GOD AND HIS REVELATION SUMMARY, PART 2.

As for God Himself and His attributes and traits, I agree with Erickson 2 that a couple of God’s attributes are His greatness and His goodness! And that a couple of realities that affect His greatness and His goodness are that He is immanent, that is, God is present and active within His creation; and that He is transcendent ,that is, God is superior to and independent of anything that He has created! There are certain attributes of God and traits of His character known by His names given in the Old Testament and the New Testament: for example, I AM, the Rock, the Present One, Almighty, Healer, Lord, Lord of Hosts, Provider, Peace, to name a few! God is distinct from His world, and it follows that there will always be a difference between God and humans, He is way higher than humans. And it follows that a person’s salvation is not his achievement, it is a gift of God achieved through His sacrifice at the cross when He came to earth as God incarnate, God in the flesh through Jesus Christ! In that God permeates the world it follows that the gospel can make contact with the unbelievers as at one point or another most persons have had no knowledge of God or His gospel of salvation! Today it is by the Holy Spirit indwelling in believers where God permeates the world and convicts the unbelievers.

As for monotheism, among the religions of the world, the Christian faith is unique in claiming that God is One and yet there are three persons who are God. The Old Testament teaches the unity of God, as for example in the Ten Commandments where it begins with “ I am the Lord your God…you shall have no other gods besides Me.” (Exodus 20: 2-3). As for the deity of the three, the names of God used in the Old Testament are used equally by Jesus Himself, in His incarnation here on earth! He was God incarnate! As for the Holy Spirit, there are biblical references that identify the Holy Spirit as God as for example in Acts 5: 3-4. As for the triune concept, it says that God must be understood as three-in-one! One Scripture that shows Trinity clearly is 1 John 5: 7 which says; “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, The Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.” According to New Dictionary of Theology “ God is not only He but also they—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, coequal and coeternal in power and glory each Person functioning in a set pattern” as seen by their specific roles as depicted by the Scriptures. And they are seen operating in mutual love( 1 Corinthians 12: 3).

NOTES
2 Millard J Erickson, Christian Theology, (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006), 289.