Last week we began thinking about God’s essential nature by noting that He is eternal. This truth is helpful to us when we read the comforting words of Deuteronomy 33:27: “The eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms.” These were the only words on a telegram delivered to our house from a former pastor in 1958 after my Dad had died unexpectedly.
This week we consider another truth about God’s nature or being.
When responding to a Samaritan woman who questioned Him about worshipping God, Jesus declared, “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:24). That God is Spirit means that He does not have a human body. As with His eternality, once again truth about God challenges our human way of thinking. All living beings that we know have bodies. Our challenge is to confess God as both eternal Being and spiritual Being.
Physical characteristics
To be sure, in order to help our understanding, the Bible often attributes physical characteristics to God. For example the words on the telegram that came to our family in 1958 made reference to God’s arms. In a similar way, when He spoke to Moses about the impending deliverance of Israel from bondage, God told Moses to say to the people, “I will redeem you with an outstretched arm” (Ex. 6:6). Again, when God finished speaking with Moses on Mount Sinai, the record says, “He gave Moses two tablets of the Testimony, tablets of stone, written with the finger of God” (Ex. 31:18). Later, God cautioned Moses, “You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me and live” (Ex. 33:20). Second Chronicles 16:9 speaks of God’s eyes, and Isaiah 59:1 makes reference to His ears.
Are we to understand that God possesses ears, eyes, arms, fingers and a face? Not literally, but thinking about God in terms of physical characteristics helps us humans gain a vivid understanding of God’s actions. This way of referring to God has a special name.
We use a big word to describe such language about God. We call such references “anthropormorphisms,” a way of speaking about God as if He were not absolutely spiritual in His being but in possession of physical features and qualities. The reality is, however, that God is spiritual in His being.
‘The invisible God’
The reality that God is Spirit means that He is invisible. In speaking of God the Son, who became flesh and blood, Colossians 1:15 says of Christ: “He is the image of the invisible God.” The doxology of 1 Timothy 1:17 puts it: “Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be honor and glory forever and ever.”
Furthermore, since God is Spirit He is infinite. He is not limited by time and space as we are with our physical bodies. We cannot be everywhere at the same time. Our physical bodies make it necessary that we take time to move from one place to another and can be in only one place at a time. God can be everywhere at the same time.
In speaking to the Samaritan woman as noted above, Jesus declared that God’s existence as Spirit informs true worship. That true worship must be “in spirit and truth” tells us that our worship must be according to truth and offered in sincerity of heart. Acceptable worship of God who is Spirit must be deeper and more inward that traditions, rituals and recitations, although such elements can contribute to worship from the heart.
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