In Joseph Heller’s classic work, Catch-22, he writes of a young soldier named Appleby. I find what he ways about Appleby to be unsettling. Heller writes:
Appleby was a fair-haired boy from Iowa who believed in God, Motherhood, and the American Way of Life, without ever thinking about any of them, and everybody who knew him liked him.[1]
Appleby believed in God as a cultural inheritance right alongside motherhood and America. Tellingly, he “believed” in these things “without ever thinking about any of them.”
Church, I must say this plainly: this simply will not do. “Belief” as an inheritance, “belief” as a cultural expectation, “belief” as a naïve acceptance of a reality one has not really considered with any seriousness, “belief” without “thinking about” that which we profess…none of these will suffice in an increasingly post-Christian age.
We must know what we mean when we say the word “God.” We must “think about” this. Otherwise, our belief is just a fancy way of saying “ignorance.” What is more, let us be clear about this: many of those who are seeking to pull you or your children or your grandchildren away from the faith are thinking about what they believe. A church without knowledge of its own creed and convictions is a church that truly is without either creed or conviction!
Let us understand what we mean when we say “God.” The Apostles’ Creed offers us two critically important attributes that helps us toward understanding. It says, “I believe in God, the Father almighty.” This little line is powerful in what it asserts and it demands our careful consideration.
God is Father.
God is almighty.
We cannot have a proper understanding of God without holding to both of these. Let us begin with the second attribute, then the first.
That God is “almighty” means that He is transcendent and other.
We begin with God as almighty. The almighty-ness of God speaks to His greatness, to His transcendence, to His otherness, if you will. God is different from us. “Medieval theologians used the Latin phrase ens perfectissimus to refer to God,” writes R.C. Sproul, “The phrase may be translated by the words ‘the most perfect being.’”[2] This, too, is what it means to speak of God as almighty.
One of the most powerful depictions of God as almighty is found in Isaiah 6.
1 In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!” 4 And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. 5 And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”
Here we see God’s authority: “sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up.”
Here we see the fullness of God’s glory: “the train of his robe filled the temple.”
Here we see God’s holiness: “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts.” (The only time in scripture when a divine attribute is mentioned three times in a row.)
Here we see God’s awesome power: “the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called.”
And here we see God’s “otherness” from humanity: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”
Forty-nine chapters later, in Isaiah 55, we see the transcendence of God.
8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. 9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
The person of God is almighty.
The presence of God is almighty.
God, in comparison to all creation, is almighty.
The mind of God is almighty.
He is different from us! He is other than us! He is greater than us! He is not like us, though we, through His grace and by virtue of both His image within and on us and the work of His Son Jesus for us, are called to strive to be like Him in holiness. Even so, we will never be God. There is only one!
If the church in America has lost anything in its view of God, it would be His almighty-ness! We have stressed the relational nearness of God. More on that in a bit. But the relational nearness of God to the exclusion of His transcendent otherness leads to a truncated view of God.
I think of a book I read some years ago in which the author spoke of God as his “lover” with whom he wants to “cuddle.” The God of Isaiah 6 may be many things. “Cuddly” is not one of them. This is what I mean: nearness divorced form transcendence results in the virtual humanization of God to the exclusion of any type of grandeur and glory that would lead us to tremble with awe or worship with amazement!
We dare not lose the fact that God is almighty! “I believe in God, the Father almighty…”
That God is “Father” means He is near and relational.
And yet, this God that is almighty is also Father! The God who is transcendent is also near! The God who is other is also our Father with whom we are in relationship!
Before we consider this biblically, let us just note this: the nearness of God is gutted of its power when divorced from the almighty-ness of God! It is the fact that God is great and transcendent and other that makes the fact that God, in Christ, is near and enfleshed and relational so absolutely astonishing! But, in Christ, this is what happens.
Paul, in Romans 8, speaks of the fact that, through Christ, we can now be in relationship with God the almighty.
14 For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. 15 For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” 16 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17 and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.
Do you see? Outside of the nearness of God in Christ, all we are left with are the twin facts (a) that God exists and (b) that God is powerful. But all these can do by themselves is create a sense of dread, or, as Paul puts it here, of “fear.” But through Christ we become sons and daughters of God, are adopted into the family of God, and are able to “cry, ‘Abba! Father!’”
This cry bursts forth from the hearts of God’s children like water in the desert! We could not have imagined saying such a thing outside of the work of Christ! But, in Christ, yes, we can call God Father!
I believe in God, the Father (nearness/relationality) almighty (transcendence, otherness).
I grew up in a pretty traditional home. The thought of calling my father by his first name was inconceivable to me. I asked him once, “Can I call you by your first name?” His response: “Sure. I’ll call you Wyman and you call me Dad.” And that was that. It was, for me, a term of respect and also of love. It is an honor to call my earthly father “father!”
How much more so, the Lord God almighty?
God is other but near.
God is the power “out there” yet the Father right beside us.
God is so mighty that we tremble yet so gentle that we are comforted.
God is so glorious that we worship Him yet so merciful that we can cry out, “Abba! Father!”
God is powerful enough to protect us from all dangers yet tender enough to gather us under His wings.
I believe in God, the Father almighty!
The “nearness” and “otherness” of God are captured beautifully in the person of Jesus.
These twin attributes—God as Father and God as almighty—come together beautifully in the person and work of Jesus.
In Matthew 6, we see this in Jesus’ response to the disciples’ question about prayer.
9 Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.
That opening phrase brings together the twin aspects perfectly: “Our Father in heaven (i.e., the Fatherhood of God), hallowed (i.e., the almighty-ness of God as seen in the hallowing or the making holy, of His name) be your name…” And all of this is possible through Christ alone! Through Christ, the God who is almighty becomes known to us as the God who is Father, for it is Christ the Son that makes it possible for us to know and be in relationship with the Father!
And the rest of the prayer further demonstrates these attributes. Watch:
10 Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. [almighty]
11 Give us this day our daily bread, [Father]
12 and forgive us our debts [Father, almighty], as we also have forgiven our debtors.
13 And lead us not into temptation [Father], but deliver us from evil [almighty]
Do you see that these truths, these attributes, are held in beautiful balance in God’s Word and by Jesus? God is almighty. God is Father. We dare not hold to the almighty without the Father. We dare not hold to the Father without the almighty. There is a biblical balance here. The one informs the other.
Our hope is in the fact that we can call the almighty God our Father through the work and the person of Jesus Christ.
Belgum Bilquis Sheikh was a Pakistani Muslim who converted to Christianity and worked tirelessly for the advancement of the gospel in the world. She wrote of how a nun challenged her to think of God differently, to speak of God differently. She writes:
The little nun’s eyes filled with compassion and she leaned forward.
“Begum Sheikh,” she said, her voice full of emotion, “there is only one way to find out why we feel this way. And that is to find out for yourself, strange as that may seem. Why don’t you pray to the God you are searching for? Ask Him to show you His way. Talk to Him as if He were your friend.”
I smiled. She might as well suggest that I talk to the Taj Mahal. But then Dr. Santiago said something that shot through my being like electricity. She leaned closer and took my hand in hers, tears streaming down her cheeks. “Talk to Him,” she said very quietly, “as if He were your father.”
I sat back quickly. A dead silence filled the room. Even Mahmud and Tooni’s conversation hung between thoughts. I stared at the nun with the candlelight glinting off her glasses.
Talk to God as if He were my father! The thought shook my soul in the peculiar way truth has of being at once startling and comforting.
Later, Bilquis Sheikh wrestles with this idea of calling God “Father.”
No Muslim, I felt certain, ever thought of Allah as his father. Since childhood, I had been told that the surest way to know about Allah was to pray five times a day and study and think on the Quran. Yet Dr. Santiago’s words came to me again. “Talk to God. Talk to Him as if He were your father.” Alone in my room I got on my knees and tried to call Him “Father.” But it was a useless effort and I straightened in dismay. It was ridiculous. Wouldn’t it be sinful to try to bring the Great One down to our own level? I fell asleep that night more confused than ever.
And yet, Bilquis Sheikh persevered in her determination to call God “Father.” She continues:
“O Father, my Father . . . Father God.”
Hesitantly, I spoke His name aloud. I tried different ways of speaking to Him. And then, as if something broke through for me I found myself trusting that He was indeed hearing me, just as my earthly father had always done.
“Father, O my Father God,” I cried, with growing confidence. My voice seemed unusually loud in the large bedroom as I knelt on the rug beside my bed. But suddenly that room wasn’t empty any more. He was there! I could sense His Presence. I could feel His hand laid gently on my head. It was as if I could see His eyes, filled with love and compassion. He was so close that I found myself laying my head on His knees like a little girl sitting at her father’s feet. For a long time I knelt there, sobbing quietly, floating in His love. I found myself talking with Him, apologizing for not having known Him before. And again came His loving compassion, like a warm blanket settling around me.
Ah! Bilquis Sheikh knew the almighty-ness of God, but not the Fatherhood of God. Through Christ she came to hold to both! This is what the gospel accomplishes. She writes one more very interesting thing about her prayer to God the Father:
“I am confused, Father,” I said. “I have to get one thing straight right away.” I reached over to the bedside table where I kept the Bible and the Quran side by side. I picked up both books and lifted them, one in each hand. “Which, Father?” I said. “Which one is Your book?”
Then a remarkable thing happened. Nothing like it had ever occurred in my life in quite this way. For I heard a voice inside my being, a voice that spoke to me as clearly as if I were repeating words in my inner mind. They were fresh, full of kindness, yet at the same time full of authority.
In which book do you meet Me as your Father?
I found myself answering: “In the Bible.” That’s all it took. Now there was no question in my mind which one was His book.[3]
Yes, this is what Christianity and its book, the Bible, brings to the table! It really does matter if you believe in “God, the Father almighty” or in “God, the Father almighty,” or, more biblically still, in “God, the Father almighty.”
Let us hold rightly to both attributes! Let us not neglect either!
“I believe in God, the Father almighty.”
[1] Joseph Heller, Catch-22 (New York, NY: Everyman’s Library, 22.
[2] R.C. Sproul, Holiness (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., 1998), p.158-159.
[3] Sheikh, Bilquis; Schneider, Richard H. I Dared to Call Him Father (p. 44–46, 48–49). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.