Chapter 2: The Nature of Spirit and Dake’s Materialistic Error

There is a profound difference between asking “What is God made of?” and asking “Who is God?” The first question assumes God is composed of some substance we can analyze and categorize, while the second opens us to encounter the living God who reveals Himself in Scripture. Unfortunately, Finis Jennings Dake fell into the trap of the first question, reducing the infinite God to what amounts to a super-powered human being with a physical body. This fundamental error about God’s nature as Spirit undermines the entire biblical doctrine of omnipresence and leads to a cascade of theological problems that ultimately present us with a different god altogether—one who bears more resemblance to the mythological deities of ancient Greece and Rome than to the God revealed in Scripture.

When Jesus spoke to the Samaritan woman at the well, He made one of the clearest statements about God’s nature found anywhere in Scripture: “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:24, NKJV). This simple yet profound declaration establishes the foundation for understanding how God can be truly omnipresent. Yet Dake’s teachings systematically dismantles this foundation, replacing it with a materialistic view that confines God to a physical body that must travel from place to place. This chapter will examine the biblical teaching about God as Spirit, expose Dake’s materialistic errors in detail, and demonstrate why getting this doctrine right is essential for true worship and proper theology.

1. Biblical Teaching on God as Spirit

The declaration “God is Spirit” (John 4:24) stands as one of the most important theological statements in all of Scripture. The Greek word used here is pneuma, which corresponds to the Hebrew word ruach used throughout the Old Testament. Both words fundamentally mean “breath” or “wind,” pointing to something that is real and powerful yet invisible and immaterial. When Scripture declares that God is Spirit, it is making a statement about His very essence and nature, not merely describing one of His attributes or modes of operation.

Understanding what it means for God to be Spirit requires us to grasp several key concepts. First, to be spirit means to be incorporeal—that is, without a physical body. This doesn’t mean God is less real than physical things; rather, it means He exists in a higher mode of being that transcends physical limitations. Second, to be spirit means to be immaterial—not composed of matter or subject to the laws that govern material objects. Third, and perhaps most importantly for our discussion, to be spirit means to be free from spatial limitations—not confined to a particular location or required to move from place to place.

Jesus Himself emphasized this distinction between spirit and physical bodies when He appeared to His disciples after the resurrection. When they were frightened, thinking they saw a ghost, Jesus said, “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” (Luke 24:39, NKJV). This statement is crucial because it shows that even in His glorified resurrection body, Jesus maintained the distinction between spirit and physical flesh. If a spirit “does not have flesh and bones,” how much more does this apply to God the Father, who has never taken on human nature?

The Old Testament consistently presents God as fundamentally different from His physical creation. In Deuteronomy 4:15-16, Moses reminds the Israelites: “Take careful heed to yourselves, for you saw no form when the LORD spoke to you at Horeb out of the midst of the fire, lest you corrupt yourselves and make for yourselves a carved image in the form of any figure.” This warning is significant—God deliberately did not reveal Himself in any physical form at Sinai precisely because He has no physical form to reveal. Any attempt to represent God in physical form would be a corruption, a fundamental misrepresentation of His nature.

The prophet Isaiah emphasizes God’s transcendence over physical creation when he records God’s words: “Heaven is My throne, and earth is My footstool. Where is the house that you will build Me? And where is the place of My rest?” (Isaiah 66:1, NKJV). This poetic language doesn’t mean God literally sits on heaven with His feet on earth—such an interpretation would make God absurdly physical and limited. Rather, it expresses God’s infinite transcendence over all creation. No physical space, not even the entire universe, can contain Him.

The Apostle Paul, writing to Timothy, describes God as “the King eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise” (1 Timothy 1:17, NKJV). Notice that God is described as invisible—not temporarily hidden or choosing to be unseen, but inherently invisible because He is spirit. Paul further emphasizes this in 1 Timothy 6:16, describing God as “dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see.” The reason no one can see God is not because He is too far away or because He chooses to hide, but because He is spirit and therefore has no physical form to be seen with physical eyes.

This understanding of God as Spirit is essential for comprehending His omnipresence. A physical body, by definition, can only be in one place at one time. It occupies space and is bounded by spatial limitations. Even if we imagine a body of infinite size (which is itself a logical contradiction), it would still be extended in space rather than truly present everywhere in the way Scripture describes God’s presence. But spirit, being immaterial and non-physical, is not bound by these limitations. God can be fully present everywhere simultaneously precisely because He is not a physical being who must travel from place to place.

2. Dake’s Materialistic View Exposed

Against this clear biblical teaching, Finis Dake presents a shockingly materialistic view of God that reduces Him to essentially a glorified human being with a physical body. In his influential work “God’s Plan for Man,” Dake makes the astounding claim: “God has a spirit body. He has a personal spirit body—a real form of being having corporeal and tangible parts.” This statement alone should raise immediate red flags for anyone familiar with basic Christian theology, as it directly contradicts Jesus’ statement that “a spirit does not have flesh and bones” (Luke 24:39).

But Dake goes even further in his materialistic descriptions. He writes, “God has a body and goes from place to place like anybody else” (God’s Plan for Man, p. 57). Think about the implications of this statement. If God “goes from place to place,” then He is not omnipresent. He must leave one location to arrive at another. While God is traveling from heaven to earth to answer a prayer, what happens to heaven in His absence? Who maintains the universe while God is in transit? These absurd scenarios flow naturally from Dake’s materialistic premises.

Dake is even more explicit in his Annotated Reference Bible, where he states that “God also has many other means of travel and goes from one place to another bodily as all other beings in existence. He is omnipresent, but not omnibody.”¹ This remarkable statement attempts to maintain omnipresence while insisting on God’s localized physical body—a logical impossibility that Dake never adequately resolves.

Dake’s materialistic view extends to his understanding of heaven itself. He describes heaven not as a spiritual dimension or the dwelling place of the infinite God, but as “a material planet”² where God lives much like humans live on earth. In his theological system, God wears clothes, eats food, sits on a literal throne, and even needs to rest. He writes about God having “hands,” “feet,” “eyes,” “ears,” “mouth,” “heart,” and other body parts—not as anthropomorphic descriptions to help us understand God’s actions, but as literal physical organs.

In his comprehensive listing of what he calls “63 Facts About God,” Dake insists: “He is a person…He has a spirit body…Shape…Form…Image and likeness…Back parts…Heart…Hands…Fingers…Right hand…Mouth…Lips…Tongue…Feet…Eyes…Ears…Head…Hair…Arms”³ and continues enumerating supposed body parts with extensive Scripture references that he interprets with wooden literalism.

This teaching finds its most detailed expression in Dake’s discussion of what he calls “God’s form.” He argues that when Scripture says humans are made in God’s image, it means we physically resemble God’s physical body. Dake writes: “God’s body is like that of a man, for man was created in His likeness and His image bodily…He can have a spirit-substance body and still be like man in size and shape.”⁴ He takes passages that use anthropomorphic language about God and interprets them with a wooden literalism that ignores genre, context, and the whole counsel of Scripture.

For instance, when the Bible speaks of God’s “eyes” seeing everything (Proverbs 15:3), Dake understands this to mean God has literal physical eyes, apparently missing the logical problem that physical eyes can only see what is within their line of sight and cannot see “everything” simultaneously.

Perhaps most troubling is how Dake handles John 4:24, where Jesus explicitly states “God is Spirit.” Rather than accepting this clear declaration, Dake attempts to redefine what “spirit” means to fit his materialistic framework. In his note on this passage, he argues: “God is a Spirit Being, not the sun, moon, stars; nor an image of wood, stone, or metal; and not beast or man. He is not the air, wind, universal mind, love or some impersonal quality. He is a person with a personal spirit body, a personal soul, and a personal spirit, like that of angels, and like that of man except His body is of spirit substance instead of flesh and bones.”⁵ This effectively empties the word “spirit” of its meaning, making it merely another type of physical substance rather than something fundamentally different from physicality.

Dake further elaborates on this materialistic conception of spirit, insisting that “Spirit bodies must consist of material and bodily form in order to appear to men and make contact with them bodily as we have seen that spirit beings do. Spiritual substance is as real as natural substance, except that it is of a higher type of matter and is governed by higher laws.”⁷ Here Dake explicitly redefines “spiritual” to mean simply a “higher type of matter,” fundamentally collapsing the distinction between spiritual and material reality that Scripture consistently maintains.

The practical implications of Dake’s view become even more problematic when we consider prayer and worship. If God has a physical body and must travel from place to place, how can He hear the prayers of millions of believers simultaneously around the world? Dake’s answer involves God being able to “feel” people’s presence even when His body is elsewhere—a concept we’ll examine more thoroughly in Chapter 4. He attempts to distinguish between “omnipresence” and what he calls “omnibody,” stating: “God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are all present where there are beings with whom they have dealings; but they are not omnibody, that is, their bodies are not omnipresent. All three go from place to place bodily as other beings in the universe do.”⁶ But this explanation only compounds the problems, replacing the biblical doctrine of omnipresence with a vague notion of “felt presence” that has no scriptural support.

Dake’s fullest explanation of his concept of omnipresence reveals just how far he departs from orthodox Christianity. He writes at length: “Spirit beings, including God, Himself, cannot be omnipresent in body, for their bodies are of ordinary size and must be at one place at a time, in the same way that bodies of men are always localized, being in one place at a time. God, angels, and other spirit beings go from place to place bodily as men do; but their presence can be any place in the universe—wherever there are other persons who also have the sense of presence enough to feel the presence of others regardless of bodily distance between them.”⁸ This remarkable statement reveals that for Dake, God’s omnipresence is not actual presence but merely felt presence—a psychological phenomenon rather than an ontological reality.

To illustrate this concept, Dake provides a personal analogy: “While I write I feel the presence of my wife and children who are hundreds of miles away at this time. They are in my thoughts, my plans, my life, and all that I do. I do nothing without them, yet they are far away. I am building a home for them to move into. I plan for them. I see them in the new home. I experience the thrill of having them with me. They are here in spirit and presence, planning with me, and we are working together to the same end in life. This presence is constant, though distance separates bodily at times.”⁹ This analogy is telling—Dake reduces God’s omnipresence to the emotional and psychological awareness one has of absent loved ones, a far cry from the biblical teaching that God is actually, essentially, and substantially present everywhere.

3. The Category Error of Physical Limitation

Dake’s fundamental error lies in what philosophers call a “category mistake”—applying physical categories and limitations to a spiritual being. It’s like asking “What color is the number seven?” or “How much does justice weigh?” The question itself is malformed because it applies categories from one realm (physical properties) to something that exists in an entirely different category (abstract concepts or spiritual realities). When Dake insists that God has a body that travels from place to place, he is making precisely this type of category error.

To understand why spirit cannot be spatially limited, we must grasp the fundamental distinction between presence and location. Physical objects have location—they occupy a specific portion of space to the exclusion of other objects. A chair is in this room, not that room. A person is here, not there. Location implies boundaries, limits, and exclusion. But presence, particularly divine presence, operates on an entirely different principle. God’s presence is not about occupying space but about His active power, knowledge, and essence being fully operative everywhere simultaneously.

Consider the analogy of human consciousness (though all analogies about God are imperfect and limited). Your consciousness is present throughout your body—you can simultaneously feel sensations in your fingers and toes, think about multiple concepts, and be aware of various inputs. Yet consciousness itself has no physical location we can point to. It’s not “in” your brain in the same way water is in a cup. Similarly, but infinitely more so, God’s spiritual presence permeates all creation without being physically located in any particular place.

Dake’s confusion becomes especially apparent in his treatment of biblical anthropomorphisms—those passages where Scripture speaks of God in human terms to accommodate our understanding. When the Bible speaks of God’s “hand” or “eyes” or “feet,” it is using metaphorical language to help us understand God’s actions and attributes. The “hand of God” refers to His power and action; the “eyes of God” refer to His omniscient awareness; the “feet of God” refer to His presence and activity. These are literary devices, not anatomical descriptions.

The impossibility of a localized omnipresent being becomes clear when we think through the logical implications. If God has a physical body in a specific location, several contradictions immediately arise. First, He cannot be truly omnipresent—at best, He could be very fast at traveling between locations, but this is not omnipresence. Second, He would be subject to the limitations of space and time, making Him a creature within creation rather than the Creator who transcends creation. Third, He would be composed of parts (head, hands, feet, etc.), contradicting the doctrine of divine simplicity which teaches that God is not composed of parts but is absolutely unified in His being.

Furthermore, if God were physically limited to a body, He would be subject to all the constraints that come with physicality. Physical bodies can be obstructed—would a wall block God’s vision? Physical bodies experience succession of time—would God have to wait for information to travel to Him? Physical bodies can only interact with what they can physically touch or influence—how then could God uphold the entire universe simultaneously? These questions reveal the absurdity of applying physical limitations to God.

The Scripture consistently presents God as transcending all physical limitations. “Can anyone hide in secret places so I shall not see him?’ says the LORD; ‘Do I not fill heaven and earth?’ says the LORD” (Jeremiah 23:24, NKJV). This verse makes no sense if God has a physical body. How can a body “fill” heaven and earth? The only coherent understanding is that God, being spirit, is present by His essence throughout all creation, not physically extended like a gas filling a container, but spiritually present in His fullness everywhere.

4. Anthropomorphisms in Scripture

One of the most significant interpretive errors in Dake’s theology is his failure to properly understand and interpret anthropomorphic language in Scripture. Anthropomorphism, from the Greek words anthropos (human) and morphe (form), is a literary device where human characteristics are attributed to non-human entities—in this case, to God—to help us understand divine actions and attributes in terms we can grasp. This is not deception or inaccuracy; it is divine accommodation to human limitations in understanding infinite realities.

The Bible is filled with anthropomorphic descriptions of God, and for good reason. How else could infinite, spiritual realities be communicated to finite, physical beings? When Scripture speaks of God’s “eyes” searching throughout the earth (2 Chronicles 16:9), it is conveying the truth of God’s omniscient awareness in terms we can understand. We know what it means to search with our eyes, so this language helps us grasp something of God’s comprehensive knowledge, even though God doesn’t have physical eyeballs that move from side to side.

Consider how Scripture itself indicates these descriptions are not literal. In Psalm 91:4, we read, “He shall cover you with His feathers, and under His wings you shall take refuge.” Does this mean God is a giant bird? Of course not! Even Dake wouldn’t argue for divine feathers. This is clearly metaphorical language expressing God’s protection and care. Yet when the Bible uses similar anthropomorphic language about God’s hands or eyes, Dake suddenly insists on rigid literalism. This inconsistent hermeneutic reveals the arbitrary nature of his interpretive method.

The principle of accommodation is crucial for understanding biblical language about God. John Calvin explained this principle well when he wrote that God, in revealing Himself to us, “accommodates Himself to our capacity” and “descends to our littleness.” Just as a parent might get down on hands and knees to relate to a small child, or use simple words to explain complex concepts, so God condescends to use human language and imagery to reveal infinite truths to finite minds. This is an act of divine grace, not divine deception.

The Bible itself provides clear examples of how anthropomorphisms should be understood. In Psalm 94:9, the psalmist asks, “He who planted the ear, shall He not hear? He who formed the eye, shall He not see?” Notice the logic here: God is not being described as having physical ears and eyes, but as the one who created ears and eyes. The point is that the Creator of sensory organs certainly possesses the faculties of knowledge that these organs provide to creatures, but in an infinitely higher and non-physical way.

Let’s examine several specific anthropomorphisms and their proper interpretation:

God’s Eyes: “The eyes of the LORD are in every place, keeping watch on the evil and the good” (Proverbs 15:3, NKJV). Physical eyes can only see what is within their field of vision and range. They cannot be “in every place” simultaneously. This verse is clearly teaching God’s omniscient awareness of all that occurs everywhere, not describing literal eyeballs distributed throughout the universe.

God’s Hand: “Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save” (Isaiah 59:1, NKJV). A literal reading would be discussing the length of God’s physical arm. But the context makes clear this is about God’s power to save. The “hand” represents power and ability to act, not a physical appendage with fingers and joints.

God’s Feet: “Thus says the LORD: ‘Heaven is My throne, and earth is My footstool. Where is the house that you will build Me? And where is the place of My rest?'” (Isaiah 66:1, NKJV). If taken literally, this would make God a being so large that He sits on heaven with His feet on earth. But the very next phrase shows this is not literal—God asks where a house could be built for Him, emphasizing that no physical structure could contain Him.

The danger of misinterpreting anthropomorphisms extends beyond mere academic error. When we literalize these descriptions, we create an idol—a god made in man’s image rather than understanding man as made in God’s image. The Second Commandment forbids making any physical representation of God precisely because God is spirit and any physical representation would be a fundamental misrepresentation. Dake’s theology, by insisting on a physical God with a body, violates this commandment conceptually even if not materially.

Furthermore, the New Testament’s interpretation of Old Testament anthropomorphisms provides guidance for our understanding. When Stephen, in Acts 7:48-49, quotes Isaiah 66:1 about heaven being God’s throne and earth His footstool, he uses it to argue that “the Most High does not dwell in temples made with hands.” Stephen understood this as figurative language emphasizing God’s transcendence, not a description of God’s physical posture.

5. Church History’s Consistent Witness

Throughout the history of Christian theology, the church has consistently affirmed that God is spirit and does not possess a physical body. This unanimous testimony from diverse theological traditions across two millennia stands as a powerful witness against Dake’s novel materialistic interpretation. From the earliest church fathers through the medieval scholastics, from the Protestant Reformers to modern evangelical theologians, the incorporeality of God has been considered a fundamental, non-negotiable doctrine of orthodox Christian faith.

The early church fathers were particularly clear on this point, often having to defend the spiritual nature of God against pagan philosophies that conceived of the gods in physical terms. Origen of Alexandria (185-254 AD), one of the most influential early theologians, wrote extensively against the notion that God has a body: “God is not a body, nor is He in a body, but is a simple intellectual nature, admitting within Himself no addition of any kind” (De Principiis, I.1.6). Origen understood that attributing physicality to God would necessarily limit Him and make Him less than truly divine.

Tertullian (155-240 AD), even though he used the term “body” (corpus) in reference to God, meant something entirely different from what Dake proposes. Tertullian used “body” to mean “substance” or “reality,” insisting that God was real and substantial, not that He had a physical form. He explicitly stated that God’s “body” is sui generis (of its own kind), utterly unlike any physical body we know. This nuanced understanding shows that even when early theologians used terminology that might seem to support physicality, they were actually affirming God’s spiritual nature.

Augustine of Hippo (354-430 AD), arguably the most influential theologian in Western Christianity, devoted considerable attention to refuting any physical understanding of God. In his work “On the Trinity,” Augustine writes: “God is not a body, not the soul, but the creator of both body and soul… He is not contained in any place, but is everywhere whole” (De Trinitate, V.1). Augustine understood that God’s omnipresence requires Him to be spirit, for only spirit can be “everywhere whole” without division or extension.

Augustine’s contribution to this doctrine cannot be overstated. He carefully distinguished between God’s presence and physical presence, explaining that God is present to all things by His power and essence, not by physical extension or location. He wrote, “God is not distributed through space by size, so that half of Him should be in half of the world and half in the other half of it. He is whole in all of it and whole in each part of it” (Letter 187). This profound understanding shaped Christian theology for centuries to come.

Moving into the medieval period, Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) provided perhaps the most philosophically rigorous defense of God’s incorporeality. In his monumental “Summa Theologica,” Aquinas demonstrates through multiple arguments why God cannot have a body. He argues that a body is composed of matter and form, implying composition, while God is absolutely simple. A body is potential (it can change), while God is pure actuality (unchangeable). A body is limited to a particular place, while God is infinite and omnipresent. Aquinas’s arguments remain influential in both Catholic and Protestant theology to this day.

Aquinas also addressed the issue of biblical anthropomorphisms directly: “Scripture teaches us about God and other spiritual realities by means of likenesses taken from bodily things… When Scripture speaks of God’s arm, the literal sense is not that God has such a member, but only what is signified by this member, namely operative power” (Summa Theologica, I.1.10). This principle of interpretation has been standard in Christian theology throughout history.

The Protestant Reformation, despite its breaks with certain aspects of medieval theology, maintained complete continuity with the historic Christian position on God’s spiritual nature. Martin Luther, though emphasizing God’s revelation in Christ, never questioned God’s essential spirituality. In his Large Catechism, Luther explains that God is “incomprehensible and invisible,” warning against any attempt to physically conceptualize God apart from His revelation in Christ.

John Calvin, the great Reformed theologian, was particularly emphatic about God’s spiritual nature. In his “Institutes of the Christian Religion,” Calvin writes: “God’s essence is incomprehensible, so that His majesty is hidden far from all our senses” (Institutes I.5.1). Calvin strongly opposed any attempt to materialize God, seeing it as a form of idolatry that reduces the Creator to the level of creation. He explains that anthropomorphic language in Scripture is God’s gracious accommodation to human weakness, not a literal description of God’s being.

The Reformed confessions that followed Calvin maintain this emphasis. The Westminster Confession of Faith (1646), which has influenced Presbyterian and Reformed churches worldwide, declares that God is “a most pure spirit, invisible, without body, parts, or passions, immutable, immense, eternal, incomprehensible, almighty” (WCF II.1). Notice how the confession links God’s spirituality with His other attributes—immutability, immensity (omnipresence), and eternality all flow from and require God’s incorporeal nature.

The London Baptist Confession of Faith (1689), the historic standard for Reformed Baptist churches, uses nearly identical language, demonstrating that this doctrine transcends denominational boundaries within Protestant orthodoxy. Even churches that disagree on baptism, church government, and other issues unite in affirming that God is pure spirit without body or physical form.

Modern evangelical theology continues this unanimous testimony. Leading evangelical theologians of the 20th and 21st centuries—including Carl F. H. Henry, J. I. Packer, Wayne Grudem, John Frame, and numerous others—all affirm God’s incorporeal, spiritual nature as an essential doctrine of the Christian faith. Wayne Grudem, in his widely-used “Systematic Theology,” states clearly: “God is spirit. Jesus tells us that ‘God is spirit’ (John 4:24). Jesus means that God’s being is not like ours. We have physical bodies, but God does not.”

6. The Incomprehensibility of God’s Being

One of the crucial doctrines that Dake’s materialistic view undermines is the incomprehensibility of God—the teaching that while we can know God truly through His revelation, we can never know Him exhaustively or fully comprehend His infinite being. This doctrine maintains appropriate humility in our theology and protects against the presumption of thinking we can fully grasp the infinite God with our finite minds. When Dake reduces God to a being with a physical body who “goes from place to place like anybody else,” he essentially claims to have comprehended God’s being in familiar, human categories.

The incomprehensibility of God doesn’t mean we can know nothing about God—that would be agnosticism. Rather, it means that our knowledge of God, while true and reliable as far as it goes, is always partial, analogical, and accommodated to our creaturely limitations. As Paul writes, “Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out! For who has known the mind of the LORD? Or who has become His counselor?” (Romans 11:33-34, NKJV).

This principle is particularly important when we consider God’s mode of existence as spirit. We have no direct experience of purely spiritual existence. Everything in our experience involves some relationship to physicality—even our own souls are embodied souls, designed to function in union with our bodies. Therefore, when we try to conceive of God as pure spirit, we must acknowledge that we are dealing with a mode of existence that transcends our experiential categories.

The distinction between what we can know and what we cannot know about God has been traditionally expressed through two complementary approaches to theology: cataphatic (positive) theology, which speaks about what God is, and apophatic (negative) theology, which speaks about what God is not. Both approaches are necessary and biblical. Scripture tells us positively that God is love, God is light, God is spirit. But it also tells us what God is not—not mortal, not visible, not physical, not limited.

Apophatic theology is particularly important when discussing God’s spiritual nature because it guards against the tendency to materialize God. When we say God is “incorporeal” (without body) or “immaterial” (without matter), we are using negative language to protect the truth about God from our tendency to think in physical categories. This is not empty negation but necessary theological precision that preserves God’s transcendence.

It’s crucial to distinguish between mystery and contradiction. The doctrine that God is omnipresent spirit contains mystery—we cannot fully comprehend how God can be fully present everywhere simultaneously. But it doesn’t contain logical contradiction. Dake’s view, on the other hand, contains not mystery but contradiction—claiming that God is omnipresent while also having a localized body that travels from place to place. This is not incomprehensible; it is simply incoherent.

The incomprehensibility of God should lead us to approach theology with humility and reverence. When we encounter aspects of God’s nature that transcend our understanding, the appropriate response is not to reduce God to our level of comprehension but to worship Him for His infinite greatness. As David declares in Psalm 145:3, “Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised; and His greatness is unsearchable” (NKJV).

This doctrine also helps us understand why God’s self-revelation in Scripture uses so much analogical and metaphorical language. God is not being unclear or deceptive; He is accommodating infinite truth to finite minds. When Scripture speaks of God as a rock, a fortress, a shepherd, or a father, it is not giving us exhaustive definitions of God’s essence but revealing aspects of His character and relationship to us through analogies we can understand.

7. Dake’s Theological Method Problems

To understand how Dake arrived at such an aberrant view of God’s nature, we must examine the fundamental flaws in his theological method. Dake’s approach to Scripture exhibits several serious methodological errors that, when combined, lead inevitably to theological disaster. These errors include hyper-literalism, failure to distinguish between literary genres, ignoring context, proof-texting without proper synthesis, and an apparent ignorance of historical theology.

Hyper-Literalism: Dake’s most obvious methodological error is his selective hyper-literalism—interpreting certain passages with wooden literalness while ignoring clear indicators of figurative language. This approach is selective because Dake doesn’t apply it consistently. As noted earlier, he doesn’t interpret Psalm 91:4 to mean God has literal feathers, yet he insists God has literal hands and feet. This inconsistency reveals that his literalism is driven not by consistent hermeneutical principles but by his predetermined theological commitments.

True biblical literalism means reading the text according to its intended sense, recognizing that the Bible uses various literary forms including narrative, poetry, prophecy, parable, and apocalyptic literature. Each genre has its own conventions and must be interpreted accordingly. When the psalmist writes poetry about God’s wings or the prophet uses symbolic imagery about God’s throne, reading these as literal physical descriptions violates the very nature of the text.

Failure to Distinguish Genres: Related to his hyper-literalism is Dake’s failure to properly distinguish between biblical genres. He reads Hebrew poetry as if it were scientific description, prophetic symbolism as if it were newspaper reporting, and anthropomorphic accommodation as if it were anatomical documentation. This is like reading Shakespeare’s “All the world’s a stage” and concluding that the earth is literally a wooden platform with curtains.

The Bible itself indicates when language should be taken figuratively. When Nathan tells David the parable of the rich man and the poor man’s lamb (2 Samuel 12:1-4), the text makes clear this is a parable. When Jesus says “I am the door” (John 10:9), no one thinks He is made of wood with hinges. When Isaiah says heaven is God’s throne and earth His footstool (Isaiah 66:1), the cosmic scale itself indicates figurative language—unless we imagine God as a giant being larger than the universe, which creates its own logical problems.

Ignoring Context: Dake’s interpretation frequently ignores both immediate literary context and broader theological context. He pulls verses out of their settings and uses them to support his position without considering what the passages are actually teaching. For instance, when Genesis speaks of God “coming down” to see the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:5), the context makes clear this is anthropomorphic language expressing God’s direct intervention in human affairs, not a description of God traveling from heaven to earth.

The broader theological context of Scripture is equally important. The Bible must be interpreted in light of the whole Bible, allowing clearer passages to illuminate less clear ones. When Jesus explicitly states “God is spirit” (John 4:24) and “a spirit does not have flesh and bones” (Luke 24:39), these clear didactic statements must govern our interpretation of anthropomorphic language elsewhere in Scripture.

Proof-Texting Without Synthesis: Dake’s method relies heavily on proof-texting—citing isolated verses to support his position without engaging in the hard work of theological synthesis. He accumulates verses that mention God’s “hands” or “eyes” as if sheer quantity proves his point, without considering how these verses fit into the Bible’s overall teaching about God’s nature. This is like pulling individual words from various sentences in a book and claiming to have understood the author’s message.

Proper theological method requires synthesis—bringing together all that Scripture teaches on a subject and constructing a coherent understanding that accounts for all the data. When we do this with the biblical teaching about God’s nature, we find that Scripture consistently presents God as infinite spirit who transcends physical limitations while using anthropomorphic language to help us understand His actions and attributes.

Ignorance of Historical Theology: Perhaps most troubling is Dake’s apparent disregard for two thousand years of Christian theological reflection. His teaching on God’s physical body contradicts not just one theological tradition but the unanimous testimony of all major branches of Christianity throughout history. While tradition is not infallible, when someone’s interpretation contradicts what every major Christian theologian for two millennia has understood, it should at least give pause for serious reconsideration.

Dake writes as if he were the first person to read these biblical texts, showing no awareness of or interaction with the rich tradition of Christian interpretation. He doesn’t engage with Augustine’s arguments, doesn’t wrestle with Aquinas’s logic, doesn’t consider Calvin’s exegesis, and doesn’t interact with any contemporary theologians who might challenge his view. This isolation from the broader theological conversation is a recipe for error.

8. Implications of Getting This Wrong

The consequences of adopting Dake’s materialistic view of God extend far beyond an abstract theological error. This fundamental misunderstanding of God’s nature as spirit has devastating implications for virtually every area of Christian doctrine and practice. When we make God physical, we don’t simply adjust one doctrine; we unravel the entire fabric of biblical theology and end up with a different religion altogether—one that more closely resembles ancient paganism or modern Mormonism than biblical Christianity.

God Becomes Finite: The most immediate implication of giving God a physical body is that He becomes finite—limited, bounded, and constrained. A physical body, by definition, has boundaries where it ends and other things begin. It occupies a specific amount of space to the exclusion of other things. It can be in only one location at a time. If God has such a body, He is no longer infinite but finite, no longer unlimited but limited. This fundamentally changes who God is, reducing Him from the infinite Creator to a finite super-being.

The Bible consistently presents God’s infinity as essential to His deity. “Great is our Lord, and mighty in power; His understanding is infinite” (Psalm 147:5, NKJV). If God has a physical body, He cannot be infinite in any meaningful sense. He becomes merely the most powerful being among other beings, the biggest entity among other entities, but not the qualitatively different, absolutely infinite God of Scripture.

This reduction of God to finitude has a cascading effect on other attributes. A finite God cannot be truly eternal (existing beyond time), truly immutable (unchangeable), or truly omnipresent (present everywhere). Each of these attributes requires and implies infinity. By making God physical, Dake inadvertently denies all of these essential divine attributes, leaving us with a god who is powerful but not almighty, knowledgeable but not omniscient, present in many places but not omnipresent.

True Worship Becomes Impossible: Jesus declared that “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:24, NKJV). This statement directly connects God’s spiritual nature with the nature of acceptable worship. If God is not spirit but has a physical body, then the entire basis for spiritual worship collapses. Worship would become a matter of physical approach to a physical being, returning us to the very understanding Jesus was correcting in His conversation with the Samaritan woman.

Consider the practical implications for corporate worship. If God has a physical body located in heaven, then our worship services on earth are attempting to communicate with an absent God who must somehow project His awareness across space to hear us. This is fundamentally different from worshiping a God who is fully present with His people whenever they gather in His name. The promise “where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them” (Matthew 18:20, NKJV) becomes meaningless if Christ (as God) has a localized body that is elsewhere.

Creation of an Idol: Perhaps the most serious implication is that Dake’s view effectively creates an idol—a false god made in man’s image. The Second Commandment forbids not only the making of physical images of God but also the mental conceptualization of God in physical terms. “You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth” (Exodus 20:4, NKJV). This commandment protects the truth about God’s spiritual nature.

When Dake describes God as having a body that “goes from place to place like anybody else,” he is conceptually violating this commandment. He is creating a mental image of God that reduces Him to creaturely categories. This is idolatry of the mind, even if no physical idol is constructed. It replaces the true God with a god of human imagination, more comfortable and comprehensible perhaps, but false nonetheless.

The ancient Israelites made a golden calf and declared, “This is your god, O Israel, that brought you out of the land of Egypt!” (Exodus 32:4, NKJV). They weren’t necessarily denying Yahweh; they were trying to represent Him in a physical form they could understand. God’s fierce anger against this act shows how seriously He takes the attempt to physicalize Him. Dake’s theology, while not creating a physical idol, creates a conceptual one that is equally problematic.

Opens the Door to Other Errors: Once we abandon the biblical teaching that God is spirit, we open the door to a host of other theological errors. If God has a body, why not multiple gods with different bodies? This is the path to polytheism. If God has a physical body, did He evolve or develop? This leads to process theology. If God has a body like ours, are we potentially divine? This opens the door to New Age thinking and the deification of humanity.

We can see this trajectory in Mormonism, which explicitly teaches that God the Father has a physical body of flesh and bones. This leads them to teach that God was once a man who achieved godhood, that humans can become gods, and that there are multiple gods governing different worlds. While Dake doesn’t go this far, his fundamental premise—that God has a physical body—is the same error that leads to these heretical conclusions.

The connection to Greek and Roman mythology is also troubling. The ancient pagan gods were conceived as super-powered beings with bodies who lived on Mount Olympus, traveled from place to place, and intervened in human affairs when it suited them. They were limited, localized, and often in conflict with each other. Dake’s god, who has a body and “goes from place to place like anybody else,” bears an uncomfortable resemblance to Zeus or Jupiter rather than to the God revealed in Scripture.

9. The Biblical Doctrine of Divine Simplicity

One of the most important classical doctrines that Dake’s view contradicts is divine simplicity—the teaching that God is not composed of parts but is absolutely unified in His being. This doctrine, while perhaps challenging to understand, is crucial for maintaining the biblical distinction between Creator and creation. Everything in creation is composite—made up of parts, whether physical parts like atoms and molecules, or metaphysical parts like essence and existence, actuality and potentiality. God alone is absolutely simple, without composition, which is what makes Him God rather than a creature.

Divine simplicity doesn’t mean God is easy to understand (He certainly isn’t!), but rather that He is not composed of parts that could be separated or that came together to form Him. When we say God is love, we don’t mean God has love as one component among others; rather, God’s very being is love. When we say God is just, we don’t mean justice is one of God’s parts; rather, God’s being is justice itself. All of God’s attributes are identical with His essence, though our finite minds must think of them separately.

This doctrine is derived from several biblical truths. First, God is self-existent and independent—”I AM WHO I AM” (Exodus 3:14, NKJV). If God were composed of parts, He would depend on those parts and on whatever brought them together, making Him dependent rather than independent. Second, God is unchangeable—”For I am the LORD, I do not change” (Malachi 3:6, NKJV). If God had parts, He could potentially gain or lose parts, or have them rearranged, making Him changeable. Third, God is perfect—”Your Father in heaven is perfect” (Matthew 5:48, NKJV). Composition implies the possibility of better or worse arrangements, but God cannot be improved.

Now consider what happens to divine simplicity if God has a physical body. A body is necessarily composite—it has parts. Even if we imagine a “spiritual body” (a contradiction in terms), it would still need to have distinguishable parts to be a body at all. Dake speaks of God having hands, feet, eyes, and other parts. This makes God composite, destroying divine simplicity and making God a creature rather than the Creator.

Furthermore, if God has parts, we must ask: What holds these parts together? What prevents them from coming apart? Are the parts essential to God’s being, or could He exist without some of them? These questions reveal the absurdity of applying composition to God. The moment we make God composite, we make Him dependent on something greater than Himself to maintain His unity, which means He is no longer truly God.

The doctrine of divine simplicity helps us understand how God can be omnipresent. If God were composite with a physical body, He could only be present by His parts being distributed through space—part of God here, part there. But because God is simple, He is wholly present everywhere. As Augustine beautifully expressed it, God is “wholly everywhere” (totus ubique). There is not more of God in heaven than on earth, not more of Him in a church than in a home. All of God is fully present at every point in space.

This also helps us understand the relationship between God’s various attributes. God’s omnipresence is not a separate attribute added to His omniscience, which is not separate from His omnipotence. Rather, the one simple God is omnipresent-omniscient-omnipotent. These are different ways our finite minds apprehend the one infinite reality of God’s being. Dake’s physical god, being composite, would have attributes as separate properties, potentially in tension with each other or operating independently.

10. The Incarnation and God’s Spiritual Nature

A proper understanding of the Incarnation actually reinforces rather than undermines the spiritual nature of God. Some might argue, “Didn’t God take on a body in Jesus Christ? Doesn’t this show that God can have a physical form?” This objection, which Dake himself raises, demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of the Incarnation and the doctrine of the Trinity.

The Incarnation is the miracle by which the Second Person of the Trinity, the eternal Son, took upon Himself human nature while remaining fully divine. The key phrase is “took upon Himself”—the Son added human nature to His divine nature without changing His divine nature. The divine nature remained spiritual, infinite, and omnipresent even as the Son also became truly human with a physical body. This is the mystery of the hypostatic union—one person (the Son) with two distinct natures (divine and human).

The Chalcedonian Definition (451 AD), accepted by all orthodox Christian traditions, carefully maintains this distinction. Christ is “recognized in two natures, without confusion, without change, without division, without separation; the distinction of natures being in no way annulled by the union.” The divine nature was not changed into flesh; rather, the Person of the Son united to Himself a complete human nature. The divine nature remained spiritual even as the Son became incarnate.

This is why even during His earthly ministry, Jesus could say, “No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven” (John 3:13, NKJV, some manuscripts). According to His divine nature, the Son remained omnipresent, filling heaven and earth, even while according to His human nature, He walked the roads of Palestine. The Incarnation doesn’t prove God has a body; it proves that the Son took on human nature while maintaining His divine spiritual nature unchanged.

Furthermore, the uniqueness of the Incarnation actually emphasizes that God, in His essential nature, does not have a body. The Bible presents the Incarnation as an unprecedented miracle, a shocking condescension, something that had never happened before and will never happen again. “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14, NKJV) is presented as an astounding event precisely because the eternal Word was not flesh before. If God naturally had a body, the Incarnation would not be miraculous but merely a manifestation of what already was.

The distinction between the Father and the Son in terms of incarnation is also crucial. The Father did not become incarnate; only the Son did. The Father remains pure spirit without any physical form. Dake’s error of attributing a physical body to God the Father contradicts the very nature of the Trinity and the specific role of the Son in taking on human flesh. When Philip asked Jesus, “Show us the Father,” Jesus replied, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (John 14:8-9, NKJV)—not because the Father has a physical form, but because the Son perfectly reveals the Father’s character and nature.

11. How Scripture Describes God’s Omnipresence Without Physicality

When we examine how Scripture actually describes God’s omnipresence, we find that it consistently presents it in terms that exclude physicality. The biblical writers use various metaphors and expressions to convey God’s universal presence, but none of these support the idea of God having a physical body. Instead, they point to a mode of presence that transcends physical categories altogether.

Consider Jeremiah 23:23-24: “‘Am I a God near at hand,’ says the LORD, ‘and not a God afar off? Can anyone hide himself in secret places, so I shall not see him?’ says the LORD; ‘Do I not fill heaven and earth?’ says the LORD” (NKJV). The language of “filling” heaven and earth cannot refer to physical occupation, as no physical body could literally fill all space. Even if we imagined an infinitely large body (itself a logical contradiction), it would displace other objects rather than fill space while allowing other things to exist there. The filling must be understood as spiritual presence that permeates all while displacing nothing.

Psalm 139:7-10 provides one of the most beautiful and comprehensive descriptions of God’s omnipresence: “Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence? If I ascend into heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there Your hand shall lead me, and Your right hand shall hold me” (NKJV). Notice how the psalmist connects God’s presence explicitly with His Spirit, not with a physical body. The “hand” and “right hand” mentioned are clearly metaphorical, representing God’s guidance and support, not literal appendages.

In Acts 17:27-28, Paul declares to the Athenian philosophers that God is “not far from each one of us; for in Him we live and move and have our being” (NKJV). This description presents our entire existence as being “in” God—we live, move, and exist within the sphere of God’s being. This makes no sense if God has a localized physical body. We don’t live inside God’s body; rather, we exist within the realm of His spiritual presence and sustaining power.

The Bible also uses spatial metaphors that, properly understood, emphasize God’s transcendence over space rather than His location in space. When Isaiah sees the Lord “high and lifted up” (Isaiah 6:1), this doesn’t mean God is physically located at a high altitude but represents His transcendent majesty. When Scripture speaks of God dwelling “in heaven,” it doesn’t confine Him to a location but expresses His transcendence over earth. As Solomon recognized at the temple dedication, “Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain You” (1 Kings 8:27, NKJV).

The New Testament continues this emphasis on God’s non-physical omnipresence. Ephesians 1:23 speaks of Christ as “Him who fills all in all.” Colossians 1:17 declares, “He is before all things, and in Him all things consist” (hold together). These passages present Christ’s divine presence as the sustaining power that maintains the existence and coherence of all creation. This is not the presence of a physical body but the presence of divine power and essence.

12. The Testimony of Christian Experience

Throughout church history, Christians have experienced the reality of God’s spiritual omnipresence in ways that confirm the biblical teaching and refute Dake’s materialistic view. Believers in different locations, praying simultaneously, have all experienced God’s presence and answers to prayer. Missionaries entering unreached territories have found God already there, preparing hearts and working in advance of their arrival. These experiences, while not establishing doctrine by themselves, confirm what Scripture teaches about God’s spiritual omnipresence.

Consider the experience of corporate worship. When churches around the world gather on Sunday morning, they all experience God’s presence in their midst. If God had a physical body that could only be in one place, only one congregation could truly have God present. The others would be worshiping an absent God, hoping He might notice them from afar. But the testimony of Christians throughout history is that God is fully present with each gathering of His people, hearing every prayer, receiving every offering of praise, and ministering to every need.

The experience of private prayer provides similar testimony. Christians in their prayer closets around the world, at the same moment, can all experience intimate communion with God. Each one can know that God’s full attention is on them, that He hears their whispers as clearly as if they were the only person in the universe. This would be impossible if God had a localized body that had to divide its attention or travel between supplicants.

Brother Lawrence, the 17th-century Carmelite monk, wrote about “practicing the presence of God”—living in constant awareness of God’s immediate presence. His testimony, recorded in “The Practice of the Presence of God,” describes experiencing God’s presence as immediately in the kitchen while washing dishes as in the chapel during formal prayers. This experience, shared by countless Christians throughout history, witnesses to God’s spiritual omnipresence that requires no physical proximity.

Missionaries have repeatedly testified to finding evidence of God’s work in places where the gospel had never been preached. Don Richardson’s “Eternity in Their Hearts” documents numerous cases of God preparing peoples to receive the gospel through dreams, traditions, and cultural preparations. This preliminary work of God in unreached places demonstrates His presence and activity everywhere, not just where His people or His supposed physical body might be.

The experience of God’s presence in suffering also testifies to His spiritual omnipresence. Christians in prison cells, hospital beds, and circumstances of extreme isolation have testified to God’s immediate presence with them. Corrie ten Boom in a Nazi concentration camp, Richard Wurmbrand in Communist solitary confinement, and countless other suffering saints have experienced God as immediately present in their darkest moments. If God had a physical body located in heaven, He would be absent from these places of suffering.

13. Responding to Potential Objections

Those influenced by Dake’s teaching might raise several objections to the biblical doctrine of God’s spiritual nature. It’s important to address these objections thoughtfully and biblically, showing how the orthodox understanding better accounts for all of Scripture’s teaching while Dake’s view creates more problems than it solves.

Objection 1: “The Bible says we’re made in God’s image, so God must have a body like ours.”

This objection misunderstands what the image of God means. Genesis 1:26-27 says humans are made “in God’s image,” but it doesn’t specify that this image is physical. In fact, the context argues against a physical interpretation. Genesis 1:27 says, “So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them” (NKJV). If the image were physical, would God have both male and female bodies? This shows the image must be something other than physical resemblance.

The image of God refers to those qualities that distinguish humans from animals—our rational nature, moral capacity, relational ability, creative power, and dominion over creation. We reflect God’s character, not His physical form (which He doesn’t have). This is why Scripture can speak of being renewed in God’s image through spiritual transformation (Colossians 3:10) rather than physical change.

Objection 2: “The Bible describes God with body parts—hands, eyes, feet. Why mention them if He doesn’t have them?”

These descriptions are anthropomorphisms—figurative language that describes God’s actions in terms we can understand. The Bible also describes God as a rock (Psalm 18:2), a fortress (Psalm 91:2), a consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29), and a mother hen (Matthew 23:37). Should we conclude God is literally made of stone, brick, flame, and feathers? Of course not. These are metaphors that reveal aspects of God’s character and actions.

The Bible itself indicates these descriptions aren’t literal. When it says God’s eyes are in every place (Proverbs 15:3), physical eyes couldn’t accomplish this. When it says heaven is God’s throne and earth His footstool (Isaiah 66:1), a literal interpretation would make God absurdly large. The biblical writers use bodily imagery to convey spiritual truths about God’s actions and attributes.

Objection 3: “How can God be personal without being physical? Persons have bodies.”

This objection confuses human personhood with personhood as such. Humans are embodied persons, but personhood itself doesn’t require a body. Personhood consists in self-consciousness, rationality, will, and the capacity for relationships. Angels are persons without physical bodies (though they can appear in physical form). Human souls after death and before resurrection remain persons despite being temporarily without bodies.

God is the supreme Person—infinitely self-conscious, perfectly rational, absolutely free in will, and the source of all relationships. He doesn’t need a body to be personal. In fact, a body would limit His personhood by confining Him to one location and preventing Him from being immediately present to all His creatures.

Objection 4: “If God doesn’t have a body, how can He act in the physical world?”

This objection assumes that only physical causes can have physical effects, but this is demonstrably false even in human experience. Our immaterial thoughts and decisions result in physical actions. The immaterial laws of mathematics govern physical processes. If created immaterial realities can affect the physical world, how much more can the Creator who made both spiritual and physical reality?

God acts in the physical world by His power, not by physical contact. He spoke creation into existence (Genesis 1) without hands to shape it. He sustains all things by His powerful word (Hebrews 1:3) without physically holding them. His spiritual presence is more immediately effective than any physical touch could be.

Objection 5: “Dake’s view makes God more relatable and easier to understand.”

Making God easier to understand by making Him less than He is isn’t a virtue—it’s idolatry. We don’t have the right to redesign God to fit our comprehension. Our calling is to worship God as He has revealed Himself, not as we might prefer Him to be. A god who is merely a bigger version of ourselves might be more comfortable to contemplate, but he wouldn’t be worthy of worship.

Moreover, Dake’s view doesn’t actually make God more relatable. A God with a physical body located far away in heaven is less accessible than the omnipresent Spirit who is always immediately present with us. The God who must travel to reach us is less comforting than the God who is already there wherever we go.

14. The Pastoral Implications

The debate over God’s spiritual nature versus Dake’s physical god is not merely academic—it has profound pastoral implications that affect every aspect of Christian life and ministry. Pastors and teachers who embrace or tolerate Dake’s view, perhaps thinking it’s a minor issue, unknowingly undermine the very foundations of Christian faith and practice. Understanding these pastoral implications is crucial for those who shepherd God’s flock and for every believer seeking to grow in faith.

Impact on Prayer Ministry: If God has a physical body that must travel from place to place, the entire basis for confident prayer collapses. How can we know God hears our prayers if He might be elsewhere? How can multiple people pray simultaneously and all be heard? Dake tries to solve this by saying God can “feel” people everywhere, but this vague notion provides no solid foundation for prayer. The biblical promise “Before they call, I will answer; and while they are still speaking, I will hear” (Isaiah 65:24, NKJV) requires an omnipresent God who doesn’t need to travel to hear and answer.

Pastors teaching Dake’s view rob their congregations of confidence in prayer. Instead of approaching a God who is immediately present and attentive, believers would be calling out to a distant deity who might or might not be paying attention. This uncertainty undermines the bold approach to the throne of grace that Scripture encourages (Hebrews 4:16).

Counseling and Comfort: In pastoral counseling, the omnipresence of God provides essential comfort to those suffering. The assurance that God is immediately present in their pain, fully aware of their situation, and actively working even when unseen, sustains believers through trials. But if God has a localized body, He might be absent when people need Him most. The sufferer’s cry, “Where is God?” would have a terrifying possible answer: “Somewhere else.”

Consider ministering to someone on their deathbed. The biblical comfort is that God is right there, ready to receive their spirit, walking with them through the valley of the shadow of death. But Dake’s god might be occupied elsewhere, leaving the dying person to face their final moments hoping God will arrive in time. This is pastoral malpractice of the worst kind.

Teaching on God’s Providence: The doctrine of providence—God’s ongoing governance and care for creation—requires an omnipresent God. Scripture teaches that God “works all things according to the counsel of His will” (Ephesians 1:11, NKJV) and that “in Him all things consist” (hold together, Colossians 1:17, NKJV). This universal providence is impossible for a God with a localized body who must travel between interventions.

When tragedy strikes, believers need to know that God was not absent, that He didn’t fail to arrive in time. The biblical teaching of God’s spiritual omnipresence assures us that God is present in every circumstance, working even through difficulty for His purposes. Dake’s view leaves us with a god who might have been elsewhere when disaster struck, unable to prevent or redeem it.

Impact on Missions and Evangelism: The Great Commission assumes God’s omnipresence. “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations… and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:19-20, NKJV). Missionaries go confidently knowing God is already present wherever they’re sent, preparing the way, working in hearts, orchestrating circumstances. But if God has a physical body, He must travel to each mission field, potentially leaving others unattended.

Furthermore, evangelism proclaims that anyone, anywhere, can call upon the Lord and be saved (Romans 10:13). This universal offer assumes God’s universal presence to hear and respond. Dake’s limited god cannot guarantee immediate presence with every seeking soul, potentially leaving some unable to access salvation because God is elsewhere.

Children’s Ministry Concerns: Teaching children about God’s nature shapes their entire theological framework. Children taught that God has a body like theirs, only bigger, will struggle to understand crucial doctrines as they mature. They’ll imagine God as a superhero rather than the transcendent Creator. This anthropomorphic god becomes an obstacle to mature faith, often leading to crisis when young adults realize the logical problems with such a view.

Children need to learn early that God is spirit, using age-appropriate analogies like the wind—powerful and real but invisible—or like love—not physical but absolutely real and present. Teaching them Dake’s physical god sets them up for either theological confusion or abandonment of faith when they encounter the logical contradictions.

15. Correcting Dake’s Errors with Grace and Truth

While Dake’s errors are serious and must be addressed, our approach to correction should be marked by grace, patience, and love for those who have been misled. Many sincere Christians have been influenced by Dake’s teaching without realizing its implications. They may have found other aspects of his work helpful and assumed his teaching on God’s nature was equally reliable. Our goal is not to win arguments but to help fellow believers know and worship God in truth.

When encountering someone influenced by Dake’s teaching, begin by establishing common ground. Affirm shared convictions about God’s power, God’s love, and the authority of Scripture. Then gently explore the implications of their view through questions: “If God has a physical body in one location, how can He hear prayers from around the world simultaneously?” “How does your view reconcile with Jesus’ statement that God is Spirit?” These questions can help people recognize problems they hadn’t considered.

Focus on Scripture rather than attacking Dake personally. While it’s necessary to identify the source of error, our primary concern should be establishing what the Bible teaches. Walk through key passages like John 4:24, Jeremiah 23:23-24, and Acts 17:27-28, helping people see what Scripture actually says about God’s spiritual nature and omnipresence.

Be patient with the process of theological correction. People who have long held Dake’s view may need time to work through the implications of change. They may have built other beliefs on this faulty foundation and fear that correcting this error will unravel their entire faith. Assure them that abandoning error for truth strengthens rather than weakens faith.

Provide positive alternatives to replace error. Don’t just tear down false teaching; build up true doctrine. Help people see the beauty and comfort of God’s spiritual omnipresence. Show them how this truth enhances rather than diminishes their relationship with God. The goal is not just correct theology but deeper worship of the true God.

Common Questions About God’s Spiritual Nature

Q1: If God is spirit without a body, how did people in the Old Testament “see” God?

A: When Scripture speaks of people “seeing” God, it refers to theophanies—temporary, visible manifestations of God’s presence, not sightings of God’s essential nature. For example, Moses saw the burning bush (Exodus 3), Isaiah saw a vision of the Lord’s throne (Isaiah 6), and Ezekiel saw visions of God’s glory (Ezekiel 1). These were accommodations to human perception, not views of God’s essence. God Himself told Moses, “You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live” (Exodus 33:20, NKJV), and later showed Moses only His “back” or aftereffects of His presence. These were symbolic visions, not physical sightings of a bodily God.

Q2: How can God be everywhere present but not be part of everything (pantheism)?

A: God’s omnipresence means He is present to all things, not that He is identical with all things. Think of it like space—space is present everywhere in the physical universe, but space is not the objects within it. Similarly, but more perfectly, God is present everywhere while remaining distinct from His creation. He is present by His power, knowledge, and sustaining activity, not by being diffused through creation or identical with it. The Creator-creature distinction remains absolute even as God is immediately present to all He has made.

Q3: If God doesn’t have eyes, how does He see? If He doesn’t have ears, how does He hear?

A: God’s knowledge is not dependent on sensory organs like ours. He knows all things immediately and perfectly by virtue of being their Creator and Sustainer. Just as a novelist knows everything about their story without needing to read it, God knows all reality because He is its source. His “seeing” and “hearing” are anthropomorphic ways of describing His perfect, immediate knowledge of all things. He doesn’t need to receive information through senses because He is the source of all that exists.

Q4: Doesn’t the Incarnation prove that God can have a body?

A: The Incarnation actually proves the opposite. It was miraculous precisely because the Second Person of the Trinity took on human nature, something foreign to His divine nature. The Son added humanity to His divinity without changing His divine nature. The Father and the Spirit did not become incarnate and remain purely spiritual. If God naturally had a body, the Incarnation wouldn’t be the unique miracle Scripture presents it as. The wonder of Christmas is that the infinite, spiritual God became also finite and physical while remaining fully God.

Q5: How can I relate personally to a God who is pure spirit?

A: God being spirit actually enables more intimate relationship than if He were physical. A physical God could only be in one place, but the spiritual God is immediately present with each of His children always. You don’t need to travel to find Him or wait for Him to arrive. He is closer than your breath, more immediate than your thoughts. Furthermore, God has revealed Himself personally through His Son, His Word, and His Spirit, making Himself known and accessible despite our limitations. The spiritual nature of God enables, rather than hinders, personal relationship.

Q6: If God is the same everywhere, why do some places feel more sacred or spiritual?

A: While God is equally present everywhere by His essence, He manifests His presence differently in different contexts. Just as the sun is equally present in its fullness whether shining on a mirror or mud, but the mirror reflects it more clearly, so God’s presence may be more evident in certain places due to human factors—faith, worship, dedication to Him, absence of distraction, or historical spiritual significance. The difference is not in God’s presence but in our awareness and the special ways God chooses to manifest Himself in certain contexts.

Q7: How should understanding God as spirit affect my daily Christian life?

A: Understanding God as spirit should transform every aspect of life. In prayer, you can be confident God hears you immediately wherever you are. In temptation, you remember that no sin is hidden from His sight. In suffering, you know God is present in your pain. In worship, you approach Him in spirit and truth rather than mere external forms. In service, you recognize God is already at work wherever He sends you. This truth makes God more accessible, not less—more intimate, not more distant. It removes the anxiety of wondering whether God is present and replaces it with the confidence of His constant presence.

Contrasting With Finis Dake’s Beliefs

To fully understand the severity of Dake’s error, it’s helpful to see his actual teachings placed in direct contrast with biblical orthodoxy. This comparison reveals not minor differences of interpretation but fundamental contradictions that amount to a different god altogether.

On God’s Basic Nature:
Biblical Teaching: “God is Spirit” (John 4:24). God is incorporeal, immaterial, without physical form, transcending all spatial limitations.
Dake’s Teaching: “God has a spirit body… having corporeal and tangible parts” (God’s Plan for Man). God is essentially a physical being with a body like ours, only larger and more powerful.

On God’s Mode of Presence:
Biblical Teaching: God is omnipresent by His spiritual essence, fully present everywhere simultaneously. “Do I not fill heaven and earth?” (Jeremiah 23:24).
Dake’s Teaching: “God has a body and goes from place to place like anybody else” (God’s Plan for Man, p. 57). God must travel between locations and cannot be bodily present everywhere.

On How God Relates to Space:
Biblical Teaching: God transcends space while being immanent within it. “Heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain You” (1 Kings 8:27).
Dake’s Teaching: God occupies space like any other physical being, living on “a material planet” called heaven where He has a localized throne.

On Anthropomorphic Language:
Biblical Teaching: References to God’s “hands,” “eyes,” etc., are figurative language accommodating human understanding of divine actions.
Dake’s Teaching: These references prove God has literal body parts—actual hands, feet, eyes, and other organs.

On the Image of God:
Biblical Teaching: Humans bear God’s image in their rational, moral, and relational capacities, not physical appearance.
Dake’s Teaching: Humans physically resemble God’s physical body—we look like God looks.

On God’s Knowledge and Awareness:
Biblical Teaching: God knows all things immediately and simultaneously by virtue of His omniscient spiritual presence.
Dake’s Teaching: God “feels” people’s presence even when His body is elsewhere, but this is different from actual presence.

Dake attempts to maintain some form of omnipresence while insisting on God’s physicality, but his explanations only deepen the confusion. He distinguishes between “omni-presence” and “omni-body,” claiming God is the former but not the latter. But this distinction is meaningless if God has any kind of body at all. A body, by definition, is localized and limited. You cannot have a localized body and be omnipresent—these are mutually exclusive categories.

His analogy of feeling the presence of loved ones who are physically absent (comparing it to feeling the presence of his wife and children when away from them) reduces God’s omnipresence to mere psychological awareness or emotional connection. This fundamentally misunderstands the doctrine. God’s omnipresence is not about feeling but about actual presence—His essence, power, and being are fully present everywhere, not just His awareness or emotional connection.

Conclusion

The biblical doctrine that God is Spirit stands at the very heart of Christian theology, undergirding our understanding of God’s infinity, omnipresence, omniscience, and omnipotence. When Finis Dake replaces this foundational truth with his teaching that God has a physical body that travels from place to place, he doesn’t merely adjust a minor doctrine—he presents an entirely different god, one who bears more resemblance to the mythological deities of paganism than to the God revealed in Scripture.

Throughout this chapter, we have seen that Scripture consistently presents God as pure spirit, without body, parts, or physical limitations. From Christ’s explicit declaration that “God is Spirit” (John 4:24) to the unanimous testimony of biblical authors that God transcends all physical constraints, the evidence is overwhelming. The anthropomorphic language Scripture uses to describe God’s actions is clearly accommodative, helping us understand infinite spiritual realities through finite physical analogies, not describing God’s literal physical form.

We have also seen how church history speaks with one voice on this issue. From the earliest fathers through the medieval scholastics, from the Reformers to contemporary evangelicals, orthodox Christianity has always affirmed God’s incorporeal, spiritual nature. Dake stands virtually alone in his materialistic view, aligned more with Mormon theology than with historic Christianity. This should give serious pause to anyone tempted to follow his teaching.

The implications of getting this doctrine wrong are severe. A physical God cannot be truly omnipresent, cannot hear all prayers simultaneously, cannot govern the universe providentially, and cannot be worthy of the worship Scripture demands. Dake’s god is too small, too limited, and too much like us to be the God of the Bible. In trying to make God more understandable by giving Him a body, Dake has made Him less than God.

As we move forward to examine other aspects of God’s omnipresence in the following chapters, we must keep firmly in mind this fundamental truth: God is Spirit. This is not a limitation but the very foundation of His unlimited nature. Because God is spirit, He can be fully present with every one of His children simultaneously. Because He is spirit, He can hear every prayer, see every need, and work in every situation without traveling or dividing His attention. Because He is spirit, He transcends all creaturely limitations while remaining intimately involved with His creation.

The practical implications for Christian life are profound. We can pray with confidence knowing God is immediately present. We can worship in spirit and truth rather than being concerned with physical location or proximity. We can live coram Deo—before the face of God—knowing that we are always in His presence. We can face trials with the assurance that God is not distant but immediately present in our suffering. We can engage in mission knowing God is already at work wherever He sends us.

Let us therefore reject Dake’s diminished, physical god and embrace the infinite, spiritual God revealed in Scripture. Let us worship Him who is Spirit in spirit and truth. Let us find comfort in His unlimited presence, confidence in His unlimited power, and joy in His unlimited love. The God who is Spirit is not less accessible than a physical god would be—He is infinitely more accessible, immediately present with each of His children always.

As we continue our study in the following chapters, examining how God’s spiritual omnipresence relates to His transcendence and immanence, how it affects our understanding of worship and prayer, and how it shapes our daily Christian walk, we must never lose sight of this fundamental truth: the God we worship is not a magnified man with a body that travels through space, but the infinite Spirit who fills heaven and earth, in whom we live and move and have our being.

“Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen” (1 Timothy 1:17, NKJV).

Bibliography

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Augustine of Hippo. De Trinitate (On the Trinity). Translated by Edmund Hill. Brooklyn: New City Press, 1991.

Augustine of Hippo. Letters. Translated by Wilfrid Parsons. Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1951-1989.

Bavinck, Herman. Reformed Dogmatics: God and Creation. Vol. 2. Edited by John Bolt. Translated by John Vriend. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2004.

Berkhof, Louis. Systematic Theology. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996.

Calvin, John. Institutes of the Christian Religion. Edited by John T. McNeill. Translated by Ford Lewis Battles. 2 vols. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1960.

Charnock, Stephen. The Existence and Attributes of God. 2 vols. 1682. Reprint, Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1996.

Dake, Finis Jennings. Dake’s Annotated Reference Bible. Lawrenceville, GA: Dake Bible Sales, 1963.

Dake, Finis Jennings. God’s Plan for Man. Lawrenceville, GA: Dake Bible Sales, 1949.

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Hodge, Charles. Systematic Theology. 3 vols. 1871-1873. Reprint, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995.

Lawrence, Brother. The Practice of the Presence of God. Translated by John J. Delaney. New York: Doubleday, 1977.

Luther, Martin. Luther’s Large Catechism. Translated by F. Bente and W.H.T. Dau. St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1921.

Origen. De Principiis (On First Principles). Translated by G. W. Butterworth. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2013.

Owen, John. The Works of John Owen. Edited by William H. Goold. 16 vols. Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1965-1968.

Packer, J. I. Knowing God. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1973.

Pink, A. W. The Attributes of God. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1975.

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Richardson, Don. Eternity in Their Hearts. Ventura, CA: Regal Books, 1981.

Sproul, R. C. The Holiness of God. Wheaton: Tyndale House Publishers, 1985.

Tertullian. Against Praxeas. Translated by Peter Holmes. In Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 3. Buffalo: Christian Literature Publishing, 1885.

Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy. New York: Harper & Row, 1961.

Turretin, Francis. Institutes of Elenctic Theology. Translated by George Musgrave Giger. Edited by James T. Dennison Jr. 3 vols. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 1992-1997.

Warfield, Benjamin B. The Works of Benjamin B. Warfield. 10 vols. 1932. Reprint, Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2003.

Westminster Assembly. The Westminster Confession of Faith. 1646. Atlanta: Committee for Christian Education & Publications, 1990.

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Footnotes

¹ Finis Jennings Dake, Dake’s Annotated Reference Bible (Lawrenceville, GA: Dake Bible Sales, 1963), note on Ezekiel 1:26-28.

² Finis Jennings Dake, Dake’s Annotated Reference Bible (Lawrenceville, GA: Dake Bible Sales, 1963), “50 Facts About the Planet Heaven,” Old Testament section.

³ Finis Jennings Dake, Dake’s Annotated Reference Bible (Lawrenceville, GA: Dake Bible Sales, 1963), “63 Facts About God,” Old Testament section.

⁴ Finis Jennings Dake, Dake’s Annotated Reference Bible (Lawrenceville, GA: Dake Bible Sales, 1963), note on Ezekiel 1:26.

⁵ Finis Jennings Dake, Dake’s Annotated Reference Bible (Lawrenceville, GA: Dake Bible Sales, 1963), note on John 4:24.

⁶ Finis Jennings Dake, Dake’s Annotated Reference Bible (Lawrenceville, GA: Dake Bible Sales, 1963), entry on “Omnipresent” in concordance section.

⁷ Finis Jennings Dake, God’s Plan for Man (Lawrenceville, GA: Dake Bible Sales, 1949), 58.

⁸ Finis Jennings Dake, God’s Plan for Man (Lawrenceville, GA: Dake Bible Sales, 1949), 61.

⁹ Finis Jennings Dake, God’s Plan for Man (Lawrenceville, GA: Dake Bible Sales, 1949), 61-62.

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