Sunday, January 26, 2014. God Is, Part Three: God Is Triune!

- Pastors rarely teach from the pulpit on the doctrine of the Trinity and we fail to do so at the church's peril.

- Many people fail to see the importance of the doctrine of the Trinity and so the Scripture's teaching on the Triune Godhead fails to be applied to everyday life.

- Teaching on the Trinity is an overwhelming task which is too big for one lesson or one sermon. So, today we will just touch on the subject.

- Historically, the First Council of Nicaea, 325 A.D., is very important for us because the delegates representing all the churches of the Roman world were united in rejecting all anti-Trinitarian teaching and in affirming Trinitarian doctrine as well as the teaching that Christ is both fully God and fully human.

- Out of the Council of Nicaea comes the Nicene Creed, which is an accepted creed around the world to this very day. (It also happens to be number 717 the back of our hymnal included for our use in worship and prayer.)

- Suffice it to say that since the days of the early church the doctrine of the Trinity has been of key importance.

- Let's explore the Scriptures together to discover the Trinity afresh and its importance for us.

- A good rule of thumb when studying doctrine is to stick with the Scriptures.

- As Jesus has said, "What is written in the Law? How do you read them?" (Luke 10:26)

- The first book of the law is Genesis and Genesis is the account of beginnings, so let's start taking our cues there.

- Genesis 1 refers to God numerous times. Spirit of God is present and God creates through speech, which tells us something about the power of words.

- Speaking of words, the word for God used throughout this chapter is Elohim a plural form of the word El meaning God.

- Now, if a Hebrew writer had wanted to use the singular word, that was certainly an option, but the writer did not.

- And this writer recorded Genesis 1000's of years before the concept of the Royal "We," so that has to leave us wondering why the author of Genesis refers to God in the plural consistently.

- In fact, Elohim is used 4000 times in reference to God throughout the Old Testament.

- So God is very often plural, which English does not reflect.

- Then we come to the creation of human beings, Genesis 1:26. 'Then God said, "Let us make man in our image."'

- As we've already said this was way before the concept of the Royal "we" ever existed.

- So in this one verse, we have God being referred to in plural, as Elohim, then we have God referring to himself using two plural pronouns and not only that, but the verb "to make" is also plural.

- And this isn't the only time this happens in Genesis. Let's look at 3:22 and see what happens after sin enters the world.

- 'Then the Lord God said, "Look, the human beings have become like us, knowing both good and evil."'

- We find the same thing again in Genesis 11. "Look!" He said, "The people are united, and they all speak the same language. After this, nothing they set out to do will be impossible for them! Come, let us go down and confuse the people with different languages. Then they won't be able to understand each other." (6-7)

- Genesis isn't the only place we find this use of plural to describe God.

- We find it again in Isaiah 6:8 with the call of Isaiah. Then I heard the Lord asking, "Whom should I send as a messenger to this people? Who will go for us?"

- Now, in each instance where the plural pronouns, us & our, were used God was speaking to himself. That is the plain meaning of the Scriptures we have examined to this point.

- Dare we deny or attempt to explain away the Scriptures which hint about the plurality of the person of God?

- Let's continue our examination of the Scriptures. The Shema, Deuteronomy 6:4-5, has much to say.

- Hear, O Israel: Yahweh, our Elohim, Yahweh is One, and you shall love Yahweh your Elohim with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your strength.

*- The Hebrew for "One" comes from a verb meaning to unify. It is used to describe marriage in Genesis 2:24, which states, "This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one."

- The unity of marriage contains plurality!

- Let's back up a moment to Genesis 1: 27: "So Elohim created human beings in his own image. In the image of Elohim he created them. Male and female he created them."

- Notice the male and the female together reflect God's image. So both marriage and the image of God, teach us not only about how God has designed humanity, but also about God himself.

*- Marriage is unity and plurality and the image of God is unity and plurality and God has designed these things after himself and he is unity in plurality.

- God is not only united, but God is unique. By his very nature, He is the only God, which exists, yet in himself, He is not alone, rather he is united.

- This message disagrees with the assumptions of the pagan world which worships many gods who were divided, dissimilar, and in continual conflict with one another and who cared little for those who served them.

- Have we heard enough evidence from the Hebrew Scriptures, the OT, yet?

- I want to avoid getting bogged down with the too many Scriptures and focus on some NT Scriptures which point to the Trinity through a handful of examples.

* - First, Jesus' baptism.

- In Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John (which is the Baptizer's testimony) all three persons of the Trinity are present in this scene.

- A voice from heaven declares that Jesus is "my beloved son."

- The Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus which Luke emphasized was in bodily form like a dove.

- The point, the gospel writers made was that this was a real event. It was not a vision.

- The voice from heaven confirmed that Jesus was, and is, the Messiah, the Son of God.

- The Holy Spirit coming down from God and alighting on Jesus in bodily form was the anointing of the Messiah.

*- The plain reading of these baptism accounts of Jesus present Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; three persons as one God with one aim, to launch the kingdom of God.

* - Second, the Great Commission.

*- Matthew 28:18-20, 'Jesus came and told his disciples, "I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age."'

- Anti-Trinitarians base their argument against the Trinity in this passage around "name" because it is singular.

- God is one, they argue, because the Scriptures say he is one. Being baptized into the name, rather than names, they assume supports their argument that God is not triune.

- Trinitarian's, however, also affirm that God is one, but without ignoring, denying or explaining away the mountain of evidence in the Scriptures which declare that God is united as three in one.

*- To be baptized in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit is to affirm one God who is three persons, and to affirm that life, strength, and grace for each day come from him alone and no one else.

*- Third, the Spirit's Arrival at Pentecost.

*- Before Jesus ascended into heaven, he told his disciples to wait in Jerusalem, where they would receive the promised Holy Spirit and then be witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth. (Acts 1:8)

- The arrival of the Holy Spirit is a Trinitarian event reminding the reader of God's actions under the old covenant.

- Tongues of fire rest on the heads of the disciples as they are anointed and filled with the Holy Spirit.

- God is praised in diverse languages the disciples had beforehand never spoken.

- Peter preaches on the prophet Joel, explaining the amazing events which have to do with the Spirit being sent by Yahweh-Elohim.

- The Holy Spirit has come because God raised Jesus from the dead and he is now the victorious, ascended Lord and Christ.

- Together with the Father, the Lord Jesus sends the Holy Spirit.

- "When sinners repent and believe the gospel of God concerning Jesus the Lord, then they receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, who is to them the Spirit of the exalted Lord Jesus" (Toon, 206).

- Because God is Triune, we can stand forgiven, our broken relationship with the Father restored through his Son.

- Because God is Triune, we can have life by the power of his name as Jesus lives.

- Because God is Triune, we can learn to love as he loves by the gifts & fruit of the Holy Spirit.

- Our Triune God is the author of life, forgiveness, and love.

Sunday, January 19, 2014. God Is, Part Two: God Is Love

Scripture: 1 John 4:7-21

        26 years ago in the town Stepanavan, Armenia lived a young woman the townspeople called "Palasan's wife." Of course, this woman had her own name, but the townspeople called her by her husband's name to show her honor.

        When the devastating earthquake of 1988 hit, it was nearly noon and Palasan was at work. He rushed to the elementary school where his son was a student. The outside surface of the building was already crumbling, but he went inside anyway, pushing the children outside through an open window to safety. After helping 28 children escape the ruined building, an aftershock hit, collapsing the remaining school building and killing Palasan.

        Townspeople of Stepanavan honor his memory and his widow by calling her Palasan's wife.

- Just like Palasan's wife, Christians wear the name of Christ as a badge of honor.

- The apostle John strongly contended that God is love and divine love passionately sacrifices self for the sake of others.

- Love is the greatest attribute of God, which is why John writes about love at length and Paul names it as the fruit of the Holy Spirit and so eloquently describes love in 1 Corinthians 13.

- The love which John describes in our Scripture lesson is self giving, rather than greedy or materialistic.

- The love which would describe the culture in which we live is more of a worldly possessive love.

- John tells his readers that God is not like that.

- God is love.

- It is a mistake to suggest that love is God, as if love were the object of our worship.

- And it is equally limiting to merely suggest that God is loving when he is so much more, he is love.

- Love is at the very core of who God is. Love isn't just one characteristic among many but the overriding characteristic which surrounds and fills everything God says and does.

- The late FF Bruce wrote that the love of God described in the New Testament is "a consuming passion for the well-being of others" (Bruce, 107).

- If we love God, John reasoned, then we will be possessed by that same consuming passion for the well-being of others, which ultimately led Jesus to the cross.

- It is in that act of sacrificing the only begotten son on a cross that the love of God is made painfully clear.

- In fact, without the cross it's impossible to understand the love of God.

- To affirm the love of God, one must first affirm Christ's suffering and death on a cross.

- Jesus' sacrifice on a cross for our sins is the great proof of God's love and the motive for our love.

- Having affirmed the self-sacrificing nature of God's love, the Christian must allow him/herself to be consumed by that same passion.

- On our own, we are not free to love like God loves so God took the initiative so that his love might live within us.

- Because God has loved us with the self-sacrificing love of Jesus that, John tells his readers, is how we are to love one another.

- God is love and divine love passionately sacrifices self for the sake of others.

- "Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we surely ought to love each other. No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us and his love is brought to full expression in us." (11-12)

- Business executive Lee Iacocca once asked legendary football coach Vince Lombardi what it took to make a winning team. The book Iacocca records Lombardi's answer:

        There are a lot of coaches with good ball clubs who know the fundamentals and have plenty of discipline but still don't win the game. Then you come to the third ingredient: if you're going to play together as a team, you've got to care for one. You've got to love each other. Each player has to be thinking about the next guy and saying to himself: if I don't block that man, Paul is going to get his legs broken. I have to do my job well in order that he can do his.

        "The difference between mediocrity and greatness," Lombardi said that night, "is the feeling these guys have for each other."

- The Christian must learn to surrender to the love of God. God is love and divine love passionately sacrifices self or the sake of others.

- God's love supplies the driving power for his children to love one another.

- We must be loving because he is loving and it's not compulsion as if God were forcing us to love, but it's because God's love is poured into our hearts through the person of his Holy Spirit.

- Because of the Holy Spirit's presence in our lives, people around us are witnesses to God's love.

- Therefore, God is made known to others through our faith in his son, as we love one another.

- God's love in us is the strongest defense for faith in Jesus Christ.

- It is the person of the Holy Spirit who enables this loving witness and empowers God's love in us.

- God is love and divine love passionately sacrifices self for the sake of others.

- The thing about God's love is that it doesn't matter if you are shy, reserved, introverted, and it doesn't matter if you are talkative, outgoing, extroverted.

- God is not concerned with how many people you love, but how much you love.

- Palasan's love for his son moved him to rescue 28 children and give his life.

- By his love, he sent his Spirit so that we will testify that God sent his Son to be the Savior of the world, verse 14.

- John wrote, if we love one another, God lives in us and now in verse 15, John tells us that God lives in all who confess that Jesus is the Son of God.

- In John's mind, Christian truth and Christian love stand as one.

- Indeed, this is the teaching of the entire New Testament. Word and deed; truth and love always go hand-in-hand not to be separated.

- So great is God's love that not only did he choose the great risk of Christ's cross, he chooses continually the great risk of dwelling within us by his Holy Spirit.

- He gives himself to us with a great vision that we will return that sacrificial love, not only to him but also to others.

- Love the Lord your God with all your heart with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. This is the first and greatest commandment. And a second is like it: you shall love your neighbor as you love yourself. All the law and the prophets hang on these two Commandments.

- God's aim is that we would put our trust in his love and learn to live our whole lives in, by, and for his love.

- John wrote, "And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world. Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love." (17-18)

- Love is made perfect, whole, or complete as God's children love one another. That John has already said.

- However, perfect love is shown especially by the confidence with which the Christian faces the Day of Judgment.

- As we mature in the faith, our confidence and love grow while our shame and fear shrink, replaced with an ever deepening sense of awe.

- Such a sense of awe causes us to stand before our heavenly Father and say to one another, "see what great love the Father has lavished on us that we should be called the children of God." (1John 3:1)

- Those that have such confidence in the love of God have no need to fear.

- They have learned the secret of the ages. "And this is the secret: Christ lives in you. This gives you assurance of sharing his glory." (Colossians 1:27)

- Such is the love of God. Not only must our understanding and acceptance of God's love for us blossom into a sense of awe but so also must our love for others.

- "We love each other because he first loved us." (19)

- By taking the initiative to love sacrificially, God shows us how to live and plants within us the desire and the power to follow his example.

- "If someone says, I love God, but hates a Christian brother or sister, that person is a liar; for if we don't love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see? And he has given us this command: those who love God must also love their Christian brothers and sisters." (20-21)

- Jesus made it clear that love for God and love for others are two sides of the same coin.

- Mutual Christian love characterizes God's true children because God is love. Therefore, hatred for a fellow believer proves fake faith.

- We can only love the unseen one by loving those already seen.

- The joy that comes from knowing that we are loved deeply, passionately, and sacrificially by God is the only thing that can move us to love others like God loves.

- Before we can love others, we must know that we are loved by God.

- The day of the earthquake 26 years ago, Palasan loved his son, and the children of the elementary school in Stepanavan that he gave his life rescuing 28 children from the crumbling building.

- For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life.

- What am I prepared to sacrifice to show others God's love in me?

- God is love and divine love passionately sacrifices self for the sake of others.

Sunday, January 12, 2014 God Is, Part 1: God Is! Genesis 1: 1; Acts 17:24-31.

Genesis 1: 1

Acts 17: 24-31

- The ancient, famous, and learned city of Athens stood for all things Greek.

- Greek poetry and philosophy continue to be renowned the world over. The Greek pantheon of gods and their mythology continue to be studied to this day.

- There is a way that seems right to a man but in the end leads to death.

- Paul spent a fair amount of time in Athens before delivering the message we are looking at this morning.

- He preached in the synagogue reasoning with the Jews and God-fearing gentiles and he spoke daily in the public square.

- When they heard him preach on Jesus and the resurrection, the Greeks thought Paul just wanted them to add Jesus and Anastasia (which means resurrection) to their pantheon of gods.

- That, of course, is not what Paul wanted them to do at all.

- Rather, Paul wanted them to abandon their ignorant idol worship and turn toward the living God in repentance and faith.

- Paul argued for the living God in five ways.

- First, God is Creator. “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands." (Verse 24)

- Paul taught a worldview that was very different from the Epicurean philosophers of that day who taught that life comes from chance combinations of atoms.

- That sounds remarkably like the evolutionary philosophy of today, which teaches that we all exist because of random natural selection.

- The truth of the matter is chance combinations or random natural selection of atoms, molecules or proteins cannot produce life.

- In fact, natural selection is not random at all.

- The existence of all life anywhere occurring by random chance is statistically impossible. Mathematics proves it.

- Life requires order and design, not random chance.

- Random Evolution cannot design anything because order and design point to a Designer.

- The creation points to a Creator.

- The Stoic philosophers of Paul's day believed in pantheism, that God and the material world are one and the same.

- If God is all, then all is God. Therefore, I am God also.

- Today, right along with evolution, one of the most promoted philosophies is the worship of self.

- The popularity of Oprah Winfrey and her new age gurus and books like The Secret are evidence enough that Stoic pantheism still lives. God is all. All is God. I am God.

- Such teaching is not the message of the Bible. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."

- He does not live in temples built by human hands, but is himself the Lord of heaven and earth and maker of everything that exists.

- It is meaningless to think that the God who made everything lives in temples or idols built by human hands.

- It is equally meaningless to suggest that this Creator God exists as all created things.

- These ideas are illogical and are well within the realm of fantasy.

- The hymn writer agreed with Scripture when he wrote of Jesus: Very God, begotten not created. O come let us adore him, Christ the Lord.

- A meaningful life is found only in our Creator; without him everything is meaningless. - God is Creator.

- Second, God is Sustainer. "And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else." (Verse 25).

- If God gives everyone life and breath and everything else what needs could he possibly have for which we, his creation, could possibly provide?

- God does not depend on us for food, clothing, or shelter. No, and God is not even dependent upon our love.

- John RW Stott puts it succinctly: "We depend on God; he does not depend on us." (Stott, Acts, 285)

- Human hands cannot serve God with anything he needs because he provides for all our needs.

- It is meaningless to think that the one who sustains all life would himself need to be sustained by us.

- A meaningful life is found only in our Creator; without him everything is meaningless. - God is Sustainer.

- Third, God is Ruler. "From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ (Versus 26-28a)

- Paul clearly had Adam in mind as the only ancestor of the human race.

- Every human being on the planet is descended from Adam and Eve.

- Grounds do not exist for prejudice or discrimination on any basis of culture, the color of one's skin, or language for we are all sons of Adam and daughters of Eve.

- Shortly after the cataclysmic global flood of Noah's day at the tower of Babel, God confused our language and sent us out to the four corners of the globe.

- The history and geography of every nation is under God's rule and is decided by his grace.

- His purpose in doing this is that we would seek and perhaps find him because he is not far off from any of us.

- As the Cretan philosopher Epimenides wrote and Paul quoted, "for in him we live and move and have our being.'

- It is meaningless to blame God for the alienation from him we experience because of our sin.

- It is our sin which alienates us from God. Blaming God or suggesting that he is distant, unknowable or uninterested is meaningless when we understand that God is active in history and that he is nearby.

- If it were not for the sin that separates us from him, God would be available to every single one of us.

- A meaningful life is found only in our Creator; without him everything is meaningless. - God is Ruler.

- Fourth, God is Father. "As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’ Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by human design and skill." (Verses 28b-29)

- 'We are his offspring' is a quotation from the third century BC Stoic philosopher Aratus from Paul's native province of Cilicia.

-Although Aratus was referring to Zeus, Paul is correct in affirming God as Father. We are God's offspring twice over.

- Those who have received Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior in repentance, obedience, and faith are the adopted children of God by his grace.

- As our Creator, God is our father and we are his offspring.

- Since he created us, sustains us, and rules us, then it is meaningless to think of God as an image made by human design or skill.

- Anything made with human hands is lifeless and owes itself to human imagination and creativity alone.

- Since God is our Father, then we cannot in any way attempt to father him.

- Our attempts to create, sustain, rule, and father God are meaningless because they are absurd contradictions to the truth which attempt to make us into gods and God into us.

- It is meaningless to worship anything made in the place of Almighty God.

- All idolatry attempts in one way or another to either limit God or to tame God, thereby bringing him under our control.

- A meaningful life is found only in our Creator; without him everything is meaningless. - God is Father.

- Fifth, God is Judge. "In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.”

- Paul began his message to the people of Athens at the Areopagus using an altar with the inscription on it, to an unknown God.

- He used their ignorance as a springboard to launch himself into teaching the truth, and it became the theme of his message, revealing to them to their own ignorance.

- Paul plainly told them that they are accountable to God for their ignorance.

- "In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he calls all people everywhere to repent."

- God was patient with people, graciously and mercifully looking the other way.

- But now things have changed; judgment is coming.

- God will judge the whole world; no one will escape his judgment.

- He will judge the world with justice. Everything will be exposed, every secret sin, every fatal flaw. And his justice will not be miscarried or denied.

- The date is set. The judge is appointed and that judge is Jesus Christ.

- "He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.”

- The resurrection of Jesus from the dead is God's evidence that Jesus is both Lord and Judge, and that he alone will judge the living and the dead.

- It is meaningless to ignore God's warning of impending judgment.

- It is meaningless to reject the resurrection of Jesus Christ because God has made him Lord and Judge.

- As Paul said, now God calls all people everywhere repent.

- A meaningful life is found only in our Creator; without him everything is meaningless.