Understanding the Purpose
Dr. John Fallahee’s webinar "The Attributes of God: A Logos Deep Dive" is designed to help users study the doctrine of God using Logos Bible Software. The goal is to move beyond basic verse lookup and develop a structured, searchable approach to understanding God’s incommunicable and communicable attributes. As the webinar emphasizes, the ultimate aim is to grow in knowledge of the living God, not just to master software features.
Key Resources for Study
The presenter highlights three foundational works for studying divine attributes:
- Stephen Charnock, Discourses Upon The Existence and Attributes of God (Puritan, 1600s) – two volumes of rigorous theological reflection.
- Robert Morey, The Attributes of God – a clear, conversational apologetic overview.
- John Feinberg, Foundations of Evangelical Theology – a systematic theology series with up-to-date scholarship.
These resources provide depth and balance, complementing Logos’ digital tools for organizing and exploring the material.
Why Study the Attributes?
Jeremiah 9:23–24 reminds us that true boasting is not in wisdom, might, or riches, but in understanding and knowing God – specifically His loving-kindness, justice, and righteousness. This passage shapes the webinar’s focus: recognizing God’s sufficiency helps believers avoid self-reliance and maintain proper perspective in duty and responsibility while keeping God central in all areas of life.
Organizing Study Notes in Logos
Dr. Fallahee walks through a practical workflow for organizing notes on God’s attributes using Logos’ Notebooks and Passage Lists. The process includes:
- Create a Notebook: Use Tools → Notes → Notebook icon → “+” to create a notebook named "Attributes of God (Webinar)". Alphabetical sorting makes it easy to locate via search.
- Add Notes (Paper): Click New Note, type the attribute title in ALL CAPS and bold it (e.g., HOLY). The “paper” is where verses and observations go.
- Insert Verses: Type a reference like Exodus 15:11. Logos auto-links the passage. Hovering shows a preview, and pressing Enter retrieves the full verse.
- Add Additional Attributes: Create a new note for each attribute (e.g., LOVE) and include relevant verses such as 1 John 4:8. Remove the default “anchor” by clicking Minus Remove to keep notes clean.
- Mass-Copy Verses: Use Documents → New → Passage List to extract verses in bulk. This is especially useful for gathering all verses on a single attribute.
- Select and Copy Text: Click and drag or use Shift+click to select a block of text, then choose Add → Selected Text to generate a clean, ordered list.
- Remove Duplicates: Click Sort to alphabetically sort and eliminate duplicate entries, ensuring a tidy list.
- Organize Within Lists: Right-click to insert headings above or below verses, enabling sub-categorization (e.g., “Unique Holiness of God”).
- Re-order Passages: Drag verses to new positions for fine-tuned arrangement without rebuilding the list.
- Linking: After pasting a Passage List into a note, click the chain-link icon to create a clickable link that opens the list directly, improving navigation.
Specialized Collections for Theological Searches
To refine searches, Dr. Fallahee shows how to download and manage free guide collections from the “07” series (e.g., Theology All, Systematic Theology, Theological Dictionaries & Encyclopedias). The steps are:
- Copy/paste a search phrase (e.g.,
07 minus theology) into the Find box. - Click Public → Yours to access available collections.
- Locate the desired collection (e.g., 07 Theology All) and click Add to Your Docs for each item.
- After download, go to Tools → Update/Revise to ensure the collection is current.
This method narrows research to theological materials, avoiding irrelevant results like devotional books or general commentaries.
Refining Searches with Precision
Search refinement is a major focus. Dr. Fallahee demonstrates combining terms using quotes and logical operators. For example:
- Searching for “attributes of God” with “omniscience” (using quotes for “all-knowing”) broadens results to include both academic and lay terminology.
- Adding “near” limits results to specific books (e.g., “omniscience near Psalms” yields 8 hits in Psalms versus 100+ in the full theology collection).
- Starting with smaller, targeted collections saves time, then expanding to the full library if needed.
Systematic theology books like Wayne Grudem’s Biblical Doctrine provide structured frameworks for categorizing attributes into communicable and incommunicable groups, while topical analysis resources like Walter Elwell’s Topical Analysis of the Bible offer scriptural references for specific attributes.
Using the Bible Browser and Fact Book
The Bible Browser (Tools > Bible Browser) is highlighted for discovering tags related to attributes. Typing “omniscience” reveals categorized results, such as 3 verses in the “promises” tag and 2,000+ in “preaching themes.” Combining tags (e.g., “omniscience” + “Israelites”) uncovers connections like God’s self-revelation in Isaiah 48:6.
The Fact Book (book with a checkmark icon) is used to explore “God’s attributes” as a theological theme. Clicking “show all” populates related tags such as “God’s wrath,” “God’s grace,” and “God’s truth.” A refined search via the Fact Book’s auto-populated terms generates precise library tags, streamlining access to relevant resources without manual input.
Highlighting and Labeling for Tagging
Dr. Fallahee introduces Logos’ highlighting tool and custom palette for tagging key concepts. He demonstrates creating a palette named “Attributes of God” with a single style:
- Click the palette’s dropdown, select Add New Style, and name it (e.g., “Attributes of God”).
- Edit the style: set Text Above to “attributes” or “God’s attributes,” choose magenta as the color, enable the capsule, and activate the labeling feature.
- Check “Prompt to Enter Attributes” and select “Attributes List” (preloaded with terms like omniscience, omnipresence).
- Save the style. When highlighting text (e.g., Psalm 139:4), select the palette, choose the appropriate label (e.g., “attribute: omniscience”), and click Done.
This tagging system makes passages searchable by attribute, turning highlights into powerful study tools.
Linking Notebooks and Enhancing Searches
After saving the style, a notebook titled “Attributes of God” is created and linked to the highlights. This connection ensures organized study, and the search tool (Tools > Notes > Notebook icon > search “attribute of God”) retrieves all tagged passages, such as Psalm 139:13–16 and Psalm 17:3.
To further streamline access, users can copy the location of a search (three dots > Copy Location) and paste it into a notes document for future reference, avoiding sifting through unrelated content.
Leveraging AI for Research
The Study Assistant in Logos offers a starting point for exploring attributes. Example prompts include:
- “What are the attributes of God?” – returns terms like eternality, omniscience, and perfection.
- “List key passages on God’s attribute of omniscience.” – returns verses such as Psalm 139:1–4 and Hebrews 4:13.
- “Related topics to God’s attributes of omniscience?” – highlights nuances like human freedom vs. divine foreknowledge and the problem of evil.
For deeper work, AI can generate .docx outlines of God’s attributes. After downloading the file, import it into Logos via Tools > Personal Book > Add Book. While AI speeds up initial research, the webinar stresses verifying outputs against trusted sources.
Practical Tips and Final Thoughts
Key takeaways from the webinar include:
- Use notebooks and bold, capitalized headings to create clear, searchable “papers” for each attribute.
- Leverage Passage Lists to gather verses, then clean duplicates and sort them for organization.
- Insert headings inside Passage Lists to group verses by sub-theme (e.g., “Holiness,” “Love”).
- Use drag-and-drop to reorder verses without rebuilding lists, maintaining flexibility.
- Utilize free “07” guide collections to broaden theological background and streamline searches.
- Expect information overload; the notebook/passage-list system provides structure to manage it.
- Regularly update downloaded collections via the Tools menu to keep resources current.
By combining intentional search strategies, structured note-taking, and Logos’ built-in tools like the Bible Browser and Fact Book, users can deepen their theological study in a hands-on, practical way. The webinar closes with a reminder that the goal of all study is to know God more fully through Scripture.