This is where a glorious turn takes place. This is why Jesus became incarnate. He became the new man to set right what was wrong, to be the new Adam to a new humanity, to make beautiful a garden that was left to rot. Jesus came to restore the image of God in man, and because of this we are guaranteed “to bear the image of the man in heaven”[3] because he has mended what was previously torn asunder. When the Spirit of Christ changes the heart of man they are made into a new creature.
When considering the communicable attributes of God – those attributes of his that he has graciously shared with his creatures – it’s not often that I think of His being Spirit. Usually I think of attributes like love, kindness, wisdom, grace, or goodness as less abstract than spirit. [1] However, it is true. God is Spirit and has communicated to us – his creatures – a spirit as well.
Understanding what God is, helps us understand what we are, and so the Scriptures indicate that God is indeed Spirit (John 4:24; 2 Corinthians 3:17). However, the scriptures do not indicate that God is merely a Spirit, or another Spirit, but that He is Spirit. The significance of this is subtle, but let me suggest that this demonstrates that all the essential qualities which belong to the perfect idea of Spirit are found in God; that He is self-conscious and self-determining. So if we ask the question “what is God?” beginning with the reality of Him being Spirit, it would necessarily follow that He is “…infinite, eternal, and unchangeable, in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth.”[2] This being the case, it is easy to see that while we are given a spirit, we are at the same time vastly different from God.
