Who is God?
Briefly stated, God is the eternal, supreme, living, intentional creator of the universe and the giver and sustainer of all life. Because He’s living, He’s not a mere impersonal “force”. Because He’s the “intentional creator”, He’s not a mere neutral observer in a chance formation of the universe. Because He’s the “giver and sustainer” of all life, He’s not a disinterested onlooker of human life.
Most of Christianity typically refers to Him simply as God and identifies some of His innumerable characteristics or attributes unique to Him. Of course, no one can define or even know all the attributes of God. His infinity defies our ability to fully conceptualize and vocabularize Him. But several attributes are commonly ascribed to Him and at least two – His eternity and His supremacy – seem quite evident.
First, God is eternal. This means that God has no beginning and no end. There never was a time that God came into being. There will never be a time at which God ceases to be. God is. God always was. God always will be.
Second, God is supreme. The supremacy of God means that He surpasses every other thing, being and force. He is not restricted or limited by any of the forces of the universe. Nor is there any being to which he is accountable. All things are beneath him and restricted, limited and accountable to Him.
Perhaps, it is fair to say that God’s supremacy and His eternity are the two attributes most unassailably ascribed to Him. But, they certainly are not all of the attributes commonly ascribed to God. Among His so many other attributes, God is also commonly said to be omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent.
By omnipotence, it is commonly understood that God is almighty. In other words, God can do anything which is not contradictory to His nature (like become a weakling or create a being stronger than He is) or is definitionally incoherent (like create a square circle), or intrinsically impossible (like stop being God).
By omniscience, it is commonly understood that God is all-knowing. In other words, God knows everything about everything. Therefore, there is nothing knowable that is unknown to God.
By omnipresence, it is commonly understood that God is everywhere in the universe at the same time. Therefore, He never really has to “go” anywhere spatially. He never has to arrive anywhere. He is already here… and there…. and there, all at the same time.
Judaism, Christianity and Islam – often called the Abrahamic religions because they trace their faith origins to the patriarch Abraham who is written of in each of their sacred books (the Jewish Tanakh, the Christian Holy Bible and the Muslim Qu’ran) – all refer to him simply as God. Orthodox Judaism, however, avoids direct reference to Him by name and will commonly spell “G_D”. Islam more frequently uses the name Allah.
Christians, Muslims and Jews all believe that there is one and only one eternal, supreme, living, intentional creator of the universe and sustainer of all life. To all three He is known as God. According to The Pew Research Center, 32% of the world’s population identify as Christian, 23% as Muslim and .2% as Jewish. Thus, 55.2% of the world’s population would identify God as the eternal, supreme, living, intentional creator of the universe and sustainer of all life.
The extent of agreement among world religions on their most basic descriptions and identifications of God become even more impressive when it is observed that of the world’s eight major religions, many of them have similar recognitions of God.
Surely, God has, through the ages revealed Himself to all humanity and He continues to do so today.