What Does God Look Like?

As I am sitting in a class on  Isaiah,  the professor mentions the vision Isaiah has in Isaiah 6. He asked the class “How can we describe the indescribable?” My question then became “why do we need to describe the indescribable?”

As I pondered this, many different reasons came to mind, the first being Power. In the old testament knowledge was power, power over the topic or ideal. Knowing the name of God was offering power to his people. If they could name him, then they could speak in his name. It is all about Power. More power comes form more understanding. Names also represented the person. So with god saying his name was I Am, he was describing himself. “I am” means he has no begin and no end.  if he has no begining and no end, then no one can have power over him, and no one can fully know him.

The second reason to be able to describe God might be to answer mystery. Mysteries need to be solved so that we can prove our mastery over the puzzle. Just remember, once we finish a puzzel, we then move on to a more difficult puzzle.  once we figure out a problem, we then have to start looking for a  a new problem to answer.

Describing God will only allow us to better Understand the puzzle, but once we understand this puzzle we call God, will a relationship with him lose its luster? I think it would, and I belive God knows it would for us. that is why he is so complex and so “unknowable” so “indescribable”

Isaiah tried to describe God’s seraphim’s and we came up with this off image of sexless beings with 6 wings, adding more mystery to their image than was before. They fly and cover their face while doing the will of God. It must be added that the images of the beasts in the book of revelation leave no lack of mystery for us either.

In the Old Testament the mystery remained, so much so that no one even said God’s name, Yahweh.  IN the new testament, however, we begin to form concepts of who God is. We can relate often times better with Jesus, because of his human form.  Some times I accept Christ so much and feel that i am able to understand him so well, that he is no longer a mystery and thus the luster of deity is lost. Basically i begin to see Christ as fully human and not God, like Hercules in Greek mythology. He’s just God’s Son, not GOD himself. My understanding leads to misunderstanding.

The New Testament also tells us about the Holy Spirit and for all parts of the Trinity we have names.  These Names act as description of the characteristics of God. God the Father, Councilor, I am, Messiah, Savior, Almighty. These adn many more help us to feel as if we can RELATE with God. If we dont understand him, how can we relate with him.

The question posed then:

Do we have to understand God, know God more to have a relationship with him, or does knowing him, make a relationship more impossible? Do we impose these names Upon God for our own good?