Over the past two weeks, we have discovered some of the many attributes of God, and this week we will wrap up our study.
So far, we discovered God's "Omni" attributes--Omniscience (all knowing), Omnipresence (ever and all present) and Omnipotence (all powerful) in our first message. Last week we discovered many of the attributes that oppose each other in our view as sinful man: Truth, Justice, Righteousness, Holiness, Perfection all stand in direct opposition to God's Mercy, Goodness and Love. The perfect love of God, shown through the sacrifice of His Son Jesus, satisfies the requirements against us because of the crimes of sin which Jesus took upon Himself.
God's Veracity (He speaks the truth and is trustworthy), Faithfulness and Persistence keep us saved; God promises salvation to those that believe, and is faithful and persistent to see it through.
This week, we are going to explore the rest of our list of the Attributes of God, separated into three groups:
God's Being:
Spirituality
Personality
Freedom
Genuineness
Time and Space:
Unity
Infinity
Eternity
Immutability
Sovereignty
The Critical Attribute:
Grace
Some of all of these attributes overlap, and there is some disagreement among scholars as to how many attributes there actually are (from nine to thirty two).
Heady stuff? In a sense yes, and we must remember that we will never really know everything about God on either side of eternity. However, we are given so much information that we can get to know God well enough to trust Him, to obey Him and to understand, at least on our level how everything fits together in God's plan for salvation
No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him...God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth." John 1:18, 4:24
*God's Being Part I: He's Not "The Man Upstairs"
We all have our pet peeves in life. I find few people, for instance, that like the "We Buy Any Car" commercial, the "1-800-MY- LEMON" commercials and so on. Likewise, there are some things that when it comes to God are like someone scratching their nails on a chalkboard, and one of them is when they refer to God as "The Man Upstairs", or "The Big Guy" or something similar that reduces God the Father to a mere man.
Quite honestly, I think that some people do this to make God a more manageable God. By that, I mean that if you can make God the Father into someone you can visualize as a man, then He is not as threatening. If we have learned anything so far in our Attributes study, it is that God is about as different to us as we are to a single celled organism viewable only under a microscope.
The First God's Being attribute: Spirit being.. In the verses above, we see that "no one has seen God at any time". God exists in a much different way than we do, and while we have a spirit within us, God IS spirit. Jesus is radically different because He is both man (flesh) and God (spirit being) at the same time.
God lives in a different plane of existence than we do. God exists, as we talked about two weeks ago, in all time frames and in all places at the same time. However, Jesus came out of eternity and into our time and space bodily, lived life like we did with two feet on the ground so that He could not only life like us and experience human life but to take upon the sin of the world on the cross, and the wrath meant for us would be spilled out upon Him on the cross.
For us to really worship God, we must worship Him in spirit and in truth. What does that mean? First, we must have a new spirit within us--that happens when we are saved. However, we are to worship Him in truth. God is truth, He never lies and all of God's truth that we need to know is written in the Bible. We break fellowship with God when we do not conduct our lives as He would have us live them, and if we worship Him in a way that is not according to His Truth in the Bible we worship in vain. If we see to reduce God to make Him more manageable, then we are not worshipping in truth no matter how "spiritual" we may feel.
So...please do not reduce God to "the Man Upstairs". I'd guess that God finds it more offensive than I do.
And God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM." And He said, "Thus you shall say to the children of Israel, 'I AM has sent me to you.' " Exodus 3:14 (NKJV)
* God's Being Part II: The Person, Independence and Reality of God
Today, let's look at the personality, freedom and genuineness of God.
Personality-- "God is personal. He has self-cognizance, will, intellect, self determination" (House). In Exodus 3:14 above, Moses had just asked God "Who shall I say sent me?", and, paraphrased, God said "Tell them I AM sent you." " Since the divine name Jehovah or Yahweh was well-known long before (cf. Gen 4:1), this revelation seems to emphasize that the God who made the covenant was the God who kept the covenant. So Ex 3:14 is more than a simple statement of identity: "I am that I am"; it is a declaration of divine control of all things. (from Vine's Expository Dictionary of Biblical Words). In short, God is not just some great spirit cloud of infinite knowledge, God is a PERSON.
Freedom--"God is independent from His creatures" (House). But our God is in heaven; He does whatever He pleases. (Psalm 115:3, NKJV) God is free to do whatever He pleases. God will do what He will do. This stands in direct contrast to those that teach that if you have enough faith you can have what you want; that would be dictating terms to God. God has a plan, it is THE plan and He is free from anyone--Satan, fallen angels and yes, even you--to tell God what to do or to restrain Him.
Genuineness-- "God is real/true" (House). And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. (John 17:3 NKJV). Not only is God truth, but God is the only True God.. There are two ways that a person can tell a real $20 bill from a fake. One is to use a special magic marker, and if it changes the wrong color then it is fake. The other is found in those that work with money as their livelihood. Because they handle money so much, they can often tell just by the feel of the bill that it is real or fake.
For us as Christians, God's Word is our "God magic marker". Sometimes we are presented something as being God's truth but we are uncertain. We do as the Bereans did in Psalm 17, we hold what is taught or presented up to the light of Scripture to see if it is true or not. If it turns out to be phony, it needs to be discarded.
We also get to know more about how to spot a fake or fake teaching by handling the word of God. We are called to "rightly divide" God's Word or to "cut it straight" by studying it (2 Timothy 2:15) . The more we study, the less we are fooled.
God is a person that is not controlled or hindered by anyone in His plan, and is the real deal and only God. No other paths, no other ways to heaven.
*God of Time and Space
"Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one! Deuteronomy 6:4 NKJV
Unity-- "God is one" (House). Deuteronomy 6:4 above is the first verse of what the Jews call the Shema, which is the Hebrew word translated in the same verse as "hear". The Shema is a Jewish confession of faith (compare to the Westminster Confession of Faith), and so "important is this confession that Jewish boys in orthodox homes are required to memorize it as soon as they can speak" (Warren W. Wiersbe, The Bible Exposition Commentary). The meaning behind "The Lord is one" is not just a statement of unity (God in three Persons), but also speaks of the uniqueness of God. The false gods of the pagans in the Near East all had different things that either made them happy or made them furious, so pagans (and Jews whenever they fell into the trap of idol worship) were constantly paranoid, not knowing which "god" they would please or get ticked off! Yahweh is One God, not many "gods".
Infinity-- "God is without termination or finitude" (House) But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain You. How much less this temple which I have built! (1 Kings 8:27). God made "heaven and the heaven of heavens", meaning "that there are systems, and systems of systems, each possessing its sun, its primary and secondary planets, all extending beyond each other in unlimited space, in the same regular and graduated order which we find to prevail in what we call our solar system..." (Adam Clarke). In other words, the universe (and other universes) are infinite and even that cannot contain God!
Eternity-- "God is free from succession of time" (House) In Psalm 41:13, David wrote Blessed be the LORD God of Israel From everlasting to everlasting! Amen and Amen. God is from everlasting (eternity backwards) to everlasting (eternity forward). God has always been, and will always exist. This teaching dovetails with the attribute of Omnipresence (God being everywhere at one time), showing God to be also in all time frames at the same time. Overwhelming thought!
Immutability-- "God is unchanging and unchangeable in His being (House). Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning. (James 1:17). Immutability means that God does not change. He is perfect, why would He need to change? James makes a striking comparison in this verse; God is the Father of lights (he created the sun and all the stars) and is light Himself. However, while the Sun does not illuminate the entire planet or the moon God's illumination has "no variation or shadow of turning". God does not change with the times, no matter what people may say.
Sovereignty-- "God is the supreme Ruler, independent of any authority outside of Himself" (House). In short, God is RULES and He is in charge of everything.
Paul wrote in Ephesians 1:21 that God is "far above all principality and power and might and dominion", showing the Sovereignty of God. More tomorrow.
For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. Ephesians 2:8-10 (NKJV)
Let's just go back over those attributes that we have seen this week, and some of those that we have reviewed in weeks past. Truth, Justice, Righteousness, Holiness, Perfection all require each and every sin ever done by sinful mankind to be punished by the eternal fires of Hell. Perfection in all Truth; Truth reveals sin; Righteousness is that truth violated in relationship with God with sin Holiness is God's total separation from evil and anything evil which demands Justice and Justice demands punishment. However, the Mercy, Goodness of God seek to redeem lost men but it is the perfect Love of God that brings us to God's Grace.
Without the critical attribute of God's Grace, we would be lost forever and condemned to Hell for all eternity. Grace is defined as "Favor or kindness shown without regard to the worth or merit of the one who receives it and in spite of what that same person deserves." (Nelson's Illustrated Bible Dictionary) So often, we demand what we deserve. As I have so often, said, don't demand what you deserve, because quite honestly God's attributes require Him to give us just that: a deserved eternity in Hell. Grace is the way out.
Let's look at the key scripture for today. The very grace (unmerited favor) that we obtain from God is not something we generate ourselves. It is a gift from God, and that faith itself is a gift from God. For those folks that say if you have enough faith God will do what you want, we must remember that it is God that gives us that faith.
Now if you think that you can earn your way to Heaven by "being good", or by giving to the church or missionary causes or other "good works", then you truly don't understand grace. In verse eight, we see that our salvation in Jesus is "not by works, lest anyone should boast". Listen to this, it's quite important: most people think that they will go to Heaven because they are good; that is being saved by what they think is good works. The problem with that concept is that those folks that think that they will be saved by "good works" and "being good" is an issue of pride. They are boasting or bragging of how good they are. Now knowing that God is the God of Truth, Justice, Righteousness, Holiness, and Perfection show us that that the person stating they are saved by being good works are condemned.
Brother Dave Staggers mentioned a thought the other day at our Bible Study. When we as saints reach the Judgment Seat of Christ, where all the saved in Jesus by His grace will be judged on our works after we are saved, we will come to see in a super-convincing manner the grace of God. How? We will see how we have, even as God's children, will have failed Him by the missed opportunities in works, right choices and unconfessed sin. We truly will see how great grace is, how wide the vast chasm between God's Holiness and our sin is, and we will weep.
