What Is God Like?

Jennifer Benson Schuldt

The Son is . . . the exact representation of [God’s] being. Hebrews 1:3

Hebrews 1:1–10

Job 20–21; Acts 10:24–48

To celebrate a special occasion, my husband took me to a local art gallery and said I could choose a painting as a gift. I picked out a small picture of a brook flowing through a forest. The streambed took up most of the canvas, and because of this much of the sky was excluded from the picture. However, the stream’s reflection revealed the location of the sun, the treetops, and the hazy atmosphere. The only way to “see” the sky was to look at the surface of the water.

Jesus is like the stream, in a spiritual sense. When we want to see what God is like, we look at Jesus. The writer of Hebrews said He is “the exact representation of [God’s] being” (1:3). Although we can learn facts about God through direct statements in the Bible such as “God is love,” we can deepen our understanding by seeing the way God would act if He faced the same problems we have on Earth. Being God in human flesh, this is what Jesus has shown us.

In temptation, Jesus revealed God’s holiness. Confronting spiritual darkness, He demonstrated God’s authority. Wrestling with people problems, He showed us God’s wisdom. In His death, He illustrated God’s love.

Although we cannot grasp everything about God—He is limitless and we are limited in our thinking—we can be certain of His character when we look at Christ.

Dear God, thank You for making a way for us to know You. Help us to grow closer to You by looking at Jesus.

The ancestry of Christ

1This is a record of the ancestry of Jesus Christ, the descendant of David and Abraham.2-6In total, there were fourteen generations from Abraham until the time of David: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah and his brothers Perez and Zerah whose mother was Tamar, Hezron, Ram, Amminadab, Nahshon, Salmon, Boaz whose mother was Rahab, Obed - Ruth's son, and Jesse the father of king David.

7-11There were a further fourteen generations between the time of David until the exile in Babylon: David, Solomon whose mother was Bathsheba, Rehoboam, Abijah, Asa, Jehoshaphat, Jehoram, Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, Manasseh, Amon the father of Jeconiah and his brothers during the Babylonian exile.

12-17And there were a further fourteen generations from the exile to the coming of the Christ, the Messiah, God's Son: Jeconiah, Shealtiel, Zerubbabel, Abiud, Eliakim, Azor, Zadok, Akim, Eliud, Eleazar, Matthan, Jacob the father of Joseph who was the husband of Mary, to whom Jesus the Christ was born.

Joseph's dream

18Now this is how the birth of Jesus took place: His mother Mary was engaged to Joseph, but before they married they had no sexual union; Mary became pregnant through the activity of the Holy Spirit.19Being a righteous man, Joseph did not want Mary to be disgraced publicly, so he thought about releasing her quietly from her commitment to him.

20After thinking about this Joseph had a dream in which an angel from the Lord appeared to him and said: "Joseph, son of David, there is nothing for you to fear. Take Mary home as your wife because she has conceived through the power of the Holy Spirit.21She will have a Son, whom you are to call Jesus, because He will save the people from their sins."

22-23All this happened to fulfil what the Lord had spoken prophetically: "The virgin will become pregnant and will bear a Son who will be called Immanuel, meaning, 'God is with us.'"

24When Joseph awoke he obeyed what the Lord's angel had told him to do and took Mary home as his wife.25But he had no sexual union with her before she gave birth to her Son. And Joseph named Him Jesus.