Sometimes I have trouble comprehending God's personhood. I mean, God isn't just this impersonal force or the "great watchmaker" that set the natural laws in order and then leaves us alone. And He doesn't just sit up in Heaven and watch us, or carry out his plans with no regard for us. God has many of the same characteristics that we, as humans, have - which makes sense, since we were made in God's image.
For one thing, God feels emotion. The Bible shows God getting angry at people that sinned, being sad for the people who don't believe, he felt satisfaction and (presumably) pleasure when he created the world - "and God saw that it was good".
But not only does he feel emotion, but humans have actually influenced God's decisions! Abraham went back and forth with God over the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah - "if there's 100 righteous people, will you destroy it then? what about 50? or 10? or even 1?". Moses pleaded with God not to wipe out the Israelites after they worshiped a golden calf while Moses was on Mount Sinai, even to the point where Moses said "Look God, take me instead, but don't wipe out these people!"
Several of these characteristics of God's personhood are blog posts - or several blog posts - by themselves, so I will come back to many of them. But for now, I have one final point: God's main desire isn't for service, or our money, or our time. He desires a relationship with us. He loves us and wants us to love him back and know Him better. Isn't that a distinctly personal trait? I still marvel at how the God of the universe actually wants to know me, a screwed up and distinctly normal teenager.
I gotta say...I hope you are planning a post on the point about God's emotion. That's something I forget too often. Great post.
ReplyDelete