… having become as much better than the angels, as He has inherited a more excellent name than they. (Heb. 1:4)

Jesus was better than the angels; so begins a series of comparisons of Jesus Christ to angels, Moses the Law-giver, the Jewish high priest, and the entire priesthood and sacrificial system. Most Christians would read this and say, “Of course, that’s a no-brainer.” That’s like comparing human intelligence with that of an ant. There is simply no comparison. But let’s examine this a bit more.

All our understanding of God requires comparison to things we know and understand. After all, how can we describe God who is infinitely greater than everything else in the universe? He is the Creator, infinitely bigger than the cosmos and smarter than all the intellect in the mind of every human who ever lived. That assertion is logically certain since He created all intelligence, and the sum total of all cannot be greater than the intellect who created them.

By analogy, how can an ant understand an elephant, except like a rough terrain of ground, something the ant already knows about? A blind person might describe the same creature as a wall, hose, rope, flaps, pile-driver, or a curved spear, depending on which part of the pachyderm he touched. So it is with any description of God; we compare Him with what we already know.

At this juncture, we need to clarify that the God of the Bible, who is the God of Israel, is ultimately incomparable. He is not just better than the gods of other belief systems. He is the only God; all other “gods” are the imaginations of false belief systems; there is simply no comparison. Isaiah the prophet recorded God’s unambiguous statements about this:

“Before Me there was no God formed, and there will be none after Me. I, even I, am the Lord, and there is no savior besides Me.” (Isa. 43:10–11)

“I am the Lord, and there is no other; besides Me there is no God.” (Isa. 45:5)

“I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me.” (Isa. 46:9)

The God of the Bible is the one and only true God, Creator of all. Therefore, He is incomparable, for how can we compare the true God to so-called “gods” that do not exist? Isaiah reflects this:

“To whom then will you liken God? Or what likeness will you compare with Him?” (Isa. 40:18)

“To whom then will you liken Me that I would be his equal?” says the Holy One. (Isa. 40:25)

“To whom would you liken Me and make Me equal and compare Me, that we would be alike? (Isa. 46:5)

So yes, God is incomparable in the absolute sense. Theologians often use terms to speak of God as “other than” anything else. To describe His power, they say there is nothing more powerful than Him. He is always greater than all else because He is other than all else. He is the Creator, and He created everything else. All existence comprises two groups of entities: the first group contains one and only one entity, and that is God, who is entirely self-existing, who always was and never had a beginning. God created the second group, which includes everything else. These are completely separate categories of existence: self-existence and created existence.

We believers worship the incomparable One, who has appeared to us as the Son of God, “For great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised” (1 Chr. 16:25).

Lord, I humbly bow my heart, my mind, my entire being before You, for You are incomparable and beyond all measure.