Who is God? Part 3A: Attributes of God, Incommunicable


Deep Dive: The Attributes of God
Let’s be clear: Because this is the infinite and eternal God we are talking about, we cannot fully understand everything about Him!  But we can understand enough about Him to come to faith in Him and to enter into a lifelong relationship and pursuit of knowing Him better.

How ‘knowable’ is God?
‘I will extol You, my God, O King, And I will bless Your name forever and ever. Every day I will bless You, And I will praise Your name forever and ever. Great is the LORD, and highly to be praised, And His greatness is unsearchable."  (Psalm 145:1-3, NASB)

Theologians have categorized God’s attributes as communicable, incommunicable, and sometimes relational. 
·      Incommunicable: those which are His alone as God, unshared with His creatures.
·      Communicable: those which we share with Him as those made in His image, that we can grow in.
·      Relational: described of God in relationship to His creatures.  There is some overlap here with God’s communicable attributes.

The following is adapted from Reid Monaghan, founding pastor of Jacob’s Well in North Brunswick, NJ, from their Gospel Class curriculum:

Incommunicable / Unshared Attributes
·      Independence – God’s being and existence is not dependent on anyone or anything else.  God has utterly no needs at all, was not created and has existence in and of himself. (Job 41:11; Psalm 50:10-12; Acts 17:24–25; Romans 11:35-36)
·      Unchanging or Immutability – God’s character and nature is utterly constant and trustworthy. God will not be one way today and then another way tomorrow and his purposes and plans are constant and sure (Numbers 23:19; Psalm 33;11, 102:25-28; Malachi 3:6; James 1:17)
·      Perfection – God is infinitely perfect in all his attributes and is not lacking in any way (Psalm 18:30; Matthew 5:48)
·      Eternity – God is, God has been, God will always be. He created space and time, relates to beings in time and will inhabit the infinite future. (Deuteronomy 33:27; Isaiah 57:15; Psalm 90:2; Romans 16:25-27; 1 Timothy 1:17; Revelation 1:8, 4:8)
·      Omnipresence – God is spirit and is present at all places in all times. He is not limited in space and time to one location or epoch of history. (Psalm 139:1-7; Jeremiah 23:23, 24)
·      Glory – God is mind blowing, indescribable and all our talk of him falls short of all that he actually is. When God reveals himself to us, it is full of radiant brilliance that provokes awe and reverent fear. (John 17, Romans 3:23, Hebrews 1:3)
·      Unity – God is not a bundle of conflicting attributes and is not fragmented in his character or purpose. He is a unified and whole being in every way. He is not “part love, part justice, part holy,” he IS these things fully.
 
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