Early Christianity on: Understanding God the Father (Full Script)

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Early Christianity on Understanding God the Father

Post-Apostolic Church

INTRO

This is the fourth video in a series on what the Pre-Nicene Christians believed about the Divinity.  And this is the first video about God the Father.

First of all, understanding God the Father is not simple.  Is fully comprehending Him even possible?  Let’s look at what the early Christians wrote.

GOD IS INCOMPREHENSIBLE

Aristides wrote,

The self-same being, then, who first established and now controls the universe—him do I affirm to be God who is without beginning and without end, immortal and self-sufficing, above all passions and infirmities, above anger and forgetfulness and ignorance and the rest….  He is neither male nor female.  The heavens do not limit him, but the heavens and all things, visible and invisible, receive their bounds from him.  (Aristides.  AD 125.  ANF, vol 9, page 263-264.)

(http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf09.xiii.iii.html, I)

(http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf09.xiii.iv.html, I)

Clement of Alexandria wrote,

The apostle will testify: “I know a man in Christ, caught up into the third heaven, and from there into Paradise, who heard unutterable words which it is not lawful for a man to speak,* ”—implying thus the impossibility of expressing God, and indicating that what is divine is unutterable by human power.  (Clement of Alexandria.  AD 195.  ANF, vol 2, page 463.)

* 2Cor 12:2-4

(http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf02.vi.iv.v.xii.html)

Origen wrote similarly and gave an analogy showing that understanding God is like understanding the Sun when all a person has seen is a small lamp.

According to strict truth, God is incomprehensible, and incapable of being measured.  For whatever be the knowledge which we are able to obtain of God, either by perception or reflection, we must of necessity believe that He is by many degrees far better than what we perceive Him to be.  For, as if we were to see anyone unable to bear a spark of light, or the flame of a very small lamp, and were desirous to acquaint such a one, whose vision could not admit a greater degree of light than what we have stated, with the brightness and splendor of the sun, would it not be necessary to tell him that the splendor of the sun was unspeakably and incalculably better and more glorious than all this light which he saw?  (Origen.  AD 225.  ANF, vol 4, page 243.)

(http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf04.vi.v.ii.i.html, 5)

Cyprian points out the irony in that we can truly comprehend God when we say He is not comprehensible.

He cannot be seen—He is too bright for vision; nor comprehended—He is too pure for our discernment; nor estimated—He is too great for our perception.  Therefore, we are only worthy in estimating Him when we say that He is inconceivable.  (Cyprian.  AD 250.  ANF, vol 5, page 467.)

(http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf05.iv.v.vi.html, 9)

Arnobius wrote to God,

O You who are Yourself unseen, and who art incomprehensible!  …You are limitless, unbegotten, immortal, enduring forever, God Yourself alone, whom no bodily shape may represent, no outline delineate; of virtues inexpressible, of greatness indefinable; unrestricted as to locality, movement, and condition, concerning whom nothing can be clearly expressed by the significance of man’s words.  (Arnobius.  AD 303.  ANF, vol 6, page 421.)

(http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf06.xii.iii.i.xxxi.html)

Lactantius wrote,

The secret of the Most High God, who created all things, cannot be attained by our own ability and perceptions.  Otherwise there would be no difference between God and man.  (Lactantius.  AD 310.  ANF, vol 7, page 9.)

(https://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf07.iii.ii.i.i.html)

SCRIPTURES: MANKIND CANNOT COMPREHEND GOD

In all those quotations, the early Christians emphasized what has already been said in the Scriptures about the Father.  His mind and thoughts are, indeed, far beyond anything mankind can understand.

Isaiah wrote,

The everlasting God, Jehovah, the Creator of the ends of the earth, faints not, neither is [He] weary; there is no searching of His understanding.  (Is 40:28, Brenton)

God Himself said through Isaiah,

“For My counsels are not as your counsels, nor are My ways as your ways,” says the Lord.  “But as the heaven is distant from the earth, so is My way distant from your ways, and your thoughts from My mind.”  (Is 55:8-9, Brenton)

Paul wrote,

For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man that is in him?  In the same way, no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.  (1Cor 2:11)

If we cannot fully comprehend the thoughts of our fellow man, then how could we possibly comprehend the thoughts of God?

EXCEPT THROUGH JESUS CHRIST

At this point, you may be asking: then how can we know anything about the Father?  What we can know about Him comes from His revelations about Himself in Scripture and in His Son, Jesus Christ.  The true understanding of the Father comes best through His Son, who said,

All things have been entrusted to Me by My Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son desires to reveal Him.  (Matt 11:27)

CONCLUSION

It is appropriate for a study on God the Father to begin like this.  As we continue looking at what the early Christians believed about God, it is important to realize how difficult these concepts about the Father will be to completely understand.  No person other than God’s Son, Jesus Christ, can fully comprehend the Father.  So if a person thinks he can comprehend God, His nature, His will, His power, His love, His holiness, His providence, His sovereignty, etc., then he is thinking himself to be the same as God.

But this doesn’t mean that Jesus and the Scriptures have left us completely in the dark.  The early Christians have given us a wealth of knowledge about the Father, but it is important to know that no one can fully understand everything.

Blessings and so forth.