What Is God Like?

If God exists, what is He actually like? Human beings have imagined God in many different ways: distant ruler, cosmic force, severe judge or comforting presence. Christianity does not leave the answer entirely to imagination. Scripture presents a God who is eternal, personal, holy, just, merciful and loving, and claims that His character is revealed most clearly through Jesus Christ. Understanding what God is like changes how we understand ourselves, suffering, morality, forgiveness and faith.

There is a difference between asking whether God exists and asking what God is like. The first question concerns existence. The second concerns character, and in many ways it is the more personal question.

A person may believe that some intelligence or power lies behind the universe without knowing whether that power is interested in humanity. God might be imagined as a distant Creator who brought everything into existence and then withdrew, an impersonal force running through nature, a strict judge watching human behaviour, or simply a name we give to whatever lies beyond our understanding.

Christianity makes a much more specific claim. It says that God can be known, not completely, because a finite human mind could never contain the fullness of God, but genuinely. Scripture presents God as One who has deliberately made something of Himself known.

The question therefore becomes more precise. If we want to know what God is like, where should we look?

Can We Work Out What God Is Like for Ourselves?

Human reason can take us some distance. If the universe depends upon a Creator, we might reasonably conclude that its source must possess power far beyond our own. The existence of order and intelligibility may suggest intelligence. Our experience of moral obligation may raise questions about whether goodness has a foundation beyond human preference.

But these observations have limits. A sunset may cause us to wonder about a Creator, but it cannot tell us whether that Creator forgives. The structure of the universe may suggest intelligence, but it cannot tell us whether God hears prayer. Conscience may point towards moral accountability, but conscience alone cannot tell us what God intends for humanity. This is where Christianity moves from reason to revelation.

The biblical claim is not simply that human beings have thought deeply about God and gradually formed increasingly sophisticated ideas about Him. It is that God has acted to make Himself known. Scripture records that revelation through creation, through God’s dealings with people and, most clearly, through Jesus Christ.

If that claim is true, we should be careful about constructing God according to our own preferences. The important question is no longer what we think God ought to be like, but what He has revealed Himself to be.

God Is Greater Than Creation

One of the first things Scripture establishes is the distinction between God and everything He has made.The Inspired Version begins with God declaring to Moses:

“I am the Beginning and the End; the Almighty God. By mine Only Begotten I created these things. Yea, in the beginning I created the heaven, and the earth upon which thou standest” (Genesis 1:2–3, Inspired Version).

God is not presented here as part of the universe. He is its source. Matter, life and the physical order do not produce God; God gives existence to them.

This is difficult for us to imagine because everything in ordinary human experience comes from something else. We have parents. Buildings have builders. Books have authors. Trees grow from seeds. Nations arise from earlier societies. We naturally think in terms of causes stretching backwards.

Christianity does not place God somewhere near the beginning of that chain as though He were simply the oldest thing in existence. It describes Him as fundamentally different from created things. God does not receive existence from something before Him. The psalmist expresses this distinction:

“Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God” (Psalm 90:2, Inspired Version).

This means God cannot be understood simply as a larger version of ourselves. Human beings are limited by time, physical existence, knowledge and circumstance. The biblical God is not.

Yet Scripture immediately adds something surprising to this greatness. The God who stands beyond creation is nevertheless interested in the people within it.

God Is Personal

Some conceptions of God are essentially impersonal. God becomes another word for nature, universal consciousness, energy or the underlying order of existence. Such ideas may contain a sense of transcendence, but an impersonal force cannot know someone.

The God described in Scripture does.

The Bible repeatedly presents God as knowing, choosing, speaking, loving, judging, forgiving and entering into relationship. These are personal descriptions. They do not portray God as an unconscious energy operating behind the universe.

When Moses encountered God, the Lord did not merely demonstrate power. He spoke about people who were suffering:

“And the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows” (Exodus 3:7, Inspired Version).

The language is significant. God sees, hears and knows.This does not mean that God is simply a human personality magnified to an enormous scale. Scripture maintains the difference between Creator and creation. Yet it does mean that Christianity understands our relationship with God in personal terms.

If God were merely an impersonal force, prayer would ultimately be directed towards something incapable of listening. Forgiveness would have little meaning because a force cannot forgive. Love would become metaphorical because love requires relationship.The biblical God is different. He knows His creation and acts within its history.

God Is Holy

The word holy is often used in Christianity, but its meaning can become blurred through familiarity. At its heart, holiness speaks of God’s absolute moral purity and His distinction from everything corrupted by evil.

Isaiah’s vision of God contains the repeated declaration:

“Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory” (Isaiah 6:3, Inspired Version).

Isaiah’s reaction is revealing. Encountering holiness does not make him feel morally superior to everyone else. It makes him more aware of himself.

This matters because human beings normally judge goodness comparatively. We compare ourselves with neighbours, colleagues, public figures or people whose behaviour appears worse than our own. By choosing the right comparison, almost anyone can appear reasonably good.

The holiness of God removes that comfort.

If God is the foundation of goodness, morality is not ultimately determined by whether we are slightly better or worse than somebody else. It is measured against a character untouched by dishonesty, cruelty, selfishness or corruption.

This also explains why the Bible takes sin seriously. Sin is not merely the violation of arbitrary rules imposed by a powerful ruler. Evil conflicts with the character of God and damages the life He intended His creation to possess.

Holiness, however, can easily be misunderstood if separated from everything else Scripture says about God. A perfectly holy God might sound remote or terrifying if holiness meant only condemnation. The biblical picture is more complete.

God Is Just

Most people possess some desire for justice, particularly when they encounter serious wrongdoing. We may disagree about punishments or legal systems, but few people genuinely believe that cruelty, exploitation and deliberate abuse should be morally meaningless.

The difficulty is that human justice is imperfect. Evidence can be misunderstood. Witnesses can lie. Governments can become corrupt. Wealth and power can influence outcomes. Sometimes the guilty escape responsibility and the innocent suffer.

Scripture claims that these weaknesses do not apply to God:

“He is the Rock, his work is perfect; for all his ways are judgment; a God of truth and without iniquity; just and right is he” (Deuteronomy 32:4, Inspired Version).

Divine justice means that evil is not finally ignored.This can sound uncomfortable because judgement places every person under moral scrutiny, not merely those whose behaviour we particularly dislike. Yet consider the alternative. If there is no final moral accountability, countless acts of cruelty throughout history simply end with the death of those involved. Victims may never receive justice, and perpetrators who successfully escaped human judgement never answer for what they did.

The biblical belief in judgement says that actions matter because people matter. But Christianity does not stop with justice.

God Is Merciful

If God were perfectly holy and perfectly just but without mercy, the biblical picture would offer humanity very little hope. Scripture instead repeatedly presents God as willing to forgive and restore.

Mercy does not mean treating wrongdoing as though it were unimportant. A judge who knowingly ignores injustice is not merciful; he is unjust. Neither does forgiveness mean that actions have no consequences.

Biblical mercy begins by taking wrongdoing seriously.

The surprising part of the Christian message is that the God against whom humanity sins is also the God who seeks reconciliation. Throughout Scripture, He warns, corrects, calls people to repentance and offers restoration.

This combination of justice and mercy can be difficult for us because human beings often lean towards one at the expense of the other. We may excuse behaviour because confrontation is uncomfortable, or become so focused upon wrongdoing that we cease to see the possibility of change.

Scripture refuses both extremes. God does not call evil good, but neither does He insist that a person who has done wrong must forever remain what they have been.

That possibility of restoration leads directly to one of Christianity’s strongest claims about God’s character.

God Is Love

The statement is remarkably simple:

“He that loveth not, knoweth not God; for God is love” (1 John 4:8, Inspired Version).

Because these words are so familiar, it is easy to make them mean whatever we want. Modern culture often treats love as approval, so saying that God is love can become a way of saying that God should never challenge our choices.

The New Testament describes something more demanding.

John continues:

“In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him” (1 John 4:9, Inspired Version).

God’s love is active. It moves towards humanity and seeks its good.A parent who loves a child does not prove that love by approving everything the child does. A doctor does not show compassion by hiding a dangerous diagnosis. Genuine love may comfort, but it may also warn, correct and protect.

The biblical idea of divine love therefore cannot be separated from God’s holiness and truth. God does not love humanity by pretending that nothing is wrong. Christianity claims that He acts to restore what has gone wrong. This reaches its clearest expression in Jesus Christ.

What Does Jesus Tell Us About God?

Reason may suggest that a Creator exists. Creation may reveal power and order. Scripture reveals much more about God’s character. Yet Christianity ultimately directs our attention towards a person.

Philip once said to Jesus, “Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us” (John 14:8, Inspired Version).

Jesus answered:

“Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father?” (John 14:9, Inspired Version).

This is central to the Christian understanding of God.

If we want to understand what divine authority looks like when expressed within human life, Christianity tells us to look at Christ. If we want to understand God’s attitude towards suffering, sin, hypocrisy, forgiveness and human worth, we look at Christ.

Jesus possessed authority without needing to humiliate people. He showed compassion without pretending sin was harmless. He confronted hypocrisy while welcoming those whom respectable society often pushed aside. He touched the unclean, spoke with the rejected, forgave sinners and challenged people to change.

Most importantly, Christianity does not portray God as observing human suffering from an untouchable distance. In Christ, God enters the human condition. The Christian story moves towards rejection, suffering and the cross before it reaches resurrection.

Whatever else Christians mean when they say that God is love, the cross prevents that love from becoming a sentimental idea.

Does God Ever Seem Different From This?

An obvious difficulty remains. If God is loving, just and merciful, why does the world sometimes appear to suggest otherwise?

People suffer terribly. Children die. Prayers appear unanswered. Natural disasters destroy lives without distinguishing between the compassionate and the cruel. Some people seek God sincerely and still experience long periods in which He seems absent.

These questions cannot simply be brushed aside by listing God’s attributes.

Scripture itself contains people asking why God seems distant, why the wicked prosper and why suffering continues. Biblical faith is not built upon pretending that life always looks as though a loving God is governing it.

The question of suffering deserves treatment in its own right later in this series. For now, an important distinction can be made. There is a difference between saying that we do not understand what God is doing and saying that God has given us no basis for trusting His character. Christian faith rests heavily upon that distinction.

If God’s character were inferred only from our immediate circumstances, our understanding of Him would change constantly. A good week might suggest that God loves us; tragedy might suggest that He does not.

Scripture asks us instead to understand circumstances in the light of what God has revealed, particularly through Christ. That does not remove grief or answer every question, but it prevents temporary experience from becoming our only definition of God.

Can We Fully Understand God?

If Christianity is correct about God, there is an unavoidable limit to human understanding.

A Creator capable of bringing the universe into existence would necessarily exceed the intellectual capacity of creatures within that universe. We should therefore expect both genuine knowledge and continuing mystery.

This does not mean that statements about God are meaningless. We can know something truly without knowing it completely. A child can know and trust a parent without understanding everything about that parent’s life, mind or responsibilities.

The same distinction applies more profoundly to God.

Christianity does not claim that the human mind can contain God. It claims that God has revealed enough of Himself for us genuinely to know His character and respond to Him.

Humility is therefore appropriate on both sides of the question. Believers should be cautious about claiming certainty where Scripture has not spoken clearly. Doubters should also consider whether difficulty in comprehending God is necessarily evidence against His existence. If God really is God, complete comprehension would be a strange standard to demand.

Why Does What God Is Like Matter?

It would be possible to treat God’s character as an interesting theological subject, but eventually the question reaches ordinary life.

If God is personal, prayer may be more than words spoken into silence. If God is holy, our moral choices possess significance beyond social approval. If God is just, evil will not ultimately have the final word. If God is merciful, our failures need not permanently define us. If God is love, then human worth rests upon something deeper than achievement, appearance, wealth or the approval of other people.

And if Jesus truly reveals the character of God, Christianity asks us to reconsider some of our most common assumptions about power and greatness. The God revealed through Christ does not merely demand service; He serves. He does not remain distant from suffering; He enters it. He does not excuse sin; He seeks to redeem the sinner.

This means the question What is God like? cannot finally remain theoretical.

Our picture of God influences whether we hide from Him, resent Him, ignore Him, fear Him or trust Him. A distorted understanding of God can produce a distorted faith.

Where Does This Leave Us?

Scripture presents a picture of God that is both greater and more personal than many of our natural assumptions. He is the eternal Creator who does not depend upon the universe He made, yet He knows the sorrows of people within it. He is holy and just, yet also merciful. He is powerful, yet Christianity points to Christ to show us power expressed through service and sacrifice. Above all, Scripture tells us that God is love, while refusing to separate that love from truth, holiness or justice.

There will still be questions. A short article cannot explain every biblical passage or reconcile every experience of suffering with the goodness of God. Nor should Christians pretend that understanding God’s character removes every difficulty of faith.

But Christianity does make a clear claim. God has not left humanity to construct Him entirely from imagination. He has revealed Himself through creation, through His dealings in history, through Scripture and most clearly through Jesus Christ.

Perhaps the question What is God like? therefore leads naturally to another. If the God revealed in Scripture really is holy without cruelty, just without corruption, powerful without selfishness and loving without indifference, are we willing to know Him as He has revealed Himself rather than simply as we would prefer Him to be?

Would you like to discuss this privately

If this article has raised a question, concern, or something you would rather not discuss publicly you are welcome to send me a message