From the outset of the Scriptures, God forbids his people to create idols. In the ancient world, idols not only represent gods, but were also the physical manifestation of the gods. The idol was the incarnation of the deity. The ancients believed that being in the presence of the idol was no different than being in the presence of the god that embodied the idol. Furthermore, being in the presence of the god/idol would bring life. They believed that the power of life harnessed by the god would be channeled through the inanimate object to the worshipper when the worshipper performed prescribed rituals.
If this is what everyone believed, why did God forbid Israel from creating idols to represent him as their patron deity? It is because he is so set a part from the created order that there is no created thing that can fully capture the Him. To create an idol in God’s image would be to grossly reduce, and therefore misrepresent who he Is. His greatness is incomprehensible to the created order. He is so set a part and so much bigger than human thinking that any attempt to wrap him up in something created by humanity would fail miserably. To propagate idolatry is to mislead people in their thinking about God.
The incomprehensible attributes of God, then, are invisible. They cannot be seen. This doesn’t mean, however, that God cannot be revealed in the visible. Paul attests to this when he says, “For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in things that have been made” (Rom 1:20, emphasis added).
In other words, the creation is not god, rather, the creation generally points to God (“general revelation”). The creation itself doest not give life, rather, the Creator gives life through the creation. The creation is the means, or instrument to a greater end rather than an ends to itself.
Did you know that you are a means to a greater end, not an end unto yourself?
This is not the only way that God reveals himself.
In the Judeo-Christian tradition, God’s ordained way of revealing himself in a more specific manner is through language. This is what the writer of the letter to the Hebrews talks about when he says, “Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets” (Heb 1:1). This is also what Psalm 119 is centrally about (too long to quote here).
This is one of those things that makes Judeo-Christian monotheism different from all the other religions in the world. All other world religions are the result of deductions made through (fallen) human observation about (fallen) reality. Christianity is different. In Christianity, the Intelligent Creator breaks into the world and reveals himself by speaking. He tells us who he is.
When God tells us who he is, two things happen.
First, the true nature of reality is revealed when God reveals himself. Without God’s Word, we cannot know that humanity is broken. We don’t know who we are without knowing God first. He is the measure of life.
In other words, it is in our brokeness that God reveals himself. Did you know that sometimes the best thing that the church has to offer the world in revealing God is its own brokeness? This also explains why it is through the brokeness of Jesus that God’s healing comes to the world.
Second, when God speaks in our brokeness, a framework for relationship is created.
Together this means that the basis for our relationship with God, the starting point, is recognizing our own brokeness.
This is attested to through the story of John the Baptist. Did you ever notice that the Gospel, the Good News of Healing and Life, starts with John, not Jesus? John had a ministry of repentance. Repentance, awareness of brokeness, is the starting point of the healing power of the Gospel.
