God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good? (Numbers 23:19)

God Is Not

Describing the nature of God can only be understood by seeing Him as all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-present in all things that pertain to the universe. It is difficult for the mind of man to see how powerful the Lord God Creator is considering that He dwells in eternity where He existed before the worlds were formed and have seen the acts of every man since Adam and will live beyond the existence of all men in eternity to come. The Bible reveals the personality of the Father as one who is full of love and yet disposed to wrath. He created the world with incredible beauty without sin and destroyed the world with a flood because of sin. In the day of the flood, the wrath of God was brought upon everything that had breath killing every man, woman, child and beast with terrific measure and at the same time shows grace by telling the son of Lamech how to save himself and seven others in an ark of gopher wood. Down through the eons of time the Lord God has shown Himself to be the only true and living God revealing Himself through by the evidence of the material world and the written word. There is much to be said about who God is and a lifetime will only touch the hem of the garment of the knowledge of how great the Lord shows Himself to be. The Bible reveals many sides of the character of God and the written word reveals some things about God that He is not.

When the children of Israel camped in the plains of Moab, the king of Moab enlists the help of a prophet named Balaam to curse the Hebrews as the Moabites were in dread of being destroyed by Israel. Balaam prophecies as the Lord instructs him and in his second prophecy reveals that God is not a man that He would act like a man. One of the fundamental failures of humankind is to believe that God is like him and that whatever the wisdom of man declares this would be the will of God. Men try to bring the Creator down on the level of the creation as if the clay can demand from the potter anything. God is not a man to act like a man or to think like a man. He is far separated from His own creation as Lord, Savior, Father, and Judge. Jesus will tell the Sadducees of His day that God is not the God of the dead, but of the living. The Jewish sect said there was no resurrection and in response to a puzzling question about who is to marry whom in the resurrection, the Son of God reminds His detractors that God cannot be imprisoned with the chains of human wisdom. Men are confined by the sphere of time but God is eternal. Jesus reminds the Sadducees that God spoke to Abraham one thousand years before and He still lives. God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.

The apostle Paul further explains the character of God when he writes to the church at Corinth reminding them that God is not the author of confusion but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints. Chaos described the worship of the Corinthians and the apostle tells the early Christians that everything the Lord has done has been with purpose and design. When men allow their own wisdom to recreate the will of God there will be confusion. God did not create a world of confusion but order and design. In the church, there should be purpose and design in the worship demanded of God. Paul tells the churches in Galatia that God is not mocked and men should not try to fool an everlasting divine being that knows all things. When the Lord established the world He created a law of sowing and reaping that holds true in nature and also the nature of man. When man desires the flesh and sows to the flesh he will reap what he sows. No man should mock God to believe that God does not see and know what man has done. It is impossible to serve the living God and fill the desires of the flesh. In a letter to some Hebrews that were endangering their souls by turning away from the covenant of Christ, the author exhorts the saints to remember that God is not unjust to forget their work and labor of love which they showed toward His name by ministering to the saints. While they suffered severe persecution, the Lord was confident of greater things for them. It is difficult to face trials but God is not unaware of the struggles His children face. He knows what they endure, He understands their heartaches and feels their pain in the trials of life. The Christian should know that God is not unjust to overlook the labors of His children because He is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them. Faith is the ingredient of character that molds the spirit of man to know that God is not ashamed of them when they follow His will. Finally, the greatest blessing possessed by man is the knowledge that God is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance. It is an eternal message from a kind and loving Father that He has never had any desire to destroy His creation. He is not slack concerning His word given to men to repent and live but is longsuffering toward all men as He is not willing to destroy anyone. What God does toward the disobedient is not what He desires but He must carry out righteous judgment because He is holy. There is no joy in what the Lord must do and God has never desired to see men destroy themselves. His grace has afforded everything a man needs to save himself but often chooses to rebel the grace of God leaving the Lord no choice but to punish. It is an eternal sadness to know that no one must perish because God is not willing that any should perish yet the majority of men will die an eternal death because they did not serve the true and living God. God is not a lot of things but what makes Him so wonderful is what He is.