identified (separated out) for man, animal and bird
But in chap. 2 we meet YHWH whose creative activity focuses on things coming out of the bare earth:
1. Adam
2. Garden of Eden
3. Trees
4. A river
5. Animals
6. Eve
But notice that the process of separation continues:
10. A day of rest was separated from the other days
11. A garden was separated out from the world
12. The Tree of Life, and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil were separated out from the other trees
13. A river was separated into 4 “heads” to cover the whole earth
14. Eve was separated from Adam – (a rib from his side)
Do you notice what is happening here? God set fairly distinct boundaries, and He meant for them to stay put. This, by the way, is where the concept of holiness comes from—separating something out from the rest. But, sin came along, and what happened?
The food that God had separated out was now joined together and included with the food that God had given them. And that set off a chain reaction that eventually sent everything back together again:
1. light and darkness
2. waters above and the waters below
3. land and sea
4. plants, trees, grasses, animals, fish, birds, people, all swept up together in a big soupy conglomerate
5. and again the earth was without form and void.
Sin had reversed creation.
But we are getting ahead of ourselves. Is Wellhausen correct in saying Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 are completely distinct, written by two separate authors?
Enter Umberto Cassuto. He was one of the first to credibly challenge the documentary hypothesis by studying the two names for God. This is what he found:
Elohim YHWH
God described in abstract terms God’s ethical nature highlighted used by thinkers meditating on lofty themes (King of the Universe) used in the context of the faith of the people (Our Father in Heaven) depicts Divine attributes in hazy/obscure terms depicts Divine attributes in clear terms used to arouse sublimity used in a more familiar sense Transcendent Immanent used in relation to the nations used in relation to God’s people refers to universal tradition refers to Israel’s tradition
So in Genesis 1 God is portrayed as the King of the Universe, enthroned in eternity, clothed in majesty and surrounded by ten thousands of His holy ones. Theologians describe this as His transcendence.
Meanwhile, in Genesis 2, we see God portrayed very differently. He is up close and personal. He kneels in the dirt, shapes the human form, and kisses it into life with the breath of life. There He is the immanent God. So which is He? Immanent or transcendent? Of course, He is both.
But that is where we come to the NT, which contains one of the best pictures of God I know of—the story of the prodigal son. We all know the story of the boy who wanted his share of the property, who then went to a far–off country to live it up and have a good time. He had lots of friends while he had plenty of money, but when it ran out, so did they. He ended up in a pigpen, wishing he could share their food until suddenly it hit him that even his father’s servants were better off than that. So he decided to go and apply for a job, hoping the old man would at least agree to that.
And we all know what happened next. He accepted his son with open arms and held a celebration party, much to the jealous disgust of his upright older brother. But the old father has really been under-rated in this story. Let’s go back to the beginning of the story and focus on Him.
When the prodigal son asked his father for the inheritance, what he was after was the future security of the entire family, especially the care of the parents when they got old. The word that is used there for inheritance is bios, the Greek word that means life. In other words, the father was prepared to sacrifice his future security, even his own life, trusting that his son would be a good guardian of the family’s resources and their future. What we learn about God here is that His involvement with humanity—a bunch of selfish little people who care only about themselves—was going to cost Him, and take Him entirely out of any perceived comfort zone. He decided He wasn’t going to lock Himself in an unreachable fortress filled with unimaginable comforts—completely untouched by the sufferings of the human race.
The prodigal’s father must have known what his son was going to do when he saw him disappearing down the road toward the main highway. He would have known about the evils of the big place—he had been around long enough to hear the stories of the passing travelers. He must have felt sick in the pit of his stomach. There’s a fascinating word that is used many times in the OT to describe the way God feels about us. It is sometimes translated compassion, or tender mercies, but it really means that God’s gut ties itself in knots in anxiety for us.
The fact that the father met his young son on his return means that he must have been out there every day, waiting watching, and maybe even expecting a return. Sure, the son didn’t know about it. He couldn’t care. He was too busy in the arms of one of his many lovers, or the music was up too loud to be able to think about anything other than, “LET’S PARTY, DUDE!!!” But it didn’t matter what the son could or couldn’t see. The fact of the matter is that his father was always thinking of him. And God goes even better than that. He sees his prodigal children in the arms of illicit lovers, or getting drunk or high at noisy parties. If He wanted, He could send down lightening, or a hailstone as big as the person sitting next to you to wipe out all those terrible people. But, despite whatever you hear to the contrary, God is not like that. His stomach churns, and He waits for his children to get to the pigpen, so that the pigs can teach the lessons that the best preachers can’t. Trouble is, many die before they get there.
And when at long last the father saw his young prodigal, he ran. Why do you think he did that? The young man was returning home in shame:
1. He wanted his old father dead so he could get the money coming to him that he would normally get on his father’s senility or death.
2. He had been fool enough to be sucked in by drugs, alcohol, and wild women.
3. He had used up all the money, some of which it was his responsibility to use in providing for the old age of his parents. So now his parents had no future, as far as he was concerned. It was now totally up to his big brother.
So he was returning home in shame - big time.
So the father ran towards him. In the Middle East, older men don’t run. It is not dignified for them. Besides, when men there run, they have to lift up their long skirt and in so doing there is the danger of their nakedness being exposed. (That’s what King David’s wife was complaining about when David danced for joy after defeating the Philistines on one occasion. David was leaping about so much that his skirt was at times lifting too high and exposing his nakedness.)
The Bible says that when the son was yet a great way off, the father started running. There was a long distance in which the father was showing off more than he should have, and with all the little kids and young women along the side of the road, either laughing behind their hands or getting red faces, the father was attracting shame to himself, so that nobody would have been thinking too much about the great shame caused by the younger son.
Then when he reached his boy, he was so happy to see him, he hugged him close and kissed him, in so doing making his own clothes dirty and smelly from the stains and slime still clinging to the son’s clothes.
What do I learn in all this about God?
He is bigger than you and I. His patience with us, and the incredible feelings He has for us, means that His own comfort and security are put into the background while He waits for us to get a life - to get our act together. He takes risks with us, many times entrusting more to us than we can handle. He even takes our shame so that we are free to make a new start in life and to finally make something of ourselves.
In all our endeavours here, lets get to know Him better, for in Him is fullness of joy, knowledge, excellence, a variety of new things that we have never even imagined, all undergirded by a gut-wrenching compassion that He has for each of us. Now turn to the person next to you and say - he’s talking to you!!
