The Nature of God

Genesis 1 says that humans were created in the image and likeness of God. For me it primarily means that everything that we are and that we have is also part of God's nature. It does not necessarily mean that God thinks and acts like us, since the Fall is not in His perfect nature. But, like His human children, God has emotions - anger, joy, grief - a mind, and a free will. If one can realize that, it will become a bit easier to understand who God really is.

Also 1 John says that God is Love. Here I would love to quote a line from an infamous book "The Shack" written by William P. Young:

"... if God did not have a love relationship within Himself, then He would not be capable of love at all. In other words, we would have a God Who, when He chose, could possibly act without love, and that would be a disaster. And that - surely - is not God!"

This quote was one of the few that got stuck in my head when I read the book the first time. And two weeks ago, when we had a discussion about the nature of God, this quote popped up in my head again. What it basically means is that Love has to be part of God's nature, otherwise He would be able to act without it sometimes.And we know that true love of 1 Corinthians 13 can only be between at least two people. So then God has to be a plural, more than one person, so that He can have Love within Himself - not loving Himself, but actually containing a loving and caring relationship within His very own nature of being - the Trinity nature. The perfection of such love is beautifully summarized in Deutoronomy 6, where God is called ONE (in Hebrew the word אחד (echad) is used, which stands for perfect unity). This is confirmed in John 10:30, where Yeshua declares that He and Father "are ONE". I still do not understand how exactly God can be one and same and yet co-exist within Himself as three distinct mutually loving entities, but the fact that love is at the core of this character of God certainly gives me peace of mind, because now I have an assurance that, no matter what God's decision is, it will be out of love for me. :)