The Invisible Father Revealed Through Yeshua the Messiah
Important: this website uses specific Hebraic/Biblical definitions for terms such as God, Messiah, Holy Spirit, Worship and Son of God. Please first read: How To Read This Website.
Introduction
From Genesis to Revelation, the Bible keeps coming back to one simple truth: there is only ONE Almighty God. The prophets declared it, Yeshua confirmed it, and the apostles taught it. Yet over the centuries, church traditions and theological systems have clouded that simple truth. Many sincere believers are no longer sure who God is, who Yeshua is, or how the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit relate to one another.
In this study we let Scripture speak for itself, comparing verse with verse. The Bible teaches that God is Spirit: invisible, immortal, and never seen by human eyes. At the same time, it shows us that this invisible God has made Himself known, and that He did so most fully through Yeshua the Messiah, who came to make the Father known to us.
Together we will look at:
- the oneness of God,
- why the Father is invisible,
- who YHVH was in the Old Testament,
- how Yeshua made the Father known as Father,
- Yeshua as the image of the invisible God,
- who the Holy Spirit is,
- and why worship is directed to the Father through the Son.
Please don’t simply take my word for it. Open your Bible, read the verses for yourself, and test every teaching, including this one, by the Word of God.
Deuteronomy 6:4 (CJB)
4 “Sh’ma, Yisra’el! ADONAI Eloheinu, ADONAI echad [Hear, Isra’el! ADONAI our God, ADONAI is one];
Deuteronomy 6:4 (KJV)
4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD:
In-depth explanation
There Is Only One God
Yeshua did not change the Sh’ma. He confirmed it (Mark 12:29). When He prayed, He called His Father “the only true God”, and the apostle Paul says exactly the same thing.
John 17:3 (NKJV)
3 And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.
1 Corinthians 8:6 (NKJV)
6 yet for us there is one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we for Him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and through whom we live.
Notice how carefully Paul puts it: one God, the Father, from whom all things come, and one Lord, Yeshua the Messiah, through whom all things come. Paul does not speak of two or three Gods. He speaks of one God, and he tells us His name: the Father.
There is only ONE God: the Father.
God Is an Invisible Spirit
Yeshua told the Samaritan woman that God is Spirit. After His resurrection He explained to His frightened disciples what a spirit is not: a spirit does not have flesh and bones. Put those two statements side by side and the conclusion is clear. The Father, who is Spirit, cannot be seen with human eyes.
John 4:24 (NKJV)
24 God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”
Luke 24:39 (NKJV)
39 Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself. Handle Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have.”
Paul confirms this twice in his first letter to Timothy:
1 Timothy 1:17 (NKJV)
17 Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.
1 Timothy 6:16 (NKJV)
16 who alone has immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see, to whom be honor and everlasting power. Amen.
The Father cannot be seen. He can only be made known.
The Son Came to Make the Father Known
This is exactly why Yeshua came. He did not come to replace the Father, or to be a second God beside Him. He came to declare Him: to show us who the Father is through His words, His works and His character.
John 1:18 (NKJV)
18 No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.
Colossians 1:15 (NKJV)
15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
YHVH: The Visible One of the Old Testament
Careful readers of the Old Testament run into what looks like a puzzle. On the one hand, God tells Moses that no man can see Him and live. On the other hand, the same chapter says that YHVH spoke with Moses face to face, and elsewhere He appears to Abraham, Jacob and others.
Exodus 33:20 (NKJV)
20 But He said, “You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live.”
Exodus 33:11 (NKJV)
11 So the LORD spoke to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend.
Yeshua Himself gives us the key. He told the religious leaders of His day that they had never heard the Father’s voice or seen His form, not even at Sinai. They called the Father their God, yet they did not know Him.
John 5:37 (NKJV)
37 And the Father Himself, who sent Me, has testified of Me. You have neither heard His voice at any time, nor seen His form.
John 8:54-55 (NKJV)
54 …It is My Father who honors Me, of whom you say that He is your God. 55 Yet you have not known Him, but I know Him…
Matthew 11:27 (NKJV)
27 …no one knows the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.
So who did Israel see and hear? The One who appeared, spoke and led them as YHVH was the Son, before His birth as a man, in a heavenly, angel-like body: the Angel of YHVH. About this Messenger, God said something remarkable:
Exodus 23:20-21 (NKJV)
20 “Behold, I send an Angel before you to keep you in the way and to bring you into the place which I have prepared. 21 Beware of Him and obey His voice; do not provoke Him, for He will not pardon your transgressions; for My name is in Him.
In the Bible, a name is more than a word. It stands for who someone is: his identity, his character and his authority. When God says “My name is in Him”, He means that His own authority and identity rested on this Messenger.
This Messenger carried God’s Name and represented Him so completely that those who met Him could say they had seen God (Genesis 32:30). The New Testament tells us who He was. When Isaiah saw YHVH on His throne (Isaiah 6), John says Isaiah saw the glory of Yeshua. And Paul writes that the Rock who followed Israel in the wilderness was the Messiah.
John 12:41 (NKJV)
41 These things Isaiah said when he saw His glory and spoke of Him.
1 Corinthians 10:4 (NKJV)
4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ.
YHVH and YHVH
Sometimes Scripture shows the visible YHVH speaking about the higher God above Him. A clear example is found in Zechariah:
Zechariah 3:2 (NKJV)
2 And the LORD said to Satan, “The LORD rebuke you, Satan! The LORD who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is this not a brand plucked from the fire?”
YHVH speaks, and calls on YHVH, the One who has chosen Jerusalem, to rebuke Satan. The visible One appeals to the authority of the invisible God above Him. We see the same relationship in Psalm 110:
Psalm 110:1 (NKJV)
1 The LORD said to my Lord, “Sit at My right hand, till I make Your enemies Your footstool.”
Here the invisible God speaks to the Messiah and seats Him at His right hand. Yeshua Himself applied this verse to the Messiah (Matthew 22:41-45). It is the same relationship He described during His life on earth: He did nothing on His own, but the will of the Father who sent Him (John 5:30).
So we need to read carefully. Not every YHVH in the text is the invisible Father, and we should not simply replace YHVH with “Yeshua” either, as if that were a translation of the Hebrew. But every time YHVH was seen and heard, it was the Son.
The Father Revealed as Father
Then who is the Father, and what is His name? Scripture does not give us a personal name of the Father that we are told to use. What Yeshua gave us is far deeper: He made the Father known as Father.
John 17:6 (NKJV)
6 I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given Me out of the world. They were Yours, You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word.
John 17:26 (NKJV)
26 And I have declared to them Your name, and will declare it, that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them.
The disciples did not need to learn a hidden combination of letters. They needed to come to know the Father Himself: His character, His love and His care. That is why Yeshua taught them to pray “Our Father”, and why He Himself called Him “Abba, Father” (Mark 14:36).
Israel never saw or heard the Father. The One they saw and heard was the Son, and the Son has made the invisible God known to us as Father.
God Revealed in the Flesh Through Yeshua
In the New Testament, the same Son came again, this time in a human body, to make the Father known. Yeshua was conceived by the Holy Spirit in the womb of Mary.
Matthew 1:20 (NKJV)
20 …for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.
Yeshua walked among people as the visible image of the invisible God. He spoke the Father’s words, did the Father’s works and showed the Father’s character. That is why He could say:
John 14:9 (NKJV)
9 …He who has seen Me has seen the Father…
Yeshua was truly human, and the fullness of God dwelt in Him. He was not the Father Himself, but the perfect image of the Father in human form.
Colossians 2:9 (NKJV)
9 For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.
At the cross, the difference between the Father and the Son could not be clearer. The Son cried out to His God:
Matthew 27:46 (NKJV)
46 …”My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”
After His resurrection, Yeshua received a glorified, immortal body. Today He sits at the right hand of God, exactly where Psalm 110 said He would be.
Yeshua is not the invisible Father. He is the One through whom the Father became visible to us.
The Holy Spirit Is Not a Separate God
Luke describes how Yeshua’s conception took place:
Luke 1:35 (NKJV)
35 And the angel answered and said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you…”
Look closely at the two lines: “the Holy Spirit will come upon you” and “the power of the Highest will overshadow you”. They describe one and the same event. And yet Yeshua never calls the Holy Spirit His Father. He always calls God the Father His Father. That simple observation says a lot: the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Father Himself, His presence and His power at work. He is not a second or third divine being standing beside Him.
Yeshua said it this way to His disciples:
Matthew 10:20 (NKJV)
20 for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you.
This fits perfectly with what we read earlier: God is Spirit. The Father and His Spirit are not two Gods, but one and the same God. The Father remains invisible in heaven, and His Spirit is His active presence, working in heaven and on earth.
In the End, God Will Be All in All
Paul looks ahead to the very end of the story. When everything has been placed under the Son, the Son Himself will place Himself under the Father, and give the Kingdom back to Him.
1 Corinthians 15:27-28 (NKJV)
27 For “He has put all things under His feet.” But when He says “all things are put under Him,” it is evident that He who put all things under Him is excepted. 28 Now when all things are made subject to Him, then the Son Himself will also be subject to Him who put all things under Him, that God may be all in all.
Even at the end of all things, the order stays the same: the Father is God over all, and the Son honors Him.
Worship the Father Through the Son
Yeshua prayed to the Father, obeyed the Father and honored the Father. When His disciples asked Him how to pray, He did not point them to Himself or to the Spirit. He taught them to speak to the Father.
Matthew 6:9 (NKJV)
9 In this manner, therefore, pray: Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name.
Yeshua never pointed people toward human traditions, but toward the will of the Father and the truth of Scripture. To follow the Son is to follow His example: worshipping the Father in spirit and in truth, through Him.
Yeshua: The Image of the Invisible God
The central message of the Bible is not the worship of several divine persons. It is the revelation of the ONE invisible God through His Son, Yeshua the Messiah. Paul calls the Messiah the image of God, and warns that the god of this age works hard to keep people from seeing that light.
2 Corinthians 4:4 (NKJV)
4 whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.
Time is short, and many voices compete for our attention. Don’t build your faith on tradition, not even on this website. Open the Bible, test everything, and return to the foundation Yeshua Himself gave us: to know the only true God, and the One He has sent.
There is ONE God, the invisible Father, and He has made Himself known through His Son, Yeshua the Messiah.
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>> The Name, the Nature and the Revelation of God the Father <<
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