Inimitable

Unique, matchless, incomparable, one and only or incapable of being imitated, very much an attribute or characteristic of Jesus. Yet far too often we’re taught to “act like Jesus”. Certainly the world needs more of Him but does it need more people pretending to be like Him? What’s truly called for is more of the actual Jesus living in and working through us. That’s what He promises to do if we’ll let Him. All that’s required is saying yes, not once but always.

Incorporeal

Incorporeality means spirituality or God is a spirit. There is no way I’m going to be able to explain this characteristic but I look forward to understanding it more one day. I do know that we are spirit too and I hope to grow more in this and less in the physical each day. Science is discovering some pretty amazing things about our world that are revealing a spiritual reality never thought of before. If you’d like to know more on that, send me a message and I’ll let you know where to learn more.

Sovereign

God’s sovereignty is in many ways the affirmation of each of the characteristics we’ve been looking at. Sovereign means supreme or most high and declares that there is none greater. I’ve also heard God’s sovereignty described as “He can do whatever He wants.” Which is true, but the reason He can do what He wills is because of who He is, because of His goodness, love, mercy and all the other attributes we’ve looked at. Sovereign also refers to freedom. God is free to carry out His plan. One of the aspects of God’s plan is giving us liberty. We can choose to avoid Him and His plan, which actually leads to bondage or we can choose to walk with Him and experience His freedom.

Simple

Really, God is simple? Theologians will tell you that God’s attribute of simplicity means that He is not made up of the sum of His parts. We’ve been saying this; He’s not sometimes this and sometimes that like we can be. He just is and He is all the time. But I think God’s simplicity is more than that. Scripture tells us that He is not the God of confusion however we imagine Him as complicated far too often. Unfortunately we think this way because it makes it easier to ignore what His desire is for us. I love this quote from Soren Kierkegaard:

“The matter is quite simple. The Bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand we are obliged to act accordingly.”

By attaching complexity to God we create religion. It becomes easy for us to leave the work of the Kingdom to the professionals, to put the Pastors and Priests between He and us. We become content with showing up each week and having just a little bit more of the mystery unraveled for us so that someday we will be able to be and do what God wants. Most often someday never comes. Today is the day, right now is the only time we can be with God. He is the God of the present and His greatest desire is for us to join Him in it, not to put it off.

For clarity’s sake I need to point out that there’s always more of God for us to know. His depth is infinite. But this is the kind of knowing that is personal not to be confused with understanding, which is intellectual. Sorry I got a bit wordy today. I so want each of us to get this or more accurately, get Him. His love for you brings me to tears.

Immanence

Immanence is another of my favorite attributes of God. It means that He is here with us. It might seem to some to contradict His transcendence (He’s outside of space and time) but it doesn’t at all because as we said earlier, He is infinite. Our immanent God is never far from us in fact scripture is abundantly clear that we literally have Christ in us. On top of that we have the Holy Spirit to guide and lead us and The loving Father to speak to and hear from while His greatest wish is that we would allow Him to shower us with His love.

Omnibenevolent

This term means that God is all good and always good. This applies to each of His attributes, thoughts, and actions. If God is involved it will be good. When it’s not good it’s because of the choices we or others have made to leave God out. But if we’ll allow Him, He’ll make things right again. This is not to say that it will be easy, comfortable or pain free, but it will be what is best. This characteristic is the foundation of the trust we must have in the Lord if we are going to have the impact on this world that is so desperately needed.

Omnipresence

Omnipresence or what is sometimes called ubiquity is the fact that God is everywhere at once. This attribute doesn’t really need an explanation but do we understand its implications? Somehow it’s easy for us to grasp that He can be everywhere in the world at one time and still not fully appreciate what that means for us individually. I think God’s favorite use of this trait is that it puts Him there with you and here with me right now. He is never absent from us. We may think we’ve somehow stepped away from Him but that’s not possible. He’s with us always, waiting to be included in all we think and do.

Confidence

One of the attributes others will see in us when our foundation is set in God’s wonderful love is confidence. Not in ourselves but in Him. It’s self-reliance that leads to anxiety and rightfully so. But trust in God brings sureness like no other. We are no longer led by doubt, fear and uncertainty. Sure those things will try to creep back in but we don’t have to make a place for them.