The Bible tells us that mankind was created in the image and likeness of God. That means that God has shared some of His characteristics with us who bear His “image”.

God has designed the nature of all people to have qualities, that while limited, point to things that are true about him.

We love because God is loving. We feel because God feels. We desire justice because he is just.These qualities are known as “communicable attributes,” attributes that He shares with us–the fingerprints of God all over the nature of mankind.

But, the Bible also teaches us that God has qualities he does NOT share with us: “incommunicable attributes,” aspects of His nature that belong to Him and no one else.

When a person neglects to acknowledge the qualities that belong to God alone, he may wrongly think of God as merely a superhuman, who is basically a better version of a man. Whatever a man can do, He can do better as though He was just a man without natural human limitations.

The LDS church teaches that God is not only like a man but that he was a man, as we are now, and that man doesn’t only progress in godliness, but that we may become gods, as He is God. According to this view, God and Mankind are essentially the same species, but in a different stage of development.

But the Bible gives a us a view of God that is FAR bigger than that!

The Bible teaches us that:

God is SELF-EXISTENT: He was not created, or formed. Nothing existed before Him.

God is INDEPENDENT: There is nothing He needs that He does not already have.

God is UNCHANGEABLE: Because He is perfect, He does not need to change or progress.

God is ALL-PRESENT: No space or time can contain Him.

These things help us to understand how much different, how much greater God is than us! He is the only one who ever has and ever will create a universe. He is the only one who can save us from our sin. He is the only one who will ever be worthy of worship.

God even says of Himself,

“Before me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after me…I am the LORD, and besides me there is no savior…To whom will you liken me and make me equal, and compare me, that we may be alike…For I am God, and there is no other, I am God, and there is none like me” (Isaiah 43:10, 46:5, 9).

The Creator is of an entirely different nature than His creation, and altogether superior!

God is not a Man, and never has been.

And only when we acknowledge the enormous gap between us and God can we truly begin to appreciate the greatness of the love He has for us.

Verse References
  • Isaiah 43:10
  • Isaiah 46:5
  • Isaiah 46:9

When a person neglects to acknowledge the qualities that belong to God alone, he may wrongly think of God as merely a superhuman, who is basically a better version of a man.