We are beginning a new sermon series entitled “The Attributes of God,” or stated another way, What is God Like? What are His characteristics. How do we define God?
Look at the picture I’m using to illustrate. It is Michelangelo’s Creation of Adam, that adorns the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Notice how God (on the right) is straining to reach out to touch man, and there is man, laid back, with a limp hand, looking like he is doing God a favor by allowing Him (God) to touch him. Isn’t that the story of man in general? Man wanting God to do all work. Wanting God to serve him. Anything man does is doing god a favor (Can we ever really do God any favors?) Thinking God a nothing more than the big “Santa Claus” in the sky to come to our rescue when ever we need him. And if we don’t need him, then God is suppose sit tight on the shelf until we do need Him.
The world as a whole, just does not have a clue as to who or what God is or what He is about.
However, notice the title of today’s message. It is not “What is God like?” but rather “What is like God?” Is there anything comparable to God? Is there anything that can be substituted for God?
To the church crowd that a statement about a substituted for God may seem absurd. If you said nothing can be substituted for God, you would be right, except this is something that the masses, even church people do every day. They substitute for God their cars, their houses, their careers, their stuff. Anytime time we worship anything other than Almighty God, we just made a substitution. What does God have to say about that?
Exodus 20:3 You shall have no other gods before Me.
Look up the 10 commandments. This is commandment number one. Yet arguably, this commandment is the commandment most violated.
There is no god like our God. Today we are looking at what is like our God. The Lord God Himself asked that question as recorded in the book of Isaiah.
Isaiah 44:6–8
Isn’t it interesting, the Bible makes no argument for the existence of God? In scripture the existence of God is always assumed. We have notable apologists who argue or give a rational defense for the existence of God and for our Christian faith. Often these arguments are made using reasoning apart from the Bible. We can know some of these reasonings and even the Bible says we ought to be ready to make a defense.
1 Peter 3:15 but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence;
One reason some of these arguments made are apart from Scripture is that most people do not accept the Bible as authoritative for many different reasons. In fact when it comes to scripture, most of the world can not get past the first verse in the Bible:
Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
If you cannot get past the first verse, the rest of scripture will be worthless to you. Even those first four word is a stopping point: “In the beginning God,” stops most of the world. This is where most of the world runs into problems. Even for those who profess a belief in God, most of those people do not understand the implications of such a belief. For starters The Bible tells us that God has very clearly made His existence known.
Romans 1:18–20 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, 19 because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. 20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.
The Bible is clear. God has made known His existence known to everyone and everyone who has rejected the existence of God has made a deliberate, willful choice to do so. Scripture is also clear, God will deal severely with those who chose to not acknowledge Him.
God’s name for Himself deals with His existence. When Moses met God at the burning bush, and asked "Who shall I say sent me?" God replies:
Exodus 3:14 God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM”; and He said, “Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ ”
Translators have a difficult time translating this phrase because it can be interpreted in so many ways: I AM THE PRE-EXISTING ONE, I WILL BE WHAT I WILL BE, or I AM THAT I AM. God’s name proclaims His existence. We cannot begin to please God unless we sincerely believe He exist.
Hebrews 11:6 And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him. The Bible has a word for those who do not believe in His existence:
Psalm 14:1 The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they have committed abominable deeds; There is no one who does good.
The word “Fool” in Biblical terms means more than just a person who lack good sense or sound judgment. It means an immoral degenerate, someone who is worthless and godless.
The fact remains, whether God is acknowledged or not, there is coming a day when all will proclaim Jesus as Lord.
Philippians 2:10–11 so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
What is critical is who will bow the knee and proclaim Jesus as Lord now?
The Bible just assumes the existence of God and does not try to prove it. Neither will we this morning. Our purpose this morning is to understand the ramifications of God’s existence. The existence of God is just our starting point. If God exist, and indeed He does, what is the ramification on our lives, on our very existence. With what can we compare God to?
The context of our focal verses in Isaiah is that of the pagan religions of the world that surrounded Israel in that day. Many of them were polytheistic (meaning many different gods) and the worship of idols, man-made objects of stone and wood, covered in gold and silver. Other worshipped created objects like the sun, moon and stars.
But why does Isaiah keep coming back to the problem of idols? Because idols are the problem. “A central theological principle of the Bible [is] the rejection of idolatry. Think about it. If there is only one God, and if we are not experiencing his reviving fullness, there is a reason. The reason is, idols are clogging the inflow of his refreshment. The exclusive reality of God forces the question of idolatry. We need to think about this because our world is crowded with idols.” [1]
Today we are only a little more sophisticated. We worship money, power, our professions, our possessions and our politics. All are idols. Many Christians fall to worship these things too. Why, because we lost sight of just who and what God is.
Isaiah 44:6 “Thus says the LORD, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the LORD of hosts: ‘I am the first and I am the last, And there is no God besides Me.
This is God Himself speaking. Notice how LORD is in all capital letters. In the Hebrew, it is God’s proper name of YAHWEH. In most of our modern Bible translations, we follow the Jewish practice of not using God’s proper name but substituting LORD for the name. YAHWEH God defines Himself as their King, and as their Redeemer and gives Himself the descriptive title of "I am the first and I am the last."
None comes before God, none comes after. This is a pretty amazing description if you think about it. Before there was anything, including time itself, there was God. God created time itself. He existed before time, and He exists at the end of time and at all points in-between. God is not bound by time and space as we understand it. And another amazing fact is that this is the same description Jesus uses for Himself, making Jesus God.
Revelation 22:13 I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.”
Alpha and Omega is the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet. It is like saying He is the “A to Z” in our vernacular.
We find this expressed in many different ways in Scripture, and we’re only going to look at a few of them.
John 1:1–3 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being.
There is so much in these opening verses of the Gospel of John. There is nothing in existence that is apart from Jesus, the Jesus who is with God and the Jesus who is God. Paul elaborates further:
Colossians 1:16–17 For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. 17 He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.
Without God through His son Jesus, there is nothing apart from Him. He causes all things to be. And because He before all things, God goes on to say Isaiah 44:6, “And there is no God besides Me.” There is nothing like God. There is nothing that is His equal.
This is something the world does not want to hear. If there is a creator, and if He created all that there is, and nothing exist apart from Him, then we are all answerable to Him. He makes all the rules we should be living by. God never asked me for my opinion of morality. In fact, if we look at man's attempt to define morality apart from God, we get the mess we are in today, our downfallen culture is the evidence of that.
Isaiah 44:7 ‘Who is like Me? Let him proclaim and declare it; Yes, let him recount it to Me in order, From the time that I established the ancient nation. And let them declare to them the things that are coming And the events that are going to take place.
There are those who will thumb their noses at God and dare God to show Himself. God says for them to show themselves. God, being at the very beginning, knows all things. We have His record in the Bible. Yet there is those who question and refute the Bible. those who will say the Bible is wrong and they know better.
The Genesis account of creation and the flood of Noah’s day is refuted more than the resurrection of Jesus. Yet God asks a simple question concerning the origin of the world and of man. God asked this question to Job:
Job 38:4 “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell Me, if you have understanding,
Yet modern man believes he has the answer the origins of man, the earth and even the entire universe. God knows the beginning, and He also know the end and all events in between. This is why we can trust Bible prophecy. God speaks as if he was there in the future, because He is there. We only guess at the future, God knows. But yet, God declares these things to us.
Isaiah 44:8 ‘Do not tremble and do not be afraid; Have I not long since announced it to you and declared it? And you are My witnesses. Is there any God besides Me, Or is there any other Rock? I know of none.’ ”
God calls us to himself. God desires for us to have a relationship with Himself. We have seen and witnessed the might acts of God, we have seen them and experienced His hand of mercy. God asks: “Is there any God besides Me?” What is our answer? Of course we will say no, but then why do we worship and turn to things before Him. Why do we trust, other people, our possessions, even ourselves before we will rely on Him?
“is there any other Rock?” Where should we be standing? “On Christ the solid Rock I stand, All other ground is sinking sand.” [2] Is there any other Rock? God answers: “I know of none.”
We must continually see God for who and what He is. All we are is because of Him, all we have is because of Him. Does it not stand to reason, that we owe all to Him?
Over the course of the next few months we are going to explore who and what God is. His power, His knowledge, the fact that He is unchanging. We will explore His holiness, His grace and mercy. His will for our lives.
God desires our fellowship, our love. God did not create us as robots, but allows us to choose to love Him and to give Him glory. But as we said earlier, there is coming a time when we all, all of creation will acknowledge His holiness, His sovereignty. There will come a time when everyone and everything will acknowledge Jesus as Lord. Who will acknowledge Him now?
There is no equal to God. The is nothing like God. And we owe all to Him.
[1] Raymond C. Ortlund Jr. and R. Kent Hughes, Isaiah: God Saves Sinners, Preaching the Word (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2005), 293.
[2] The Solid Rock, Edward Mote, ca.1834
