No Nonsense about God 1: The Greatness of God

So Jesus went out into the desert: and there he was able, as his public ministry took shape, to be with God in all God’s greatness.

For, whatever else God is, if God is God, God is great! Above, beyond; immortal, invisible, inexpressible, unending, unbounded… we use so many negative words when we talk about God, because the positive words are not adequate to describe God. If God could be known, understood, defined, or proved, he would not be God.

And it is to this God in all his greatness that our scriptures bear witness:

“Heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain you”, says Solomon;
“O the majesty and magnificence of his presence!”, says the psalmist;
“O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!”, says St Paul.

We stand at the edge of a huge sea, awestruck by its beauty, with small waves lapping at our feet: but quite unable to comprehend its vastness and its glory as it stretches out of our sight into infinity.

God is great!….. But surely this is obvious and indisputable, the most obvious thing anyone could say about God. So what is “the greatness of God” doing in a series called “No nonsense about God”? Doesn’t everyone agree on this one? Yet actually there are two widespread heresies which undermine belief in God’s greatness:
that Christians know all about God; and (similar but subtly different)
that only Christians know about God.

Christians know all about God. This idea comes partly from misreading certain texts in the Bible: for example Paul’s famous speech to the Athenians in Acts 17. While wandering around the city, he tells them, he has come across an altar with the inscription “To the unknown God”; and he goes on to say, “This God, whom you worship as unknown, we proclaim to you”. This is often taken to mean “God was unknown, but now he is no longer unknown”. But Paul didn’t say, “God was unknown, but now we know all about him”. What he said was “We are proclaiming to you the unknown God”. In fact he goes on to talk about God who is beyond this world and beyond our imagining; and this leads him to talk about the second of Moses’ ten great commandments, “You shall not make graven images or worship them”.

Now we are probably not in much danger of literally worshipping images carved out of wood or stone: but there is a great danger and temptation to worship graven images of the mind: I can make a god in my mind, and not only worship it myself, but, much worse, also insist that everyone else should worship it too. And this is a besetting sin for Christians: I know all about God, and, unless your image of God is exactly like mine, you don’t know God at all! But God is and always will be beyond our minds, greater than anything we can say or think about him: yes, we do know God, but only as we know another person, touching only the fringes of all that is to be known.

But surely we can at least say, as Christians, that the Bible tells us all about God? Well, if so, then our God is

lover, beloved, father, mother, fighter, judge;
like a lion, like a hen, like an eagle, like a lamb, like a dove;
wind, fire, creator, destroyer, healer;
who commands war, ordains peace, punishes ruthlessly, forgives endlessly;
demands sacrifice, rejects sacrifice, gives the law, overturns the law;
strides over mountains, whispers in the night;
calls Moses but then tries to kill him;
cannot be seen yet has been seen;
dwells in deep darkness, and in unapproachable light…..

….. Images, metaphors, hints, glimpses: that’s what we find in the Bible, never ultimate definitions. For the God of the Bible, the God of Christianity, is infinite and multifarious and great: he can be touched and glimpsed, but never grasped or tied down.

But even if we cannot know all about God, we often take it as read that Christians are the only ones who know about God. Even if we don’t know everything, other people, other religions, know nothing! a dogma which, once again, is usually backed up by a few odd verses taken out of context.

Yet, if we are only glimpsing one small aspect of this vast ocean which is God, might there not be other people, standing on other beaches, who can see other aspects? You may know the poem about the Six Blind Men of Hindustan, who came across an elephant one day. One of them caught hold of its trunk and said “Ah! this elephant is like a snake!”; another took hold of its tusk, and said “it’s like a spear!”; the next touched its side, and said “it’s like a wall!”; and so on. And the poem ends;

And so these men of Hindustan
disputed loud and long,
each in his own opinion
exceeding stiff and strong:
for each was partly in the right,
yet all were in the wrong.

We think we have a monopoly on God! Yet, if you have ever properly met, shared, listened, discussed, and above all prayed with people of other faiths; if you have experienced their wisdom and their holiness; then it becomes impossible to say “Your God is a false God; your God has nothing to do with our God”. The wit of Jews, the humility of Muslims, the riotousness of Hindus, the calm of Buddhists, the devotion of Sikhs, even the mystery and the power of primitive religions: all add to, and enrich, our understanding and our knowledge of God. Of course we can see things wrong with other religions, as no doubt they can see things wrong with ours: but isn’t it indeed our great God whom they seek? whom they too have glimpsed?

And it doesn’t stop there. For why should God only be known in religion? If God is God, God cannot be confined to religion, but will break out all over the place:

in artistic creation, in scientific breakthrough;
in the mysteries of mathematics, in the amazements of astronomy;
in the subtle beauties of Mozart, in the raucous razzmatazz of Broadway;
in the tenderness of human love, in the riotousness of the natural world;
in the cut and thrust of politics, in the elegance of sport.

Here too, and in countless other places, we can catch a glimpse of God that should not be ignored: for God is great.

So, as Christians, we need to cultivate that greatest of virtues, the virtue of humility, acknowledging our smallness in the face of our great God; not worshipping the graven images of our mind; not pretending we know it all; not rejecting the insights of our fellow seekers: but always, as in the last of C.S. Lewis’ Narnia books, going further up and further in! always discovering more truth, more depth, more wonder, as we continue our journey into the inexhaustible glory of the greatness of God. Amen.