God: An Introduction to God
Our most basic religious belief is that God exists. By the capitalized word “God,” we mean the God described in the Bible: a good and powerful supernatural being who created all things, who cares about us, who cares about what we do, who is involved in our lives, and who offers us an eternity with his goodness.
Humans cannot understand God in totality, but we can have a good beginning point for understanding who God is and what God is doing. Let’s focus on some of the basic qualities of God.
God’s existence
Throughout history, throughout the world, most people have believed in supernatural beings. Some believed in invisible forces of nature; others believed in human-like beings controlling the sun, moon, stars, oceans, rivers and animals. Some believed in one supreme god who ruled all the others; some believed that the supernatural forces were fighting against one another. For the readers of this lesson, we will focus on the God of the Bible.
There is no way to prove God’s existence so that everyone is convinced. It is better to talk in terms of evidence, rather than proof. The evidence gives us confidence that God exists and is the sort of being the Bible describes. God “has not left himself without a witness,” Paul told the people in Lystra (Acts 14:17). What is the evidence?
Scripture. Various people have claimed that God appeared to them. The Bible tells us that Jesus had personal knowledge of God. “God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart…has made him known” (John 1:18). This is part of the evidence, although we also admit that not everyone’s claims are true. Many of these experiences are private, so we also look for more public evidence of God.
Creation. Psalm 19:1 tells us, “The heavens are telling the glory of God.” Romans 1:20 tells us, “Ever since the creation of the world God’s eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been seen and understood through the things God has made.” Creation itself tells us something about God.
It is reasonable for us to believe that something caused the earth, sun and stars to be the way they are, just right for human life. Scientists say the universe began with a big bang, and it is reasonable for us to believe that something caused the bang. If this is the way it started, then God caused it.
Design. Creation shows signs of order, of laws of physics. If various properties of matter were different, then earth would not exist, or humans could not exist. If the size or orbit of earth were different, then conditions on this planet would not permit human life. Some people believe that these are lucky accidents; others believe that the more reasonable explanation is that the solar system was designed by an intelligent Creator.
Life. Life is based on incredibly complex chemicals and reactions. Some people believe that life had an intelligent cause; others believe that it happened by chance. For many people, the existence of life is evidence of a Creator God. Some believe that God individually creates each person, each animal, and each kind of animal. Others believe that God created the biological processes that bring about this diversity.
Morality. Is right and wrong a matter of opinion, of majority rule, or is there some authority above humans that defines good and evil? If there is no God, then humans have no basis for saying that anything is evil, no reason to condemn racism, torture, rape or murder. If good and evil exist, there must be a God who defines what they are. If there is no God, then we have no way to decide what is good, other than the opinions of whoever is in power.
Experience. Books on apologetics explore some of these ideas in more detail. But often, it comes back to personal experience. Some people accept the evidence as the best explanation for who we are and how we are to live; others do not. The Holy Spirit leads people to accept such evidence, but the Spirit does not force people to believe it if they do not want to.
Greatness
What sort of being is God? Bigger than we can imagine! If he created the universe, then he is bigger than the universe—and not limited by time, space or energy, for he lived before time, space, matter and energy did.
2 Timothy 1:9 mentions something God did “before the ages began.” Time had a beginning, and God existed before that. He has a timeless existence that cannot be measured by years. He is eternal, of infinite age. Mathematics is too limited to describe God’s existence.
Since God created matter, he existed before matter, and he is not made of matter. He is spirit—but he is not “made of” spirit. God is not made at all; he simply is, and he exists as spirit. He defines existence—he defines spirit and he defines matter.
God existed before matter did, and the dimensions and properties of matter do not apply to him. He cannot be measured in kilometers or in kilowatts. Solomon said that even the highest heavens could not contain God (1 Kings 8:27). He fills heaven and earth (Jeremiah 23:23); he is everywhere, or omnipresent. There is no place in the universe where he does not exist.
How powerful is God? If God can cause a big bang, design solar systems, create the codes in DNA and manage all these levels of power, then he must be unlimited in power, or omnipotent. “Nothing will be impossible with God,” Luke 1:37 tells us. God can do whatever he wants to do.
God’s creativity shows that he is more intelligent than we can understand. He controls the universe, constantly causing its continued existence (Hebrews 1:3). That means he must know what is happening throughout the universe; he is unlimited in intelligence—he is omniscient. He knows whatever he wants to know.
God defines right and wrong. He has the power and the desire to always do right. “God cannot be tempted by evil” (James 1:13). He is consistently and perfectly righteous (Psalm 11:7). His standards are right, his decisions are right, and he judges the world in righteousness. He is, in his very nature, good and right.
In all these ways, God is so different from us that we have special words that we use only for God. Only God is omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent, eternal. We are matter; he is spirit. We are mortal and limited; he is eternal and infinite.
Other ancient cultures believed in gods and goddesses who fought with one another, who acted selfishly, who could not be trusted. But the Bible reveals a God who is in complete control, who needs nothing from anyone, who acts only to help others. He is perfectly reliable, his behavior is perfectly good, righteous and completely trustworthy. He is in a different category of existence, goodness and power.
This makes life much simpler. People do not have to try to please 10 or 20 different gods; there is only one. They do not have to please the changing rules of human cultures; God does not change his definitions of right and wrong. The Creator of all is still the Ruler of all, and he will be the Judge of all. Our past, our present and our future are all determined by the one God, the All-knowing, All-powerful, Eternal One.
| From our Statement of Beliefs: God, by the testimony of Scripture, is one divine Being in three eternal, co-essential, yet distinct Persons—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The One God may be known only in the Three and the Three may be known only as the one true God, good, omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent, and immutable in his covenant love for humanity. He is Creator of heaven and earth, Sustainer of the universe, and Author of human salvation. Though transcendent, God freely and in divine love, grace and goodness involves himself with humanity directly and personally in Jesus Christ, that humanity, by the Spirit, might share in his eternal life as his children. (Mark 12:29; Matthew 28:19; John 14:9; 1 John 4:8; Romans 5:8; Titus 2:11; Hebrews 1:2-3; 1 Peter 1:2; Galatians 3:26) |
Goodness
If all we knew about God is that he had incredible power over us, we might obey him out of fear. But God has revealed to us another aspect of his nature: The incredibly great God is also incredibly gentle and good.
One of Jesus’ disciples asked him, “Show us the Father” (John 14:8). He wanted to know what God was like. He knew the Old Testament stories of the burning bush, the pillar of cloud and fire at Mt. Sinai, the whisper that Elijah heard, and the fantastic throne that Ezekiel saw (Exodus 3:4; 13:21; 1 Kings 19:12; Ezekiel 1). God can appear in all these ways, but what is he really like?
Jesus said, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14:9). If we want to know what God is like, we need to look at Jesus. We can learn a bit about God from nature; we can learn more from the way he revealed himself in the Old Testament, but we learn the most from the way that God reveals himself in Jesus.
Jesus shows us what God is like. Jesus is called Immanuel, which means God with us (Matthew 1:23). He lived without sin, without any selfishness. He is a person of compassion. He has feelings of love and joy, disappointment and anger. He cares about individuals. He calls for righteousness, and he forgives sin. He served others, even in his suffering and death.
God is like that. He described himself to Moses in this way: “the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, yet by no means clearing the guilty” (Exodus 34:6-7).
The God who is above all creation is also able to work within creation. This is his immanence, his being with us. Although God is larger than the universe and everywhere within the universe, he is with believers in a way that he is not with unbelievers. God is close to us.
In Jesus, God entered human history, space and time. He was in human flesh, showing us what human life ought to be like, showing us that God wants more for our lives than merely flesh. We are offered eternal life, life beyond the physical limits we have now. The Spirit of God comes to live in us and make us children of God (Romans 8:11; 1 John 3:2). God continues to be with us, working in space and time to help us.
The great and powerful God is also the gentle and gracious God; the perfectly righteous Judge is also the merciful and patient Savior. The God who is angry at sin also provides salvation from sin. He is mighty in mercy, great in gentleness. This is what we should expect from a Being who can create the codes in DNA, the colors in a rainbow and the delicate wisps on dandelion seeds. We would not exist at all, except for the fact that God is kind and gentle.
God describes his relationship to us in several ways. In one way of describing it, he is a father and we are his children. In another, he is the husband and all believers together are his bride. Or he is a king and we are his subjects. He is a shepherd and we are the sheep. In these figures of speech, God describes himself as being in a situation of responsibility to protect and provide for his people.
God knows how tiny we are. He could eliminate us with just a small change in cosmic forces. But in Jesus, God shows us how much he loves us, how much he cares for us. Jesus knows the kind of pain we go through, because he felt it. He knows the pain that evil causes, and he was willing to suffer it, to help us.
God has plans for us, for he made us to be like himself (Genesis 1:27). He invites us to become more like himself—in goodness, not in power. In Jesus, God gives us an example to follow: an example of humility, selfless service, love and compassion, faith and hope.
“God is love,” John wrote (1 John 4:8). God demonstrated his love by sending Jesus to die for our sins, so we might live with him in eternal joy. God’s love is not wishful thinking—it is action that helps us in our greatest need. But God’s love doesn’t mean that God will do everything that we want him to do – it means doing what he knows we need.
What we learn about God from the crucifixion of Jesus is just as important as what we learn from his resurrection. We already knew that God had the power to bring people back to life, but before the crucifixion, we did not know that God loved us so much that he was willing to suffer to rescue us. God is willing to suffer physical and emotional pain, even pain caused by the people who are being helped. His love invites us and encourages us. He does not force us to do his will (1 Corinthians 13:5).
God’s love for us, shown most clearly in Jesus Christ, is an example for us of how we should live: “This is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:10-11). If we live in love, then eternal life will be a joy not only for us but also for those who live with us.
If we follow Jesus, we will also follow him in death, and in being brought back to life. The same God who raised Jesus from the dead will also raise us and give us life eternal (Romans 8:11). But if we do not learn to love, then we will not enjoy everlasting life. So God is teaching us to love, at a speed we can follow, giving us a perfect example, changing our hearts by the Holy Spirit working in us, preparing us for greater things in the future. The Power who controls the sun is working gently in our hearts, winning our affection and loyalty.
God gives us meaning in life, direction for life, hope for life eternal. We can trust him, even when we suffer for doing good. God’s goodness is backed up by his power; his love is guided by his wisdom. He has all the forces of the universe in his control, and he is using them to help us. “All things work together for good for those who love God” (Romans 8:28).
Response
How do we respond to a God so great and gentle, so powerful and tender? We respond with worship: amazed at his goodness and power, we repent and obey in response to his truth and wisdom.
To his mercy, we respond with thankfulness; to his grace, with loyalty; to his goodness, with love. We admire him, we adore him, we give ourselves to him and wish we had more to give. Just as he has shown his love for us, we let him change us so that we love the people around us. We use all that we have, all that we are, all that he gives us, to serve others, just as Jesus did.
This is the God we pray to, knowing that he hears every word, he knows every thought, he knows what we need, he cares about our feelings, he wants to live with us forever, he has the power to give us everything we want, and he has the wisdom not to.
God has proven himself faithful in Jesus Christ. His power is always used in love. God is supreme in power, and supreme in love. We can trust him in absolutely everything.
For further reading
Now that you’ve had an introduction to God, wouldn’t you like to know him better? We get to know God in several ways: through nature, through our experience with the Holy Spirit, through the Scriptures, through spiritual disciplines and through the words of other believers.
To learn more about God, read the Bible, especially the New Testament. Try a modern translation such as The Message, by Eugene Peterson, or The New Living Translation, published by Tyndale. For evidence of God’s existence, we recommend the following (easiest listed first):
- Paul Little, Know Why You Believe
- C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
- Lee Strobel, The Case for a Creator
- Peter Kreeft and Ronald Tacelli, Handbook of Christian Apologetics
- C. Stephen Evans, Why Believe?
- James Sire, Why Should Anyone Believe Anything at All?
- William Lane Craig, Reasonable Faith
- C.S. Lewis, Miracles
- Alister McGrath, Intellectuals Don’t Need God and Other Modern Myths
For discussions of the attributes of God:
- Max Anders, God: Knowing Our Creator
- Paul Little, Know What You Believe, chapter 2
- Gilbert Bilezekian, Christianity 101, chapter 2
- J.I. Packer, Knowing God
- Millard Erickson, Introducing Christian Doctrine, chapters 8-15
- Donald G. Bloesch, God the Almighty
Note on creation: The diversity of life is a separate question. Some people accept the theory of evolution; others reject it. Some people believe that the evolutionary theory describes the way that God produced biological diversity; others believe that God worked in some other way. The controversies about evolution are too complex to be resolved here; we simply note that they do not affect the question of how life originated in the first place. Few people have studied evolution well enough to make their own conclusions about it; for the most part, they accept the word of “experts.” That includes opponents as well as supporters of evolution. For further study, see Three Views on Creation and Evolution, edited by J.P. Moreland and John Mark Reynolds (Zondervan, 1999).
Things to think about
- Do the evils in this world weaken our faith in God, or strengthen it?
- If God is good, why did he make humans fallible, able to choose wrong?
- What does God say about the way we use his creation?
- How can God be distant to one person, but near to another?
- Can we trust a God who has all power but isn’t always good? Can we trust one who is always good but is limited in power?
- In what way is God like Jesus, and in what way is he different?
- Does God’s mercy cause you to admire him, or to ignore him?
Author: Michael Morrison, edited in 2026