Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
New Visions
What is God Really Like?

What is God Really Like?

Last updated on: July 23, 2020 at 3:10 pm by Karl J. Forehand

What is God Really Like? 2020-07-23T15:10:42-06:00 Karl J. Forehand

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

While I was raising children, I always felt good for just a second when I was retributive. When they would disobey my commands or lie to me or sneak around behind my back, it felt particularly good, for just a second, to lose it and shame them or embarrass them into submission. However, almost immediately, I felt remorse for it. Although it got immediate results, it sometimes caused more damage than it did good. It was not me at my best.

I was raised in a tradition that taught that God was that way. He created a system of perfection that we could NEVER attain to and it absolutely made Him out-of-his mind crazy when we could not keep this law or if we ignored or rejected Him. This transgression angered him so badly, that if we didn’t do something rather simple, He would burn us forever in eternal conscious torment. Even though He was immensely retributive, He discovered a way to forgive us and not punish us forever, but this New Covenant would require a sacrifice!

So many things about this seem wrong to me now. For example, I told my children that no matter what they do, I would never abandon them. I can’t be a better father than God and I talked about this in my book, Apparent Faith. Even the Bible seems to negate that sacrificial system and of course, we can always pose the question, Why didn’t God just forgive us like the example we saw in Jesus if He is truly restorative. I don’t believe anymore that God can be retributive and restorative at the same time. It must be one or the other.

But this thought came to me several months ago. I hardly ever quote Scripture anymore because it seems we argue about Scripture so much that I would rather just state my opinion and let people decide for themselves. I’m not on a quest to prove or disprove the Bible. I just want to know the Divine and that is what I am seeking within. While searching, I first thought of this general theme in Christianity, it goes something like this:

God is Love

Even in the Old Testament the prophets and writers of that time, were beginning to understand God’s love when they used words like Hesed which means loving kindness. But they still associated God too much with their gods and so I believe they made some mistakes. Thankfully, Jesus cleared up some of these misconceptions when he boiled down God’s intentions to “Love God and Love your Neighbor.” He corrected His disciples that wanted to rain fire from heaven and He stopped Peter from using the sword.

Other writers of the New Testament, drawing on Jesus picture of what God is like, determined that God is very simply Love. The basic understanding of the New Covenant is not just that God sometimes does loving things. The noticeably clear understanding of the writers was that God IS love.

Love keeps no record of wrong.

Early understandings of God like to think of him like Santa Claus who kept a record of naughty and nice. But the apostle Paul said something different. He said, love keeps no record of wrong. He agreed with Jesus that love was the most important thing. So, If God is Love (and I believe the very essence of the Divine is love), then He cannot be retributive. If God were retributive, then would not Jesus have been like that? Jesus said He never strayed from what the Father wanted Him to do. And I cannot remember Jesus ever being retributive.

The only way to reconcile the Father and the Son to some type of penal substitutionary atonement is to separate God into more than one Essence. Even Biblical literalists say that God only has one essence. That essence my friends is love, real love is always restorative.

Immediately after blowing up at my children, I began to try to restore the relationship. Even in all my shortcomings, I was still restorative. The best parents are like this and they long to restore the relationship. We don’t need a sacrifice to be made, no one has to die. We don’t need our children to worship us or give up anything to restore the relationship and we certainly don’t dream of torturing them forever.

Jesus looked out over the crowd that crucified Him and said what is natural for a restorative God to say. He said, “Father forgive them.” And guess what? That is what a restorative Father does, “He loves, He forgives, He restores!”

Karl Forehand is a former pastor, podcaster, and award-winning author. His books include Apparent Faith: What Fatherhood Taught Me About the Father’s Heart and the soon-to-be released Tea Shop. He is the creator of The Desert Sanctuary and Too Many Podcasters podcasts. He is married to his wife Laura of 32 years and has one dog named Winston. His three children are grown and are beginning to multiply!

Support us on Patreon * The Desert Sanctuary Website

Photo by revac film’s&photography from Pexels

Previous Post

July 21, 2020

Our Evolving Faith

Next Post

July 25, 2020 BEING with Solitude

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Abuse Addiction Advent adventure Alpha Male Animals Answers Attachment Attitude authenticity Authenticty Authentiicity Awareness being Bible Black Community BLM body awarenss book Books Bravery Bullying Bypassing Certainty Certianty Chamge change children Christianity Christmas Church Comfort community Compaasion Compassion Complementarian Complementarianism Conditioning Consciousness Contemplation Control Conversation Converstations Covid-19 Creation Darkness Death Debate deconstruction demons depression desert Devil Disciples discussion Divine dreams Easter Eclipse Empathy Essence evolution evolve faith fatherhood Fear fiction Flood Focus Focusing Focussing Future Genesis Goals God Gratitude grief growth Guns Hate healing Health Heart Hell Holiday Hypnosis ignorance Improvement infallible Inner Child Integrity Intuition Jesus Jezebel Journey King LGBTQ+ Love MAGA Marriage meditation Men Mercy Message metaphysical Mindfulness Misogyny Mourning Music Mystic mystical Narcissism Nationalism Nature New Year Novel Nutrition Organization other Pain Pandemic parenting Pastors Patriarchy Patriotism Personal Growth Plan Poet poets Police politics Power practice praise Prayer presence pro-life Problem Solving Progress prolife Prophet prophets Purity Culture Purpose Queer Questions Racism Rape Rapture reconstruction Recovery Religion Resolutions Restoration Resurrection Retribution Reviews Root Cause Sanctuary Satan SBC Scripture Seeking Self-Care Self-esteem Seminary Sex Shadow shame social justice social media solitude Spirits Spirituality stillness Story Survivor Thanksgiving Theologians Theology Tradition Trauma travel Trump Uncategorized Unchurching Universe Violence Vision Voice Volunteer Vulnerability War Women Word worship Writing

Select a Month September 2026 August 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What is the Bible's view of laziness?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Rest is forbidden A little sleep leads to poverty Laziness is good Only farmers can rest

Books by This Author Books by The Desert Sanctuary

See All Titles »