To contemplate God, His power, love, intelligence and glory, etc. is like contemplating our solar system from an ant’s perspective. I remember standing, for the first time, on the South rim of the Grand Canyon and being in awe of its size and its beauty. If I were standing before the throne of God, if He indeed sits upon a throne, I imagine the degree of awe would be indescribable. Awe is defined as the sense of our own littleness in some greater presence or power; it is an emotion of profound reverence. Based on that definition. There is no awe in contemplating the gods of men, manmade gods, or idols. There is no awe in contemplating the gods of most Christian sects, as they are simply described by their doctrine as incomprehensible. Each minister may declare, in all soberness, that their incomprehensible god is greater than all the other incomprehensible gods. There is no awe in any of the incomprehensible gods. Beyond the word incomprehensible, there is no image or substance that the word is able to conjure up that might make one feel ‘in awe’ of an incomprehensible God.
The Lord revealed to Abraham the following: “I am the Lord thy God, I am more intelligent than they all.” (Abraham 3) We were all intelligent beings before we were created as mortals. God, in the above passage, described the level of His intelligence as more intelligent than all of them. Not just more intelligent than the most intelligent among them, but more intelligent than they all. His creations are incomprehensible, but God, our Father, is not. Emmanuel Kant described the incomprehensible nature of His creations this way: “The world around us opens before our view so magnificent a spectacle of order, variety, beauty, and conformity to ends that, whether…we regard the world in its greatest or in its least manifestations, even after we have attained to the highest summit of knowledge which our weak minds can reach, we find that language in the presence of wonders so inconceivable has lost its force…nay, even thought fails to conceive adequately, and our conception of the whole dissolves into an astonishment without the power of expression…”
Years ago there was a television show called ‘What’s My Line.’ The show challenged a panel of four celebrities to correctly identify a described contestant who typically had an unusual occupation or experience. This “central character” was joined by two “imposters” who pretended to be that central character. The celebrity panelists questioned the three possibilities, and while the two impostors were allowed to lie, the central character was sworn to tell the truth. Can one imagine such a line-up of the gods, including: 1) The idols of men (collected from around the world, their clay, wood or metal images), 2) All the incomprehensible (and there are many of them as well), 3) And the real God. Here we have the two impostors plus the central character. The panel was expected to be able to identify the real person in spite of the two impostors who were allowed to lie. For the sake of this discussion, instead of the panel being made up of four celebrities, that panel can be made up of anybody or everybody. From the line-up, described above, is there a soul on earth that would have any difficulty in identifying the real God? Even those, who belong to churches which claim the god they worship is incomprehensible, would have no difficulty in selecting the real God. The real God’s image has been imprinted in every person’s mind from before the world was. The Father of us all will be easily identified, regardless of what has been taught in the world. When I was a young man, and still a member of a protestant church, the image of God that was in my mind was a correct image. Not the image taught by my minister, of a God that was incomprehensible. I was unable to comprehend his God.
Yes, to try to contemplate the creations and the Glory of the God of this universe may conjure up an indescribable awe, but to describe His physical attributes should not be that great of a challenge. Why is it not a challenge? Because we were made in His image. “God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth,” (Genesis 1:27–28) I can stand before a mirror and see my image and describe it for the whole world. I can also describe Heavenly Father in the same way. He has a body of flesh and bones as you and I have. His body has two arms and two legs with hands and feet etc., all of which are similar to mine. As mortals, we can not be more specific than that because we haven’t seen him nor do we have a picture of Him. But Isaiah described the Son before He came to earth, he said, “…he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.” (Isaiah 53:2) Isaiah may have seen the Savior in a vision and he did not describe Him as a particularly handsome man. When the Savior did appear before men on earth, He was asked by one of His disciples, speaking for all, show us the Father. His reply was simply, “Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father?” ( John 14:9) I suppose a person might justly ask what was the Savior referring to. Was He actually describing the Father, and saying He looks just like me? Paul, the Apostle, speaking to the Hebrews, put their resemblance this way: “Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person.” (Hebrews 1:3) I believe He was saying that God the Father looks very much like Him, as a man. Much like Seth, in the Old Testament was described, “And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth.” (Genesis 5:3) Adam first, and then all of God’s children were, and are being created, in mortality, in God’s image. The primary difference is that He is immortal and a glorified being. When Christ said that the Father and I are one.
He was saying we are one in purpose. But He made it clear that His Father was the greatest of all, “For the Father is greater than I.” ( John 14:28)
I believe it is important to know what God, our Father’s, physical appearance is like, so that we can know whom we worship and have a correct image in our mind as we pray and reverence Him. Even more important is to know of His attributes. He is all powerful, because all of the intelligences in the universe love and honor Him, because He represents the very embodiment of truth. He is just and fair to all, and His great love for us is unequal. He is unchangeable, meaning that we can always count on Him to fulfill His promises to us if we are obedient. We recognize Him as the greatest intelligence in the universe. He is a God of glory and light, where light is defined as intelligence. I know that God, the Father, and His Son, Jesus Christ live, and I know that I am His son as well. All of the populations of the earth, from Adam, are and were His sons and daughters, too. We can all select the real God before the host declares, “Will the real God step forward!” From the Christmas Carol, ‘I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day,’ we hear these inspiring words, “Then pealed the bells more loud and deep: “God is not dead, nor doth He sleep.” (Henry W. Wadsworth) For those who still may question whether there be a God or who may believe that He is dead, I would recommend that you follow the advice given in this little phrase, “I would rather live my life as if there is a God, and die to find out there isn’t, than live my life as if there isn’t, and find out there is.” (Albert Camus)
We can all know before that time comes, if we will but believe and live our lives accordingly. As the famous Reverend Billy Graham has said, “Life without God is like an unsharpened pencil—it has no point.” The Holy Ghost will testify to our spirit of the existence and the true nature of God if we will but allow Him to.