Paul had a wonderful way of putting things into perspective. In 1 Corinthians 13 he writes to the Corinthian church and lets them know that there are things that are more important than the charismatic gifts. Spiritual gifts, he notes are helpful and they build up the body of Christ, but they are pretty much useless unless they are accompanied by love (or “charity” in the older English). His writings have helped many churches get perspective on the things that really matter. However, Paul ends 1 Corinthians 13 with a very interesting statement:

1 Corinthians 13:13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Now, I would suggest that we all agree that love is the greatest virtue—it just seems right. However, why? Why is it greater than faith and hope? Together these are classically called the “Theological Virtues” which means that they are dependent upon God Himself—without Him true Christian faith, hope and love could not exist. But, again, why does Paul say that love is the greatest? Allow me to take a stab at providing some reasons.

First, the Greatest Intellectual Virtue

The way one determines the greatness of a virtue comes from its object. For example, if the object of my life is to collect antique car parts, it may be a nice pursuit and it may even be profitable for me; however, very few people would consider collecting car parts the most noble of personal pursuits. On the other hand, someone who dedicates himself to assisting starving children as the object of their life would be said to have a noble pursuit. It is the object that determines the greatness. Consequently, the highest object of our intellect is the consideration of the ultimate cause of all things, which is God. We call this pursuit the pursuit of wisdom. Therefore, the greatest intellectual virtue is not science (which has the causes of nature as its object) but wisdom. History is replete with stories of how individuals and nations that had great science but little wisdom ended up doing very destructive things (e.g. Nazi Germany). Hence it should be such that wisdom exercises judgment over all the other intellectual virtues and directs them to their proper uses.

Faith, Hope and Love

Faith, hope and love all have as their object God Himself. As you know, faith must have an object—biblically it is not some sort of disconnected power force like the Star Wars “force.” God is the object of Christian faith--specifically expressed in the life, death and resurrection of Christ for our redemption. These things are what we believe in. Likewise, the object of our hope is literally the “blessed hope” of Christ’s appearing. Hope is not wishful thinking about a future possibility. It is the tangible, but as of yet, not visible consummation of the Kingdom of God. Love, of course, is the love of God. Why then is love considered greater than faith and hope?

One answer is that after Christ has returned, there will no longer be any need for faith and hope. However, another answer goes a little deeper. Love, by its very nature, causes the lover to come closer to the object. While both faith and hope are of things not possessed, love in a very real way takes possession of the beloved within the lover. We see this in romantic relationships. When lovers are parted, they think a lot about their beloved and hold them in their “hearts” as dear to them. Both lover and beloved are drawn by desire to be with one another (“parting is such sweet sorrow”). Likewise, those that love God are drawn to Him and have a wonderful union with Him. And this is why, I suggest, love is the greatest virtue.

1 John 4: 16 …God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.

A genus is a class of objects divided into several subordinate species; it is a class more extensive than a species. Thus in the animal kingdom the lion, leopard, tiger, cat, and panther are species of the Cat kind or genus.

The Bible indicates unequivocally that God is not like man:

Numbers 23:19 - "God is not a man, that He should lie, Nor a son of man, that He should repent;

Malachi 3:6a "For I am the LORD, I change not."

1 Timothy 6:15-16 (God) "alone is immortal and who lives in unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see."

John 4:24 “God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth."
(Jesus defines what a spirit is like) Luke 24:39 "Touch me and see; a ghost [Greek, pneuma, "spirit"] does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.”

Man belongs to the genus of mammals and is the species of Homo Sapiens (literally meaning “wise man”). God, however, is not part of any genus and He is a species unto Himself. Therefore, while man is like God, God is not like man. For instance, we say that a statue is like a man, but we do not say that a man is a statue. All creatures that God has created can be said in some way to be like God; but not that God is like any creature. It is just that man is in a very special way like God; however, again, God is not like man.

Aquinas reflects on the genus issue by noting: “God is not related to creatures as though belonging to a different genus, but as transcending every genus, and as the principle of all genera.” (Summa, I, 4, 3)

If we reflect on this we can see that since God is in no specific genus (no general class at all); therefore, he transcends all genera. God transcends all creatures vastly more than any creature in one genus can transcend any creature in another genus. For example, a cat which is a brilliant and highly tuned predator transcends many other creatures of lower genera. However, God is transcendent beyond all genera because He is the creator and source of all of them. He is truly transcendent. On the other hand, though He is not in a genus, he is the sustainer of all life. In this way we can speak of God as truly immanent in all of His creation. He is somewhat like light. Light has no color but it can be with and reveal all colors. Without God sustaining all things, they would cease to exist.

Colossians 1: 16-17 For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. 17 He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

Certain religious groups have committed the error of believing that God has a body which makes them anthropomorphites, people who say that God is human-like in His form. Amazingly, in recent years, this type of doctrinal decay has also started to show up in Evangelicalism, most notably in the Word of Faith movement.

Those that believe God has a body argue that man is made in the image of God (Gen. 1:26–27) and point to verses that refer to various descriptions of where He has a strong arm, or the Scripture speaks of the eyes of God, and so forth.

In doing this, they intensely misinterpret Scripture. First, the image of God we bear involves that part of us that separates us from animals (the purpose that the image plays in Genesis 1 is to separate humans from the animals that God had just created). Christians, since the era of the early church, have understood this part of us to be our rational soul. Secondly, when the Bible tells us about God’s strong right arm, his eyes, and the like it is using metaphorical language to communicate to us about God’s power and knowledge. This can be understood by the fact that the Bible also speaks of God as having feathers and wings; yet even those who believe God has flesh and bones would not go this far. For instance Psalm 91:4 says “He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.”

Therefore, I will present here in summary form a list of reasons why God cannot have a body composed of flesh and bones. However, please understand that I am not here referring to the human nature of Jesus Christ nor his resurrected and glorified condition.

● In John 4:24, Jesus teaches us: "God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." This means God has no body, because a spirit is, by nature, an incorporeal being. As well, Jesus tells us, "a spirit has not flesh and bones" (Luke 24:39). There is a big difference between being a spirit and having a spirit. Jesus says that the Father is a spirit, not that the Father has a spirit; this means that he lacks a body entirely.

● The Apostle Paul teaches us that the belief that God has a body is a dangerous and pagan doctrine that we should avoid. Romans 1:22-23 states: “22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles."

● God cannot be controlled by the very laws He created. If He had a physical body that would mean He is governed by laws of the physical realm.

● Jews who share the Old Testament Scripture with Christians are monotheistic and also resist any bodily understanding of God. One of their greatest teachers outside the Bible era was Maimonides. He listed this as his third principle, he said: This is all to say that He does not partake of any physical actions or qualities. And if He were to be a body then He would be like any other body and would not be God.

● God would have to be a hermaphrodite – having both male and female organs. The reason for this is that the Scripture is sometimes cited as "proof" of God having a human-like body is Genesis 1:27 where God says that he created both males and females in his image.

● Because of the size of the universe it would be impossible for God, if He had a localized physical nature, to create, maintain and control the universe. How could God, as a human-sized being, direct a universe of 10-15 billion light-years across? He would be unfathomably dwarfed by the universe, as we are. Yet, exactly the opposite is said of God – that the universe cannot contain him (2 Chronicles 2:6).

●The Church Fathers, of course, agreed, and loudly and consistently declared the fact that God is an immutable (unchanging), immaterial spirit who has an entirely simple (not made up of parts) nature. Since all bodies (including planets, stars and galaxies) extend through space and therefore can be divided into parts, it is clear that God cannot have a body.

● God must be the most perfect and noble of beings. However, animate bodies are clearly more wonderful and noble than inanimate bodies (e.g. rocks). The animation (to live) of a creature, though, depends for its living-ness (animation) on its soul. This means that the soul is even nobler than a body. “Therefore it is impossible that God should be a body” –Aquinas.

● Finally, I end with a wonderful quote from Irenaeus: "Far removed is the Father of all from those things which operate among men, the affections and passions. He is simple, not composed of parts, without structure, altogether like and equal to himself alone. He is all mind, all spirit, all thought, all intelligence, all reason . . . all light, all fountain of every good, and this is the manner in which the religious and the pious are accustomed to speak of God" (Against Heresies 2:13:3 [A.D. 189]).

Many people think that because God is omnipotent and infinite in ability, that He can do anything. However, the Bible clearly states that it is impossible for God to lie (Hebrews 6:18) and that God cannot be tempted or tempt anyone (James 1:13). What’s going on here? Is God omnipotent or not?

Well, yes, God is omnipotent and He does have infinite ability within the realm of that which is the truth. Another way of putting this is that God can do everything except “essential impossibilities.” Essential impossibilities are those things that involve concepts that are mutually at odds with each other and therefore equate to “nothingness.” These intrinsically impossible things can be classed into two categories:

1. Any action on the part of God which would be out of harmony with His nature and attributes;
2. Any action that would simultaneously put together mutually resistant elements, e.g. a square circle, an infinite creature, etc.

These cannot come into existence because they are by their very nature “nothing” (cannot truly exist) and are called by theologians essential impossibilities, meaning that in their very essence they cannot exist. A circle is by its nature is round and therefore it can never be square. If God were to make a circle into a square (which He could do), it would then simply be a square—there cannot be a square circle.

Examples of actions that are out of harmony with God’s nature

(a) It is impossible for God to sin

"To sin," says Thomas Aquinas, "is to be capable of failure in one's actions, which is incompatible with omnipotence" (Summa, I, Q, xxv, a. 3). God being omnipotent (all powerful) never fails in His actions and is not capable of sin.

(b) What God decides cannot be changed or reversed

From eternity the creation of all things, their various changes in time and space, and the way in which all things would occur were determined by God's free will. If any of this could change, it would follow either that God's wisdom was flawed or that His decisions are capricious. This, however, does not mean that man is a robot or that we do not have free will—we do.

(c) The creation of an absolutely infinite creature or of an absolutely greatest number if creatures is impossible, because the Divine power is inexhaustible

No number of actualized possibilities exhausts God’s power; therefore, while God can create as many creatures as He desires, there can never be so many creatures created that it exhausts His power to keep creating. Likewise, no other infinite creature can exist or be created other than God (who is uncreated) because there is no end to infinity.

Mutually exclusive elements that are impossible

Another type of intrinsic impossibility includes all that would simultaneously denote what are known as “mutually repellent elements,” e.g. a square circle, an infinite creature, etc. Additionally, God cannot make something that has happened in the past to be non-existent because it is contradiction. It is a contradiction that the same thing that has happened should also not have happened.

I’m sure you have heard someone quote the Bible where it says in Isaiah 55: 8 "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. 9 As the heavens are higher than the earth, so … my thoughts than your thoughts.” Or maybe this from 1 Corinthians 1:27 “But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise;.” Often what people are trying to communicate with these verses is same as what I heard a pastor recently say. He told his audience that God tells us to do illogical things and in order to fully follow Christ we need to stop trying to figure things out. The implication of all of this is that faith and reason are at odds. In this way of understanding things, there is a realm of religion and faith and then there is the realm of evidence, reason, logic and science. Many Christians adhere to this notion. Unfortunately, what they don’t realize is that this not only pushes Christianity out of the public square of debate, reason and science: but, worse, it pigeon-holes Christians as a group of irrational and illogical religionists. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact this whole issue is about truth.

The classical definition of truth is called the correspondence theory. As Blackburn and Simmons state in “Truth” (Oxford Press, 1999) the correspondence theory of truth asserts that “for a proposition to be true is for it to correspond with the facts." Or as Thomas Aquinas stated, “truth is in the mind as conformed to the thing understood” and “truth is defined as conformity between intellect and thing” (Summa Theologiae, Volume 4: Knowledge in God). In other words for a thing to be true it must correspond to the way things are in “real life.” For example, to say or believe snow is white is true, if and only if snow is white.

Beyond the correspondence theory of truth, Christians have the witness of Scripture where Jesus asserts, John 14:6, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” Simply put, Christians believe that God is truth itself. Therefore, from a human perspective to have truth in one’s mind is to apprehend something as it is. But, truth in God goes beyond mere conformability to His intellect, for truth not only resides in God, but (according to Aquinas) “he is the supreme and original truth.”

The bottom line in all of this is that truth is a central concept in Christianity. We are thinking truthfully when what we believe to be true actually exists in reality. This way of understanding truth is the basis for all rational endeavors including religion, science, politics and business. Consequently, when Christians allow themselves to be pushed into the pigeon-hole of having an irrational faith it is a mistake of the highest category. Christianity is coherent, reasonable and vitally connected to the truth of the way things are in reality. Christianity is not an irrational or illogical religion.

What about those Scriptures, though? Don’t they tell us God does illogical and irrational things that do not make sense? No, they don’t. As is often the case, the Isaiah and Corinthian texts are taken out of their natural context and made to say something they were never intended to say. Isaiah is proclaiming that while men often refuse to have mercy on their enemies, G0d has higher ways of thinking that include being merciful to humanity. This is not irrational, as we now know; mercy has a powerful “real life” effect in that it redeems lives. Paul in 1 Corinthians is not saying that God’s ways are irrational he is saying that man’s highest wisdom pales into insignificance when compared to God’s thinking and that God can take the seemingly unimportant and weak things and use them for His mighty purposes. For Paul the epitome of this is that God used the humiliating crucifixion of Christ to redeem and transform the world. To the Greco-Roman world of rigid class structure this seemed ridiculous but now we see how the cross has transformed society and created new kinds of human relationships based on love and service and mutual respect. Frankly, the Christian way works better in the laboratory of life for more people. Why? Simply put, because it is true to reality.