What does it mean that God is Almighty?

This title for God is first mentioned in Genesis 17:1. In seven instances the word, God [El], which we have already considered, is combined with Shaddai, generally translated The Almighty. Some interpret the name as "Almighty in sustaining resources" (as the mother's breasts for her babe). It occurs 48 times in the Old Testament, of which number the Book of Job claims no less than 31 instances. In that Book the thought stands out pre-eminently that the Lord is Almighty.

It would seem to be much in character with this Book, where we have the story of the controversy God had with Job, who got no relief or blessing till he arrived at a right estimate of himself in the presence of God. Chapter after chapter Job sought to vindicate his own self-righteousness in controversy with his three friends. Finally God spoke to him, which brought him to the true confession, "I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye sees Thee. Wherefore I ABHOR MYSELF AND REPENT IN DUST AND ASHES" (Job 42:5-6). And so Job found his highest blessing in this discovery, and learned at last that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy (James 5:11).

"And I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, by the name of God Almighty, but by My name Jehovah was I not known unto them" (Ex. 6:3). The answer is, that up to the time of the burning bush, though the name of Jehovah occurs frequently on the sacred page, yet in God's oral communications with the early patriarchs the meaning of the word, Jehovah, was not fully revealed, but He presented Himself again and again as the Almighty God. They knew the name, but did not know its significance.

Having experienced the futility of his own efforts to obtain the promised heir, and having been kept waiting until he is ninety and nine, and thus realized his utter weakness, the LORD appeared to Abraham and revealed Himself as "the Almighty God." This, as it has been pointed out, was a great advance upon former communications. In Genesis 15, we have read that God revealed Himself to Abraham as his shield and exceeding great reward. There it was a revelation of what God was for Abraham; here it is a revelation of what God is in Himself.

If then, God is Almighty, God's purposes and promises will surely come to fruition, however impossible their fulfilment may appear to nature, and sight, and the flesh. Abraham only has to remember that God is Almighty and at once every difficulty will disappear, every obstacle will be surmounted, and in quiet faith and patience he will be enabled to wait for God to act in God's own time. No longer is Abraham to expect anything from nature. Everything depends upon God from first to last.

If God covenants to bless by His Almighty power, there must, on our side, be no confidence in the flesh or allowance of its activity. For the believer today, circumcision is, we know, "of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God" (Rom. 2:29). The refusal of the flesh is not to be merely an outward neglecting of the body of which the world can take account, but the refusal of the flesh in all its inward workings in the heart — its self-confidence, self-righteousness, vanity and lusts — as that which has been condemned in the cross (Col. 2:11).

Here is the then characteristic revelation of Himself, and farther than this none of the patriarchs ever advanced. El Shaddai (God Almighty) is the substance of the distinctive truth on which the fathers flourished. Here was that which especially became their joy and their source of strength. This they learned in the face of all difficulties and of every foe. "I am the Almighty God."

He needed to be the Almighty God to bring about the blessedness He is here speaking of. The connection of El Shaddai, I repeat, is not with putting down foes, but, wonderful to say, with Abram's walk before Him! "Be thou perfect."

He never felt so overwhelmed in the presence of God, just because he had never been so near Him in spirit before. "He fell upon his face, and God talked with him." Yes, Abram is in the dust before Him. It is not worship at the altar, nor a sacrifice to secure a promised gift, but communion: God deigns to talk with Abram.

"And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God, the Almighty, is the temple, and the Lamb. And the city hath no need of the sun, nor of the moon, that they should shine on it." No earthly nor even heavenly lights of the old creation are wanted there. "For the glory of God lightened it, and the light [literally, lamp] thereof is the Lamb."