““And the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm…””
““And the LORD regretted that he made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart””
“The eyes of the LORD are toward the righteous
and his ears toward their cry. ”
Have you ever read a Scripture verse and immediately furrowed your eyebrows in confusion? Did the Bible just say that God has hands and arms? The LORD regretted that he made man? I thought God was Spirit and that he doesn’t have body parts like eyes or ears. Why does Scripture speak about God having human-like emotions or body parts? Maybe you’ve had those questions at some point or another. Maybe it has even caused you to doubt your faith. Maybe it has caused you to seek out the real answer. Or maybe you have simply tried to ignore these tough questions altogether.
When tackling such things, we must keep in mind the author and the reader. The Author of Scripture is God. The readers of Scripture are humans. God is infinite in his knowledge, meaning that there are no limitations to His knowledge. On the other hand, humans are finite creatures with limitations to our knowledge. God knows all things perfectly. We do not. We are limited in our understanding and in our comprehension. So what is Scripture? Scripture is the infinite God’s revelation of Himself and of salvation to us, finite humans.
With that, we come back to those questions. Does God have human-like emotions or body parts? No. God is speaking to us incarnationally. In other words, God comes down to our level when He speaks to us. These verses that speak about God having eyes or ears are ways that He is speaking to us using anthropomorphic language. Anthropomorphic simply means the attribution of human characteristics or behavior to a god, animal, or object. In our case, describing God as having hands, arms, eyes, ears, and emotions is a use of anthropomorphic language so that we can comprehend and understand who God is.
Let’s dig in a little more. In Deuteronomy 26:8 the description of the LORD having hands and arms are ways which reveal to us that God is mighty, strong, and powerful. Nothing is outside of his grasp. He is omnipotent (all powerful). God’s “eyes” and “ears” in Psalm 34:15 reveal to us that he sees and knows all things. He is omniscient (all knowing). But what about the LORD regretting? Don’t we believe that God is immutable, that he is unchanging (Mal. 3:6)? Did the Lord change his mind? Simply put, no. Again, using the anthropomorphic figure of speech, the infinite God is speaking to finite humans in language that we will understand. God is revealing what he had already eternally determined to do in human language and understanding. In other words, God is not reacting to what he doesn’t already know. Rather, God is revealing to us His eternal plan in language that we can comprehend.
Why bring this up? Why should you care about the use of anthropomorphic language of Scripture? We should care because it reveals to us even more about our loving God. Our infinite, immutable, omnipotent, omniscient God comes down to us and speaks to us in our language, using words that we can understand and comprehend. He doesn’t do so mockingly like he’s talking down to us. He doesn’t look down his nose at us. Rather, he speaks as a loving father speaking to his young child.
But he not only speaks to us using anthropomorphic language in Scripture, he also speaks to us through his Son (Heb. 1:1-2). Our infinite God not only incarnationally speaks to us in Scripture, but He incarnationally came down to us in Jesus. He not only reveals Himself (John 14:9) but reveals and secures salvation for us (Col. 1:22).
What should be our response to God’s incarnational speaking? Our only response to this should be worship. We should worship God for who He has revealed himself to be. We should worship God for who we are in relation to God. We should worship God for the amazing grace we see when he stoops down to our level both in Word and in Jesus, the Word made flesh!
Praise God with me today!
Ryan