The Other

I have continued to be fascinated by Karl Barth's understanding of God as the wholly Other.

At first the language sounded so idolatrous to me I did not know what to make of it. As I have joyously plodded through his Romans, though, I have come to love his concept. It is his way of comprehending God as something other than the close, pantheistic "god" of the Liberalism in which he was trained and which he had swallowed whole in his early days as a pastor. When Barth had his crisis that led him away from Liberalism, he found in the New Testament and in the writing of the orthodox Protestant theologians a different God entirely. This God was not connected to man in the way that Liberals thought of Him. He was not the "common human spirit" or the universal "Father of all men." This God was the Wholly Other. He was not like us. He was hidden and unknowable except through His own decision to reveal Himself to men. For Barth this revelation was Jesus Christ, and only secondarily was it Scripture. The Bible was the primary witness, the "vehicle" for the revelation of Jesus.

I have come to really enjoy this way of seeing God. When Scripture says that God is "holy," that is exactly what it means - God is "different," "separate," indeed, "Other."

We cannot know God except through Jesus Christ. While I would be unwilling to abandon the objective reliability of the Bible, I would still echo the words of the Apostle Paul as he considers his fellow Jews' faithful, daily study of the Torah,

"For to this day, when they read the old covenant, that same veil remains unlifted [referring to the veil Moses used to cover the glory of God which showed on his face], because only through Christ is it taken away. Yes, to this day whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts. But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit." - 2 Corinthians 3:14-18

Setting aside the fact that the Apostle Paul does not seem to play by the "rules" when discussing the inner workings of the Trinity, I cannot fail to be exhilarated by what this text means! It means that when we turn to Jesus, the real purpose of the Scriptures becomes manifest. When we look Jesus full in the face - via the the witness of the Bible - we take on His image. We look God in the face through Scripture. We reflect His glory through the working of His Word on our hearts as we trust and obey and believe.

We are indeed saved unto glorious things.