“God’s purpose in revelation is to make friends with us” by Scott Swain
“Speech is not merely adventitious to God. In contrast to mute idols, the true and living God is a speaking, commanding, promising, and pledging God (cf. Ps. 115:5, 7; 135:16).
Indeed, before all ages God is a communicating God: “In the beginning was the Word” (Jn 1:1). Before God created the world, the Word was “with God,” reposing at his side in active fellowship (cf. 1:18), and this Word “was God,” the radiant self-communication of the Father’s being, his “only-begotten Son” (Jn 1:1, 14; Heb. 1:3).
According to Holy Scripture, the eternal fellowship of the Father and the Son is shared by the Holy Spirit, who searches the “depths” of God’s intelligent and adorable life (1 Cor. 2:10). The one true God thus ever lives a life of communication and communion as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (cf. Jn 17:5, 24).
In his unfathomable kindness, the blessed Trinity has determined to share his life of communication and communion with us. To be sure, “we cannot fully comprehend his incomprehensible being.”
The being and ways of the triune God are “past finding out” (Rom. 11:33, KJV). Nevertheless, because it is the triune God himself who personally undertakes to reveal himself to us, “we can truly taste and see his goodness.”
The unfathomable God can reveal himself to finite humanity in a manner that is sufficient for creating, sustaining, and perfecting an intelligent, saving fellowship with humanity.
To this end, the Son was sent to reveal his own unique knowledge of the Father: “No one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him” (Mt. 11:27; cf. Jn 1:18).
Moreover, the Spirit was sent “that we might understand the things freely given us by God” (1 Cor. 2:12; cf. 2:7; Jn 16:13–15).
In all of God’s words to us, and supremely in Holy Scripture, God wills to include us in the blessed life of communication and communion that he is.
1 Jn 1:3 is thus a kind of mission statement for God’s word: “that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ” (cf. 1 Jn 4:13).
Communication from the triune God is a means to communion with the triune God. ‘God’s purpose in revelation is to make friends with us.'”
–Scott R. Swain, Trinity, Revelation, and Reading: A Theological Introduction to the Bible and Its Interpretation (London; New York: T&T Clark, 2011), 15-16.
