The Attributes of God - with study questions

by Arthur W. Pink

But let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth Me, that I am the LORD” (Jer 9:23,24).

“Who is like unto thee, O LORD, among the gods? who is like thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?” (Exo 15:11).

He changes not (Mal 3:6), therefore His essential glory can be neither augmented nor diminished.

He is solitary in His majesty, unique in His excellency, peerless in His perfections. He sustains all, but is Himself independent of all. He gives to all, but is enriched by none.

Such a God cannot be found out by searching. He can be known only as He is revealed to the heart by the Holy Spirit through the Word.

yet, we still have to say with Job, “Lo, these are parts of His ways: but how little a portion is heard of him? but the thunder of His power who can understand?” (26:14).

The God of Scripture can only be known by those to whom He makes Himself known .

increasing in the knowledge of God” (Col 1:10).

The care of Providence reaches to the most insignificant creatures, and the most minute events—the death of a sparrow, and the fall of a hair.

When we reach the bounds of the finite and gaze toward the mysterious realm of the infinite, let us exclaim, “O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!” (Rom 11:33).

In every instance where God has decreed an end, He has also decreed every means to that end.

Nothing escapes His notice, nothing can be hidden from Him, nothing is forgotten by Him.

His knowledge is perfect. He never errs, never changes, never overlooks anything.

“For I know the things that come into your mind, every one of them” (Eze 11:5).

Neither the darkness of night, the closest curtains, nor the deepest dungeon can hide any sinner from the eyes of Omniscience. The trees of the garden were not able to conceal our first parents. No human eye beheld Cain murder his brother, but his Maker witnessed his crime. Sarah might laugh derisively in the seclusion of her tent, yet was it heard by Jehovah. Achan stole a wedge of gold and carefully hid it in the earth, but God brought it to light. David was at much pains to cover up his wickedness, but ere long the all-seeing God sent one of His servants to say to him, “Thou art the man”! And to writer and reader is also said, “Be sure your sin will find you out” (Num 32:23).

The wicked do as naturally hate this divine perfection as much as they are naturally compelled to acknowledge it. They wish there might be no Witness of their sins, no Searcher of their hearts, no Judge of their deeds. They seek to banish such a God from their thoughts: “They consider not in their hearts that I remember all their wickedness” (Hos 7:2). How solemn is Psalm 90:8! Good reason has every Christ-rejecter for trembling before it: “Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, our secret sins in the light of thy countenance.”

Here is encouragement to prayer. There is no cause for fearing that the petitions of the righteous will not be heard, or that their sighs and tears shall escape the notice of God, since He knows the thoughts and intents of the heart. There is no danger of the individual saint being overlooked amidst the multitude of supplicants who daily and hourly present their various petitions, for an infinite Mind is as capable of paying the same attention to millions as if only one individual were seeking its attention.

“Great is our Lord, and of great power: His understanding is infinite” (Psa 147:5).

God’s knowledge of the future is as complete as is His knowledge of the past and the present, and that, because the future depends entirely upon Himself. Were it in anywise possible for something to occur apart from either the direct agency or permission of God, then that something would be independent of Him, and He would at once cease to be Supreme.

God’s knowledge does not arise from things because they are or will be, but because He has ordained them to be.

Nothing we do, say, or even think, escapes the cognizance of Him with whom we have to do: “The eyes of the LORD are in every place, beholding the evil and the good” (Pro 15:3).

The whole of my life stood open to His view from the beginning. He foresaw my every fall, my every sin, my every backsliding; yet, nevertheless, fixed His heart upon me. Oh, how the realization of this should bow me in wonder and worship before Him!

What is needed is to find out how the word is used in Scripture. The Holy Spirit’s usage of an expression always defines its meaning and scope.

The fact is that “foreknowledge” is never used in Scripture in connection with events or actions; instead, it always has reference to persons. It is persons God is said to “foreknow,” not the actions of those persons.

God foreknows what will be because He has decreed what shall be.

To countless thousands, even among those professing to be Christians, the God of the Scriptures is quite unknown.

“Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself” (Psa 50:21).

The “god” of this twentieth century no more resembles the Supreme Sovereign of Holy Writ than does the dim flickering of a candle the glory of the midday sun.

The supremacy of the true and living God might well be argued from the infinite distance which separates the mightiest creatures from the almighty Creator.

the God of Scripture is no make-believe monarch, no mere imaginary sovereign, but King of kings, and Lord of lords.

THE SOVEREIGNTY of God may be defined as the exercise of His supremacy—see

He is the Most High, Lord of heaven and earth. Subject to none, influenced by none, absolutely independent; God does as He pleases, only as He pleases, always as He pleases. None can thwart Him, none can hinder Him.

There is no attribute more comforting to His children than that of God’s sovereignty.

God on His throne is not the God they love. But it is God upon the throne that we love to preach. It is God upon His throne whom we trust.

God is perpetually the same: subject to no change in His being, attributes, or determinations. Therefore God is compared to a “Rock” (Deu 32:4, etc.) which remains immovable, when the entire ocean surrounding it is continually in a fluctuating state; even so, though all creatures are subject to change, God is immutable. Because God has no beginning and no ending, He can know no change.

There never was a time when He was not; there never will come a time when He shall cease to be. God has neither evolved, grown, nor improved. All that He is today, He has ever been, and ever will be. “I am the LORD, I change not” (Mal 3:6) is His own unqualified affirmation.

Whatever the attributes of God were before the universe was called into existence, they are precisely the same now, and will remain so for ever.

His power is unabated, His wisdom undiminished, His holiness unsullied.

His veracity is immutable, for His Word is “for ever...settled in heaven” (Psa 119:89). His love is eternal: “I have loved thee with an everlasting love” (Jer 31:3) and “Having loved His own which were in the world, He loved them unto the end” (Joh 13:1). His mercy ceases not, for it is “everlasting” (Psa 100:5).

“The counsel of the LORD standeth for ever, the thoughts of His heart to all generations” (Psa 33:11). Therefore do we read of “the immutability of His counsel” (Heb 6:17).

What comfort would it be to pray to a god that, like the chameleon, changed color every moment? Who would put up a petition to an earthly prince that was so mutable as to grant a petition one day, and deny it another? (Stephen Charnock, 1670).

He only is independently, infinitely, immutably holy.

Holiness is the very excellency of the divine nature: the great God is “glorious in holiness” (Exo 15:11).

It is an attribute of attributes” (J. Howe, 1670). Thus we read: “the beauty of the LORD” (Psa 27:4), which is none other than “the beauty of holiness” (Psa 110:3).

His justice is a holy justice, His wisdom a holy wisdom, His power a “holy arm” (Psa 98:1). His truth or promise a “holy promise” (Psa 105:42). His name, which signifies all His attributes in conjunction is “ holy” (Psa 103:1) (S. Charnock).

Because God is holy He hates all sin. He loves everything which is in conformity to His laws, and loathes everything which is contrary to it. His Word plainly declares, “The froward is abomination to the LORD” (Prov 3:32). And again, “The thoughts of the wicked are an abomination to the LORD” (Prov 15:26).

The unregenerate do not really believe in the holiness of God. Their conception of His character is altogether one-sided. They fondly hope that His mercy will override everything else.

The fact is that nothing makes more manifest the terrible depravity of man’s heart and his enmity against the living God than to have set before him One who is infinitely and immutably holy.

But blessed be His name, that which His holiness demanded, His grace has provided in Christ Jesus our Lord. Every poor sinner who has fled to Him for refuge stands “accepted in the Beloved” (Eph 1:6). Hallelujah!

that power belongeth unto God” (Psa 62:11).