Knowing God

I spent a lot of years angry at God. I was so angry that there came a point that I decided he was a fable, he did not exist, he was a crutch for the weak who could not handle the troubles of life. I took every opportunity to prove to others they were living a lie. That was until the faithful day I met my wife, who after we were married decided she need to get back to church. I had no intention of stopping her, and I also had no intention of joining her. As time progressed, she return home and tell me that many people at church had asked her to lunch but she felt guilty leaving me at home alone. She eventually convinced me to go with her, if only to go out to lunch later. It was in that church, that I was confronted with the truth of who God is. I was invited to join a class called Christianity 101; I reluctantly went vowing I would not participate. In that class, I was confronted with the reality of who God really is, and what he had done for me. He was nothing like I had imagined, my eyes were opened not only to my own sin, but my eyes were opened to who this God was that I was sinning against.

Paul in his letter to the Romans declares, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Today we live in a world where evil has become good, and good has become evil. There is a prevailing wind where no one wants to or in many cases are held accountable for their own actions. It always seems to be someone else’s fault. The church has not been immune from this thinking and the truth about sin has been replaced in many churches with a I want to make you feel good attitude. The outside pressures of a politically correct world have infected many churches and the thinking of many Christians to the point that sin has become nothing more than a minor inconvenience. There are some pulpits that are afraid to make people feel uncomfortable by speaking about sin for fear people will not come back, because it makes them uncomfortable. They ignore God’s holiness, righteousness and justice. An ever-growing number of Christians ignore sin because they fear the backlash of being labeled intolerant. The truth is that when we sin it should make us uncomfortable, if you go to church every Sunday and leave feeling better about yourself every Sunday, there is a problem. I can tell you that there are Sundays when Pastor Pat has preached the word and it has caused me pain as I have come face to face with things in my life that fall short of God’s desires Sin is defined by Webster’s dictionary as: The voluntary departure of a person from a known rule or duty prescribed by God.” What makes sin serious is not that we sin, what makes sin serious is that we sin against God.

Psalm 51-1-4

Have mercy on me O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleans me from my sin! For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment.

The good news is God is good, the bad news is that God is good and we are not.

Paul Washer made this comment about sin; “If the bravest and most hardened person understood even in the smallest portion of who God is; he would immediately collapse under the weight of their own sin.” Every sin we commit we commit against God. That is why it is of the utmost importance that we have a right view of who God is. To have a wrong view of God is to have a wrong view of sin and that can cost you your eternal soul. It is written that a fool that says there is no God how much more foolish it is to have a wrong understanding of who God is and believe ourselves to saved when we are not.

My goal today is for us to renew our understanding of who God is, I am going to concentrate on five specific characteristics of God. God’s Supremacy, Sovereignty, Holiness, Righteousness, Faithfulness and Love.

God is Supreme

1 Chronicles 16:25

For great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised, and he is to be feared above all gods.”

We live in a time where man has decided to name himself as being supreme. We see ourselves the top of the food chain, this of course is a lie, strip a man of all his technology and place him on the African savanna and he quickly discover how vulnerable he really is. Some take this same thought process when they deal with God lifting themselves above God, in their own ignorance and pride they see themselves as God’s equal or even as God’s better. If we truly understand God’s supremacy, we soon realize for lack of a better word how I significant we really are.