The LORD
Beyond Roles

[Writer’s Note: As in the prior three Encounters, this is presented as my understanding in part of who Yahweh is and should be considered as opinion only. Consider and decide for yourself.]

If we could remember our first interactions with others, we would have likely perceived them in Roles rather than Relationships. Perception tends to categorize into Roles and it isn’t until we become aware of our emotional interactions that we sense the beginnings of relationships. Both societies and individuals create categories with expectations of those in the Role we assign them to will be how they act if they are to meet those expectations. Jesus challenged two groups, those following John the Baptist and those following tradition, to re-evaluate their perception of what was True:

I tell you, among those born of women none is greater than John. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he.” (When all the people heard this, and the tax collectors too, they declared God just, having been baptized with the baptism of John, but the Pharisees and the lawyers rejected the purpose of God for themselves, not having been baptized by him.) ¹

Notice the Role division, the expectation of those willing to change and those relying upon their own traditions. Jesus goes on to give a simple example of Role expectations:

“To what then shall I compare the people of this generation, and what are they like? They are like children sitting in the marketplace and calling to one another, “‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not weep.’ ²

‘If we do, then you respond to our expectation.’ Using childish games make the example less threatening but then Jesus applies the lesson:

For John the Baptist has come eating no bread and drinking no wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’ The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is justified by all her children.” ³

We learn to perceive those nearest ourselves through our senses and the interactions we have with them. That interaction typically grows into our relational view of life. The infant is in the most basic of roles, one needing others to provide for their care. That care can be provided through a couple different levels of caregiver relationships. We prefer to believe the infant will have a nurturing relationship in which not only are needs like food, shelter and security provided but nurturing would also include positive emotional support, tenderness, understanding, empathy, touch and positive care. Think of the infant expressing needs and those who respond in the meeting of those needs and how that shapes the early understanding of relationships, care, nurture, identity as part of the family. Now take that thought and apply it to the LORD making Himself known to His created ones. Would it not seem most likely to be by relational comparisons?

Masters, treat your bondservants justly and fairly, knowing that you also have a Master in heaven. ⁴

This allusion to the LORD from Colossians likens the LORD to a Master and disciples as bondservants. We have two roles: God is Master and disciples are bond servants; there is also the parallel that as a human master of a bondservant is to treat the servant ‘justly and fairly’ that the human master is also to be a servant of the LORD, the Master in heaven. We tend to think of the LORD in roles, the things He does or what we expect of Him, more than in a relational sense. At this point, stop and consider if YHWH is Relational or is simply fits into Roles we observe. While the LORD is known by many titles, these have more to do with the functions than the persons of the LORD. YHWH is not limited to Roles for He is able to be all that He desires to be, express Himself in all the ways He is and do it all in the same time and place. The LORD does not have the limitations we perceive when it comes to expressing who He is. Roles imply a limitation to a particular function at at point in time and space which does not fit the nature of Yahweh.

Think for a moment about the first thing the Scriptures say about God:

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. ⁵

We immediately think of God in the Creator Role—doing, creating, being—but there is no relationship implied in our perception of what God is doing. We lose sight of He is in relationship with Himself while He is creating. We may even think only one Person of Yahweh is involved in the creating but while the Hebrew for ‘God’ is a plural noun suggesting a title He is relational to Himself even before extending the invitation for relationship with God to us. Relationally, He says,

“Let us make man in our image, after our likeness… So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” ⁶

As mentioned, we think of God in Roles as Creator and even when told in Genesis 2:16 that the LORD God spoke to the man, we do not think of the command ‘to not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil’ as relational. We do not consider what is given us as relational but as coming from a role of authority that we likely resist. While the LORD is giving us the groundwork for relating to us, we perceive a Creator withholding something we want on our terms.

When the Creator God continues to reveal Himself, we think of Him as a Role, impersonal rather than Relational. Certainly He does function in roles but there is the likelihood we limit Him to Roles and not Relationships. While we may scoff at earlier generations as old-fashion, treating God as far away, our limiting Him to Roles has that same impact. It is possible we have difficulty with God outside of Roles because we have the mindset that limits God to being a Role-bearer. Our perception of God as infinite or eternal hinders our accepting Him as a Person with personality and being Relational. ‘God’ as expressed in this word is more Title than Relationship. ‘God’ is a substitute for His Name, for His personal identity. In Hebrew, a name was indicative of the nature of the person—example:

‘Moses’ or mōšê in Hebrew literally means ‘drawn out’ as Pharoah’s daughter named him when he was ‘drawn out’ of the water. ⁷

Jesus got into a conversation with a Samaritan woman about God and she immediately took the conversation into doing, Role-related, while Jesus kept taking it Relational:

“But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” ⁸

How do you relate to God if He is spirit? How do you get your head around someone who has presence without the substance or form perceived with our senses rather than our spirit? Here’s a different element for consideration: the LORD is ‘spirit’ in His most basic nature and yet He is ‘Father’ to those who would worship Him. The appearance of our existence is flesh, tangible, touchable, finite, see-able, present. How do we begin to comprehend something that is ‘spirit’? How do we cease seeing individual Roles and come to know the Relational YHWH? How does YHWH become personal instead of a divine concept? How does YHWH make Himself knowable?

In Greek, ‘spirit’ is pneuma and is used for breath and wind as that which is felt but not seen, that which moves, that which emanates from. We easily recognize the effect by sight or feel but the source is unseen yet is still very real. Now take that word and think of the nature of God and how God would make Himself knowable.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men.
The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. ⁹

John 1 is largely about Jesus, the Word of God, who ‘became flesh and dwelt among us’ so we could begin to ‘see His glory’ or as it says in 1 Timothy 3:16,

Great indeed, we confess, is the mystery of godliness: He was manifested in the flesh, vindicated by the Spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among the nations, believed on in the world, taken up in glory. ¹⁰

‘Manifested’ carries the idea of being made visible in a way that can be observed. God who is spirit is not visible in His natural form to that of this creation other than when He ‘makes Himself visible’ as when during the Exodus He led by a pillar of cloud or fire, when He descended upon Mt. Sinai as fire, when the light of His presence caused Moses’ face to glow. With these thoughts as background, let me go into how the LORD revealed Himself in a progression so we could begin to understand His identity. ‘LORD’ is His identity as much as a statement of His nature. His very transcendency beyond what He created inclines us to see Him only in the Role of what He has done and not who He is.

In Exodus, the LORD introduces Himself to Moses as the LORD, then follows up using this name to identify Himself with His character when Moses returns to Him for the second set of tablets after Moses had broken the first:

So Moses cut two tablets of stone like the first. And he rose early in the morning and went up on Mount Sinai, as the LORD had commanded him, and took in his hand two tablets of stone. The LORD descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD. The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.” And Moses quickly bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped. ¹¹

‘LORD’ in these verses is YHWH, the specific name by which the Creator God identifies Himself as not only pre-existing creation but also having all the supreme character which differentiates Him from gods created by mankind. [writer’s note: throughout this website, when we are writing of YHWH, the use of LORD is standard even in the NT where the Sovereign God is being named. [For a deeper dive into YHWH, see Encounter I AM Hebrews] 

Translators have frequently used the simpler titles for God because the Jewish were unlikely to speak the proper name represented by YHWH. Several of the other titles have more to do with Roles the Israelites saw in the LORD—names using the ‘El’ compounds like El Shaddai for God Almighty or El Elyon for God Most High.

In the New Testament Greek, adoni is typically translated as ‘lord’ or ‘Lord’ in the sense of the ‘royal we’ and is the master Role name of God. Theos is frequently translated as God. Both are used of Jesus in quotes from the Old Testament where YHWH is decidedly the object of the quote.

• Kurios is used both of the LORD and man and is written as ‘Lord.’
• Despotes while used of men in classic Greek is used only of the Christ in the NT and is written as ‘Master’ or ‘Sovereign Lord.’
• Rabboni is used of Jesus and is a transliteration of the Hebrew title for teacher into Greek and was used by Mary at the tomb when she recognizes Jesus

There are other titles used for roles such as baal which typically is owner, master, even husband or one to whom we submit such as the Canaanite god Baal. Then there are euphemisms which allude to deity but may or may not be referring to the LORD. And there are all the compound names of God in specific roles, names that transliterate YHWH as Jehovah like:

• Jehovah-Jireh The Lord will Provide GENESIS 22:14
• Jehovah-Rapha The Lord who Heals EXODUS 15:26
• Jehovah-Nissi The Lord My Banner EXODUS 17:15
• Jehovah-Shalom The Lord is Peace JUDGES 6:24
• Jehovah-Raah The Lord My Shepherd PSALM 23:1
• Jehovah-Sabaoth The Lord of Hosts 1 SAMUEL 1:3
• Jehovah-Shammah The Lord is There (Present) EZEKIEL 48:35

These are aspects of who the LORD is and yet none are inclusive of all He is—each is what we would think of as a role or relationship, how God expresses Himself in ways we can recognize.

In the New Testament, Yahweh is known as the Vine, the Vinedresser, Good Shepherd, Advocate, Alpha & Omega, Sanctifier, Savior, King, Almighty, Author, Perfecter, Bread, Life, Way, Rock, Lamb, Cornerstone and another couple hundred more. But these almost always are titles of Roles and do not extend beyond a single facet of how we might relate to Him. There is an inherent danger in limiting the LORD to our favorite roles for then we miss the infiniteness of all that He is beyond and the fullness of the relationship possible in all that He has been, is now and will continue to be forevermore. Roles have the possibility of seeing the LORD through a microscope and missing the broadness of the telescopic panorama of His broadness. Roles may become finite but the LORD is and always will be Infinite.

My Mother’s generations had a popular song “Don’t Fence Me In” and while the lyrics aren’t about the LORD, it could be that too often we do ‘fence in’ the LORD and create a ‘too small’ view of who He actually is. If our goal as disciples is to know YHWH relationally, we likely want to know Him as all He is revealing and not just a few facets of His expression. Something to think about.