\u201cI am the one and only\u201d sang Chesney Hawkes in 1991, to great chart success. Sadly for him, it was, pretty much, his one and only hit. According to Collins dictionary, the phrase \u201cThe one and only can be used in front of the name of an actor, singer, or other famous person when they are being introduced on a show.\u201d In my head it\u2019s a phrase that gets used a lot by over excited masters of ceremony at boxing matches and darts matches. \u201cthe one, the only, Phil \u201cthe power\u201d Taylor\u201d, and so on.<\/p>\n
In English we need two words \u2013 one AND only to communicate something about unity and uniqueness. One and only, not divided nor multiplied, but united and unique. One and only \u2013 we need two words. In Biblical Hebrew, however, you only need one word that carries both meanings, which is great, very economical, until you\u2019re trying to translate that word into English and you have to choose one of the meanings to emphasise in your translation. <\/p>\n
If you look at verse four of chapter six of Deuteronomy you\u2019ll see that it says, \u201cHear O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one Lord.\u201d But, you might also see that there\u2019s a footnote to go with the verse, and in that footnote it gives alternative translations, which rather than describing the Lord as one, describe the Lord as the Lord alone. The translation in the main text chooses to emphasise the unity of God, the alternative is to emphasis the uniqueness of God. It isn\u2019t that one is right and one is wrong \u2013 we need both to capture the breadth of meaning in the Hebrew. <\/p>\n
This conclusion is supported by the response of the Scribe in his conversation with Jesus. Having asked his question, and heard Jesus\u2019 reply, he responds, \u201cYou are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him.\u201d That is to say, God is both one and only. <\/p>\n
It may lead to a bit of a dilemma for translators, but I think that this is a gift to us, as it give us an opportunity to look at both of these shades of meaning, to reflect on them, and to think about what difference they make to our relationship with God. And this is the important bit. You see, the next verse goes on to talk about loving God with our whole selves \u2013 our mind, strength, and soul. It seems to me that in order to love someone, you have to know who they are, you have to find out something about them. And that process doesn\u2019t stop as your relationship with them progresses. In fact, in the best of cases it\u2019s like a virtuous spiral. We love someone so we want to know them better, and as we get to know them better, so we love them more, and so on. <\/p>\n
So what does it mean to say that God is one? I\u2019d like to offer three words. Consistent, undivided, and faithful. <\/p>\n
God is consistent. God is the same, yesterday, today and forever. God\u2019s character doesn\u2019t change. God has always been, is now, and will be forever: creative, loving, kind, merciful, patient, just, righteous, holy. God in Eyton in 2018 is the same God who was God in Jerusalem in AD 30 and the same God who was God in the middle of the Sinai desert hundreds of years before that. Sometimes we find this difficult to believe. We read parts of the Old Testament and compare them with the New Testament and wrestle with some of the tensions of the way that God is portrayed. This difficulty is not new. As early in the Christian church\u2019s life as 70 years after Jesus\u2019 return to heaven a man called Marcion of Sinope was arguing that the God of the Old Testament was completely different to the God of the New Testament, cut all the bits out of the Bible that he found objectionable and was left with none of the Old Testament, parts of Luke\u2019s gospel, and ten of Paul\u2019s letters. It was one of the first great doctrinal arguments in the early church \u2013 do we really believe that God is one \u2013 consistent through time and space? We might find it difficult to see that consistency some times, but that is because our vision and understanding are imperfect, and so we choose to submit them to God, and ask that the Holy Spirit might reveal that consistency to us, so that we can know God better, love more deeply, and really mean it when we say, as we did in the words of the creed a few moments ago, \u201cI believe in one God.\u201d <\/p>\n
God is undivided. God\u2019s mind, heart, and self are not divided in any way. I wonder if you ever find yourself in two minds about something. God doesn\u2019t. I wonder if you ever say that your heart wants to do one thing, but your mind another. God doesn\u2019t. Do you ever feel like you\u2019re being torn in two? God doesn\u2019t. God is one: undivided, whole hearted, single minded. It seems to me that we don\u2019t often think about this. When we talk about the Trinity it seems to me that we tend to focus on the three persons of God, Father, Son, Spirit, and on what makes the three distinct. So today, we\u2019re focussing on what they have in common. For they are one. Trying to get our heads round this might cause us to want to go and have a lie down in a darkened room, but we have to grapple with this. This is our beloved we\u2019re talking about. Father, Son, Holy Spirit are not three gods, they are not three parts of God, they are one God, one substance, undivided, more than that \u2013 indivisible. <\/p>\n
God is faithful. Flowing out of God\u2019s consistent character and undivided nature is God\u2019s faithfulness. Even when we are flaky and inconsistent, even when we fail and fall, even when we sin and rebel, God does not abandon us. God is faithful and trustworthy, reliable and dependable. We don\u2019t have the Holy Spirit saying one thing to us, Jesus saying something else and the Father not backing up either. No, they reveal each other to us, they teach us the same things, they are faithful to each other. We can rest in this, even when we don\u2019t understand it all, even when life is hard, and we can\u2019t feel it, we can rest in this. God is faithful.<\/p>\n
So what does it mean to say that God is one? God is one means that God is consistent, undivided, and faithful. <\/p>\n
And what does it mean to say that God is the only? Perhaps it might help to think of different spheres of life, and what it means to say that God is the only God in each of those spheres. <\/p>\n
God is the only God of Belief. The people of God, having been rescued from slavery in Egypt, have been wandering around the desert for 40 years. They are about to enter the Promised Land. In that land, they were going to find all kinds of religious beliefs. There would be sun gods and moon gods, fertility gods and weather gods, gods of the cities and gods of the plains. Before they go into that place God makes a claim. None of those gods are really God. You can\u2019t pick and choose, there is only one God, who is God of all those places, all those aspects of life, the whole of creation, and alone is to be worshipped. Jesus made the same claim about himself, for example in John 3:18, \u201cHe who believes in him is not condemned; he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.\u201d We also live in a society of many religions, it might feel uncomfortable or arrogant to say it, but we are called to bear witness to this claim of God\u2019s to being unique. God is the only God.<\/p>\n
God is the only God of the world. It is not just the gods of religions that God claims primacy over. God is also God over the secular gods of our culture and society. In our world there are competing claims and expressions of power and influence. There are competing political systems and theories, multinational corporations controlling data, finance, and medicines, media forces from CNN to Youtube. These are the elemental forces and energies of our day, that have a massive influence on us and our thinking. But they are not God. God is the only God. <\/p>\n
God is the only God of our hearts. Our gods are the things that we worship, that we prioritise, that we invest our time and energy in that take the place of the one true God. For each of us the temptations will be different. Money, career, family, clothes, reputation, cars, holidays, education. None of these are bad things, in fact they\u2019re all good things, given to us by God. The problem comes when the created takes the place of the Creator, when we give these things a higher place in our hearts, minds, and lives than God. This cannot be if we are to be loving God with our whole selves: body, mind, and soul. God is the only God. <\/p>\n
\u201cHear O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is the one and only.\u201d Consistent, undivided, faithful God of belief, of the world and of our hearts. Worthy of all of our worship, worthy of all of our love, worthy of all of our lives. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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