On the Nature of God

This writing is going to be different from the others. I don't have some great theme which I am going to lay out before you, instead I will share some thoughts I have which I am working through. I have no answer as of yet to what I am writing, and I wish to be honest in my ignorance there. What I am doing now is sharing with you who would read this what I have found so far, a theme I have stumbled upon, a thought which I do not know the conclusion to.

As it is with many things which I write, this is about the Christian faith, and more specifically on God. Theology is my absolute favorite thing to speak about with others, which many come to learn when speaking with me. I can chat about anything, but theology is my favorite of all the options. And in this moment, I have a question which I have stumbled upon and which I do not yet have an answer for. In the past I have had questions which I wondered about and it took months before I found some form of answer to - such as whether our souls have a "purpose" to them like the angels (which was partly addressed in this article), or the reason why the dead were raised in Matthew 27:52-53 (which I shared an answer to in this article). I don't doubt that eventually the question (which I will share with you momentarily) that I have will be answered by some benign comment made by a friend in the future, something that will seem so trivial and yet I have so easily overlooked.

Here is what currently plagues my mind. Christ is called the "Word" of God, Christ is the Word. John 1:1, 14: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth." The spoken Word, the good news sent out, the manifestation of proclamation.

Then we have the Holy Spirit. In the Old Testament we Christians look back at these parts of Scripture, and for those well-studied (or the rest of us who read the studies of these more intelligent people) we see that the Spirit of God is the Hebrew word "ruach", which means "breath". We also see Christ breathe on His disciples (John 20:20-22), and these men are gifted with the Holy Spirit Himself. Spirit is Breath.

Now, here is the thing which has been plaguing me. One is the Word, one is the Breath, and why are these so similar? These two things are different, just as the two Persons of the Trinity are different, and yet there is similarity here. And so I ask again, why? Why is the Son the Word and the Paraclete is the Breath? What is the meaning behind this? Perhaps there is not some great theological truth to be discovered in contemplating this similarity - but to immediately contradict that statement, there's always something about God for us to discover, and He lays out before us nuggets of great revelation if we but look for them.

Now for some theology which we know about. Both the Son and the Holy Spirit share their origin in the Father (not that they are created - I'm not going to explain the whole theology of the Trinity just now) and each are distinct Persons, therefore it makes sense that the Son and the Spirit wouldn't both be the Word or both be the Breath. One is one, the other is the other. But in procession, the Father is "the first Person" of the Trinity, the Son proceeds from the Father, and the Holy Spirit is the love come from the Father given to the Son in return which the Son gives back to the Father. The Holy Spirit is called "the bond of love" between the Father and the Son, in my imperfect articulation this "completes" the Trinity by manifesting the connection between the two, relating the three.

Perhaps you are confused why I feel the need to explain the Trinity here. Simply put, the Son is not the Spirit, the Spirit is not the Son, they are distinct and carry out different works. I want to establish that the two are different, and as I have done so I now wish to revisit the original question; why do they, by the descriptions of being the Word and the Breath, share this similarity? Both are things which come from the mouth, both have a "movement" of sorts in that they travel, both signify life in some way, and there are many more similarities you could find if you wished.

And so, we return again to the question, what is the meaning behind this similarity between the two Persons? Or, perhaps the question is not what is the greater meaning, but what we can derive from this similarity. From that perspective, we see that both have movement and have action, both convey authority. Let's address each of these concepts.

Movement & Action

Neither is inactive in the Trinity, there is "activity" in the "titles" of the two Persons as the Word and the Breath. The word and breath of a man comes forth from the mouth intentionally, it is not accidental. There is intentionality in both a word and a breath, it is a thing which one does, not a thing which just "happens". Your blood pumping through your body happens and you can't stop it, but you can choose to be silent, or you can choose to hold your breath.

Authority

Words carry meaning, they have power. Words are the authority to name something which does not have a name in and of itself. A rock does not have a name which we must learn, we assign it a name. A child born into this world does not arrive with a name, it is bestowed one by the parents. To speak is to claim authority over reality by naming it - and the very Word of God has authority over all creation by the fact that He is the Word, and in that all creation comes into being through Him.

Breath. To breathe is a rebellion against death in a way, since death involves a ceasing of breathing. To breathe is to declare, passively, that you are a member of the living. But in the Christian lens, to breathe upon something or someone is incredibly powerful. Christ breathes upon the Apostles and Pentecost begins. In Scripture when the breath of God (or written as the "spirit of God" but we know these are the same thing) is upon someone they then have the power of God to a degree. "Whoever's sins you forgive are forgiven, whoever's sins you retain are retained" is a power given to the Apostles at Pentecost. Authority over creation, this comes from the Breath of God being upon you, being within you.

From these concepts we see that God the Word and God the Breath are not passive, God is not apathetic. He is active, He is a creator, He is a mover, He is alive, He is life itself. God is, and God does - meaning God is existence itself, God is the great mover.

But we return to the original questions, which boiled down come out to be "Why do the Word and Breath seem so similar in concept?" I still don't have an answer for this, and I suspect it will take me many more months of prayer and reading and conversation before I come to some sort of conclusion regarding this. What I do know is that there is some sort of mystery here which seems to be forgotten or seldom talked about. What is the message behind one being the Word and the other being the Breath - and then lastly, what is the Father in this question of mystery?

Written for VME Catholic, by Ethan Hall