For people of faith, we ask questions like: Who is God? What is He like? Can we really know Him? Some say God is too mysterious to know – He is the incomprehensible God. Others act like they have Him all figured out, as if the Doctrine of God is comprehensive enough. The truth is that the concept of divine revelation is somewhere in between: God reveals Himself, but we can never completely grasp.
What is Divine Revelation? Simply, it is the disclosure of God.
We must remember two truths about divine revelation: God reveals, and Man’s ability is limited. Consequently, the revelation is not whole. But let’s explore more here.
Two Ways God Speaks
1. General Revelation: Through Creation and Conscience
The beauty of a sunrise, the vastness of the stars, the moral pull of the conscience are common ways God speaks that there is a God. Scripture tells us that creation itself declares His glory. This kind of divine revelation is available to everyone, everywhere. But while it points to God, it doesn’t give us the whole picture, nor is it sufficient to save. It’s a universal and non-redemptive witness to God’s existence, power, and moral demands. It tells us that God is there, but not fully who He is.
2. Special Revelation: Through God’s Word and Jesus
Special revelation is God’s specific, saving self-disclosure, primarily through the Bible and supremely in the person of Jesus Christ. If creation is like a sketch, Jesus is the full portrait. Through the Scriptures, God speaks not just to inform us, but to invite us into a relationship with Him. Unlike general revelation, it contains the explicit message of salvation, revealing God’s redemptive plan, the truth about sin, and the way to be reconciled to him through faith.
Yet, even with special revelation, the noetic effects of sin have clouded humanity’s ability to understand God fully.
Talking About God: Words and Mystery
When we talk about God, we often use everyday words: God is good. God is faithful. God is holy. These are true, but we must also remember that God is greater than anything our words can capture.
Think of it this way: we can say, “God is our Father.” That’s helpful, but it’s still limited, because He’s more than any kind of human father we’ve ever known. Or we can say, “God is love.” That’s true, but His love is deeper and wider than anything we can compare it to.
So we can kind of comprehend God to a degree. And this is where we must humble ourselves. Our words cannot fully capture all that God is. And so, sometimes the best way to honor God is not by piling on more words, as we often do in some prayer spaces, but by being quiet before Him. Silence, awe, and wonder are also ways we express our devotion to God.
Revelation Is Grace
Here’s something we must not miss: we do not discover God on our own. He is the one who discloses Himself. We cannot unmask Him. Instead, God unmasks us. This may be difficult for some to read. But if we could disclose God by our effort, we would all come to discover God on our own, without God’s grace, without His pull, without His self-disclosure. The question one must ask is, “how can a sinner reveal God to himself?”
It is by special revelation that God discloses himself to people by opening their eyes. That moment of awareness is not our achievement, but God’s act of grace. He initiates, and the person responds to that revelation positively by what we call “faith”. He removes the blinders from our eyes so that we finally see who He is — the One who has been there all along.
Why Revelation Matters Today
Divine Revelation keeps us grounded:
- It reminds us that God wants to be known — He reveals Himself because He loves us.
- It reminds us that God is still greater than our understanding — He reveals, but He also remains beyond our full grasp.
This shapes how we live:
- Sharing with others: We speak confidently about what God has shown us in Jesus, but with humility, knowing He is always bigger than our explanations.
- Prayer: We bring our words to Him — thankfulness, confession, requests — but we also learn to sit in silence, resting in His presence.
- Everyday faith: We see God’s fingerprints in the world around us, but we remember that only in Christ do we see His face.
The Gift of Revelation
Here’s the good news: we don’t climb our way up to God. He stoops down to us. Revelation is not the result of human discovery but the gracious act of God Himself.
He unmasks us, clears our vision, and makes us aware of His presence. He reveals Himself so that we can know Him, love Him, and be transformed by Him. And as we respond in faith, humility, and obedience, we can reflect that revelation to the world around us.
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