There is one thing Jesus did that triggered both the general population and the priesthood more than anything else: when He declared Himself to be God. Throughout the Gospel of John, Jesus gave Himself seven “I am” statements along with one very big “I AM” statement. Here they are:
- I am the Bread of Life (John 6:35)
- I am the Light of the World (John 8:12)
- I am the Door (John 10:9)
- I am the Good Shepherd (John 10:11,14)
- I am the Resurrection and the Life (John 11:25)
- I am the Way and the Truth and the Life (John 14:6)
- I am the Vine (John 15:1,5)
- Before Abraham was, I AM (John 8:58)
Let’s examine each one and discuss why Jesus would say this about Himself, especially at the risk of extreme peril and rejection.
Jesus is the Bread of Life. John 6 opens with the feeding of the 5000 and covers Jesus’ discourse with the people who sought to make Him an automated food machine so they didn’t have to work for their food. He didn’t give them a second bite. He instead told them that their trust sustenance would be Him, His very life. To the Jews, eating any flesh and blood of a human was the ultimate food sin, yet Jesus said we were to eat His flesh and drink His blood. He was speaking of The Lord’s Supper and, of course, His crucifixion, but He is also the Word of God made flesh. And man does not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Jesus is that word. Jesus wanted us to take no other source of sustenance other than Him.
Jesus is the Light of the World. Jesus is the only source of visibility, knowledge, and understanding. Yes, we have the sun for physical light, and yes, we have education, but they are mere shadows of the true light and true knowledge – Jesus. Jesus is the only one who helps us to see clearly in any circumstance.
Jesus is the Door. Jesus is the only way in. He was speaking about a sheep pen; being the door, He marks and identifies who belongs in the pen and who doesn’t. But this also applies to the door of the Ark of Noah – one door, one way in, one means of salvation. Trying to get in any other way is like a thief trying to sneak in and claim what is not his. Jesus is the only way to salvation.
Jesus is the Good Shepherd. Jesus is the guardian, protector, and supplier for the sheep. He will beat up the wolves, and He will lead us to the fields and waters to eat in peace. Even when enemies are around, He will prepare a table for us while He protects us. But as the Good Shepherd, He also corrects us and disciplines us so that we may walk with Him instead of going our own way.
Jesus is the Resurrection and the Life. Jesus is the source of life. He won’t merely bring us to resurrection, He is the resurrection itself. It is in and through Jesus that life is given, taken away, and even given again. Lazarus had died, and Jesus waited intentionally for him to die so that He could perform His final public miracle: raising Lazarus from the dead. Jesus did this to demonstrate that physical death, physical sickness, or even the pain of suffering and torture mean nothing to a Christian who has their trust in Jesus because He has the power over it. It does not mean all will be healed physically in this life or there will be no suffering, but it means there is far more with Jesus than this physical life.
Jesus is the Way, Truth, and the Life. Jesus is exclusive. I know that is not a popular thing to say, but there is only one means of salvation and that is through Jesus Christ. He is the way to life. He is the truth, the only standard of reality that is never wrong. He is the life, and those who have Christ have something that no one or nothing else can offer: hope beyond this world. No other religion can do it. No achievement of man can do it. Only Jesus can do it. And the best part about it is we don’t have to do the heavy lifting. All we have to do is follow Him and He takes care of all the details.
Jesus is the Vine. Jesus is the source of life and the power behind all life. We have to rest and trust in Him and stay connected to Him. Otherwise, we are like a dead branch that can do nothing but be a pawn or tool in someone else’s hands. But if we are attached to Jesus, not only will we bear spiritual fruit, but we will have the “goods” to grow. The more we grow, the stronger the attachment to the vine.
Jesus is the I AM. This is the ultimate statement of Jesus’ self-identification where even above His declaration to be one with the Father, here He declared Himself to be the very God who appeared to Moses. And newsflash: He was. It was the Angel of the Lord who appeared to Moses and declared Himself to be the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It was Jesus who appeared to Abraham multiple times and it was Jesus who wrestled with Jacob. Jesus is the I AM. He truly could declare Himself to be God because He was the very one who gave Moses that name.
Jesus is everything – quite literally, everything. He is God. Everything is about Him and for Him. He created everything for His glory and His pleasure, and He created us to be able to partake in that love He has. He is the purpose of all things, and we exist to worship Him and to enjoy Him forever. He is to be the center of our thoughts, the source of our sustenance, our go-to, our protection, our provider, our everything. While we have our doctrines and our theologies, every one of them is centered around Jesus. And if we miss Jesus, we miss everything. Don’t miss Him.
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Who are you?
You may answer that question in a variety of ways. The simplest way is to give your name, but there are many other ways we share our identity and answer the question of who we are Perhaps you identify yourself with your employment or career: I’m an engineer, a teacher, etc. Perhaps you identify yourself with your role in the family: I’m a mother, a father, a grandparent, etc. Perhaps you identify yourself with your current role in life: I’m a student, a homemaker, etc.
While all those things may be true about us and they do form a part of our worldly identities, everyone who is a believer in Jesus Christ has an identity much greater and more important than that: I am a child of God, loved by Him.
Around 6-7 years ago, the church I was attending at the time spent months focusing on how we can fully grasp that identity while living in this world. While it was impactful for me at the time, I don’t think I could have gotten through the major life transitions I’ve had over the past year without that foundation of my identity rooted in Christ. I do a lot of different things in life and I have a lot of titles, but only one actually matters: I am a child of God, loved by Him.
Where does this idea come from? There are 5 key Scripture passages that build the foundation for this identity in Christ, which is who we are as believers in Jesus. Note the phrases that I have bolded in each passage.
Genesis 1:27: “So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.”
1 John 3:1-2: “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.”
Ephesians 2:8-10: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
2 Corinthians 5:17-18: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation.”
Colossians 3:1-4: “Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.”
Each of us has been created in the image of God. We share some (not all) attributes with the almighty God of the universe! We were created with souls and the free will to choose to love God (or to reject Him). He has created us to be His children, whom He loves with unconditional love. There is nothing we can do to make God love us less, and there is nothing we can do to make God love us more.
We will be like God one day; we will never BE God, but we will be like Him when we join Him in heaven for all eternity. He chose to save us and give us the gift of His grace, which we accept through faith. He created us as His handiwork, and then when we as humankind sinned and separated ourselves from God, He redeemed us through the sacrifice of Jesus and made us a new creation in Him.
Our life is hidden with Christ in God. While the things of this world matter while we’re in this world, the significance of our lives is not in what we do but in who we are: we are children of God. It is His working in our lives that matters, and how we are obedient to what He calls us to do.
While these ideas may be somewhat easy to grasp intellectually, it’s another matter to fully grasp them to the core of our being. How do these truths play out in daily life?
The main impact of these truths is how we see ourselves, which then flows out to how we relate to others. My value as a person is not in what I can accomplish but in who I belong to; I am a child of God. My identity as a person is not in the roles I have in this world; I am a child of God. My purpose in life is not to do what I want to do or to be successful financially; I am a child of God, loved by Him, so my purpose is to be obedient to my heavenly Father.
If we truly believe these statements, then we will be secure in our identity in Christ no matter what happens to us in this world. We will still face difficulties in this world, whether as a consequence of our own actions or as a consequence of living in a broken and fallen world, but our attitude in facing those difficulties will be totally different. Nothing in this world can change who we are in Christ! Losing a job, being bullied or called terrible things, the breaking up of a family, serious illness – nothing can change the fact that I am a child of God, loved by Him.
Our identity in Christ and who we are is not based on circumstances. It is based on who the eternal God is, and He never changes. No person in this world can change who you are in Christ, no matter how much influence they have on your life.
If you are not a believer in Jesus, then you may not yet have this identity, but it is available to you! Just as is written in Ephesians above, this is the gift of God. God’s grace allows us to have faith in Christ, and that is when we are able to start fully grasping this new identity.
Who are you? You are a child of God, loved by Him.
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One of the greatest blunders that many evangelicals have made is changing the Gospel presentation to starting with God and who God is to “God has a wonderful plan for you.” This not only makes the Gospel about man, how precious man is, and how God needs man, but it spits on the face of God and basically turns him to a pansy. When the focus of the message is wrong, it paints a wrong picture about God and those are not secondary issues we can just set aside.
The Gospel starts with God. The first words of the Bible are: “In the beginning, God…” It all starts with God. It was God’s plan to create a universe, a setting in which mankind would rebel against God and in which He would come down and rescue His people from their sin. God is the originator, the orchestrator, the plotter, the planner, and the architect, and He will finish everything that He started. But first, we have to know who God is, because if we get God wrong, none of the message of the Gospel is going to work. God is who the Gospel is about. He is the hero of the story. He’s not a mere genie who assists man in his own story, nor even merely the wise mentor, but the hero. And a severe problem we have today is we think we are the heroes of our own story. Hint: we aren’t. We are the damsel in distress in the best-case scenario. In reality, we are the villain. We are the ones who sinned. We are the ones who rebelled. We are the ones who deserve the cheers and jeers from an audience that wants to see the villain go down. We are the ones over whom the people will rejoice to see justice to be met. And God is going to see that justice is done. It is God who this story is all about, and when all is said and done, it will be God who eternity is focused on.
Who is God? I have both blog posts and a book about the character and attributes of God – who He is and what He is like. Of many different attributes, I will emphasize a few. First, God is the Creator. I’ll deal with this more next week, but the Gospel starts with God as creator. Being the creator means God not only knows but also controls every intricate detail about His creation. This is called sovereignty. This is a dreaded word in today’s soft evangelical world, where God is more treated like a divine butler, or a needy, sissified God who needs man, or a shampoo model who breaks if you breathe near them. God is sovereign. That means He rules over all things, including our circumstances. He can change them in an instant, and they are all there to establish and build God’s plan and God’s kingdom.
Many people do not like the idea of God as sovereign because it takes self out of the equation. One thing I will be addressing in this series is the deadly teaching and belief that we can come to God on our terms. It comes in many forms, but we have to understand that God is God, and we are not. We do not have a say in how reality works, and we most certainly do not have a say in what God should or should not do. In every case when we do that, we are projecting ourselves onto God and telling Him that He should do what we think should be done. Sometimes out of His compassion and love for us, He will. But sometimes for other purposes we cannot know nor understand at the moment, He does not. God has a much bigger plan involved than we can imagine, and it has many more pieces in play that we can understand. Sometimes He allows suffering due to consequences of sin and other times to train and prepare us for something much bigger. We don’t know why God allows some to sin against others in very grievous ways but part of what triggered me to write this seriously is to show how the Gospel is also for the victims of such sins. We know that God is still good despite the evil decisions of man.
God is a holy, righteous, and just God. This means when we sin against Him, He does not and will not let sin go unpunished. A wrong has been made, and He cannot let that slide or that would be unjust. Yes, God does and has allowed very evil things to happen, but they never happen without consequences. Nobody sins without consequences. Some are immediate, some are not, but our sins will find us out and justice will be had. Even for those who repent, there are still consequences. Just ask David. God forgave him of his sins regarding Uriah and Bathsheba, but he would deal with violence the rest of his life and it would be a permanent blemish on his record.
Yet, God is also kind, merciful, and compassionate. He is strict about His law and requires absolute, 100% perfection to keep it, but He also knows the propensity of the heart and weakness of man. He knew man would sin and rebel against Him, and as a means of showcasing His glory, He chose to create man anyway so He could save us from ourselves. God loves us enough to let us choose to do what we want to do, even if it hurts us, but He also loves us enough to come and save us when we come back to Him. However, His love and mercy work side by side with His righteousness, justice, and sovereignty.
So God gets all the glory, salvation is only offered when God offers it and on God’s terms. He gives man zero say on the terms – only to accept or reject them wholesale. As we will see as this series progresses, don’t mess around with God, because He is not messing around Himself. He has an agenda, and it’s His agenda. While He does indeed care for His children, He deals with things so that He gets the glory and His kingdom is advanced.
If we are going to preach the Gospel correctly, it must be God-centered, not man-centered. The Gospel is about God and what God does; it is not about man and how special man is that God needs to come get us to meet His needs. God has no needs, especially not any “needs” that could be fulfilled by sin-cursed people like you and me. We need Him, and the sooner we recognize that, the much better outlook we’ll have because it is not about us, nor dependent upon us. And that means we can rest and rely on God to do the heavy lifting. Life is so much easier to handle (not saying it will be easy, but easier to handle) when we can just roll things off for God to handle than try to deal with them ourselves.
Next week, we’ll look at Creation – how God designed everything at first, how He incorporates the Fall, and the eventual restoration of the creation.
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But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For he “has put everything under his feet.” Now when it says that “everything” has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.
- 1 Corinthians 15:20-28
Paul has presented the case of Jesus Christ being raised from the dead in this chapter. Now he affirms that fact and explains what that means for believers – that Jesus Christ is the guarantee that we, too, will be raised from the dead one day.
The Greek phrase translated as “But… indeed” at the start of verse 20 is a common one for Paul. He uses it in his letters multiple times when he makes a conclusive point about something. We don’t always see it translated that same way in English, but he uses this in 1 Corinthians 13:13, Romans 3:21, Romans 6:22, and Colossians 1:22 just to name a few. It is a certain fact that Christ has been raised from the dead, and Paul has proven that through his discussion earlier in this chapter.
But then we see the phrase “the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” in the second half of verse 20. What does that mean? In the Old Testament, the firstfruits are the first part of a harvest that would be offered to God as an offering (see Leviticus 23:9-14). This offering was to happen before they worked on the main harvest, and it was a promise that the rest of the harvest was coming. So in that way, Jesus’ death and resurrection happened before the full “harvest” of all the believers in Christ who were going to die and be raised again. Christ’s resurrection came first before the believers, and it was also a promise of the resurrection that all believers will experience one day.
Verses 21-22 sound very similar to the points Paul made in Romans 5:12-21 about the first and second Adam. Adam brought death to all mankind by introducing sin into the world, and Jesus Christ was the second Adam who brought life to all mankind through His death and resurrection. One man brought sin and death, and one man brought resurrection and life. The entire human race experiences sin because of Adam, but those who have faith in Jesus Christ will experience life through Him.
Then, Paul gets into some concepts that are a bit harder to work through. In verses 23-24, Paul presents a timeline of sorts. First, Jesus Christ was resurrected as the firstfruits, which is like that offering that happens before the main harvest. Next, those who belong to Christ will be resurrected; that phrase can be translated more literally as, “Then the ones of Christ in the second coming of him.” The Greek word for “second coming” is parousia. This term can simply mean a person being present, but when used to refer to Christ, it means His second coming. The next event is handing over the kingdom of God. This is a total conquest of the entire world by Jesus Christ, including everything that is visible and invisible, all earthly and spiritual powers and authorities.
Everything will be under Christ’s feet (verse 25 and verse 27), meaning that He is the one true ruler and authority over everything because of His resurrection. This verse alludes to Psalm 110:1, which says, “The Lord says to my lord: ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.’”
The final enemy that needs to be destroyed is death (verse 26). We know that Jesus has already conquered death because He died and then was raised again. He was not simply resuscitated to live longer and then die a second death like humans who were raised (Lazarus, for example) but Jesus is permanently alive and will never die. Death has no power over Him because He already defeated it! He will never again experience death.
There is a caveat mentioned in verse 27, that “everything” being under Jesus’ feet does not mean that God is under Jesus’ authority, because God is the one who gave that authority to Jesus in the first place. This is where the doctrine of the Trinity comes into play, that Jesus and the Father (and the Spirit) are all the same God yet separate persons within God.
Verse 28 continues this thought by explaining that Jesus (the Son) will be subject to God the Father (the one who put everything under Him). This is part of the interaction of the Trinity, but this verse also reinforces that God is one God – “so that God may be all in all.” But there is a process to it. The world was created by God, it fell into sin because of man, then was restored to order through Jesus’ death and resurrection and then His second coming, which we are still waiting for today. One day, God will truly be recognized by all as the sovereign one (see Revelation 22:3-5).
Essentially, the main idea is that Jesus’ resurrection was a really big deal. Not only does it grant us as believers eternal life forever in Him, but it will bring the whole world into restoration and under Jesus’ power and authority. That idea of authority can either be a comfort if you’re on the “good side” of that authority, or it can be terrifying if you’re on the “wrong side.” While we are all on the wrong side because of our sin, we have the opportunity through the love of God to have faith in Jesus Christ and live our lives for Him. We can experience God’s forgiveness for all our sins through Jesus’ righteous death, which then puts us on the “good side.” Which side are you on?
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For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words. The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, for,
“Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?”
But we have the mind of Christ.
- 1 Corinthians 2:11-16
In the previous section, Paul compared the wisdom of God with the wisdom of this age, concluding that there is in fact no comparison between the two. God’s wisdom is infinitely greater than that of any person of any era! Paul continues that idea of contrasts here by comparing the Spirit of God with the spirit of the world.
Just as we cannot fully understand God’s wisdom, we cannot understand any of God’s wisdom without God’s Spirit. In verse 11, Paul states that no person can truly know another person’s thoughts. In that same manner, no one knows God’s thoughts except for God Himself. God’s Spirit referred to here is, of course, the Holy Spirit. This is not referring to some kind of spiritual force but rather the person of the Holy Spirit, who is fully God along with the Father and the Son.
While it appears that this verse gives us an analogy comparing the Holy Spirit to God like a human spirit is to that person, that is not the case here. The grammar of the Greek text does not support that analogy, nor does our theology of the Trinity. The spirit of a person is that person, whereas the Holy Spirit is a separate person of God, while still also being fully a part of God.
We as believers have received the Holy Spirit in our lives. We have not received some other spirit that comes from this world, but the true Spirit from God. Why do we need the Holy Spirit in our lives? “So that we may understand what God has freely given us” (verse 12). The Spirit reveals God’s Word to us and helps us understand who God is and how we should live out our Christian faith.
The point of having God’s Spirit in our lives is given in verse 13: we speak words taught by the Spirit. The only way to convey the truths of God’s Word is through words that the Holy Spirit gives us. While we cannot fully understand spiritual realities with our finite human minds, the best attempt we can make is through language given to us by the Spirit. This is again showing the contrast between God’s wisdom and human wisdom, the Spirit of God and the spirit of this world.
Verses 14-15 emphasize this contrast even more. If we don’t have God’s Spirit, then we can’t understand the things of God. Those who are unbelievers consider God’s ways and Word to be foolishness like Paul talked about in 1 Corinthians 1:26-31. The only way to understand God’s wisdom is through God’s Spirit, so someone who doesn’t have God’s Spirit just doesn’t understand. But for those of us who do have God’s Holy Spirit living in us – believers in Jesus Christ – we are able to understand these things, at least at a human level. We are able to discern the things of the Spirit.
Those of us who are believers with God’s Holy Spirit are not subject to merely human judgments, meaning that we follow a different authority and a different wisdom than the wisdom and authority of this world. This is confirmed by the quote that Paul gives in verse 16 from Isaiah 40:13. As with most of the quotations Paul gives in this letter, it is not word-for-word, but he provides the same idea as that verse here.
While we cannot fully know the wisdom of God, we do have some knowledge of it. We don’t know the mind of the Lord in a way where we are in authority over Him or could instruct Him; that much is made clear by this quote that Paul gives. But then he follows that up with stating that we have the mind of Christ. What is Paul saying here?
Recall that the city of Corinth, where the recipients of this letter were located, was a very pagan city. There were lots of Greek philosophers there who relied on their own minds to discern the truths of this world. While Paul acknowledges that he does not fully know the mind of God, he is emphasizing that anything that he teaches will be like foolishness even to the smartest philosophers of the day because Paul has the mind of Christ and they do not. Paul does not know everything that Jesus knows, of course, but through the power of God’s Holy Spirit, he has access to whatever the Spirit wants to reveal to him.
The same is true for us today! While we can never know everything that God knows, and in fact we can ever only know a really tiny fraction of that knowledge, we have access to whatever the Holy Spirit desires to reveal to us. We don’t need to reason out how this world works through the limited capacity of our human brains when we have the whole mind of Christ that we can access through the Holy Spirit!
That also means that anyone who does not have the Holy Spirit will see our message and our teaching as foolishness. They can’t understand the things of God when they don’t have His Spirit to help them understand. This is the epitome of Paul’s argument contrasting the wisdom of God with the foolishness of this world. They are completely at odds with each other, and the only way for one to understand the other is through the power of God’s Holy Spirit.
Are you living your life through the understanding of your human spirit in this world, or through the knowledge that you gain through God’s Holy Spirit? Choose wisely!
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The fourth category of doctrines we will examine is called Pneumatology, the study of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the person of the Trinity who is either the least discussed or is over-emphasized to a very unhealthy level. There is a reason why the Holy Spirit is often not spoken about much: because one of His primary jobs is to reveal Christ. So, unlike the Father and Christ, the Holy Spirit never points to Himself. Be careful about churches that over emphasize the Holy Spirit. I am not saying never talk about Him, but if the general trend is to talk about the Holy Spirit and NOT talk about what the Holy Spirit does, then you must be careful because something is not right.
One of the Holy Spirit’s jobs is to reveal Christ as mentioned above. He will showcase who the true Jesus of Nazareth of the Bible is, and one of the ways He does this is by illuminating Scripture. In my previous series, I wrote about how to read and understand the Bible. Above all I wrote in that series, it is the Holy Spirit who makes the Scriptures come alive. It’s not just understanding what the Bible states that gives it power; it is the active work of the Holy Spirit that gives it power. Spurgeon said that he would never think about trying to defend the Bible, because it would be like trying to defend a lion. Why would you? Just turn the lion loose and he’ll defend himself. Likewise, while apologists do make a strong effort to try to defend the Bible and the faith, I have been convicted that this is the totally wrong approach. We don’t need to defend the Bible intellectually. We instead need to turn it loose because the Bible, when used as the weapon of the Holy Spirit, will strike down the false teachings and demonic ideas and forces we face. For too long, I’ve merely relied on my intellect, rather than actually submitting to the Holy Spirit and letting Him do the battle.
One of the other jobs of the Holy Spirit is to convict the world of its sin. One thing you can state for sure: if a pastor or ministry refuses to deal with sin, and especially if they boast about not dealing with sin, you can mark that pastor or ministry as having nothing to do with the Holy Spirit. If they refuse to deal with sin, the Holy Spirit will, and they are at war with each other. I am not saying that every sermon has to only be about sin, however, when it shows up (which will be often) it does need to be addressed.
In this series, I am showcasing how each system of theology has to deal with origins, let us examine what the Bible says about the Holy Spirit regarding origins. The Holy Spirit is the second person of the Trinity mentioned in the Bible. In Genesis 1:2, God had created the primitive form of the earth, which was primarily just water and the Holy Spirit hovered over them. The term is more likened to “brooding” than mere “hovering.” And it was in this moment that the creation truly began and the Father said, “Let there be light.”
The Apostle Paul makes a connection between this passage of Genesis 1:1-3 and salvation. In Genesis 1:1-3, God creates the seed form of the earth that was incomplete, and the Holy Spirit “brooded” over the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light,” and the creation process began in greater detail. Then Paul states how in the same way God commanded light to come into existence, He also shines light upon our hearts. When God saves someone, we see the same process. The “seed” is planted, the Holy Spirit “broods” over that seed, and then God grants salvation. So even in the first three verses of Genesis, we have the process of salvation in its seed form.
The Holy Spirit didn’t merely enter the picture 2000 years ago at Pentecost. He was there from the start and had an active role in Creation. He was the agent who used the prophets to speak about future events and to reveal what was going on or what needed to happen. He is the one who does the work in plowing, sowing, planting, watering, making the seed grow, and then producing the harvest. The Holy Spirit is the one who convicts man of sin, teaches man right from wrong, corrects and trains man in his journey of sanctification, and then protects and preserves man in salvation.
So, this concludes the three big systematic theology categories of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, but there are six more to come. We will also be looking at anthropology (the study of man), hamartiology (the study of sin), soteriology (the study of salvation), ecclesiology (the study of the church), angelology (the study of the angelic/demonic), and eschatology (the study of end times). I am still baffled that cosmology (the study of origins) is not an explicit category here; a misunderstanding of origins will lead to a misunderstanding of each of these categories. So even though the study of origins is not formally in the list, I will argue that you don’t have a proper view of the rest of the systems without a proper view of origins. Stay tuned for next week on anthropology.
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Theology Proper focuses on the study of God the Father. One of the things that theologians must be careful about is that when we study God, we are not studying a concept or an idea but a person. God is not a research specimen that fits under our microscope to manage and control. There are two ways we can study God. We can know things about Him, such as knowing about a sports superstar. We can learn all his stats, the games he’s played, how he won championships, etc. We can do the same with God. We can learn and study His attributes and His characteristics. However, unless you know that superstar personally, you only know about him rather than knowing him. Likewise, many people know a lot about God, but few actually know Him.
I have written many blog posts about the attributes of God and the names of God, and I even have a book on the attributes, actions, and character of God in the Psalms available from Worldview Warriors Publishing called The God of the Psalms. I have also written about God as Trinity. The bulk of the teachings on “theology proper” is regarding the attributes of God, so I am not going to spend a lot of time on that here. Instead, I will showcase how our beliefs and our observations that we attribute to God are actually in agreement to these attributes, while also addressing the origins debate.
There are two major competing origins views. One comes from the Bible, that God created everything in six days and roughly only 6000 years have passed since its completion. The other has many different flavors but all involve gradual processes over the span of millions of years, whether some “god” is part of the process or not. The young earth creationists and old earth creationists all proclaim that God created, but we differ in our beliefs of how He created. The question we have to ask is this: Does the model we believe and teach fit with the character of God the Father as revealed in Scripture?
This is a question few people are asking. Some are asking it because some do bring it up. If God created a world in which millions of years of animal death was the norm prior to sin (and that is without mentioning all the human remains and fossils that they say predate any image of Adam), does that reflect God’s character of never making anything with error or flaw? Likewise, if God truly is immutable and He never changes, then therefore His scientific laws should never change, therefore the earth is millions of years old, correct? Those are the two arguments regarding origins and the character of God.
I find the latter to be a categorical error because it compares the creation of God to be akin to the character of God. Yet we know from the Bible that the “laws of nature” are not unchangeable and absolute fact. How do we know that? Because the Bible has miracles, and when the end times comes, God is going to end everything. So, I find that attributing the laws of nature to being immutable is actually an unintentional form of deifying nature. And God is a jealous God; He will not tolerate competition for His glory.
That said, if animals were dying and life was corrupt and broken prior to sin, then that is saying that God is not only inept at creating things, making them flawed, but it also lessens God’s justice upon sin. Why? Because if death was already happening prior to sin, then God threatening death as judgment upon sin has no real weight. If Adam and Eve and the animals were going to die anyway, all that eating the fruit of the Tree did was speed it up. It didn’t change anything.
Lastly on this point, the art is a reflection of the artist. If the creation is corrupt, the creator is corrupt. And the teachings of life over the span of millions of years is not original to the last 200 years. The Gnostics taught it 2000 years ago, citing a corrupt creator, the Demiurge, who created the universe out of the corrupted essence of the “True God” as we see it today. I truly believe that if the teachings of millions of years were carried to their logical conclusion, the resulting models would be all but identical to the Gnostics. What we believe about origins reflects what believe about the Creator. Likewise, how we view the Creator will determine how we view the creation. We need to at least be consistent with our position. When we try to mix and match things because a lot of mainstream people believe something other than what the Bible says, it shows we really only believe what the audience in front of us believes. We as Christians are commanded to not let the fear of man dictate what we do or think.
God the Father is not just some concept out there either. He knows every thought we have about Him and how we treat Him, whether we want to recognize it or not. Every one of us do not, cannot, and will not ever be able to treat God with the honor and respect He deserves. Yet He chooses to love us in our finite, broken, and rebellious state. But He doesn’t ask for much from us: just to believe Him and obey Him. That takes trust – trust He is more than willing to build with us if we let Him. Throughout the Bible, God showcases His character in Israel’s history so that we all know that He is good and trustworthy. Yet we also learn in His dealings that He does not mess around regarding sin. This is why we can’t mess around with the Flood account.
This past November, I taught a session on the theology of the Flood during a Creation Conference I helped host. All I did was showcase the Biblical account of the pre-Flood world, the Flood account, and the post-Flood world according to Scripture and the theological lessons we learn from it. My audience said it was very helpful for them to see the issues involved and that it’s not small matter. The only point from that talk I’ll point out here is that the Flood had to be global in its extent just on the point of the message of the Gospel alone. In the non-global flood models, there would always be an escape for mankind outside the Ark. And that is a severe problem because the Ark has always been understood as a type of Christ, the one means of salvation. Every New Testament author who speaks of this event said only Noah and his family escaped via the Ark. No one else. It is a strike against God the Father to teach a non-global flood because it teaches that God’s judgment is not universal, comprehensive, and complete. Yet if we teach what the Bible does say about the Flood correctly, we’ll get God’s character of righteous judgment and mercy and grace correct as well.
Next week, we’ll examine Christology: the study of Jesus Christ.
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by Jaya DeZurik
The most basic teaching of Christianity is that God is love. From the creation of Adam and Eve in Genesis to the promise of Christ’s return in Revelation, God’s love is revealed throughout all Scripture. There are three facets of God’s love demonstrated in the Bible that I will point out.
1. God’s love in consistent. His love doesn’t waver or change from day to day. God’s love stays the same regardless of man’s inconsistency. God’s love for us does not fluctuate; it remains constant and consistent with His character. Even in the days of Noah, God’s love for mankind did not diminish. In fact, God grieved that He had made people because their actions became so deplorable. Their violence grieved Him because of His love for them. In His great love for mankind, He saved the one righteous man, Noah, and his family, thereby saving future generations that include us. Psalm 36:5-7 says, “Your love, O LORD, reaches to the heavens, your faithfulness to the skies. Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, your justice like the great deep. O LORD, you preserve both man and beast. How priceless is your unfailing love!”
2. God’s love is persistent. God’s love continues forever despite our opposition and outright defiance toward Him. God will not quit loving anyone. We see God’s patient endurance with people throughout Scripture. As the Israelites repeat the pattern of reaping the consequences of their sin, repenting, and turning to God, He was always faithful to forgive them out of His great love for them. God knows the mind and patterns of men, yet His love continues for us forever. Psalm 106:1 says, “Praise the LORD. Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever.”
3. God’s love is insistent. God is resolute in His love for us. He WILL love us because He IS love. God’s love for us will not back off or back down no matter what. In His infinite wisdom, God knows how fickle our feelings are and how erratic we are in our behavior. He will love us in spite of our changing attitudes toward Him. God loves us when all we see is the goodness of God and when all we see is the ugliness of life. Romans 8:38-39 says, “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
When we go through difficult times in life, it seems or feels as though God has rejected, abandoned, or forgotten us. It is important to remember that God always loves us and is always motivated by love toward us because God IS love. Even when it appears that our circumstances are determined by anything but love, God is still true to His character of love. Our perception of love comes through lives tainted by sin and wounds and influenced by our physical perceptions. I encourage you to remember and believe that God loves you, even if your feelings and life situations tell you otherwise.
God’s love for you is consistent; it is steady and unwavering.
God’s love for you is persistent; it perseveres and never quits.
God’s love for you is insistent; it is unrelenting.
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“In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. So he became as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs.” -Hebrews 1:1-4
As I wrote about last week, we do not know who wrote the book of Hebrews. But whoever the author is, he starts right in with some great theology! While Hebrews is generally considered to be a letter, it doesn’t start out with the usual letter format of initial greetings, including who is writing and who is the intended audience. Instead, the author starts right into Jesus and His saving work.
The author begins by telling his readers that God is active; He has spoken, and He still speaks. This is a common theme throughout the Bible, starting all the way back in Genesis 1:3 when God spoke light into existence, and He continued speaking the rest of our world into existence throughout the Creation account. God spoke to Moses in the burning bush, God spoke to Elijah in a still, small voice, God spoke to Isaiah in the temple, etc. God can convey His message to His people in a variety of ways, and speaking is just one of the ways we see God communicating with us.
This initial phrase in verse 1 of explaining how God spoke to “our ancestors” is one of the ways that the audience of this book may be identified. All of these people to whom God had spoken (at least as far as we have record of) would have been of the nation of Israel, so the author and readers of this book were likely Jewish, hence the name of the book as Hebrews.
The author builds on the past speaking of God and shows that still continues today. The phrase “in these last days” in verse 2 may sound to our ears like the author thinks the end of the world may be upon them. But that phrase is more literally translated as “on the last of these days.” This phrase is found in the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament) where it refers to the time of the Messiah. Here in this context, it means that we are now living in the new age where the Messiah, Jesus, has come. This connects the times of old where God spoke through the prophets and the current time of the letter where God spoke through His Son Jesus.
Next, the author goes on to explain who this Son of God is. He gives 8 different truths about this Son:
1. He was appointed as heir of all things (verse 2)
2. God made the universe through Him (verse 2)
3. He is the radiance of God’s glory (verse 3)
4. He is the exact representation of God’s being (verse 3)
5. He sustains all things through His word (verse 3)
6. He provided purification for sins (verse 3)
7. He sat down at the right hand of God in heaven (verse 3)
8. He became superior to the angels (verse 4)
What do all these mean?
Jesus has been appointed as heir to all things. This shows us that Jesus holds a supreme place in the ruling of the universe. It may seem unusual that He was “appointed” to this role; we would think that the Son would automatically be the heir. But this active verb shows us that God is actively acknowledging Jesus as the heir.
God is the creator, but we know that Jesus was present at Creation and involved in the process. We see this in John 1:3, 1 Corinthians 8:6, and Colossians 1:16. The word used in Greek here for “the universe” also refers to time rather than just the physical world we see around us. Jesus has been involved in Creation and all of time.
Jesus is the radiance of God’s glory. The word used for “radiance” can also mean a shining forth of brightness or a reflection. Jesus shines forth with God’s glory, and He is a reflection of that glory as well. We see the glory of God through the person of Jesus.
The Greek word translated as “exact representation” is actually spelled like “charakter,” and this is the only time it is used in the New Testament. This word originally referred to an instrument used for engraving, then it referred to a mark stamped on that instrument, like the impression of a die. We see the being or essence of God in the person of Jesus as we would see the impression made from a die.
The idea of Jesus sustaining all things is not like simply holding up the universe, but it has the idea of carrying it along and helping it toward a goal. God did not just create the world through Jesus and then let it go and do its own thing; rather, Jesus is actively working in this world. His Word is active and powerful in this world.
The concept of Jesus providing purification for sins is central to this book. This is why Jesus came to earth - to deal with the problem of mankind’s sin. We will see this concept much more as we continue our journey through Hebrews. The word “purification” can be used in the sense of a ritual cleansing, but it can also refer to the removing of sin from our lives.
After Jesus’ purifying work was done, He “sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.” The sitting posture shows that that person is resting after their work is done, and the right hand is the place of honor. This phrase tells us that Jesus’ work was done, and because of that, He now has the place of highest honor in heaven.
Finally, even though Jesus has always been superior to the angels, the writer tells us He “became” superior because of the work that Jesus did. He was always God, then He became man to defeat sin once and for all, and then He came back to heaven as much superior to the angels because of what He did on earth. His name is even more important now that He has accomplished His atoning work.
So what does all this mean for us today? This magnificent Jesus that the writer of Hebrews tells us all about is the same Jesus who provided salvation for us. We have the amazing opportunity to be in relationship with God because of Jesus’ work. Give God the glory for that by living your life for Him today!
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Today’s phrase of the Lord’s Prayer finally ends the first sentence: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:9-10). The whole prayer so far has been one sentence: addressing our Father in heaven, calling Him holy as He is, desiring that His kingdom come, and that His will be done. Today, we’re looking at how and where those things should happen - on earth as it is in heaven.
Interestingly, the Greek for this phrase appears backward from what we read in our English translations. It literally translates to “as in heaven also upon earth.” But even though the wording is in a different order, the English meaning remains true.
This phrase, “on earth as it is in heaven,” links the previous two phrases of “your kingdom come” and “your will be done.” Where or how will God’s kingdom come? It will be on earth as it is in heaven. Where or how will God’s will be done? It will be done on earth as it is done in heaven.
God is currently reigning over His kingdom in heaven. His kingdom is present here on this earth, but not in the same way. Only perfection exists in heaven, while the earth is still full of sinfulness and brokenness. When we pray for God’s kingdom to come on earth as it is in heaven, we are praying for that holy and perfect reign to be over all the earth as well. One day at the end of this world, we will get to experience the new heaven and earth. We are currently separated from that perfection by our sin, but we look forward to the day that it will come, and this earth will be like heaven.
I encourage you to read all of Revelation 21 for more about what this will look like. “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, ‘Behold, the tabernacle of God is among the people, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them, and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.’ And He who sits on the throne said, ‘Behold, I am making all things new.’” (Revelation 21:1-5a).
The kingdom of God is already present on this earth, but we want to see it come in its perfect form as well - we want it to be on earth as it currently is in heaven.
Next, we want God’s will to be done on earth as it is in heaven. We can discern God’s will for our lives on this earth, but it’s not the same as God’s will in heaven. Again, the separation and difference are due to the sinfulness of this world in comparison to the perfection of heaven. God’s will is perfect, but we aren’t able to fully perceive His perfection through our sinful minds.
It’s important to note the context of this passage of the Lord’s Prayer when we look at this topic. As I wrote about in the introduction, the instance of this prayer that we’re focusing on happens during Jesus teaching what’s known as the Sermon on the Mount. This teaching includes topics such as murder, adultery, divorce, loving our enemies, giving to the needy, fasting, not worrying, judging others, etc. When we are living in the perfection of heaven and God’s perfect will is all we know, none of these topics will be relevant! God’s desires will always be accomplished; we won’t need to be instructed on how to do so. There will be no evil to compare it to; everything will be perfect, including how we’ll know what God’s will is for us.
This phrase of the Lord’s Prayer also confirms for us that heaven is real. While it may not be a physical place as we understand space in this world, but heaven is a place where we will be able to live one day, as long as we have faith in the saving work of Jesus Christ. If heaven were not real, Jesus would not reference it in this prayer. We may not know all the details about heaven or be able to understand it with our limited intellect, but it’s sufficient to know that it will be far better than this earth - it will be perfect. For more on heaven, check out this post.
We desire that this earth would look more like heaven. As we pray this model prayer that Jesus has given us, we desire for God’s kingdom to come to this earth as it is currently in heaven, and we desire for God’s will to be done in a most perfect way.
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Our journey through the Lord’s Prayer continues with the phrase, “Your will be done” in Matthew 6:10. This phrase taken by itself may raise the questions of, “Whose will?” “What is that will?” and “Why should we want it to be done?”
As I wrote about last week, the “your” written here is our Father in heaven - God. So the easy answer to the first question is that we want God’s will to be done.
The next question we may ask is what is God’s will. That is not an easy question to answer in just a few words, as God’s will for each of our lives is different than anyone else’s; God’s will for my life is not the same as God’s will for your life. But, we can look to the Scriptures to see what God’s will is in an overall sense.
Jesus tells the crowds in John 6:38-40, “For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.” Jesus clearly states that His mission is to do the will of “him who sent me,” that is God the Father. Because we as Jesus’ followers are called to imitate Him and become more like Him, then our will, too, should be to do the will of the Father.
Jesus elaborates on that will a bit more by saying that His purpose is not to lose anyone that the Father has given to Him, but to give them eternal life raise them up on the last day. This shows us that Jesus’ whole purpose in life is to do exactly what the Father wants Him to do. This should be our purpose in life as well - to do the will of the Father. Our desire should be to guide people to Jesus so that they can receive the gift of eternal life from Him.
How do we know what God’s will is? Romans 12:2 tells us, “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is — his good, pleasing and perfect will.” We need to allow ourselves to be transformed in Jesus so that our mind will function more like the mind of Christ, and we will be able to discern what God’s will is for us. We know that God’s will is good, pleasing and perfect, because God Himself is good, pleasing, and perfect; nothing evil can exist in Him at all. So if we suspect something may be God’s will, we should test it against that criteria.
But perhaps you’re wondering how we’ll be able to accomplish whatever God’s will is for us. Hebrews 13:20-21 says, “Now may the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.” It is through the power of God that we will be equipped with whatever we need for accomplishing whatever God wants for us to do.
Maybe you need something more specific that tells you what to do in order to do God’s will. 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 says, “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” Of course, all of that is easier said than done; it is no easy task for us to rejoice always, pray continually, or give thanks in all circumstances. But that is what we are called to do.
This is exactly why we need to pray for God’s will to be done - we know we are not capable of figuring out or fulfilling that will in our own power. We need the power of God working in and through us in order to figure out what God’s will is, and then to actually do it. For more on praying along with God’s will, check out this post. Praying for God’s will to be done encompasses both asking for God’s power to help us be obedient to whatever He is calling us to, but it also encompasses God’s overall plan for the world.
We as human beings will never fully understand the mind of God or how He is working all things together for His good purposes. God’s will is not just individual for each of ours lives but it is also much grander - for all of humanity, in all times and in all places, from those who have already lived to those who are yet to live. God created this world and had a plan for it from the beginning; while His will was that we as humans would always live in perfect harmony with Him, that was broken by mankind’s desire for sin. But God had a plan in mind, and that was for Jesus to come to this earth as a human (yet also fully God), live a perfect life, then die and be raised again so that our relationship with God may be restored.
While Jesus has already come and completed the work He needed to do in order to provide salvation for all of humanity, we are still waiting on the full restoration of all creation back to the perfection in which God created it. When we pray “Your will be done,” we are not only praying for God’s will to be done in our own individual lives but also for Jesus to come again so we can experience that eternal perfection.
What are you praying for regarding God’s will? We often get so wrapped up in our own individual lives that we may forget to consult what God’s will is for us, or we miss the big picture of God’s master plan for all of humanity. Join me in praying that God’s good, perfect, and pleasing will may be made known and accomplished for each of us, individually and as God’s creation.
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Last month, I wrote on Theology Proper, which helps answer the question of who God is. We can never fully know God, but He has revealed much of His character to us. In that post, I also looked at the idea of the Trinity - how God is three distinct persons yet one God. As humans, we find the ideas of God as Father and Jesus as Son somewhat easy to grasp, especially since Jesus came to earth in human form. But the Holy Spirit is a much more vague concept for many Christians to understand. Today, we’ll look at pneumatology, which is the study of the Holy Spirit.
The word pneumatology comes from the Greek word for spirit, pneuma. Both pneuma and the Hebrew word for spirit, ruach, have the idea of breath or wind also. This is where we get English words like pneumatic from; not because pneumatics have anything to do with the spirit, but more of the idea of wind.
The person of the Holy Spirit can best be described within the concept of the triune God. The Spirit is a full person along with the Father and the Son, so any characteristic that applies to one person of the Trinity applies to all of them. The Spirit is also eternal and unchanging, just as the Father and Son are. The Spirit is also omnipresent (all-present), omnipotent (all-powerful), and omniscient (all-knowing), just as the Father and Son are.
We often think of the Spirit as some sort of mysterious divine force rather than as a person, often because it’s easier for us to relate to the Father and Son as persons. But we can have a relationship with the Spirit just as we can with the Father and the Son.
In the Bible, we see the Spirit expressed in a variety of terms and images. Here are some examples:
- Life-breath (Genesis 2:7)
- Wind (Genesis 8:1)
- Fire (Matthew 3:11-12)
- Water (Isaiah 44:3)
- A cloud (Exodus 24:15-18)
- A dove (Matthew 3:16)
- Paraclete/comforter/advocate (John 14:16)
There is no single passage in Scripture that we can point to in order to learn all about the Spirit, but it is evident throughout the Bible that the Spirit is working as God. We see the Spirit present at Creation in Genesis 1:2. We see the presence of the Spirit in Jesus in Luke 4:18-19. In the book of Acts, we see multiple times that the Spirit facilitates salvation. Throughout the Scriptures, the Spirit gives power and gifts to the people, such as leaders and warriors in the Old Testament and the apostles and others in the early church, especially leaders and missionaries. We see the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23. These are not traits that we can live out on our own, but ones that the Spirit lives out through us. They’re not our fruit, but the Spirit’s fruit that we make evident through our obedience to Him.
We are given lists of the gifts of the Spirit in Romans 12:3-8, 1 Corinthians 12-14, Ephesians 4:1-16, and 1 Peter 4:8-11. There are three main views on the status of these gifts, particularly the gifts that are considered “ecstatic” (healing, miracles, speaking in tongues, and interpretation of tongues): continuationists, cessationists, and cautionists. Continuationists believe that these gifts are still present and active today. Cessationists believe that these gifts are no longer active at all. Cautionists believe that it is possible that these gifts are still active but that is not a main focus of the Church. Personally, I am a cautionist, but I believe any of these views are plausible today.
We see that the written Word of God was inspired by the Spirit in 2 Timothy 3:16-17. The Word also refers to the person of Jesus, who shares a unified relationship with the Spirit. There is a definite connection between Jesus and the cross event of salvation and the Spirit revealing that truth to individuals to provide for their salvation. God could work in people’s lives through the Spirit without the written Word of God, but He has revealed Himself through the Word so they may work together. The Holy Spirit uses the written Word of God to make us wise, lead us to Christ, bring us salvation, bring us to faith and sustain our faith, to teach us, to reprove us, to correct us, to train us in righteousness, and to make us complete in God for every good work.
The Holy Spirit may still be difficult for us to define, especially in our Western culture where many do not acknowledge the presence of spiritual beings. But, we know from God’s Word that the Holy Spirit is very much an active part of the Trinity, and the Spirit dwells within the hearts of all believers. “But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you” (John 14:26).
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Last week, I wrote about why studying theology is important for all followers of Christ. As we begin digging deeper into the various areas of theology, the first one will investigate is known as theology proper: the study of God and who He is.
One thing that is very important is to realize that God cannot be fully described or understood by our finite human minds. He is the infinite God, and as His creation, there is no way we can completely comprehend Him in our fallen and sinful state in this world. Our human minds are unable to understand that which is larger than us, and God is much, much larger than even our greatest understanding. We may try to define God, but it’s not us who defines Him but rather He reveals Himself to us.
But, God has revealed a lot about Himself to us through both general and special revelation. General revelation is what we can know about God through nature and the creation He has given us (see Romans 1:20). While general revelation can tell us some about who God is, there are no specific saving truths communicated through it; that’s why we also need special revelation. Special revelation is God’s Word as revealed in the person of Jesus, the written form of the Old and New Testaments, and through preaching, teaching, and study. Special revelation tells us specific truths about God’s character and our relationship with Him.
God’s nature can best be described through His attributes, which are categorized into immanent and transcendent. Immanent attributes are ones that we can know through our reason and reading of God’s Word. Those generally include love, faithfulness, mercy, justice, wisdom, and goodness. Transcendent attributes are ones that can only be accepted on revelation since they are outside the scope of our full understanding. Those generally include self-sufficiency, eternality, omnipresence (all-present), omnipotence (all-powerful), omniscience (all-knowing), immutability (changeability), and impassibility (ability to suffer). You can read about some of those attributes at their links or in this blog series by my fellow author Charlie Wolcott.
We often try to define God in human terms, but God is definitely not a human. He’s not a created being as we are, so He does not have the same attributes as we do. We can only get a dim glimpse, at best, of who God is based on what He has revealed to us. Augustine of Hippo is attributed as saying, “If it is understandable, it’s not God.”
God can also be defined as Trinity - three distinct persons yet one God - though that is also a difficult concept for us humans to fully understand. Each person (the Father, the Son Jesus, and the Holy Spirit) has its own function, but none of their functions can happen without the other persons and their internal relationship to one another. We see some of this interaction somewhat explained in the following verses, all of which are Jesus speaking:
“But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.” (John 14:26)
“When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father —the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father—he will testify about me.” (John 15:26)
“No, the Father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God.” (John 16:27)
There are many analogies for the Trinity, but all of them break down at some point. One is an egg; the yolk, white, and shell are 3 distinct parts, but all make up one egg. Another is juggling with 3 balls; each ball is unique, and the whole of juggling can’t happen without one of them. But both of these analogies break apart in that the pieces of each can be separated, while God cannot be separated. Another analogy, used by Augustine, is a psychological one of mind, emotion, and knowledge; they are 3 distinct aspects of a human personality, and all are present to make up a human.
If all of this sounds confusing, it is. Even the great theologian Martin Luther struggled with describing the Trinity. He once wrote:
“To be sure, a threeness does exist in the Godhead, but this threeness exists in the Persons of the one Godhead. Not three Gods, not three Lords, not three Creators, but one God, one Lord, one Creator, or, as we are wont to say: One divine Essence and yet three distinct Persons – Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. I call this Being a Threeness, for threefoldness sounds strange. I cannot give this Being a fitting name.”
There is so much more that could be written about who God is, and a lot of theologians have spent many hours and many big words discussing and arguing over nuances of God’s character based on what God has revealed to us. There are a variety of beliefs that exist in the Christian world about specific characteristics of God where the Scriptures are not clear, but the most important aspect to remember is that God is God and we are not. We can never fully understand who He is, but we can be thankful for His general and special revelation to us and the ways He does reveal His character to us.
This forum is meant to foster discussion and allow for differing viewpoints to be explored with equal and respectful consideration. All comments are moderated and any foul language or threatening/abusive comments will not be approved. Users who engage in threatening or abusive comments which are physically harmful in nature will be reported to the authorities.
For much of the second half of 2020, I spent a lot of time in Old Testament history and the prophets. The #1 charge against Israel was the crime of idolatry. Every king of Israel and Judah was labeled as a good king or a bad king depending on how they handled idolatry. In the Northern Kingdom of Israel, every king (except three, two of which lasted less than a month, Zimri and Shallum, and the last king, Hosea) was judged on their stance regarding Jeroboam’s two golden calf idols (see my post on this for details). Most of these kings merely permitted the worship there, but others actively participated in the worship of other idols. In the Southern Kingdom of Judah, the kings were judged by how the high places were allowed to operate. In both kingdoms, they were judged and sentenced by God to exile because of idolatry.
Why does God take idolatry so seriously? Is He that petty and that desperate for worship? My answer to that is “no.” God takes idolatry seriously because it is ultimately a root for all sorts of evil. Some may say pride is the root, or the love of money is the root, but if you pay attention, the love of self or the love of money are both forms of idolatry. It hit me recently that idolatry and idolatrous practices in some way, shape, or form violate all 10 of the Commandments. Some have said that the Ten Commandments were the “wedding vows” between God and Israel. So, to commit idolatry was a violation of wedding vows, and many of the prophets use marriage to showcase what idolatry was (Hosea 4 is one example). Israel turned herself into a prostitute, sleeping with every man she could find, and only giving lip service to her husband. This was a serious crime.
There are multiple facets to idolatry. I’m going to cover just the basics here, then for the next 10 weeks, I’m going to explore each of the Ten Commandments and how idolatry violates them, then give a conclusion on how to break free of idolatry. First, on the simplest level, idolatry is the worship of something other than the true God, in place of God. Man was created to worship God. That is part of being made in the image of God. Our primary purpose of existence is for the glory of God, which is why all we do should be for that purpose. Idolatry takes that glory that we give and attributes it to another. Man is meant to function as a person with God as his fuel. A human being does not function as he ought to function without God. This is why sin breaks us and we malfunction in it. When we seek a different fuel for our needs that only God can provide, it’s idolatry. What’s more is all these other sources are only temporary. None of them last, so when we worship idols, it’s never enough. There is always a need for more. You need more gods, more sources to fill your needs, or you need harder and “better” worship. And there’s never any way to know if you did enough or not.
Idolatry, especially for the case of Israel, was saying: “God, I don’t trust You. I don’t believe You.” When we don’t believe someone, it’s like we are calling them liars and saying they cannot and should not be trusted. It doesn’t matter who you are; when someone says, “I don’t believe you,” it’s insulting. There are a number of people who should not be believed, but when the person who has a long track record of being trustworthy is not believed, it’s insulting to that person at best. What’s worse is that especially regarding Israel, idolatry doesn’t just call God a liar; it makes YOU a liar. Here’s why. Israel had made a covenant with God. God laid out the terms on Mt. Sinai (the Ten Commandments) and Israel agreed to the terms. It didn’t take them long to break their vows and to break their end of the deal. God kept His, but Israel didn’t keep hers. It’s not different today. Many people claiming to be Christians, “signing on” to the New Covenant Christ gave us are breaking our vows and turning to idols today. Our idols take different forms than Israel’s, but it’s still the same key issue.
Idolatry was not merely a personal affair. It was a family affair. Jeremiah 7:17-19 describes how the whole family would work together for the idolatrous rituals. Now, the kids may only be doing it due to obedience to their parents, however, kids learn most from observing their parents, which is why generational curses persist. It takes a willful decision to break that curse. And some kids weren’t willing participants. Many were killed as a sacrifice to some of these idols.
The rituals in idolatrous practices were full of debauchery and in some cases sadistic. Many rituals involved drinking, drugs, and sex. Many of the shrines had prostitutes who worked for the temples (men, as well as women), and don’t think children weren’t sold to work the temples too. In India in the late 1800s to early 1900s, Amy Carmichael rescued 300 orphans, mainly girls, from such practices still going on in recent times.
Israel had a unique charge against them regarding idolatry that many tend to miss. In all their idolatrous practices, they STILL did the sacrifices and ceremonial laws that God had established. That’s why Elijah asked the people: “How long will you waiver? Either the Baal is God, or the Lord is? Make up your mind.” (my paraphrase). That’s why Hosea said: “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.” Because it was ritual only and they were treating the True God like any other pagan god. They were just trying to cover all their bases, trying to make sure they hit all the religions possible, just in case one was wrong. They always had a Plan B.
The final thing I’ll point out here in my introduction to this series is the arrogance Israel had in their idolatrous practices. They knew they were God’s people. They knew that the True God had singled them out to be His people. They had the words from God Himself. As a result, they thought they were above reproach. Because God had saved them so many times in the past, despite their sin, they thought they were invincible, and that any trouble they were in was because they weren’t serving the “gods” well enough. They knew of God’s great acts of mercy, and His great acts of judgment upon their enemies, but it never entered their mind that God might turn on them because of their rebellion and treachery. It wasn’t as though they weren’t warned. This reminds me of many modern “Christians” who think because they are saved that they can believe whatever they want about God, doctrine, any secondary issue, or whatever but as long as they confess Jesus Christ, they are getting in. Israel though the same thing too. As long as they confessed Jehovah and did the sacrifices, they were in. I’m not calling for legalism or any work-based salvation here, but our faith in Christ requires more than mere agreement to doctrine. It requires a trust in Him and Him alone. There is no other name under heaven by which man might be saved.
So, over the next couple months, I am going to go into detail about idolatry and how it violates all ten of the Ten Commandments directly or indirectly and why God takes it so seriously.
This forum is meant to foster discussion and allow for differing viewpoints to be explored with equal and respectful consideration. All comments are moderated and any foul language or threatening/abusive comments will not be approved. Users who engage in threatening or abusive comments which are physically harmful in nature will be reported to the authorities.
