Who Is God
GOD AND HUMAN
LIFE
Who is GOD
Who is GOD
• What we think about God affects our attitude toward everything else.
• Our understanding of God makes all the difference in our answers to many vital questions of life.
• It impacts/determines our understanding of ourselves. • John Calvin: “Human beings never achieve a clear knowledge of themselves unless they first look on God’s face”.
Who is GOD
Monism:
• all reality is one, and the nature of this reality is divine.
• everything is a part of God.
• Any differences like, life and earth, pain and pleasure, good and evil, or even past and future are illusory.
• Salvation in this contest therefore implies selfrealization. discovering one’s essential divinity
Who is GOD
Dualism:
• There are two, rather than one ultimate principles • Good - light; evil – darkness
• So all sufferings are due to evil and both will exist eternally because they are coequal.
Polytheism
• Many gods
• Usually multiple good gods and evil ones
Who is GOD
• Bible does not establish the existence of God but accepts the existence of God.
• Gen 1:1 says “ in the beginning God. . .”
• Bible also tells us that He is the creator and sustainers of this universe.
• Bible also tells that he is the Father of our Lord
Jesus. Implication: everything we say about
God must be confirmed by what we find in
Jesus. For then only will our concept of God be fully and distinctively Christian.
Who is GOD
Theism in the Bible
• recognizes the reality of both the world and
God
• The world is real though it is not divine
• the world is not evil just because it is not divine • The distinction between God and the world does not coincide with the distinction between good and evil.
Who is GOD
• God is the single source of all that exists; his power is unrivalled, so there is no chance of a permanent conflict between God and everything else.
• what the good God created is good and the creatureliness should not be identified with evil. • evil is not something that
LIFE
Who is GOD
Who is GOD
• What we think about God affects our attitude toward everything else.
• Our understanding of God makes all the difference in our answers to many vital questions of life.
• It impacts/determines our understanding of ourselves. • John Calvin: “Human beings never achieve a clear knowledge of themselves unless they first look on God’s face”.
Who is GOD
Monism:
• all reality is one, and the nature of this reality is divine.
• everything is a part of God.
• Any differences like, life and earth, pain and pleasure, good and evil, or even past and future are illusory.
• Salvation in this contest therefore implies selfrealization. discovering one’s essential divinity
Who is GOD
Dualism:
• There are two, rather than one ultimate principles • Good - light; evil – darkness
• So all sufferings are due to evil and both will exist eternally because they are coequal.
Polytheism
• Many gods
• Usually multiple good gods and evil ones
Who is GOD
• Bible does not establish the existence of God but accepts the existence of God.
• Gen 1:1 says “ in the beginning God. . .”
• Bible also tells us that He is the creator and sustainers of this universe.
• Bible also tells that he is the Father of our Lord
Jesus. Implication: everything we say about
God must be confirmed by what we find in
Jesus. For then only will our concept of God be fully and distinctively Christian.
Who is GOD
Theism in the Bible
• recognizes the reality of both the world and
God
• The world is real though it is not divine
• the world is not evil just because it is not divine • The distinction between God and the world does not coincide with the distinction between good and evil.
Who is GOD
• God is the single source of all that exists; his power is unrivalled, so there is no chance of a permanent conflict between God and everything else.
• what the good God created is good and the creatureliness should not be identified with evil. • evil is not something that