Lessons In Truth - Lesson 2 - Annotation 3
Is God a person? Explain.
3. God is not a person. If we attempt to personify God, we set Him apart from us. God is not a person having qualities or attributes; He is All-Good. God is Spirit, Being, the everywhere-present Mind teeming with living ideas, qualities, or attributes, such as life, love, power, wisdom, substance, joy, strength, plenty, and every other good thing.
A person is: A human being of flesh and blood, bound by beliefs in certain limits of time, place, power, and circumstances; subject to temptations; possessed of characteristics; relative, existing only in relation to something else.
God is: Being, Spirit, unlimited, changeless good; omnipresent, omnipotent, omniscient Mind; not confined to any place, form, or time, yet present in every form and place at all times; the source of all qualities of good; the Absolute, free from imperfection.
This view of God does not set Him apart from us, but rather brings Him "closer . . . than breathing, and nearer than hands and feet (The Higher Pantheism, by Tennyson). We come to know Him as the loving presence within. (Lessons In Truth Lesson 1 Annotation 9 will deal with God as our loving Father.)
"Then let us dismiss the thought that God is a man, or even a man exalted far above human characteristics. So long as the concept of a man-God exists in consciousness, there will be lack of room for the true concept, which is that God is First Cause, the Principle from which flow all manifestations" (The Twelve Powers of Man 52).
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Preceding Entry: What is the relation of God to man, and to all His creation?
Following Entry: What is love in Divine Mind? How does it manifest in man, and throughout all creation?
