HOW WELL DO I KNOW GOD?

KNOWING GOD, THE ONLY FOUNDATION AND FOUNTAIN OF LASTING FULFILLMENT.

 

 

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In writing this book, I do not come to you as someone who has all the answers but as someone who has always had a lot of questions. What I have written in the following pages is simply some conclusions I have made from my own struggles to understand the truth about God and man that have helped me personally over 37 years of my Christian life. Some things, especially regarding our everyday experience of God I have experienced only enough to know they are true and in no way have I come close to putting them consistently into practice. It is my hope and prayer that if you too have struggled with any of these same questions; you may find within these pages answers to some of your doubts and struggles as well. In the mean time let us pray for each other that God will bring us more and more to that place where we know the fullness of joy that comes from Him alone.

 

Some of what I discuss is more commonly addressed in technical theological works; especially in the first section of this book. I have attempted however to put these matters into as practical and understandable of terms as I was able since theology often scares many and is viewed as being esoteric and not at all practical. This is not God’s intent or desire however. His truth is for all the church, not just the theologians of the church. The word theology actually comes from two separate words which in essence simply mean a word about God; “ology” coming from the root word “logos” which means word or knowledge and “theo” coming from the root word “Theos” which means God. So we could say theology is nothing more then a word about God, which we all need.

 

Last of all I wish to mention I have learned that no amount of explanation or discussion of God’s truth is helpful in and of itself, no matter how well or poorly expressed unless it is illumined by God’s Spirit. As Christ admonished us, those who have ears to hear, let them her… Therefore it is my prayer and I hope yours that God will enlighten your hearts and minds as you read this. Without His Spirit working to reveal the Father to us, we can see and hear nothing from Him. I also pray that only that which is of Him in the following pages will be implanted in your heart and bear fruit and that which is not true to His word will fall by the way side. My God richly bless you in your reading. God speed.

 

 

Introduction

 

Most people today believe in order to understand humanity we must study mankind exclusively. But might we have it backwards? To fully learn about and understand ourselves, maybe we need to understand God more fully, in whose image we are made. Could this be even more important then the study of human behavior? With all the understanding modern psychology offers about humanity there still remains extensive confusion, questions, restlessness and disillusionment about who we are, why we are here and why we are the way we are. This is certainly true in the "unbelieving" world that doesn't claim God is a significant part of their lives. But this is also true among many within the "faith" community who say God is significant. The world's confusion is understandable but why the confusion in the Christian community? Isn't the Christian community supposed to have the answers to these kinds of questions? Could it be that the Christian community as a whole is also confused and spiritually impotent due to a shallow and weak understanding of God? Or is it possible that some within the faith community don't even know Him at all but only think they know Him or have a distorted characterization of Him? I have found that in a large part of today's Christian community there is very little discussion or wrestling with who God is as a person and how that impacts our lives on an everyday level. One of the main focuses of my life has been how can I know God to the fullest extent possible and what exactly does knowing God entail.

 

Related to knowing God is the question of what makes us "tick?" Why are we human beings the way we are with our incredible capacity for great good as well as great destruction? Knowing who God is and who we are and in what ways each impacts the other is part of what I have attempted to address in writing this.

 

I believe the Bible teaches we were made by God, for God and that everything else flows from these foundational truths. But what does this mean exactly? If God created all things for Himself, which the Bible clearly seems to teach, where do you and I fit in? And if our understanding of God (as well as ourselves) comes short of who He actually is (and therefore indirectly who we are as well) what effect does that have on our daily lives, if any? Does this insufficient understanding have an effect on our being as happy and fulfilled as possible? Does it have any impact at all on whether life is truly fulfilling or not?  If it does, how does it? I would suggest and hope to prove that understanding certain aspects of God's person are vital to our knowing and experiencing Him to fullest extent possible and therefore our being fulfilled and experiencing life to the fullest extent possible. Without knowing God truly and clearly, I don't believe it's possible to experience life fully in the way He has designed and intends for us. It is good to be reminded that Christ said, "I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full" (John 10:10). We must ask ourselves whether this characterizes our lives now. If not, why not?

 

Aren't we all interested in living life to the fullest? Don't we want the best life possible? Of course we do! But there are several related issues. HOW that is achieved? What does that mean? What does a truly fulfilled life look and feel like? Compared to others we may feel we are in pretty good shape but how do we know there isn’t more to life then what we are now experiencing; possibly far more? The non believing world certainly offers many possible options and solutions to this question of happiness and fulfillment. Just watch virtually any commercial and listen for the offer of a better life. It is the subtle if not blatant appeal of almost every commercial. But do any of those options really satisfy our true longings and match up with who we are? And even more importantly, do they agree with what the Bible says about us and why we are here?

 

Now if these alternate solutions offered by the world do not fit who we really are or what the Bible says about us, how does that impact us individually, as well as those we come in contact with? Could it be that all poor choices in life are a direct result of not knowing who God is truly and clearly? (By knowing I mean in the personal sense, not merely cognitively).  If that is true wouldn't this in turn result in our operating in a manner contrary to God's design and even be the primary reason for much of our personal pain and suffering. And as a result much of the pain and suffering in the world as well? However God usually "gets the wrap" for all the pain and suffering in the world, doesn't He? We have heard of the book, “Why does God let bad things happen to good people?” But maybe we are looking in the wrong place for the reason there is so much pain in the world or our own lives. Maybe there ARE answers that really do make a difference but we are either not aware of them or not hearing them for some reason and therefore are falling far short of what we were designed to experience. I have learned when we do listen and hear, having a clear understanding of God as presented in the Bible is the difference between despair and hope, disillusionment and strength, giving up and moving forward, merely surviving or thriving and flourishing.

 

The world more then ever questions whether God is relevant; especially in light of the seemingly randomness and hardships of life. Many, maybe most, (at least in the Western world) have stopped asking all together and have simply concluded God is not relevant at all. They have either concluded He doesn’t get involved in their lives because He isn’t there or He doesn’t care, so neither do we care about Him. If the unbelieving world can not see by the lives of those of us who claim to know Him, the reality of how God does care and does make a significant difference in their life, it isn't hard to see why they wouldn't think He could be relevant to them either. As believers who claim to know God, we must ask ourselves if we really know God or just a characterization of Him. If our knowing God does not impact our day to day lives in such a way that others notice, maybe we don't know Him as well as we think we do or at least as well as we could.

 

What about those of us who do know God? Even if what we know about God is sound as far as it goes, is there more we can and need to know about Him? I believe there are certain aspects of God's person that are not very well understood by many of us within the faith community, much less by those in the world. These are aspects that are vital to our experiencing all He desires to be for us and thereby resulting in our being all we were designed to be for Him and for each other; both of which have a direct bearing on our fulfillment and happiness. I will attempt to communicate in this book these certain characteristics of God. I will only scratch the surface since the finite can not fully communicate or plumb the depths of the infinite. But for that same reason I think we will come short of what God intends if we do not continually wrestle with and grasp who this infinite God is and search diligently into His G

 revelation of Himself within the Bible as well as in creation to see what He is seeking to tell us about Himself. I am not saying we should necessarily to be uncertain about what we already understand about God but we need to at least not be complacent or satisfied with what we already know or think we know. To think that we can know a few things about the infinite God and that there is no need to ever be learning more may result in our missing out on more then we could ever imagine. Not just in this present life but maybe even more importantly in our eternal existence to come. In his book “God’s Passion for His Glory” John Piper says it this way “…we have scarcely begun to see all of God that the Scriptures give us to see, and what we have not yet seen is exceedingly glorious.”

 

We could compare knowing some things about God to briefly glancing at an intricately woven tapestry and then walking away saying, "yes I saw the tapestry" believing we know all we need to know and being satisfied with that.  We may feel we know all there is to know about the tapestry without ever studying it, exploring all the details and learning what it took to make it etc. Our understanding of God could also be like entering a sprawling mansion with hundreds of rooms only to look at a display of a layout of the house in the entrance hall and then leaving feeling we have seen the mansion. We may think, “Why bother going to the extra trouble.” But wouldn’t knowing these things first hand give us a truer picture and appreciation for the value of the tapestry or the mansion. Without doing so how can we fully appreciate these in all their richness?

 

Of course knowing God is infinitely more vast and important then exploring mansions or studying tapestries. The mere fact that God is infinite suggests our understanding of Him can never be exhausted in this life or the next. If He is in fact infinite in every way, our knowing Him can have no end, because He has no end; which is all the more reason we should never stop striving to know Him more fully.

 

Certainly whatever our understanding of God is, it must be within the boundaries of scripture as well as through observing his creation/creatures within those same boundaries, (through which we can also learn of Him. [Romans 1:20]). But can we ever exhaust what lies within those boundaries? As already suggested, I don’t think we can but we should try with all the strength we have because knowing God, I would suggest, is the most important endeavor we can ever undertake. If our understanding or view of God (and ourselves, since they are tied together) is lacking or skewed, then I suggest every aspect of how we look at and conduct our life will also be lacking and skewed. This is not just a great dishonor to God but also a great loss for us.

 

It has been said the key to great faith is more about the object of our faith then the faith itself. Believing this to be true, we will initially focus on God, the object of our faith; who He is, what He is like and then what knowing Him means for us individually and collectively; how this directly effects who we are, i.e. why we were created and exist etc. If our understanding of God (which I hope to show has direct bearing on our understanding of ourselves) is not accurate or clear our faith will be misplaced and therefore weak at best, i.e. based on something that does not match reality. Misplaced faith is living in a dream world at best; a myth, not reality.  But even worse resulting in our not seeing and displaying God to the fullest extent possible resulting in present and eternal loss for us as well as others, not to mention the loss of God by being inadequately displayed to a world created for and by Him.

 

The initial groundwork covered in the following pages will be a bit more theological and basic to begin with but as we progress we hope to show the significance and importance of how a sound understanding of God is essential to laying a strong foundation for living life itself. (Even though there is a progression of thought through the book, those of you with a more practical and less technical orientation may wish to skip down to the middle three sections on pain, faith and obedience first and then come back to the first section. But I encourage you to come back if you do, as the first section is foundational to the rest). I should add that I will not be discussing in depth every aspect of God’s character but primarily those relevant to the points I seek to address in this book i.e. this book is not an attempt to be an extensive discussion of all the attributes of God’s. I only hope in reading this you will discover a little more about God and, therefore, a lot more about yourself,  your purpose and fulfillment and in turn your joy and contentment in this life.

 

I would also encourage you just to skim through the table of contents listed before each section and if you find something that grabs you, read it. If that section doesn’t help, jump around. Even though everything is tied together, each section may be helpful on its own depending on where you are and what questions you have struggled with. Eventually I encourage you to read the book in its entirety to the get the full sense. But I suggest this as a possible approach because when I first read J.I. Packers book “Knowing God” from the start to end I found it somewhat boring and hard to complete. Years later as a result of the encouragement of others I picked it up again and skimmed through it by jumping around and reading different sections. This brought the book to life for me. I have since read it several times over and now consider it among the top 10 most important books I have ever read.

 

This brings me to another point. You may not find this book helpful at all at this point in our life. If not, just put it aside. Then some day down the road when you are in a different place there may be things here that will be helpful. Many of the books I have found most helpful didn’t help me at all my first reading as was the case with Packers book. It was only years later when I came back that God used them to minister to me in a powerful way. That has been true of many of the most influential books I have read.

 

One final comment before jumping in; I have noticed many of the truths of scripture are found in tension. By that I mean the truth usually lies somewhere between two extremes we are naturally inclined to gravitate toward. Not unlike balancing on a tight rope where we are inclined to fall to one side or the other but must stay in the middle in order to keep from falling to our destruction. I believe this is so because logic though a useful tool is often given precedence over faith and scripture. As a result certain elements within differing schools of theological thought take logic to such an end that they ignore clear teaching of scripture opposite of where that logic takes them. Logic and reason are like anything else however. They too must come under the rule of Christ for they like any other gift of God can be used or misused due to our propensity to be independent of God. Logic though a gift is still being used by our fallen and finite minds, no matter how gifted the one using it. And if unchecked can be used as a substitute for faith i.e. we can ultimately depend on it instead of God to “understand” the world we are in. We must be aware that in our fallen condition we are prone to want to control instead of trust. We reason that if we can figure out every aspect of God and His dealings then there can be no surprises; we can’t be “blindsided” by God; or so we think. It is this fear and desire to understand/control that can drive us to use logic in a way God never intended.

 

So, am I saying we should abandon logic and only live “by faith?” No, no more then we should stop working to buy food but instead trust God to fly a roasted chicken into our mouths when we are hungry. God gives us gifts to be used for His ends, including our ability to reason, so we should and must use them. We will address this very point more fully later on.

 

While a student at Columbia Bible College, Roberston McQuilken the former President once said, “the closest I get to the truth is swinging past it as I pass from one extreme to the other.” C.S. Lewis described this same principle by saying truth is like being on top of a plateau and we tend to fall off one side of the cliff while reacting and backing away from the other. What exactly did Rev. McQuilken and C.S. Lewis mean? A classic example would be the tension between God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility. Scripture clearly teaches both, but because of our finite understanding and desire to fit everything we know into nice neat logical packages we gravitate to one side to the detriment of the other. It is more comfortable to be settled then to be in tension, but tension is where we grow and most importantly where we most have to depend on God. Certainly we must use reason and logic but ultimately this is where I believe God wants us to live and in part why He doesn’t always reconcile things the way we desire and naturally are inclined to want them.

 

Therefore instead of seeking to reconcile what God has not, some of what I write leaves seemly competing truths in tension and does not bring them to complete closure. You may want to make a mental note of this as you read so you don’t react to what I have written and fall off one side of the cliff backing away from the other. I encourage you to eventually read the book in it’s entirety to see what is said about the other side before drawing any final conclusions. Often our demand for “understanding” all the mysteries of scripture is nothing more then arrogance and ultimately comes out of a lack of trust in God. Even if some things are not clear in our own minds, it is important and helpful to know they are in clear in Gods mind and that should be enough and sometimes must be enough and all we are given.

 

Now to the book itself; there are four main sections that address the following questions plus a commentary at the end on Romans 6-8:

 

  1. Do we have a clear view of God? (and therefore of ourselves)
  2. Why are we in such pain?
  3. Faith; what is it and how does it work?
  4. Obedience, what it is and what it isn’t.
  5. Commentary on Romans 6-8.

 

 

 

Section I

 

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Do we have a clear view of God?

(And therefore ourselves)

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1.     We seek life

2.     We are creatures

3.     Creatures unlike any other

4.     God is Triune. The ground for many other attributes of God.

a.     God is independent. An incommunicable attribute

b.     God is also dependent

c.     God is love, the ground of his being personal and relational. A communicable attribute

d.    God loves himself; the basis and moral ground for this.

e.     God is free

f.       God’s motive behind creation.

5.     How we are like God. A closer look.

6.     God is relational

7.     The basis of our value. Like God but different

8.     The finite and the infinite

9.     Was God’s original plan thwarted by man’s rebellion?

10.Has God changed?

11.  God needs us?

12.Which is God's end, His greatest glory or our highest good?

 

Let us begin.

 

Nothing can satisfy us at our deepest level but Jesus. Not recreation, sex, drugs, entertainment, vacations, houses, cars, boats, money, accomplishments, prestige, promotions, power, academic achievement, food, TV, loved ones, family, friends, anything or anyone else you wish to fill in the blank with. Nothing!1 So why are we so drawn, no, irresistibly pulled to these and find ourselves seeking from them, often desperately, only what God tells us He alone can give us? To know the answer we must understand who we are 2, why we are this way and what it is we are really seeking.


In the next several pages we will attempt to give an overview addressing what we believe is taught in Holy Scripture regarding these things and then we will take each point in this overview and elaborate on the implications more fully in subsequent chapters. We won
't be spending a lot of time initially "proving" our points so much as simply stating them, how they are connected and what the implications are. We will be moving quickly through some foundational thoughts in this initial part, so hold on. (For the editor I have placed a number before each section that deals with a main point which again will be addressed more in length later).

 

1.     We seek life.


What is man seeking? In short, to say it simply and straight out, we seek life. The bible confirms this directly and indirectly in several places by setting forth “life” as the greatest goal and reward. (See John 10:10  and 2 Corinthians 5:4b-5a ) Not just life offered to us for those fleeting moments through the things or activities listed above but never ending life or to use a biblical phrase, "eternal life".  Eternal life may not be a conscious pursuit for most but since we were designed for eternity, nothing less will do.

 

But what is it about “life” that is so important to us and how exactly do we define this life we are so driven to obtain? At its core I would suggest for us life is knowing and experiencing that I am valuable. You could also describe this as knowing I am important, significant, of great worth and so on. This core aspect of our being is tied directly to our being in God's image, which we will address further on. But this longing for life translates into seeking whatever gives me the greatest sense of value or to use a modern psychological phrase, a sense of worth. Usually this longing is expressed either passively; I am loved and therefore important, valuable etc., or actively; I love and have brought value to another and therefore I am valuable. (It feels good to be wanted, appreciated and needed). In fact this is so central to whom we are that if we ever come to the place we feel completely worthless or life is completely pointless (nobody loves me. I am unimportant, life is meaningless…etc) and we no longer have any hope of “life” the pain becomes so great we will seek to end “life” or rather the lack of it. And the very experience of this kind of pain in itself says something very significant about who we are doesn’t it? And it also raises the question of why are we this way?  In the second part of this booked titled the "Anatomy of Pain" we will look at this question of pain in greater depth.

 

For the moment we need to dig deeper and look at why we are this way? Why we crave for, indeed must have, a sense of value? Why do I need to know I am loved or I can love? We must go back to who we are and even further back to what makes us this way.

 

2.   We are creatures


First of all the bible says we are creatures. The significance of this will be discussed in more detail later but for now the primary point I wish to address is as creatures we are not self sufficient i.e. we did not come into existence by our own effort or power nor do we continue to exist independently (to use an analogy, batteries are not included) but our existence is dependent at several levels on several things. For example in the physical realm we need food, air, water and shelter to name some basic needs for our existence. These resources which are vital to our physical existence come from outside of us. Though on a very significant level most of us ignore this and take our existence for granted. We are reminded however of how fragile life truly is when these things are no longer available. When our life or the life of another is in jeopardy or on the edge of being extinguished we are jarred back to the reality of how fragile we are and how dependent we are on resources outside of ourselves. This also helps explain why funerals are so unpopular even though well attended.

 

Which also begs the question of where do these resources come from? As Christians we know God not only created all things but sustains them as well. We may have fooled ourselves into believing we keep our life going, but the very resources mentioned were not created by us but are simply used by us. We may gather them, rearrange them, combine them, grow them etc. but in fact we do not bring them into being or ultimately sustain their ongoing existence. But in our foolishness we take pride in our ability to obtain anything we believe gives us life forgetting these are all truly gifts. 3 Because of our aversion to dependence on God (which often feels more like a desire to be independent and not consciously an avoidance of God) we worship (ascribe worth to) the gifts apart from or instead of the Giver/Creator. 4 Rom 1:25. However God reminds us in Deuteronomy 8:17-19,You may say to yourself, ‘My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.’ But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth … 19 If you ever forget the LORD your God and follow other gods (anything you value and look to for life other then the true God) and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed.”5

 

With that said we wish to continue by pointing out that we are not only dependent on things outside ourselves physically but spiritually and emotionally as well. To address this let us take a closer look at our “creature hood”.

 

3.   Creatures unlike any other.


We are not just creatures but we are creatures of a unique kind. Unlike the rest of creation we are in the image of God, our Creator. Genesis 1:25-27. But what is the significance of being in God
's image? To understand this we must understand some things about God first. What is He like and in what ways we are like Him i.e. how we are in His image. For now, regarding our significance, we will simply say that we have the greatest capacity to reflect, display and honor God and His person above all the rest of creation and we are the only creatures who willfully and consciously do so. Only you and I can willfully and consciously recognize or refuse to recognize the great glory/value of God. So now let's take a closer look at God and how knowing and understanding what He is like first is vital to knowing and understanding ourselves.

 

4.   God is Triune. The ground for many other attributes of God.

         

       a. God is independent. An incommunicable attribute


Before we look more at how we are like God let us first look at some ways we are not like God. The first and most fundamental characteristic about God we must understand is unlike His creatures, God is independent. There is nothing that God needs outside Himself in order for Him to be or remain God. Unlike us, His creatures, He is lacking nothing and therefore He needs nothing. In the book of Acts we are told,

 

Acts 17: 24"The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. 25And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else.

 

The significance of this is that we, as creatures add nothing to God to make Him anymore then who He already is. From this we understand a key aspect about the person of God. He did not create us in order to fill something lacking within Himself. This has huge significance on many different levels. It addresses how much and with what kind of love God loves us for one, because it raises the question of why He created. Why is this important? Because it gets at the heart of the issue of whether God truly loves us or is He simply using us for another end i.e. does He have a hidden agenda. We will address this more later? In contrast to us, His totally dependent creatures, God is the totally independent Creator. In fact God is the only truly independent and self sufficient being in the universe. Everything else is sustained by Him and therefore dependent on Him. He is sustained by no one or no thing.

 

Now let us take a closer look at why He is independent. One reason I would suggest is because He is inter-dependent. To say it another way, He derives from Himself everything He needs to be God and He is dependent on nothing other then Himself to be the all sufficient, all supreme being. He is self sustained. You could say He is self contained. So there is a sense in which God does not need anything or anyone outside of Himself because, unlike us, everything necessary for His existence, He also provides within His own person or being. 6 We will look at this in more depth immediately below in “God is also dependent.”

 

Now this is where the oft-minimized and misunderstood “doctrine” of the Trinity comes to play. The Christian church as a whole agrees that God consists of three persons but for most believers this is simply a dry piece of theological information that we don't often think much about, do not understand, or indeed can we understand fully but, to a certain degree, we must simply accept by faith. Therefore many leave it at that and do not dig into the riches of who God is regarding this foundational and fundamental characteristic of His being. But the truth of God being three distinct persons and still one God has very significant and far reaching implications for us even at a practical everyday level. What we understand about God and more specifically about His make up as three persons and yet one God is vital to us experiencing Him and knowing Him to the fullest extent possible. And knowing Him, not just intellectually but personally, is foundational to our experiencing the purpose for which we were created and therefore our own fulfillment as well. We will try to demonstrate this more as we go on. In short God being three persons and yet one God, is far more then just an obscure, incomprehensible, theological fact. It is a vital aspect of His very being and therefore also vital to our knowing/experiencing God to the fullest extent possible. (When we say "knowing God" we are not just speaking of a mere intellectual comprehension of God but an intimate and personal knowledge such as a husband knowing his wife or visa versa over against you knowing your son's coach or the teller at the bank.)

 

b. God is also dependent

 

But what about His dependence; how exactly can or is the Almighty, all sustaining God dependent? We do not usually think in terms of God being dependent, do we? In fact this may even sound a bit heretical at first. He is God, we might say. How can God be dependent on anything? Well in fact He isn’t just dependent on anything. God is certainly not dependent on anything in creation. Logic alone tells us this must be true. Since He created and sustains everything, the creation is dependent on Him and not the other way around. But what about God being dependent on Himself? Is this even possible? If so, what exactly does it mean or look like? As suggested above the grounds for God’s independence is His inter-dependence. This is a mystery but in a very real sense God is just as dependent on Himself as you or I are dependent on Him. So yes, God is absolutely dependent but only within His own being.

 

However is this a real dependence as you and I understand the word? If so, how is this even possible? As already mentioned, because He is a being of three distinct entities within one being, each entity, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit relate to each other as truly distinct beings while at the same time they make up only one God. Therefore dependence or inter-dependence is deeply rooted in God’s very make up. Just because it is dependence within Himself, does not make it any less of a dependence or less of a reality. We may not be able to make sense of this logically but we certainly see the evidence of it in how God first relates to Himself, then to us and how we in turn relate to Him. This will become more evident further on.

 

So what exactly is the practical significance of His being dependent? There are several things. Because God is inter-dependent, He is also an inter-relational and inter-communicating being. Therefore He truly understands what it means to need and can identity with the feeling of need. How so, you may wonder. Did not the Son experience the pain of the crucifixion and subsequent separation from His Father? And did not Christ also experience the consequences of sin during His crucifixion as well as the rest of his ministry with all its emotional impact? Even though none of this was due to His own sin, the painful consequences were the same never the less. Remember His agony in the Garden of Gethsemane as He faced the prospect of bearing your sin and mine with its consequent judgment and separation from His Father? Did not God the Father also experience the loss and pain of separation from His only begotten Son; the Son of His eternal love? Due to the inter relationship of the Father with His Son, it was not just the Son who experienced the suffering of the cross, the Father did as well. Due to the varying degrees of separation the Father and Son experienced during Christ’s time on earth, God and His Son fully entered into all aspects of the pain and suffering caused by sin.

 

Have you ever been estranged from someone you loved; one of your kids, a parent or a spouse due to some barrier between you? Of course, you say. How did (or does) it feel? Whatever you felt, God has felt this too. Granted the separation the Son experienced was due to our sins and not His own it was still separation none the less with all its ramifications. God understands truly what relationship is and what losing it feels like, possibly in a way even greater then we do. Since the level of relationship and dependence between the Father and Son is perfect and on an infinitely higher level then our own, wouldn’t the pain of its loss for Him also be infinitely greater?

 

God not only understands the joy of loving and being loved, of honoring and being honored but also losing that honor and the feeling the loss of it. The shame of Christ’s heinous and reprehensible death was even greater since it was not due to anything He had done wrong. Much of our suffering is due to our own sin, His was due only as a result of someone else’s sin. So God does and can experience all aspects of being in a relationship, just like you and I; the bad as well as the good. What does this mean for us? As far as this discussion goes, God and His Son truly and really feel our pain and weakness as well as our joys and pleasures.

 

Heb 4:15  For we have not a high priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but one that hath been in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin..

 

The word tempted here is not the idea of being enticed to wrong as much as to endure the experience of a difficult event or its consequent struggle i.e. to be tested or disciplined by it.

Tempted: Πειράζω, peirazō, pi-rad'-zo; to test (objectively), that is, endeavor, scrutinize, entice, discipline: - assay, examine, go about, prove, tempt (-er), try.

 

God also truly and really enjoys our love and appreciates our gratitude and honor as well as the honor and glory exchanged between the members of the Trinity. This is in part due to His being in relationship throughout eternity and our being able to enter into relationship with Him because we are in His image i.e. we are like God. Since we are like Him we can really and truly bring joy to His heart not unlike the joy His only begotten Son also brings to His heart. We can bring sadness to His heart when we are alienated from Him just as when His Son was alienated from Him at the cross for the same reason i.e. our sin. It is also worth mentioning that Christ is our elder brother and we too are considered sons of God. Though we are not the eternal only begotten Son we are adopted sons and daughters in Christ nevertheless who will live with God our Father throughout eternity just as our elder brother Christ will. As a result of all these things God really and truly feels the give and take of relationship with us just as you and I feel it with each other.

 

The interaction of God as a triune being is key to what makes God a relational being instead of some stoic impersonal force. He not only understands and designs relationship he is relationship. Relationship is at the very core of His Being and has been from eternity past. All other relationships are a reflection of the primary relationship who is God. Nothing He does is outside of relationship, whether that be within Himself or with you and I. Relationship and therefore love is rooted in His very essence. God could not be a God of love if He were not a God of relationship first.

 

Where do you think we get the capacity to feel the various aspects, both good and bad, of being in relationship? Does it come out of a vacuum or simply because we are in rebellion? We were relational before the fall, were we not? Would it make sense that we as His creatures could feel and experience something more or completely different regarding relationship then God Himself could feel and experience? No, these qualities are in us because they were in God first and are all a part of God’s being as well as ours who are in His image.

 

This also explains how we can truly enter into a real relationship with God and Him with us. Relationship is not something new, strange or awkward to God but has been a part of His make up from eternity past long before you and I even entered the picture. Dependence within a relationship is a deeply rooted quality within God’s very make up. Just because it is dependence within Himself, does not make it any less of a dependence or less of a reality. So again dependence is not just a reality of our existence but is also a reality of God’s. For us, it is dependence outside of our being. For God it is dependence within His but still dependence never the less. 

 

In closing this section we wish to also point out that our independence is directly in conflict with these realities in a far more significant way then we may have before now considered. How so? Our attempted independence is contrary not just to who we are as dependent beings but also to whom God is as an inter-dependent being. It is a violation of every aspect of our being in the image of God. God designed us for a relationship of dependence on Him so that we could participate in the inter dependence He has within Himself. So for us to attempt to be independent of God doesn’t just violate our nature but God’s as well.