Yesterday, I talked about how God does not experience the emotions of regret or repentance like we humans do.
When we read the Bible, the words we use to describe God might make it seem like He feels the same things we do, like being sorry or feeling bad about something.
But God is not a man.
So the words we use to describe His feelings might not mean the same thing when they’re used to talk about Him.
A lot of people get confused about this.
So let me try my best to help you understand.
First, you need to come to terms with the fact that God lives in a world very different from ours.
He is a spirit and freely inhabits both the spiritual and physical realms of our universe.
On the other hand, we humans are restricted to the physical or earthly realm.
The spiritual world that God inhabits may have boundaries, but they go way beyond the four-dimensional limits of the earth we live in.
And there’s no way we can know what those limits in the spiritual world are.
Now here’s the thing.
We have to use words to communicate with each other.
But God and other spiritual beings don’t have that limitation.
That’s right.
The fact that we have to employ human vocabulary to communicate is a limit that spiritual beings don’t have.
Another big difference is that we can’t see into their world (the spiritual realm).
But they can see and understand everything about ours.
Are you with me here?
The bottom line is spirits don’t communicate with each other like we do using spoken language.
Even if they did, they inhabit a realm we know nothing about and have never experienced first-hand.
So whenever we attempt to explain the spirit world and the things of God to each other using human vocabulary, we’re severely handicapped by the fact that we can’t see into the spiritual world, at least not in the way spiritual beings can.
So we have no choice but to use earthly language to express things of a spiritual nature.
This results in our words not being the perfect fit.
It also results in a lot of subconscious projection going on.
We project our feelings and thoughts onto God, including our weaknesses and limits.
We assume He feels the way we feel and thinks the way we think…
When the truth is He’s far beyond our human thoughts and limitations.
And that’s your takeaway for today.
There’s a HUGE gap between God and man that can’t be bridged by human language alone.
At the end of the day, the words we use to describe God will to a degree always be figurative.
They will always be anthropomorphic meaning we will always fall into the trap of assigning human qualities to a being who is NOT human.
We have no choice because we’re human.
Ya feel me?
CONNECTING THIS TEACHING TO THE NEW TESTAMENT
“For anyone who speaks in a tongue
does not speak to people but to God.
Indeed, no one understands them;
they utter mysteries by the Spirit.”
-1 Corinthians 13:12
“The circumcised believers who
had come with Peter were astonished
that the gift of the Holy Spirit
had been poured out even on Gentiles.
For they heard them speaking
in tongues and praising God.”
-Acts 10:45-46
“All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit
and began to speak in other tongues
as the Spirit enabled them.”
-Acts 2:4
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