Nature of God

The Church of the Nazarene's first Article of Faith describes God as 'one eternally existent, infinite God, Sovereign of the universe...holy in nature, attributes, and purpose.' God is eternal, self-existent, all-knowing, all-powerful, omnipresent, perfectly holy, perfectly just, and perfectly loving. He is not an impersonal force but a personal being who creates, sustains, communicates, and redeems.

The Wesleyan-Holiness tradition places particular emphasis on God's holiness and God's love as the two supreme attributes that define his nature and purpose. The call to entire sanctification — to be holy as God is holy — flows directly from the Nazarene understanding of God as perfectly holy. At the same time, Wesley's definition of Christianity as 'perfect love' reflects the conviction that God's essential nature is love (1 John 4:8, 4:16).

The Nazarene God is also deeply personal: his relationship with human beings through Christ and the Spirit is the center of spiritual life. The Holiness Movement has always emphasized the experiential reality of God's presence — 'the blessing of a clean heart' that can be known and felt — consistent with Wesley's own insistence on religion of the heart rather than mere formal observance.