God is Holy

Leviticus 11:45 For I am the Lord that bringeth you up out of the land of Egypt, to be your God: ye shall therefore be holy, for I am holy.

The word holy is an adjective that means pure, clean, free of defilement, and in the case of God, the Holy One of Israel, to never have suffered that condition. Purification, a process required of man, to become holy and therefor able to come before God, is never applied to God.

1 Corinthians 3:17 If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.

Consider this if you would, that God, who is holy, pure and undefiled, should ever be touched by any impure thing, He would cease to be God. His Holiness would consume any amount of sin that even tried to come in His presence.

Deuteronomy 9:3-4 Understand therefore this day, that the Lord thy God is he which goeth over before thee; as a consuming fire he shall destroy them, and he shall bring them down before thy face: so shalt thou drive them out, and destroy them quickly, as the Lord hath said unto thee. Speak not thou in thine heart, after that the Lord thy God hath cast them out from before thee, saying, For my righteousness the Lord hath brought me in to possess this land: but for the wickedness of these nations the Lord doth drive them out from before thee.

Leviticus 22:3 Say unto them, Whosoever he be of all your seed among your generations, that goeth unto the holy things, which the children of Israel hallow unto the Lord, having his uncleanness upon him, that soul shall be cut off from my presence: I am the Lord.

Because of just one act of disobedience Adam and Eve were cut off from the presence of God.

God is Love

1 John 4:8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.

God’s love is pure and unchanging. God does not love as man loves.

Jeremiah 3:1 They say, If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another man’s, shall he return unto her again? shall not that land be greatly polluted? but thou hast played the harlot with many lovers; yet return again to me, saith the Lord.

There are seven words in the Greek that can be interpreted as love and none of them adequately expresses God’s pure love.

Love (Noun and Verb):

“Agapao and the corresponding noun agape present the characteristic word of Christianity, and since the Spirit of revelation has used it to express ideas previously unknown, inquiry into its use, whether in Greek literature or in the Septuagint, throws but little light upon its distinctive meaning in the NT.” (Vine’s Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words)

Even if we examine the love chapter, 1 Corinthians 13, all we can learn there about God’s love is contained with the encouragement and ability of Christ’s disciples to express in human form. Even within that we find difficulties.

Love is patient, love is kind and is not envious; does not brag, is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things, love never fails.

These instructions are how love acts as a verb and still does not adequately cover He who is love as a noun. The indwelling God who lives in your heart is that love and words cannot adequately express all He is in you.

John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.