Attributes of God

In Creation, natural light produced many blessings upon our planet. The light streaming from the sun caused flowers to bloom, called dormant seeds forth from the soil, brought grain to maturity, and allowed animal and bird life to flourish. What was from the beginning still occurs to this very day. Light produces life.

In His public ministry, Jesus made two statements about light that at first seem to stand in contradiction to one another. Recorded in John 8:12, Jesus said of Himself, “I am the light of the world.” According to Matthew 5:14, Jesus said of and to His disciples, “Ye are the light of the world.” How can this be? Who is the light of the world? Is Jesus the light of the world, or are we the light of the world?

Light seems to be a favorite theme in the writings of the Old Testament prophets. Living in dark days of judgment, destruction, devastation, and death, they longed for the day when the light of God’s own countenance would shine again upon His people. These prophets anticipated the day when the Light of the World, the promised Messiah, would dawn upon the horizon.

“Let there be light!” These are the first words spoken by God as recorded in Genesis 1:3. Is it not fascinating that light existed before there was a sun, a moon, or stars? By God’s creative command, light streamed through the universe! Yet, in spite of the vast progress of scientific knowledge, scientists today still struggle to accurately define light.

James, the brother of Jesus, was raised in Nazareth along with Jesus Christ as his eldest half-brother. Growing up, James personally witnessed Jesus increasing in wisdom, in stature, and in favor with God and man. He saw how his older half-brother obediently and respectfully submitted Himself to Mary and Joseph on a daily basis. James had seen the unchangeable perfections of our Lord on public display in Galilee.

It is important to understand that mankind views time differently from how God sees time. As created beings, we are locked in time. We cannot see the past nor the future other than as memories of days gone by or in anticipation of things to come. God, however, lives outside of time. He can see the past and the future as clearly as He sees the present.

We can be grateful that Biblical Christianity is the one and only thing that is steadfast forever. This phrase describing the God of the Bible as “stedfast for ever” came not from the lips of an Israelite prophet or a priest but was part of a royal proclamation by a Persian ruler named Darius!

Our God does not change. The assurance of God’s immutability gives us as His children a stable confidence in an unstable world. No matter who is in the White House, God is on the throne! No matter how formidable the sea to cross or the stronghold to conquer, God Who brings us forth in freedom is the same Who empowers us to stand firm for His glory.

The Colossae church was plagued by Gnostic false teachers who belittled the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ and denied His eternal sonship. They asserted the preeminence of human reason above divine revelation, and claimed that they had a secret key to knowledge, hence their name “Gnostics.” In minimizing Christ and promoting themselves, these false teachers had the audacity to deny that Jesus was fully divine. Some said that His deity came upon Him only at His baptism. Others took the other extreme and denied the full humanity of Christ, asserting that He was merely an apparition, without a genuine body of flesh.

Not only did John assert that Jesus is the self-existent Maker of all things, he asserted in Hebraic contrasting form (the literary device of saying the same thing the opposite way) that nothing can exist without Him! No other reality exists in all the universe that can have any being apart from the Lord Jesus Christ, the first Cause.

When we say that Jehovah is “self-existent,” we are implying that the God of the Bible does not need to prove or explain His existence. In the witness of the prophets, the Lord often undergirds His statements, not with evidence nor with logic, but with a self-sufficient statement of the presuppositional authority of His Word: “for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it” (Isaiah 40:5 and Micah 4:4).

The Lord answered Moses with an assertion of His own self-existence. “And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM” (Exodus 3:14). God’s response must have come as a shock to Moses. God did not explain Himself. He did not set about to prove His existence by rational arguments. On the surface, the statement seems to repel inquiry and to have an air of aloofness, giving distance between the Israelites and God. Let’s take a moment to look a little deeper and consider the grammatical form of God’s revelation of Himself.

This past year we have surveyed the attributes of God. We examined twelve attributes during 2024. By God’s grace, we anticipate studying twelve more attributes, one each month, in 2025. We hope that this overview of God’s attributes—the essential and permanent characteristics of His nature—has been and will continue to be edifying and encouraging for you and your family.

The incarnation of the Lord Jesus is the central event of human history. When we celebrate Christmas, we are celebrating far more than a babe born in Bethlehem. We are rejoicing in the fact that God came down to earth as our Emmanuel. Jesus is “God with us.” The Apostle Paul celebrates this fact in one of the most unusual verses in his epistles.

The wondrous mystery of the Triune God was on full display in the unique miracle of the virgin birth of the Lord Jesus Christ. When the archangel Gabriel brought news to a young maiden named Mary in the village of Nazareth, the messenger of Jehovah gave witness to the wonder of the Trinity. This special birth is unique in all of human history.

In this Messianic prophecy, God the Father is speaking of “my servant,” the One Whom He also calls “mine elect.” In this same prophecy, the coming Messiah is proclaimed as the One “in whom my soul delighteth.” The direct fulfillment of this very passage was at the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan River. At that moment, God the Father announced, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17).

“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth” (Genesis 1:1). Although the subject of this first sentence is plural, Elohim, the verb created is given in the masculine singular form. This God of the Bible, the Creator of all things, is one; but the One is also three Persons—three, but also one. What would seem to be a grammatical mistake is actually a statement of profound Trinitarian truth.

In laying aside the things of the past, we often think of our sins and failures. But it is not just our failures we must forget; we must also forget our successes! We dare not glory in our accomplishments or even our spiritual attainments. What are you seeking? Are you clinging to your past successes? Or, are you discouraged by your past failures? Do the distractions of “things on the earth” pull your affection away from Christ? If any of these situations are so, learn with Paul to forget those things which are behind!

One of the central doctrines of orthodox Christianity is the Trinity. The Godhead is three in person. The Godhead is one in essence. It is important to recognize that in making the statement, “I and my Father are one,” Jesus was not denying the Trinity, nor giving credence at all to the twin heresies of unitarianism or modalism.

The world has tried in vain to establish a one-world government. The prophet Zechariah declared, “And the LORD shall be king over all the earth: in that day shall there be one LORD, and his name one” (Zechariah 14:9). Unity is an attribute of God. He is one, and His name is One. Thus, it follows that God brings unity to all that He governs.