Christlike Atrributes

[Finrock]

So, this thread has its beginning from a discussion or at least a semblance of a discussion I was having concerning the type of being that God is. This is to set some groundwork for how I interpret certain scriptures and what they mean. It may also be helpful to others who may have some misunderstandings about who or what God is.

Here you will find what I believe about God. I will list some negatives and some positives. The positive qualities that I am listing are all qualities of God that I have experienced first hand. Meaning, I have learned these things not just by reading scriptures or by believing someone's testimony or by theory, but I've learned these things with first hand experiences I have had with God and from God's own mouth. These are things He has either spoken to me, shown to me, or which I have otherwise experienced as I've interacted with God over the course of my life. The negative attributes are qualities that I have never experienced from God or they are qualities that are contradictory to the positive qualities of God (Meaning, if God is X, then God can't be Y). I also want to note that it is my view that the words "charity" or "love" or more specifically the "pure love of Christ" encompasses all of the good attributes of God, but for this to be helpful I will include it as a separate attribute along with other attributes.

Positives (God is...):

• God is humble
• God is kind
• God is patience
• God is love (the literal epitome of love or charity or "the pure love of Christ")
• God is virtuous
• God is long suffering
• God is understanding
• God is empathetic
• God is compassionate
• God is forgiving
• God is gentle
• God is happy
• God is jovial

Negatives (God is not...):

• God is not punitive
• God is not coercive
• God is not manipulative
• God is not totalitarian
• God is not vindictive
• God is not dictatorial
• God is not oppressive
• God is not angry
• God is not petty
• God is not malicious

Okay, so these two lists convey my general understanding of God and what type of being He is. It also reflects what I have learned about God from Him and through my experiences with Him over the course of my life.

Another observation I would like to put out here is that the positive list represents attributes that we should develop in our personal lives. The negative list represents attributes we should reject in our personal lives.

My next post will address how we should address or interpret certain scriptures which appear, on the surface, to contradict some of these attributes. For instance, there are plenty of parts in the scriptures which seem to speak about an angry, vengeful, or mean spirited God. In fact, many people are turned off about the idea of God because of some of these scriptures. So, I will provide some ideas as to how these scriptures can be resolved and how they are often, in my view, misunderstood.

I welcome any comments along the way...

-Finrock

[Rensai]

So, this thread has its beginning from a discussion or at least a semblance of a discussion I was having concerning the type of being that God is. This is to set some groundwork for how I interpret certain scriptures and what they mean. It may also be helpful to others who may have some misunderstandings about who or what God is.

Here you will find what I believe about God. I will list some negatives and some positives. The positive qualities that I am listing are all qualities of God that I have experienced first hand. Meaning, I have learned these things not just by reading scriptures or by believing someone's testimony or by theory, but I've learned these things with first hand experiences I have had with God and from God's own mouth. These are things He has either spoken to me, shown to me, or which I have otherwise experienced as I've interacted with God over the course of my life. The negative attributes are qualities that I have never experienced from God or they are qualities that are contradictory to the positive qualities of God (Meaning, if God is X, then God can't be Y). I also want to note that it is my view that the words "charity" or "love" or more specifically the "pure love of Christ" encompasses all of the good attributes of God, but for this to be helpful I will include it as a separate attribute along with other attributes.

Positives (God is...):

• God is humble
• God is kind
• God is patience
• God is love (the literal epitome of love or charity or "the pure love of Christ")
• God is virtuous
• God is long suffering
• God is understanding
• God is empathetic
• God is compassionate
• God is forgiving
• God is gentle
• God is happy
• God is jovial

Negatives (God is not...):

• God is not punitive
• God is not coercive
• God is not manipulative
• God is not totalitarian
• God is not vindictive
• God is not dictatorial
• God is not oppressive
• God is not angry
• God is not petty
• God is not malicious

Okay, so these two lists convey my general understanding of God and what type of being He is. It also reflects what I have learned about God from Him and through my experiences with Him over the course of my life.

Another observation I would like to put out here is that the positive list represents attributes that we should develop in our personal lives. The negative list represents attributes we should reject in our personal lives.

My next post will address how we should address or interpret certain scriptures which appear, on the surface, to contradict some of these attributes. For instance, there are plenty of parts in the scriptures which seem to speak about an angry, vengeful, or mean spirited God. In fact, many people are turned off about the idea of God because of some of these scriptures. So, I will provide some ideas as to how these scriptures can be resolved and how they are often, in my view, misunderstood.

I welcome any comments along the way...

-Finrock

Pretty good list. Mostly I agree with those attributes, but a couple seem odd. First, I don't think God is humble, he is the one being that doesn't need to be because he is perfect and usually in scripture he isn't shy about letting us know it. Its true, Christ was humble at times in his role as the savior, but as a God not so much, at least not that I can recall reading. I also don't recall any scriptures where God is jovial and at times he can definitely be punitive if that is what is called for, not in a malicious way, but in a way that lets you know he's serious and means business. Anyway, looks good to me overall. I think you could expand it a lot though. He is omniscient, he knows everything about this earth and its inhabitants down to the tiniest speck and knows the past, present and future. Omnipotent. He's the only being that can have full faith in himself and in who we can place our full faith. He is trustworthy and honest, he will never lie or fail to do anything he says he will do. He is very selfless, doing this great work so we can learn and grow and hopefully gain exaltation. He gives much and asks only that we obey his commandments, which are for our own good and happiness anyway. He is meticulous and has planned each of our lives and everything on this earth down to the smallest detail to give us the best chance to learn and grow. I'm sure there are more divine attributes we could list, but I'll stop there.

The list of what he's not is so long I'm not sure that's really worth attempting. Anything that falls short of perfection is not an attribute he has.

[nightlight]

So, this thread has its beginning from a discussion or at least a semblance of a discussion I was having concerning the type of being that God is. This is to set some groundwork for how I interpret certain scriptures and what they mean. It may also be helpful to others who may have some misunderstandings about who or what God is.

Here you will find what I believe about God. I will list some negatives and some positives. The positive qualities that I am listing are all qualities of God that I have experienced first hand. Meaning, I have learned these things not just by reading scriptures or by believing someone's testimony or by theory, but I've learned these things with first hand experiences I have had with God and from God's own mouth. These are things He has either spoken to me, shown to me, or which I have otherwise experienced as I've interacted with God over the course of my life. The negative attributes are qualities that I have never experienced from God or they are qualities that are contradictory to the positive qualities of God (Meaning, if God is X, then God can't be Y). I also want to note that it is my view that the words "charity" or "love" or more specifically the "pure love of Christ" encompasses all of the good attributes of God, but for this to be helpful I will include it as a separate attribute along with other attributes.

Positives (God is...):

• God is humble
• God is kind
• God is patience
• God is love (the literal epitome of love or charity or "the pure love of Christ")
• God is virtuous
• God is long suffering
• God is understanding
• God is empathetic
• God is compassionate
• God is forgiving
• God is gentle
• God is happy
• God is jovial

Negatives (God is not...):

• God is not punitive
• God is not coercive
• God is not manipulative
• God is not totalitarian
• God is not vindictive
• God is not dictatorial
• God is not oppressive
• God is not angry
• God is not petty
• God is not malicious

Okay, so these two lists convey my general understanding of God and what type of being He is. It also reflects what I have learned about God from Him and through my experiences with Him over the course of my life.

Another observation I would like to put out here is that the positive list represents attributes that we should develop in our personal lives. The negative list represents attributes we should reject in our personal lives.

My next post will address how we should address or interpret certain scriptures which appear, on the surface, to contradict some of these attributes. For instance, there are plenty of parts in the scriptures which seem to speak about an angry, vengeful, or mean spirited God. In fact, many people are turned off about the idea of God because of some of these scriptures. So, I will provide some ideas as to how these scriptures can be resolved and how they are often, in my view, misunderstood.

I welcome any comments along the way...

-Finrock

God gets angry...

[BackBlast]

Pretty good list. Mostly I agree with those attributes, but a couple seem odd. First, I don't think God is humble, he is the one being that doesn't need to be because he is perfect and usually in scripture he isn't shy about letting us know it. Its true, Christ was humble at times in his role as the savior, but as a God not so much, at least not that I can recall reading. I also don't recall any scriptures where God is jovial and at times he can definitely be punitive if that is what is called for, not in a malicious way, but in a way that lets you know he's serious and means business.

I think this represents a general misunderstanding of what humility is. It isn't self-deprecation. That is a false humility and can actually be the opposite. Acknowledging the truth of who you are, authority or responsibility that you have is being truthful and a humble person is also truthful.

Humility represents the state opposite that of pride. A prideful person is inclined to stretch the truth, leverage accomplishment or position in one area into an unrelated area for purposes of exercising out of scope dominion, etc. A humble person understands their proper role and fulfills it without going out of scope. A humble person submits to whom they should, and serves those they should, and commands and exercises the proper amount of authority over those they should.

[Rensai]

Pretty good list. Mostly I agree with those attributes, but a couple seem odd. First, I don't think God is humble, he is the one being that doesn't need to be because he is perfect and usually in scripture he isn't shy about letting us know it. Its true, Christ was humble at times in his role as the savior, but as a God not so much, at least not that I can recall reading. I also don't recall any scriptures where God is jovial and at times he can definitely be punitive if that is what is called for, not in a malicious way, but in a way that lets you know he's serious and means business.

I think this represents a general misunderstanding of what humility is. It isn't self-deprecation. That is a false humility and can actually be the opposite. Acknowledging the truth of who you are, authority or responsibility that you have is being truthful and a humble person is also truthful.

Humility represents the state opposite that of pride. A prideful person is inclined to stretch the truth, leverage accomplishment or position in one area into an unrelated area for purposes of exercising out of scope dominion, etc. A humble person understands their proper role and fulfills it without going out of scope. A humble person submits to whom they should, and serves those they should, and commands and exercises the proper amount of authority over those they should.

That sounds good.

[Finrock]

So, this thread has its beginning from a discussion or at least a semblance of a discussion I was having concerning the type of being that God is. This is to set some groundwork for how I interpret certain scriptures and what they mean. It may also be helpful to others who may have some misunderstandings about who or what God is.

Here you will find what I believe about God. I will list some negatives and some positives. The positive qualities that I am listing are all qualities of God that I have experienced first hand. Meaning, I have learned these things not just by reading scriptures or by believing someone's testimony or by theory, but I've learned these things with first hand experiences I have had with God and from God's own mouth. These are things He has either spoken to me, shown to me, or which I have otherwise experienced as I've interacted with God over the course of my life. The negative attributes are qualities that I have never experienced from God or they are qualities that are contradictory to the positive qualities of God (Meaning, if God is X, then God can't be Y). I also want to note that it is my view that the words "charity" or "love" or more specifically the "pure love of Christ" encompasses all of the good attributes of God, but for this to be helpful I will include it as a separate attribute along with other attributes.

Positives (God is...):

• God is humble
• God is kind
• God is patience
• God is love (the literal epitome of love or charity or "the pure love of Christ")
• God is virtuous
• God is long suffering
• God is understanding
• God is empathetic
• God is compassionate
• God is forgiving
• God is gentle
• God is happy
• God is jovial

Negatives (God is not...):

• God is not punitive
• God is not coercive
• God is not manipulative
• God is not totalitarian
• God is not vindictive
• God is not dictatorial
• God is not oppressive
• God is not angry
• God is not petty
• God is not malicious

Okay, so these two lists convey my general understanding of God and what type of being He is. It also reflects what I have learned about God from Him and through my experiences with Him over the course of my life.

Another observation I would like to put out here is that the positive list represents attributes that we should develop in our personal lives. The negative list represents attributes we should reject in our personal lives.

My next post will address how we should address or interpret certain scriptures which appear, on the surface, to contradict some of these attributes. For instance, there are plenty of parts in the scriptures which seem to speak about an angry, vengeful, or mean spirited God. In fact, many people are turned off about the idea of God because of some of these scriptures. So, I will provide some ideas as to how these scriptures can be resolved and how they are often, in my view, misunderstood.

I welcome any comments along the way...

-Finrock

Pretty good list. Mostly I agree with those attributes, but a couple seem odd. First, I don't think God is humble, he is the one being that doesn't need to be because he is perfect and usually in scripture he isn't shy about letting us know it. Its true, Christ was humble at times in his role as the savior, but as a God not so much, at least not that I can recall reading. I also don't recall any scriptures where God is jovial and at times he can definitely be punitive if that is what is called for, not in a malicious way, but in a way that lets you know he's serious and means business. Anyway, looks good to me overall. I think you could expand it a lot though. He is omniscient, he knows everything about this earth and its inhabitants down to the tiniest speck and knows the past, present and future. Omnipotent. He's the only being that can have full faith in himself and in who we can place our full faith. He is trustworthy and honest, he will never lie or fail to do anything he says he will do. He is very selfless, doing this great work so we can learn and grow and hopefully gain exaltation. He gives much and asks only that we obey his commandments, which are for our own good and happiness anyway. He is meticulous and has planned each of our lives and everything on this earth down to the smallest detail to give us the best chance to learn and grow. I'm sure there are more divine attributes we could list, but I'll stop there.

The list of what he's not is so long I'm not sure that's really worth attempting. Anything that falls short of perfection is not an attribute he has.

The list is not exhaustive, for sure. I think, though, many people have imagined in their hearts or believe in a God who is coercive, angry, punitive, and vindictive and my main point is to address these types notions. We can find scriptures which seem to indicate that God gets "angry" or He is coercive, punitive, and/or vindictive. I submit, though, that He is nothing like that and that those scriptures when used to support these ideas of God are being misinterpreted or misunderstood. I wanted to start with a baseline, however, as to what type of God I have had personal experience with. Of course, all of these ideas about God that I am listing can also be found in the scriptures, but I think firsthand experience is more potent than theory, interpretation, or speculation. It has been very important for me to understand correctly what type of being God is, because much of my life I have lived with certain misunderstandings and this ignorance of God has caused me to live in sin and to be separated from Him.

As far as humility goes, God is humble. Although I have firsthand experience with God's humility, as I said, we can also find this idea about God in the scriptures. So, this scripture below matches or supports my personal experiences with God. This is strong evidence to me that my understanding of God is correct. He said that we can look to Him to learn how and what to be because God is the epitome of all Good things:

29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.

-Finrock

[Finrock]

So, this thread has its beginning from a discussion or at least a semblance of a discussion I was having concerning the type of being that God is. This is to set some groundwork for how I interpret certain scriptures and what they mean. It may also be helpful to others who may have some misunderstandings about who or what God is.

Here you will find what I believe about God. I will list some negatives and some positives. The positive qualities that I am listing are all qualities of God that I have experienced first hand. Meaning, I have learned these things not just by reading scriptures or by believing someone's testimony or by theory, but I've learned these things with first hand experiences I have had with God and from God's own mouth. These are things He has either spoken to me, shown to me, or which I have otherwise experienced as I've interacted with God over the course of my life. The negative attributes are qualities that I have never experienced from God or they are qualities that are contradictory to the positive qualities of God (Meaning, if God is X, then God can't be Y). I also want to note that it is my view that the words "charity" or "love" or more specifically the "pure love of Christ" encompasses all of the good attributes of God, but for this to be helpful I will include it as a separate attribute along with other attributes.

Positives (God is...):

• God is humble
• God is kind
• God is patience
• God is love (the literal epitome of love or charity or "the pure love of Christ")
• God is virtuous
• God is long suffering
• God is understanding
• God is empathetic
• God is compassionate
• God is forgiving
• God is gentle
• God is happy
• God is jovial

Negatives (God is not...):

• God is not punitive
• God is not coercive
• God is not manipulative
• God is not totalitarian
• God is not vindictive
• God is not dictatorial
• God is not oppressive
• God is not angry
• God is not petty
• God is not malicious

Okay, so these two lists convey my general understanding of God and what type of being He is. It also reflects what I have learned about God from Him and through my experiences with Him over the course of my life.

Another observation I would like to put out here is that the positive list represents attributes that we should develop in our personal lives. The negative list represents attributes we should reject in our personal lives.

My next post will address how we should address or interpret certain scriptures which appear, on the surface, to contradict some of these attributes. For instance, there are plenty of parts in the scriptures which seem to speak about an angry, vengeful, or mean spirited God. In fact, many people are turned off about the idea of God because of some of these scriptures. So, I will provide some ideas as to how these scriptures can be resolved and how they are often, in my view, misunderstood.

I welcome any comments along the way...

-Finrock

God gets angry...

It depends on what you mean by "anger". Anger is a sin and needs to be purged from our lives. There is no place for anger in the heart of a disciple of Jesus Christ because there is no place for anger in God's heart. God doesn't get "angry" the way that we get angry. Here is a pretty good article from February 1980 Ensign written by Burton C. Kelly. It gives us some clues as to how we might be misunderstanding the scriptures, misinterpreting them, or misusing words in the scriptures which to the Lord has a very specific meaning which often is very different from how we generally use the word or understand the word, like anger. Although I agree with almost everything in this article, there are some ideas even here that need to be a bit more nuanced. I intend to address these as time allows, but for now, this is a good start and points us in generally the direction that I am trying to take and point people to:

But, some may ask, “Why is it that God himself gets angry?” The scriptures make reference to God’s wrath or God’s anger. Would God command us not to get angry and yet be a God of anger himself?

At this point we should look at our definition of anger. I am using it in the sense that it is an emotion that results from judging others unrighteously, wanting to control others, or selfishly wanting our own ends met. I submit that God does not get angry when anger is thus defined—or as we commonly use the word. In Mark 3:5, after the Savior healed the man with the withered hand on the Sabbath, we find the people seeking to accuse him. “And when he had looked round about on them with anger, being grieved at the hardness of their hearts, he said unto the man, stretch forth thine hand.” There are some critical phrases in that statement. First of all, the Savior was “grieved” because of the hardness of their hearts. He was concerned about them, caring, compassionate. His “anger” did not arise, as does ours, out of a judgmental condemning of others, out of selfishness to get his own ends met, nor out of the desire to control people and deny them their freedom.

Anger is a feeling of hostility, resentment, wrath, or ire. None of these feelings was present nor, I believe, ever is present with God. I believe God’s actions are interpreted at times as arising out of anger because he applies consequences, including punishment, for violation of his laws. But when we look at God’s punishment, we find that it is just—there is no element of hostility or revenge. This is certainly true in the case of Christ driving the money changers from the temple. He did so with sternness, but his motivation was from a desire to serve God and bless his children, not a desire to harm others.

Good parents also apply consequences to their children’s behavior to help them learn the truth. Many scriptures state that the Lord’s chastisement and the suffering that comes from it are for the benefit of his children and arise out of compassion.

One other thing might help us understand the use of the word anger as it is applied to the Lord. Doctrine and Covenants 1:24 tells us, “These commandments are of me, and were given unto my servants in their weakness, after the manner of their language, that they might come to understanding.” [D&C 1:24] In other words, I believe that the word anger is applied the way it is in the scriptures because we understand that language and because it has the clearest, most positive effect on us (see D&C 19:6–7).

We should also re-examine the instruction in Doctrine and Covenants 121:43. “Reprov[e] betimes with sharpness.” [D&C 121:43] I suggest that sharpness here means pointedly, in a very direct, confronting way, so that we will not be misunderstood, “then showing forth afterwards an increase of love toward him whom thou hast reproved lest he esteem thee to be his enemy.” I suggest that the only way we can really show that increase in love, unless it be some time afterwards, is to have not been angry in the first place, but to truly have been moved upon by the Holy Ghost.

-Finrock

[Rensai]

So, this thread has its beginning from a discussion or at least a semblance of a discussion I was having concerning the type of being that God is. This is to set some groundwork for how I interpret certain scriptures and what they mean. It may also be helpful to others who may have some misunderstandings about who or what God is.

Here you will find what I believe about God. I will list some negatives and some positives. The positive qualities that I am listing are all qualities of God that I have experienced first hand. Meaning, I have learned these things not just by reading scriptures or by believing someone's testimony or by theory, but I've learned these things with first hand experiences I have had with God and from God's own mouth. These are things He has either spoken to me, shown to me, or which I have otherwise experienced as I've interacted with God over the course of my life. The negative attributes are qualities that I have never experienced from God or they are qualities that are contradictory to the positive qualities of God (Meaning, if God is X, then God can't be Y). I also want to note that it is my view that the words "charity" or "love" or more specifically the "pure love of Christ" encompasses all of the good attributes of God, but for this to be helpful I will include it as a separate attribute along with other attributes.

Positives (God is...):

• God is humble
• God is kind
• God is patience
• God is love (the literal epitome of love or charity or "the pure love of Christ")
• God is virtuous
• God is long suffering
• God is understanding
• God is empathetic
• God is compassionate
• God is forgiving
• God is gentle
• God is happy
• God is jovial

Negatives (God is not...):

• God is not punitive
• God is not coercive
• God is not manipulative
• God is not totalitarian
• God is not vindictive
• God is not dictatorial
• God is not oppressive
• God is not angry
• God is not petty
• God is not malicious

Okay, so these two lists convey my general understanding of God and what type of being He is. It also reflects what I have learned about God from Him and through my experiences with Him over the course of my life.

Another observation I would like to put out here is that the positive list represents attributes that we should develop in our personal lives. The negative list represents attributes we should reject in our personal lives.

My next post will address how we should address or interpret certain scriptures which appear, on the surface, to contradict some of these attributes. For instance, there are plenty of parts in the scriptures which seem to speak about an angry, vengeful, or mean spirited God. In fact, many people are turned off about the idea of God because of some of these scriptures. So, I will provide some ideas as to how these scriptures can be resolved and how they are often, in my view, misunderstood.

I welcome any comments along the way...

-Finrock

Pretty good list. Mostly I agree with those attributes, but a couple seem odd. First, I don't think God is humble, he is the one being that doesn't need to be because he is perfect and usually in scripture he isn't shy about letting us know it. Its true, Christ was humble at times in his role as the savior, but as a God not so much, at least not that I can recall reading. I also don't recall any scriptures where God is jovial and at times he can definitely be punitive if that is what is called for, not in a malicious way, but in a way that lets you know he's serious and means business. Anyway, looks good to me overall. I think you could expand it a lot though. He is omniscient, he knows everything about this earth and its inhabitants down to the tiniest speck and knows the past, present and future. Omnipotent. He's the only being that can have full faith in himself and in who we can place our full faith. He is trustworthy and honest, he will never lie or fail to do anything he says he will do. He is very selfless, doing this great work so we can learn and grow and hopefully gain exaltation. He gives much and asks only that we obey his commandments, which are for our own good and happiness anyway. He is meticulous and has planned each of our lives and everything on this earth down to the smallest detail to give us the best chance to learn and grow. I'm sure there are more divine attributes we could list, but I'll stop there.

The list of what he's not is so long I'm not sure that's really worth attempting. Anything that falls short of perfection is not an attribute he has.

The list is not exhaustive, for sure. I think, though, many people have imagined in their hearts or believe in a God who is coercive, angry, punitive, and vindictive and my main point is to address these types notions. We can find scriptures which seem to indicate that God gets "angry" or He is coercive, punitive, and/or vindictive. I submit, though, that He is nothing like that and that those scriptures when used to support these ideas of God are being misinterpreted or misunderstood. I wanted to start with a baseline, however, as to what type of God I have had personal experience with. Of course, all of these ideas about God that I am listing can also be found in the scriptures, but I think firsthand experience is more potent than theory, interpretation, or speculation. It has been very important for me to understand correctly what type of being God is, because much of my life I have lived with certain misunderstandings and this ignorance of God has caused me to live in sin and to be separated from Him.

As far as humility goes, God is humble. Although I have firsthand experience with God's humility, as I said, we can also find this idea about God in the scriptures. So, this scripture below matches or supports my personal experiences with God. This is strong evidence to me that my understanding of God is correct. He said that we can look to Him to learn how and what to be because God is the epitome of all Good things:

29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.

-Finrock

Yes, I think you and backblast are right about the humility. I knew the correct definition somewhere in the back of my mind, but when I was responding to your post I was thinking of the incorrect, common definition of being self-deprecating as backblast said. I also agree that god is not coercive, vindictive, etc. Scriptures where he appears so are due to poor translation or not enough information on our side i believe. For example, Jonah could be cited as an example of God being coercive, and taken at face value he would be. However, we know from the pearl of great price that the noble and great ones or God's leaders, were called and agreed to their jobs before even coming to earth. With that understanding, God's handling of Jonah is changed. Now he is no longer coercive, but supportive. Jonah agreed and wanted to do his job, he just had a moment of weakness kind of like a recovering addict might I think. Alma the younger would be another good example of that.