Over the last year, went went over arguments for and against the existence of God. We will now turn our attention to describing and defining what the one true God is like using Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology.
These are commonly known as God’s attributes which are classified in two categories, communicable and incommunicable. Last week we went over communicable attributes. This week we’ll cover the names of God and then move on to the incommunicable attributes in subsequent blogs:
2. The Names of God in Scripture. In the Bible a person’s name is a description of his or her character. Likewise, the names of God in Scripture are various descriptions of his character. In a broad sense, then, God’s “name” is equal to all that the Bible and creation tell us about God. When we pray, “Hallowed be your name” as part of the Lord’s Prayer (Matt. 6:9), we are praying that people would speak about God in a way that is honoring to him and that accurately reflects his character. This honoring of God’s name can be done with actions as well as words, for our actions reflect the character of the Creator whom we serve (Matt. 5:16). To honor God’s name is therefore to honor him. The command, “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain” (Ex. 20:7) is a command that we not dishonor God’s reputation either by words that speak of him in a foolish or misleading way, or by actions that do not reflect his true character.
Now the Bible does give many individual names to God, all of which reflect some true aspect of his character. Many of these names are taken from human experience or emotions in order to describe parts of God’s character, while many other names are taken from the rest of the natural creation. In a sense, all of these expressions of God’s character in terms of things found in the universe are “names” of God because they tell us something true about him.
Herman Bavinck, in The Doctrine of God gives a long list of such descriptions of God taken from creation: God is compared to a lion (Isa. 31:4), an eagle (Deut. 32:11), a lamb (Isa. 53:7), a hen (Matt. 23:37), the sun (Ps. 84:11), the morning star (Rev. 22:16), a light (Ps. 27:1), a torch (Rev. 21:23), a fire (Heb. 12:29), a fountain (Ps. 36:9), a rock (Deut. 32:4), a hiding place (Ps. 119:114), a tower (Prov. 18:10), a shadow (Ps. 91:1), a shield (Ps. 84:11), a temple (Rev. 21:22), and so forth.
Taken from human experience, Bavinck finds an even more extensive list, which is reproduced here only in part: God is called bridegroom (Isa. 61:10), husband (Isa. 54:5), father (Deut. 32:6), judge and king (Isa. 33:22), man of war (Ex. 15:3), builder and maker (Heb. 11:10), shepherd (Ps. 23:1), physician (Ex. 15:26), and so forth. Furthermore, God is spoken of in terms of human actions such as knowing (Gen. 18:21), remembering (Gen. 8:1; Ex. 2:24), seeing (Gen. 1:10), hearing (Ex. 2:24), smelling (Gen. 8:21), tasting (Ps. 11:5), sitting (Ps. 9:7), rising (Ps. 68:1), walking (Lev. 26:12), wiping away tears (Isa. 25:8), and so forth. Human emotions are attributed to God, such as joy (Isa. 62:5), grief (Ps. 78:40; Isa. 63:10), anger (Jer. 7:18–19), love (John 3:16), hatred (Deut. 16:22), wrath (Ps. 2:5), and so forth.
Even though God does not have a physical body, Scripture uses various parts of the human body to describe God’s activities in a metaphorical way. Scripture can speak of God’s face or countenance (Ex. 33:20, 23; Isa. 63:9; Ps. 16:11; Rev. 22:4), eyes (Ps. 11:4; Heb. 4:13), eyelids (Ps. 11:4), ears (Ps. 55:1; Isa. 59:1), nose (Deut. 33:10), mouth (Deut. 8:3), lips (Job 11:5), tongue (Isa. 30:27), neck (Jer. 18:17), arms (Ex. 15:16), hand (Num. 11:23), finger (Ex. 8:19), heart (Gen. 6:6), foot (Isa. 66:1), and so forth. Even terms describing personal characteristics such as good, merciful, gracious, righteous, holy, just, and many more, are terms whose meaning is familiar to us through an experience of these qualities in other human beings. And even those terms that seem least related to creation, such as eternity or unchangeableness, are understood by us not intuitively but by negating concepts that we know from our experience (eternity is not being limited by time and unchangeableness is not changing).
The point of collecting all these passages is to show, first, that in one sense or another all of creation reveals something about God to us and that the higher creation, especially man who is made in God’s image, reveals him more fully.
Grudem, W. A. (2004). Systematic theology: an introduction to biblical doctrine (pp. 157–158). Leicester, England; Grand Rapids, MI: Inter-Varsity Press; Zondervan Pub. House.