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BY PASTOR GLENN PEASE
CONTENTS
1. THE GLORY OF GOD based on Rev. 21:9‑21
2. THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD based on II Pet. 1:2
3. GOD IS HOLY Based on Psa. 99
4. GOD IS LIGHT based on I John 1:5
5. GOD IS LOVE based on I John 4:7‑12
6.
GOD IS MERCIFUL based on Acts 17:16‑34
7.
GOD IS OMNIPOTENT PART 1
Based on Rev. 1:1‑8
9. GOD IS OMNISCIENT MATT.
11:20‑24
11. GOD IS MERCIFUL Based on Ps. 51:1
12. GOD IS AN AWESOME GOD Based on Psa. 99:1f
13. GOD IS OUR FRIEND Based on
Luke 15:11‑32
14. ROCK OF AGES Based on Psa. 61
1. THE
GLORY OF GOD based on Rev. 21:9‑21
The heavens declare the glory of God, and that is why the
study of astronomy is so fascinating. It is constantly confirming what God has
revealed in His word. Many Christians look at God's revelation of the heavenly
city and conclude that it must be symbolical and not literal. A fourteen hundred square mile city of gold
with the walls loaded with precious gems seems a little too extravagant even
for God. But then comes the March 1992
issue of Science News, and it is
revealed that scientists have found literal jewels in the heavens. They have found, not just the glorious light
of stars, galaxies, and supernovas, but actual diamonds in the sky.
A NASA team in Hawaii, using an infrared telescope, found what
they are convinced are real diamonds and three Milky Way clouds. They knew there were diamonds out there
somewhere already, for in 1987 diamonds were found in meteorites that fell to
earth. These researchers have concluded
that the carbon dust that gives rise new stars is as much as ten percent in the
form of diamonds. They feel there is
likely to be diamonds in every molecular cloud in the heavens.
The point is, when we read this description of the heavenly
city made of gold and precious stones, we do not have to back away from the
literal interpretation, as if God does not have the know how or the power to
produce such an abundance of precious stones.
If man could get at them he could fill the Grand Canyon with diamonds
that God has already created in stellar spaces.
The reason I take this picture literally is not just because
of any scientific discovery, but because John tells us in verse 11 that the
city shown with the glory of God and its brilliance was like a very precious
jewel. If this is not literal, then it
has to be greater than the literal, for God's glory will never be less than the
glory of the kings of the earth, who splendor will be brought into the city, as
John says in verse 24. I have seen
pictures of the crown jewels of the royalty of the earth. They are awesome in their glory. It is a valid assumption that God, the king
of the universe, will have a glory that is so superior to theirs, that it will
take our entire vocabulary of words dealing with light and jewels to describe
it. Words like brilliant, magnificent,
glorious, lustrous, regal, resplendent, dazzling, luminous, radiant, gleaming,
glittering, glistening, and a host of others.
It's a city of gold and
jewels,
For it's God's glory that we
share.
Only the boldest of fools
Would want to miss being
there.
In America The Beautiful, we sing the last verse‑‑
"O beautiful for
patriot dream
that sees beyond the years
Thine alabaster cities
gleam,
Undimmed by human
tears!"
And in the chorus we sing,
"May God thy gold refine," and, "Crown thy good with brotherhood
from sea to shining sea." All
these terms of gold, gleaming, and shining are ideals of man. He wants his cities to shine with the glory
of gold and brilliant light. That ideal
will never be complete until God builds the city. That is just what John saw in his vision of the golden city of
heaven. Man has done some impressive
things in his cities, but only the city of heaven will shine with the very
glory of God.
Emerson said, "I always seem to suffer some loss of faith
on entering cities." They can look
quite impressive as you approach and see the new buildings on the skyline. The vast array of gleaming windows can be
awesome, but when you get there you are hit by the reality that the beautiful
city is filled with corruption.
Aristotle felt the government should prevent people from accumulating in
cities, for they become hot beds of corruption. We see the truth of his conviction in every large city. Jesus wept over the largest city He ever
entered, the Old Jerusalem, because of it's corruption and resistance to the
will of God. That city and it's leaders
killed the very Son of God, and revealed just how corrupt the city could be,
even when the most glorious works of man are all around. The beautiful temple with it's treasure of
gold and works of art did not prevent such corruption.
Jesus loved all the beauty and glory of the temple, but he
wept for the people, for they were rejecting the one all this beauty pointed
to. Hitler and the Gestapo leaders
would feast in luxury with the world's finest art all about them. Then they would enjoy the exquisite beauty
of the best classical music. Yet, from
that setting of grandeur they could go forth to kill, in cold blood, millions
of innocent people. The glory of what
man can create is impressive, but man cannot be changed by the glory of
man. Man can only be changed in any
deep and permanent way by the glory of God.
What is the glory of God?
It is basically those aspects of God's character and power that we can
see. Contrary to the idea that all we
know of God we must take by faith, the Bible says there is much that we can see
of God's glory. The heavens declare it,
that is, they reveal it to man. The
works of God in His visible creation are of such conspicuous glory that God
holds man accountable for seeing it, and
praising Him for it. Those who refuse to see the Glory of God in
creation are willfully blind, and they will be judged. Paul says in Rom. 1:19‑20,
" Since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made
it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities‑his
eternal power and divine nature‑have been clearly seen, being understood
from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." What a paradox! There is no excuse for not
seeing the invisible nature of God.
The idea that non‑Christians cannot see the glory of God
in creation is a direct rejection of Paul's clear teaching. We should expect
just the opposite according to Paul. We should expect non‑Christians to
be able to see and write about the glory of God. Christians do no have a
monopoly on seeing the glory of God. We should be able to read the poetry of
other religions and see that they too see the glory of God. Paul makes it clear
in verse 21 that non‑Christians have knowledge of God. He writes of the
pagan world, "For although they knew God they neither glorified him as God
nor gave thanks to Him." Paul says they knew God. They blew it and lost
sight of His glory. They went after idols instead, but the point is, they did
know God.
The implications of this are astounding. For one thing, it
means we do not need to be threatened by the wonderful things we can read about
God in the religious literature of the world. We are to expect to find such
things, even in pagan literature, for it is inexcusable blindness for men not
to see the glory of God in what He has made. Sincere seeking pagans will
discover a great deal of God's glory. This ought not to be a surprise, for it
confirms what Paul says. The goal of life is to see the glory of God.
Moses said to God in Ex.33:18, "Show me Thy glory." Moses
had seen the wonder of God's power in delivering the people of Israel from
Egypt. He had seen more miracles than anybody in history, and yet he is not
satisfied. He wanted to see the very glory of God's being. He saw the
miraculous pillars of fire and smoke that led them by day and by night, but now
he wanted the best. He wanted to see the ultimate glory. He wanted to see the
very essence of God. He saw the burning bush and he talked with God, but now he
wanted God to come out from hiding behind his symbolic miracles and show
himself directly. He wanted a glimpse of
God in person.
God responded to this request by telling Moses is was a
request for death. No person could look on God and live. He did, however, let
Moses get in a cleft of the rock, for protection, and get a glimpse of God from
the back. He got a glimpse of God's glory and that was the fulfillment of his
greatest goal. That is the ultimate goal of man, and that is the point of the
heavenly city. It is the place where we get to finally see the glory of God in
all its fullness. Like Moses, we only get a glimpse of that glory now, at best.
We can see it everywhere in His creation, but then we will see it in His
person.
Gwynn McLendon Day, in Gleams of Glory, writes,
"As I stand in the glow
of the rising sun and am drenched by
the other‑world
splendor of its golden flood, I see something
of the glory of God. As I
gaze into the jeweled heavens at
midnight and wonder at their
sparkling beauty and infinitude,
I experience something of
his glory. The flaming sunset, the
flashing lightning, the
silent snowstorm, the rolling thunder, and
the fragrant flowers are
intimations of his majestic splendor.
Truly, "the whole earth
is full of his glory." Tennyson phrased it:
The sun, the moon, the
stars, the seas, the
hills and the plains,‑‑
Are not these, O Soul, the
Vision of Him
who reigns?
The manifestations of God in
nature are just the outer fringes of
his garment. As splendid, as
awe‑inspiring, and as revealing as
they are, these do not
satisfy the soul's yearning for God.
And so she prays, "Show us thy glory, O our Father! It is
all about us, but we are blind and unobserving. Open the eyes of our souls that
we may see thee and know thee in all the majestic fullness of thy revelation to
men. In the name of thy glorious Son we pray. Amen." This is the dream, the goal, the desire, and
the aspiration of all of God's children. To see the glory of God in all its
fullness is our final destiny. That is why glory is such a vast subject in the
Bible.
The word glory is found 194 times in the Old Testament and 161
times in the New testament, for a total of 355 times. This does not even count
the use of the word to glorify. Yet it is a greatly neglected subject. Charles
Ryrie in his book, Transformed By His Glory, checked into 8 standard theology
books, and he discovered that only 2 of them referred to the glory of God. Six
of them had absolutely nothing to say about this vital subject, and one of them
was his own book, and that is why he wrote a whole book on the subject, to
offset his previous neglect. The subject is complex, but the essence of it is
simple. Glory is a visual display of what is pleasing to the eye, and thus,
awesome to the mind. Whatever, by its brilliance or beauty, stimulates
admiration, has a glory.
If the fire works display is really good, it is glorious, for
it is a visual treat. If the model home
you go through is full of bright pleasing colors, and all is so clean and fresh,
you experience the glory of what man can produce. Glory is a visual term. It
has to do with what you see. The present glimpses of the glory of God, which we
see in His creation are to fill us with anticipation about what we will see in
the glorious city of gold. W. Seeker
wrote, "When you survey the spacious firmament, and behold it hung with
such resplendent bodies, think‑‑if the suburbs be so beautiful,
what must the city be!"
Stained glass windows are often great works of art, and they
are glorious to behold. But from the
outside they are not all that impressive.
They have to be seen from the inside with the sunlight coming through to
be seen in the fullness of their glory.
That is why we will never see the fullness of God's glory until we see
it from within that golden transparent city.
There the light of His glory will flood our eyes with color and beauty
that is beyond anything we can imagine.
But the Bible often reminds us, what will be in it's fullness is already
a part of the now. Lois Blanchard has
captured this idea in her poem There Are Some Shining Moments,
"There are some shining
moments
When we can almost see
Across the gulf that
separates
Us from eternity.
When all the clouds are
lifted
And everything is bright,
There are some shining
moments
When our faith is almost
sight.
There are some shining
moments
When va1ues seem so clear,
When things of earth are far
away
And things of God are near.
There is no inner struggle
To go the way we should.
There are some shining
moments
When we know what things are
good.
There are some shining
moments
When the cares of life
recede
And all the things that
trouble us
Seem trivial indeed.
And even deeper sorrows
Find solace in that hour.
There are some shining
moments
When we know God's lifting
power.
There are these shining
moments.
They come not every day;
For we may walk through
swirling clouds
Great portions of the way.
So tread the path they
brighten
When these shining moments
come;
For they are heaven's
lanterns
To light the journey
home."
God's glory lights even the earthly cities of time to some
degree, and that degree gets greater as His children reflect His glory. Paul tells us how we can practice being in
heaven. We don't have to wait to see
the glory of God. It is displayed in
great measure in time, and we can begin now to taste of the things to
come. Whoever heard of practicing to be in heaven? Where do we see such instructions? We see them in Phil.4:8, "Finally brothers, whatever is
true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is
lovely, whatever is admirable‑‑if anything is excellent or
praiseworthy‑‑think about such things." This brings heaven to
earth, for Paul goes on in the next verse and says, practice this and the God
of peace will be with you. Focus your
life on the glorious and you will reflect the glorious.
If Moses, who met with God for 40 days, became radiant with
the glory of God, what will be the effect on those who dwell with God forever
in the fullness of His glory? The Bible
tells us they will share in the glory of God.
This is the final and ultimate gift of God to His people, but it was the
first gift to His Son. In John 17:24
Jesus prayed, "Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where
I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me
before the creation of the world..
Glory is love made visible, Jesus is saying. All gifts are some degree of glory. They are often shining like jewelry, or gorgeous colors, like
flowers. But even if they are a dull
pair of black or brown gloves they convey a glory, for they are visible objects
that say to another I love you.
Love and glory are linked together inseparably so that with
any love you also have a glory. This is
illustrated by the old Negro engine man who loved his job on the cargo boat on
the great lakes. When he was asked how
he managed to keep his engine room so bright and shining, he replied, "Oh!
I gotta glory!" The poet put this
practical theology in verse‑
Oh! You gotta get a glory
In the work you do;
A Hallelujah chorus
In the heart of you.
Paint, or tell a story,
Sing, or shovel coal,
But you gotta get a glory
Or the job lacks soul.
The great, whose shining labours
Make our pulses throb,
Were men who got a glory
In their daily job.
The battle might be gory
And the odds unfair
But the men who got a glory
Never knew despair.
Oh, Lord, give me a glory,
When all else is gone!
If you've only got a glory
You can still go on. Author unknown
Anything you love you
will glorify, and this helps us grasp how we can glorify God. We are to love Him with all our hearts,
minds, and soul, and when we do we will share in His glory, and reflect
it. The diamond glorifies the sun by
reflecting its glory. We glorify the
Son of heaven, the Lord Jesus, by reflecting His glory. The whole idea of being the light of the
world is glorify Jesus by reflecting the light of His love in this dark world. This is the way God's people have always
glorified Him. God would turn His face
toward them and shine on them like the sun.
They in turn would look to His face and become radiant. Then they would reflect His grace in the
world. Psalm 34:5 says, "Those who
look to Him are radiant." The more
men look at the glory of God the more they will radiate that glory. Paul says it clearly in II Cor.3:18,
"But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord,
are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of
the Lord."
Every Christian is becoming brighter or dimmer, depending on
the exposure to the glory of God. If
you are just to busy to spend time beholding the glory of God in His Word or
His works, you will cease to shine and lose the glow that reflects His
glory.
"The light you are
reflecting
Be it bright or be it dim,
Is shining in the measure
Of the time you spend with
Him."
2. THE
KNOWLEDGE OF GOD based on II Pet. 1:2
Columbus was on his fourth voyage in 1504. His ships were
grounded in St. Ann's Bay in Jamaica, and the natives revolted and refused to
supply the Spaniard with food. There seemed to be no way of escaping the
agonies of starvation. Columbus was looking at the almanac, and he learned that
a total lunar eclipse was coming. On the evening it was due he called for the
natives to assemble and told them that unless they repented and helped them God
would blot out the moon, the sun, and the stars, in that order. He pointed to
the moon which had already begun to darken. The natives were terrified and
begged Columbus to intercede for them. Delivering food was resumed at once, and
Columbus promised that disaster would be averted. The darkness passed, and
nothing happened, of course, and the natives never revolted again.
Here is an example of the power of knowledge. Because Columbus
understood the workings of God's creation, he was able to save his life and the
lives of his men. Knowledge enabled him to dominate and manipulate the natives
who were ignorant and superstitious. The weak are almost always weak because of
ignorance, and the strong are almost always strong because of superior
knowledge. This is supported by Scripture, reason, history, and experience. Knowledge
is power because it leads to the discovery of the means of power. America is
the strongest nation in the world because of its superior technological
knowledge, and because it has been able to tap the resources of power in God's
creation. Only those nations that are also in possession of this knowledge are
any challenge. In some nations wood is still the primary fuel. As nations
advance they use greater sources of power right up to nuclear fuel. Growth in
knowledge leads to growth in power. This is beyond dispute.
This being so, it follows that growth in the knowledge of God
should lead to greater power in the spiritual realm. We do not need to
speculate on this, for this is precisely what Peter and the whole of the Bible teaches.
Paul longed to know Christ and the power of his resurrection. The two go
together. In the knowledge of God and of Christ is the power to be and become
all that we should be. Peter says in verse 2 that "grace and peace be
multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord." Grace
and peace are two major values for the Christian life, and Peter says they are
multiplied in the knowledge of God and of Christ. Growing in grace and peace is
a matter of knowing God better.
Then Peter goes on in verse 3 and says, "His divine power
has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of
him..." In verse 5 knowledge is one of the things that we are to
diligently add to our faith. In verse 8 the goal of all is from the negative
side that we shall not be unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Then in 2:20 Peter says the power that enables men to escape the evil forces of
the world is the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. He closes this
letter by writing, "But grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ." If we had nothing but II Peter, we could say that
the knowledge of God is the power of God, and the means to all His benefits and
promises.
This means modern man is so close to the truth and yet so far.
The worldly wise know that knowledge is power. In fact, knowledge has become
their idol. The success of science in demonstration the power of knowledge has
led to knowledge and education being held forth as the panacea for all our
problems, and the cure for all our diseases. Knowledge is the modern Messiah,
which will bear our burdens and heal our diseases. Salvation through science is
the only hope that millions even consider today.
The tragedy is that they have the right answer, but the wrong
object. Knowledge is the answer, but not knowledge of the creation, but
knowledge of the Creator. Modern man is making the same foolish mistake the
ancient wise men made. Paul in Romans 1 says they had the revelation of God,
and they could have chosen Him, but in
their wisdom they became fools and chose the impersonal handiwork of God and
ignored the personal love and purpose of God. Man is becoming an expert on the
disease, but ignoring the cure completely. He has the right idea that knowledge
is power, but he is blind to the highest and most necessary kind of power that
man needs, which is spiritual power. He neglects the knowledge of God, the only
source of such power. Modern men, in general, have a thirst for knowledge of everything, but what they most need they
most neglect. They are like Mark Twain when he received an invitation to dine
with the Emperor of Germany. His little daughter said to him innocently,
"You'll soon know everybody except God, won't you papa?" This is the
judgment on modern man. He is anxious to know everything and everyone but God.
God is being pushed out of the curriculum in the college of
life for masses. There are too many supposedly more realistic and practical
subjects to study. The feeling is that what cannot be known according to the
scientific method is not really knowledge, but myth and superstition. Science
is like the self‑sufficient college head who said, "I am the master
of this college, and what I don't know isn't knowledge." God is excluded, and the result is man has
been able to develop cures for almost everything but the major things, like sin
and alienation from God. Science alone is like the medicine chest that one
wrote about.
Is my finger bleeding and
cut nearly off? In my medicine chest there's a cure for a cough.
Is a tooth shooting pins out
in every direction? Here is something thats good for a hang nail infection.
Have I poison ivy and need
for a lotion? Well, here, all unused, is a seasick potion.
My medicine chest's never
known to fail me...It's bursting with cures for what doesn't ail me.
This is the weakness of science when it comes to the issue of
solving the sin problem, which keeps individuals and the world in the same miserable
mess in spite of all the scientific successes. Physical power is not enough,
for man need spiritual power, and this can only be found in the knowledge of
God and of Jesus Christ. The task of the church is not to denounce science and
growth in the knowledge of the natural. This is both futile and foolish, for
man's mistake is not in studying God's creation. It is in neglecting to study
God Himself. This would enable man to use his knowledge of creation for even
more good to fulfill the purpose of its Creator. The Christian is not for the prevention of the knowledge of
creation, but for the promotion of the knowledge of the Creator.
Over half a century ago Thomas Huxley praising the advances of
science declared that the nation which sticks closest to the facts will
dominate the future. Edward Miall, a member of Parliament agreed, but he added,
"The greatest fact is God." This is what we must believe and persuade
others to believe; and not just non‑Christians, but Christians as well.
They are often the cause for the unbeliever ignoring God. Believers often have
such a poor, small and pathetic conception of God that the unbeliever feels
that He is an irrelevant fact. Goethe
wrote, "As a man is, so is his God, therefore was God so often an object
of mockery." Someone said that if a triangle had a god it would give him
three sides. In other words, God created us in His image, and we tend to return
the favor and reduce Him to our image. Emerson put it, "The god of the
cannibal will be a cannibal, of the crusader a crusader, and of the merchant a
merchant." Walter Bagehot wrote,
The Ethiop gods have Ethiop
lips,
Bronze cheeks, and woolly
hair,
The Grecian gods are like
the Greeks
As keen‑eyed, cold,
and fair.
All of this is natural, and usually harmless, but it can lead
to great danger, and even evil, as men develop a god to justify all they do.
Willilam James, the great student of religious experience, said, "The God
of many men is little more than the court of appeal against the damnatory
judgment passed on their failures by the opinions of the world." A very
non‑subtle example of this is the little girl who insisted that there was
a lion in her front yard. Her mo;ther ordered her to go up to her bedroom and ask
God to forgive her for lying. In a short time she returned with this happy
report. She said, "God said never you mind Mary, that bid dog pretty near
fooled me too." It is funny as a girl, but tragic if she continues to use
God to justify her stubbornness as an adult.
A false knowledge of God is possibly even worse than lack of
knowledge. We must avoid the practice of being chummy with God. It only reveals
our ignorance and not a depth ;of Knowledge. It is often our false pretence
that drives people away from God. Let us be honest and admit that we are
pilgrims with a long way to go, and let us stand in awe and silence before that
which we already know of God. Let God
be God and tremble, and do not cloud His light with the darkness of our
ignorance. Do not hold the puny candle of your mind before the infinite depths
of the mystery of God and pretend that you see. Be still and know that e is
God, and that we, like Paul, only see through a glass darkly. Christopher P.
Cranch wrote,
Thou so far we grope to
grasp Thee,
Thou so near we cannot clasp
Thee;
All pervading Spirit flowing
Through the worlds, yet past
our knowing;
Artist of the solar spaces
And these humble human faces..
Though all mortal races
claim Thee;
Though all language fail to
name Thee;
Human lips are dumb before
Thee;
Silence only may adore Thee.
Hab. 2:20 says, "But
the Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before
him."
We must stress the majesty and mystery of God even as we grow
in more and more intimate knowledge lest we become too familiar, and by loose
language bring offense rather than glory.
Let us never reduce God to our image, and our puny righteousness. We never will if we obey the words of Peter,
and grow in the knowledge of God. This
is the way to the mature, abundant, and powerful Christian life. The idea was not new with Peter, for the
knowledge of God was also the very essence of Judaism. The knowledge of God is a key theme in the
Old Testament. The whole purpose of the
book of Proverbs was to help men understand the fear of the Lord, and find the
knowledge of God. One knew nothing of
importance until he knew God, for the fear of the Lord was the beginning of
knowledge.
When Israel lacked knowledge of God she lost all the values of
life that made her useful to man and pleasing to God. For example, in Hos. 4:1‑3 we read, "Here the Word of
the Lord, O people of Israel, for the Lord has a controversy with the
inhabitants of the land. There is no faithfulness
or kindness, and no knowledge of God in the land. There is swearing, lying, killing, and stealing, and committing
adultery; they break all bonds and murder follows murder. Therefore the land mourns, and all who dwell
in it languish." It sounds like
today's newspaper report on our own society.
The difference is it states clearly the cause and solution for the
mess. In verse 6 God says, "My
people are destroyed for lack of knowledge, because you have rejected knowledge
I reject you.
When a nation departs from the knowledge of God every value of
the good life departs from them, and evil and decay take their place. Grace and peace, and all the blessings of
God come to the individual and the nation by the same means. They are found in the knowledge of God, and
so the only true solution for personal, national, and international problems,
is to grow in the knowledge of God. In
Hos. 6:1,3,6 this is made clear:
"Come, let us return to the Lord; for He has torn, that He may heal
us; He has stricken, and He will bind us up...
Let us know, let us press on
to know the Lord....(God says,) for I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice,
the knowledge of God, rather than burnt offerings. God wants us to know Him.
This is the essence of biblical religion.
God wants no part of thoughtless and mechanical ritual. To worship God right we must worship in
spirit and in truth. We must be students
we wrestle and struggle with language and ideas as we seek to know God in
truth, and love Him with all of our mind as well as heart and soul. Christians need to become better students of
God's Word. We should think of the
church as a university, and not merely a place for fellowship. We should be coming to church to learn what
God has revealed about Himself. It is
not enough just to get good feelings, for the goal of all we do in church is to
grow in the knowledge of God.
I am convinced that American Christians are the greatest
wasters of resources for knowing God in history. We have resources beyond the imagination of the Apostle
Peter. We could know far more about
God's Word than he did if we made diligent use of these resources. Our problem is that we do not invest our
time in the study of His Word. The most
important thing we can do in this world is to grow in the knowledge of God and
of Christ our Lord.
Nathanial Michlem of Mansfield College, Oxford has written a
poem of a blind girl who sewed by day and read her Braille Bible each
night. Her fingers became callused and
the letters in her Bible were no longer readable. Frantically she sought a way of restoring her sensitive touch by
paring away the calluses. She
discovered the pain was so great that she could not sew or read. Then came the evening when she raised her
Braille Bible to her lips to kiss it farewell before she placed it on the
shelf. She discovered that her
sensitive lips quivering in sadness were able to distinguish the letters, and
she could kiss the words into life again.
She found a new method of knowing God's Word through her lips, and she
went on growing in the knowledge of God.
If your method of Bible study has become stale, and your mind callused
and no longer sensitive to the Word of God, do not put your Bible on the shelf,
but search for a new method to kiss the Word into life again. Experiment and never cease, for all the
blessings and power for the abundant life can only be yours as you grow in the
knowledge of God.
3. GOD IS
HOLY Based on Psa. 99
Most speeches and sermons have three parts to them. There is the introduction, the body, and the
conclusion. Often they have three
points in the body as well. Then there
is another three fold factor involved.
There is the message as written; then the message as delivered, and
third what the speaker wishes he had said after it is all over.
Winston Churchill was
one of histories greatest speakers, and he had this advice involving still
another threeness in speech. If you
have an important point to make, he advised, don't try to be subtle and be
clever about it. He said use the pile
driver. Hit the point once, and then
come back and hit it again, and then hit it the third time a tremendous
whack!
We do not know who the author of Psalm 99 was, but many
centuries before Churchill he was already applying this wisdom in
communication. This is called the holy,
holy, holy Psalm because the word holy is used to conclude each of the main
divisions of it. He says of God, he is
holy, and then a second time, he is
holy, and then third time he gives it a tremendous whack, and concludes,
"The Lord our God is holy."
The attributes of God are numerous, but the only one that is
given a threefold emphasis is his holiness.
The seraphs above God's throne in Is. 6:3 are saying, "Holy, holy,
holy is the Lord Almighty." In
Rev. 4:8 the wondrous four living creatures around the throne of God are saying
ceaselessly, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty."
Repetition is used in the Bible to convey degree. If you repeat something you raise the degree
of it's importance. Verily verily or
truly truly I say unto you, was the way Jesus called attention to a very
important message. R.C. Sproul tells of
the battle of the kings in the Valley of Siddim in Gen. 14 where some of them
fell into tar pits. The Hebrew says
they were pit pits. In other words,
there are pits, and there are pit pits.
The pit pits are pittier than the pits.
When you fall into these pits it
is not just your typical pit fall. You
are in deep deep trouble. If the
bottomless pit was to be described by the use of repetition, it would be called
the pit pit pit. The three fold
repetition is the ultimate beyond which you cannot go. You can't get any pitter than a pit pit
pit, for that says it all.
So when the Bible goes from holy is the Lord, to holy holy is
the Lord, to holy holy holy is the Lord, it has reached the level of the
ultimate in holiness. There is no other
degree of holiness beyond holy, holy, holy. God is absolutely holy, infinitely
holy, eternally holy. Of course, He is also love, love, love, and mercy, mercy,
mercy, and justice, justice, justice, and we could go on through all of His
attributes. But the fact is God's holiness is the only one of His attributes
which is put into this Trinitarian form.
It is the only one elevated to the third degree in it's verbal
communication.
Other beings are called holy, and other things, and even one place
is called holy of holies. It is raised to the second degree, but no
where is there anyone or anything raised to the third degree, except God. He, and he alone, is holy, holy, holy. Hannah in her prayer in I Sam. 2:2 says,
"There is no one holy like the Lord;...."
The holy can cease to be holy and become unholy. Even holy angels fell. The holy of holies can be destroyed, as it
was several times, and ceased to be a holy place, but became rather a common
place where God is no more present than anywhere else. But the holy holy holy can never cease to be holy or in anyway whatsoever deviate
and do what is unholy.
God's holiness, like His love, puts limitations on His
power. The tyrant does not need to
worry about whether or not his actions are right, just, morally pure, and
ethically fair. He does anything he has
to do to accomplish His will. If it
takes lies, thievery, and immorally, then so be it. Anything goes for the cause.
God cannot do that to get His will done. If He could He would not have sent His son
into the world to die. A tyrant does
not sacrifice for you, they sacrifice you for themselves. God sacrificed for you. If God could do anything to get His will
done, would Jesus have bothered to teach us to pray, "Thy will be done on
earth as it is in heaven." What a
strange prayer that is if God can do His will without limitations. If God was not limited by His love and
holiness, this prayer would be as meaningless as asking the sun to shine, and
the earth to revolve. But God is no
vast machine cranking out His will automatically without any hindrance.
The history of Israel is the history of God's limitations
because of His holiness. If God was not
holy He could have said to Adam and Eve, "We will just overlook your
transgression and pretend it never happened." If God was not holy He could have let Israel profane His name and
desecrate His law, and still have blessed them, and made them rulers of the
world. All of history could have been different
if God was not holy. There would have
been no flood and no judgments; no fall of Jerusalem and destruction of the
temple.
Evil is so powerful and effective just because it does not
have the limitations of holiness. The
power of the Mafia, and the whole underworld system, is due to the capacity of
evil men to ignore all that is holy.
God cannot do that. He cannot
lie, steal, cheat, and treat persons like things. God can only do what is holy without deviation, for as John says,
"God is light and in Him in no darkness at all." That means God cannot cut any corners, and
be unholy, even now and then, to speed up the process of getting His will done
on earth.
Holiness and love have this in common: They both impose limitations on the power of
God. God can do anything, we say, but
forget that we are, in saying that, only referring to His potential power. If we refer to God's love and holiness, we
can come up with an enormous list of things God cannot do, for He cannot do
anything that is non‑loving, and unholy, and that covers a multitude of
possibilities. He cannot deny His
essence, and be what He is not.
This explains a lot as to why the will of God is often so slow
in being fulfilled. It would be even slower
if God's holiness did not give balance to His love. Love controls God's power so that it is not the sheer power of
the tyrant doing His will whatever the cost to other wills, and without respect
to their freedom. Love is why God is
long suffering, and why the sinner has time to repent. But if love was the only attribute of God,
evil could go on endlessly abusing the will of God, and there would never be
judgment. Holiness is that attribute of
God that gives balance to His love.
Holiness puts a limit on God's love, just as love puts a limit on God's
power. God never ceases to love, for He
is love, but He is holy love, which means, there comes a point where judgment
is the most loving thing that can be done.
God loves the sinner, and forgives, forgives, and
forgives. But God, being holy, can
never love sin. By His nature He
cannot love evil of any kind. He must
condemn evil and judge sin. God never
forgives sin, only the sinner of his sin.
If the sinner does not at some point remove himself from his sin by
means of repentance and forgiveness, there comes a point where God's holiness
demands judgment.
This is why the holiness of God is not as appealing to man as
the love of God. It is sort of the dark
side of God from man's perspective. It
is that side of God that produces His anger and judgment. It seems so opposite of love that many
refuse to accept God's holiness, for it seems to contradict His love. How can God love sinners and yet still at
some point let His wrath fall on sinners.
It seems so contradictory that many have chosen to go with love, and
reject holiness. Beside being a clear
rejection of God's revelation, this is also a clear rejection of common sense.
The principle of the holy balancing the loving is built right
into reality. Every power you can think
of is the same as God's power. All
power illustrates God's power, for all power has the same capacity to bless or
blast. All power is both loving and
holy. That is, it will be loving when
you relate to it properly, but it will be holy, or judgmental, when you refuse
to abide by it's laws.
Take electricity for an example. It is one of the greatest sources of blessings known to man. We don't have to list its blessings to prove
the point. If electricity was personal
we could sincerely say electricity is love.
All of our daily lives are enriched by its power. But we also know it is dangerous power. Many people are killed and injured every
year by this blessed power. If you violate
its love you will see it is a holy power.
It will not tolerate violations of its laws. It is much more legalistic than God is. He will put up with numerous violations with patient
endurance. Electricity will zap you
with one violation. Electricity is not
personal, however, and so, nobody ever questions it or condemns it for its
swift judgment.
When God's holiness
operates like electricity, however, it makes men furious. There has probably never been a reader of
the story of Uzzah in I Chron. 13 who has not gotten angry at God, or at least
puzzled. Uzzah was moving the ark of
God when the oxen stumbled, and he put his hand on the ark to steady it. God struck him down, and he died, just as if
he had touched a live power line. David
became very angry at God, and he was afraid to move the ark any further, for
fear of what God's wrath might do next.
So they left it at the house of one called Obed‑Edom. The Lord blessed his house and all that he
had. The ark was a great blessing to
him, but deadly to one of those moving it because he got on the wrong side of
this blessing, and violated its laws.
Here is the scary side of God. God is long suffering and slow to anger the Bible says. Yet here we have a picture of what looks
like an instant boil. God exploded in
fury and Uzzah was gone. God gave
Ninevah forty days to repent, but Uzzah, who was no pagan, but a faithful
servant, doesn't get forty
seconds. It all seems so unloving and
unjust that people get angry at God.
But if you see the whole story in the light of God's clear revelation it
all makes sense, and it illustrates the holiness of God.
Uzzah was a Kohathite, and they were specialist, just like a
modern day electrician. They had clear
teaching on what they could and could not do in dealing with the holy things of
God. It was there job to move the ark,
and all the holy things, as Israel moved.
In Numbers 4:15, after describing how they are to carry everything, it
is stated, "But they must not touch the holy things or they will
die." Two more times in the next
three verses God warns them as to what they must do so they may live and not
die.
It was a dangerous job and the rules for survival were
clear. Uzzah broke those rules and he
died, just as skilled electricians do when they violate the rules of
electricity. You know you cannot tamper
with the blessings of electricity and keep it a blessing. It will become your enemy if you stick a
fork into a socket. You will see a
friend suddenly become a foe, and you could be killed by this violation. This is true for every power you can think
of that is a blessing. It can also
become your judge and executioner.
Fire is the source of so much life, health, and joy. Yet it is one of the most destructive forces
on the planet, and it turns lives and property and dreams into smoke and
ashes. Water is the very essence of
life, and a blessing beyond words to convey.
Yet it drowns, floods, and destroys.
It has its loving side, and its
holy side. The sun gets into the
top blessings of all time, but it too will burn, blind, and turn gardens into
deserts. The laws of men are a great
power for blessing. They keep order in
society, and protect us. They are the
key to civilization. Yet if you get on
the wrong side of these laws they will punish you, imprison you, and make your
life miserable.
We could go on and on illustrating the point, that all
beneficial power is also power that will express judgment if you violate its
laws. There is no such thing as a power
that is one hundred per cent loving regardless of how you relate to it. So when we come to God, the source of all these
other powers, it makes sense that he will also fit this same pattern, and be
both loving and holy.
Men like to think it is a contradiction that God can be both
loving and holy. It is no more a
contradiction than it is that electricity can broil your steak, and also burn
your finger. Heaven and hell are not contradictions. They are simply the finals in the series
that characterizes all of life. When
you are on the right side of a power, you will be helped by it. When you are on the wrong side of a power,
you will be hurt by it. Reject the proper relationship to fire and
you will get burned. Reject the proper relationship to water and you will be
drowned. Reject the proper relationship to electricity and you will be
electrocuted. Reject the proper relationship to law and you will be
arrested.Reject the proper relationship to God who is love, and you will get
judgment.
This whole principle that is built into all of reality is
based on the fact that God is holy.
This means He has standards. He
does not operate on whim and feeling, but on what is good, right, just, and
fair. It is His holiness that demands
that all sin and evil be eventually entirely eliminated. He cannot accept any lesser goal because He
is holy.
Love can live with, and tolerate, sin, temporarily. If God was not love, but operated as all
other powers in an impersonal legalistic fashion, all men would have long ago
been annihilated. Love is what keeps
history going, but holiness is what keeps it heading for the goal of total
elimination of all evil. These two attributes
of God‑love and holiness, are often seen in conflict, but they are
not. They are partners. God is love, but for love to be truly
authentic it must by necessity be balanced by hatred for all that destroys
love. That is what holiness is. It is that in God which hates all that is
not loving. Holiness is just the other
side of the coin of love. You cannot
have heads without tails, and you cannot have love without hatred for what is
the enemy of love.
If I love good music, it
follows that I will hate rotten music.
If I love harmony, I will
hate discord.
If I love beauty, I will
hate what is ugly.
If I love what is pure, I
will hate what is contaminated.
If I love what is clean, I
will hate what is dirty.
If I love truth, I will hate
falsehood.
On and on we could go, showing that love and holiness are
partners, for holiness is that which
backs up love by being an enemy of all that is unloving. God is love, but because He is also holy, He
is the enemy of all that is non‑loving.
God cannot love both justice and injustice, mercy and cruelty, right and
wrong, truth and error, good and evil.
God's love is limited by His holiness so that He cannot love what is a
contradiction to love. His love is kept
pure by holiness, for all that is non‑loving is excluded from His love.
All judgment is simply love being protected by holiness. If love had no such protection it would
become so weak and watered down that it would cease to be love. It happens all the time on the level of
human love. Love for, and tolerance of, evil, gets to the point where love
becomes the support of the evil. In the
world of alcoholism, for example, there are what we call enablers. These are loved ones of the alcoholic, who
by their love keep enabling the alcoholic to go on drinking. They have love, but lack holiness to balance
that love. There is never judgment, but
only tolerance, and the end result is the evil goes on and on until love itself
is destroyed. Love without the balance
of holiness is a love that will self‑destruct.
We do not like the
holy side of God we think, but in reality, without it He would not be a
God worth worshipping, for His love would soon become meaningless, for evil tolerated
endlessly would eventually win the battle of light against darkness. Stress the love of God without the balance
of the holiness of God, and you will lean toward liberalism. Stress the holiness of God without the balance
of His love, and you will lean toward legalism. Put love and holiness together, and you have a Biblical theology
of balance where there is hope for the sinner, but also serious danger if the
gift of God's love is not accepted.
Holiness is that which makes God beautiful. We are told
repeatedly in Scripture to worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. Holiness
takes all of the attributes of God and blends them into a symmetrical whole so
that God is seen as glorious. Holiness balances all of God's attributes so that
there is perfect harmony. John Howe wrote, "It is the transcendental
attribute that runs through the rest and casts a glory upon every one of
them." Jonathan Edwards said, "No other attribute is truly lovely
without this, and no otherwise than it derives its loveliness from this."
Spurgeon said, "Holiness is the harmony of all the virtues...His power is
not His choice virtue nor His sovereignty, but His holiness." Just as all
the colors come together in the light from the sun, so holiness is that light
of God's glory that combines the beauty of all his attributes.
Startling beauty should always make us think of God. He is the
author of all that is beautiful. His nature is beautiful and He created what
was perfect beauty and flawless harmony. Sin has messed up his creation, but the
fact is there is still enormous beauty that is everywhere reminding us that the
Creator is a God of beauty.
The goal of God is that His people would be holy as He is holy
and be beautiful people in character.
All evil will be eventually eliminated, and we will be like Him. This means the Christian goal in this life
is not success, or even happiness, but holiness. God is not impressed by human success, but by our conformity to
His will and by our partaking of His nature.
This means we cannot use power in any way we choose. Our power must, like God's, be limited by
love, and our love be limited by holiness.
We have the highest obligation to be separated from all that is unholy
that we might bring honor and glory to Him who was, who is, who will ever be
holy, holy, holy.
PART 2
There is no subject on which the human mind can focus
that is more significant, more important, and more vital than the subject of
God. In the Great Books Of The Western
World almost every great author that has influenced the Western World in any
realm of knowledge has had something to say about God. Of the 100 great ideas that have changed the
course of history, the chapter on God is the longest of the 100. The introduction says, "The reason is
obvious. More consequences for thought
and action follow from the affirmation or denial of God than from answering any
other basic question."
God is infinite, however, and so there is no end to what can
be know of God. We can never know all
about God, but we can know what He has revealed about Himself. Among the many things He has told us, one of
the most important of all is that He is holy.
Not only is His holiness exalted to the level of being repeated 3 times,
as no other attribute is, it is also the only attribute that is so beautiful
that it is associated with beauty over and over again. In I Chron. 16:29 we read, "Worship the
Lord in the beauty of holiness."
We read it again in Psa. 29:2 and 96:9.
Holiness is that which makes all that God is glorious and
beautiful.
A. W. Tozer in his book The Knowledge Of The Holy writes,
"It is my opinion that the Christian conception of God current in these
middle years of the 20th century is so decadent as to be utterly beneath the
dignity of the most high God and actually to constitute for professed believers
something amounting to a moral calamity."
He writes again, "I believe that there is scarcely an error in
doctrine or a failure in applying Christian ethics that cannot be traced finally
to imperfect and ignoble thoughts about God."
Russel Metcalf Jr. in his book on worship tells of two
colonial churches in his state. One has
a steeple so large for the size of the church that it looks like an architectural
case of the tail wagging the dog. The
other has a steeple so small it looks like a birdhouse perched on the
Parthenon, a blemish instead of a crown.
He points out that beauty is the blend of all component parts into a
graceful whole so that the parts do not call attention to themselves, but to
the over all impression of beauty.
Holiness takes all the attributes of God and blends them into one
symmetrical whole so that God is seen as glorious, and so perfectly balanced that
He is beautiful. If God is not beautiful,
you see some aspect of His being without the balance of holiness. Get that into the picture and you will see,
not a God, which makes you angry or bitter, but one who makes you worship.
This fits the case of the believer as well. A Christian ceases to be beautiful when
holiness is not the key element that holds the pieces together. If a Christian gets lopsided and does not
have a beautiful life it is due to the lack of holiness. Holiness balances all virtues in proper
proportion so that one is Christ‑like.
Jesus was the perfect man, or the most beautiful and attractive man
whoever lived, and it was because He was holy.
Holiness is what made Jesus exclusive.
He was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin. He was in the world, but not of it. He could be in the presence of sin and not
be contaminated by it because He was holy.
It is holiness that enables love to be inclusive. He loved everyone. This is dangerous without holiness, for love of the sinner can
easily lead to becoming like the sinner in his sin. Jesus had no such problem because of His holiness. Holiness has no interest in sin, and so it
keeps love from loving the sin as well as the sinner. It enabled Jesus to live
the paradox of being inclusive in loving all, and yet exclusive in being unlike
anyone he loved. Nothing is really and fully good, true, and beautiful unless
it is balanced by holiness. This
paradox of love and holiness is basic to the Christian walk. Love calls us to inter the world, but
holiness calls us to withdraw from the world.
The tension is always there to both love and hate the world. When that tension ceases something is wrong. The Christian will either so love the world
that he becomes a part of it, or so hates the world that he parts from it and
loses his saltiness. Both are
mistakes. The goal is balance so that
one is in the world loving it, and yet keeping unspotted by the world. Only love and holiness together can make
this balanced walk possible. We need to
see the holiness of God better in order to have some measure of His
holiness.
GOD'S HOLINESS IS
AWESOME.
The more we grasp the holiness of God, the more we feel a
profound awe and smallness. The key
idea of holiness is set‑apartness.
God is so far above the dimension of reality that we inhabit that His
presence is a shock to our system.
Because the Lord reigns and is seated between the cherubim, and is
exalted over all the nations, the response to those who become conscious of it
is that of trembling, shaking, and praise of His awesome name. He is holy means that He is above all and
apart from all. God is not contaminated
by any aspect of fallen man, or fallen creation. He is transcendent. This
is the theological term used to describe the fact that God is wholly
other. It makes God hard to grasp, for
there is no one to compare Him with. He
is one of a kind, and so unique that He is in a class by Himself. Man cannot even invent ideas of God that can
rise to His level and be in any way in the same category with Him.
In Ex. 15:11 Moses asks, "Who among the gods is like
you, O Lord? Who is like you‑majestic
in holiness,.." In I Sam. 2:2
Hanna sang, "There is none holy like the Lord, there is none beside
Thee." God asks the question
Himself in Isa. 40:25, "To whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal?
Says the Holy One." God is praised with holy, holy, holy because in him
you have reached the ultimate of holy, beyond which there is no going. The holy
of holies was where the high priest could meet with God on the Day of
Atonement. Any other entering would die in the presence of such holiness.
If God was only holy, we would not know He even existed, for
He could have no contact whatever to that which is not holy. But God is love, and so He not only made
what is not Himself, but He relates to it, and He relates to us even as fallen
creatures. But when He does His
holiness is awesome, and man is made fearful in His presence. Some of you may be old enough to remember
the scary radio program called The Inner Sanctum. When that creaking door began to open there was silence in our
home. I did not know then that Inner
Sanctum meant within the holy. But I
enjoyed the eeriness of dealing with the mysterious. I don't thing I ever connected that scary feeling with the awe
that should be a part of the worship of God.
We have not stressed the holiness of God enough to produce that kind of
awe.
We want to experience the
presence of God in worship, but here is a side of God's presence that is not
always pleasant.
Isaiah in chapter 6 describes his scene the Lord high and
lifted up. He heard the Seraphs singing
holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty.
He does not say that he clapped his hands and shouted for joy in the
presence of God's holiness. Instead he
says in verse 5, "Woe is me! I am
ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips,
and I live among the people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King,
the Lord Almighty." He was frightened
by the awesome scene and felt very unholy.
I have read of the shock that people have had to endure when their
prayer for revival was answered and they felt God's presence. The Holy Spirit was present in such power
that people who thought they had it all together were convicted of their deep
sinfulness. They wanted revival for the
rest of the unholy world, but in the presence of God's holiness they saw how
unholy they were.
They were worse off than before, for before they felt
sanctified and worthy of God's presence, but in His presence they felt
unclean. The more you sense the
presence of God, the more you will realize how sinful you are. This is not a pleasant revelation, and so we
do not really go all out to see the holiness of God. Martin Luther froze at the altar the first time he led the
mass. His father sat in the
congregation and felt a wave of parental embarrassment sweep over him as he saw
his son fail. Luther's lips began to
quiver as he tried to speak, but nothing would come out. Later Luther explained what had happened to
paralyze him.
He wrote, "I was utterly stupefied and terror‑stricken. I thought to myself, 'With what tongue shall
I address such majesty, seeing that all men ought to tremble in the presence of
even an earthly prince? Who am I, that
I should lift up mine eyes or raise my hands to the divine Majesty? The angels surround him, at His nod the
earth trembles. And shall I, a
miserable little pigmy, say 'I want this, I ask for that'? For I am dust and ashes and full of sin and
I am speaking to the living, eternal and the true God."
The holy is a mystery.
It is so far removed from what is normal to us, and so we are mystified
by the very thought of it. People love
ghost stories even if they do not believe in ghosts because the very thought of
such a thing produces a sense of awe.
People go crazy to see and experience what makes them scream, and what
makes their skin crawl. They go to
horror movies and take rides on fear producing machines. All of this craving for thrills so natural
to man is a hunger for the supernatural.
People want to relate to the world that is beyond, and which is fearful
and awesome because it is so different.
They do not choose the way of spirituality, and so they go the way of
secular experiences to get a taste of the mysterious and the holy. Man wants to rise above the ordinary and
taste the extraordinary. He gets bored with
the commonplace and needs the feeling that there is more. He does not seek the awesomeness of God to
get this experience because it is not fearful in a fun way, but in a scary way.
Without a relationship to God, man feels threatened by the holiness of God.
The miracles of Jesus met with great joy among the people, but
the Pharisees were offended because they felt the presence of what they thought
was evil and not good. They said he was doing them by the power of Beelzebub.
Some felt God and they felt the devil in the same setting. Two people eat the
same food and one feels great and the other gets sick. The problem then is not
the food but the state of the body it goes into. One is ready for it and the
body is compatible. It is a blessing to this one, but to the body not ready to
receive it, there is the curse instead of the blessing. One receives riches and becomes a great
blessing to mankind by his generosity. Another receives riches and becomes a
greedy evil power that is a curse to mankind. The point is, we must be in the
right state of mind and soul to benefit from the holiness of God. If we are out
of fellowship with God his holiness is like grabbing a live wire, and we will
be electrocuted like Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5 who were struck dead
because of trying to deceive the Holy Spirit. But if we are in the right state
of mind and soul as were the believers at Pentecost, we will be filled with
power and joy. May God give us the joy
of being in that state where we can appreciate the awesomeness and beauty of
His holiness.
4. GOD IS
LIGHT based on I John 1:5
The Emperor Trajan said to Rabbi Joshua, "You teach that your
God is everywhere. I should like to see
Him." The Rabbi replied,
"God's presence is everywhere, but He cannot be seen. No mortal eye can behold His
glory." The Emperor insisted,
however, and so the Rabbi said, "Let us begin then by first looking at one
of his servants. The Emperor consented
to this, and so followed the Rabbi out into the open. "Now," said the Rabbi, "Gaze into the splendor of
the sun." "I cannot,"
said the Emperor, "The light dazzles me." The Rabbi responded, "Thou art unable to endure the light of
one of his servants, and canst thou expect to behold the resplendent glory of
the Creator. Would not such a light
annihilate thee?"
The Jews had a higher concept of God than all ancient peoples,
because God revealed Himself to them as
a God of glory, light, and splendor.
The Old Testament has many descriptions of God like that given in Hab.
3:3‑4. "His glory covered
the heavens, and His praise filled the earth.
His splendor was like the sun rise; rays flashed from His hand, where
His power was hidden." It was
because of this knowledge of the glory of God that the Jews were an optimistic
people. A man's character is determined
largely by the character of the God he worships. If one worships a god who is a tyrant, and unpredictable, and
without mercy, but cruel, it is not likely he will be a man of flaming
joy. Luther lived for years with a
false concept of God, and as a result, lived in fear and dread. Most religions have had such a dark concept
of God that the followers of these religions seldom knew what it was to be
truly joyful and at peace.
Many ancient peoples, and peoples yet today, whose god's are
made in the image of man, and are only depraved supermen, cruel and immoral,
are no more optimistic than the materialist who says, "I feel the universe
is one huge, dead, immeasurable steam engine, rolling on in its dead
indifference to grind us limb from limb."
You can't expect persons like that to be bursting with optimism, and
bubbling with joy. On the other hand,
when people have the concept of God as He is revealed in Scripture, it leads to
optimism and joy. This was true in the
Old Testament, even before God fully revealed Himself in Jesus Christ.
The Jews began their day at sundown, rather than at
sunup. All their festivals and holidays
begin at night, and their Sabbath also begins at night. All of this was to symbolize their optimism
and confidence in the God of light.
Anyone can have confidence in the day, and look forward to a bright day
when the sun rises, but the Jews began their rejoicing as the sun sank to
symbolize their confidence that even in the darkness light will prevail, and a
new day will dawn. Tomorrow always
comes for the believer. Even death
cannot change that. Such was the
attitude of the Jews who had only a shadow of the full revelation yet to
come. How much greater ought our joy
and optimism to be who stand in the full light? Paul in II Cor. 4:6 writes, "For God, who said, 'Let light
shine out of darkness,' made His light shine in our hearts to give us the light
of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ."
We have a message as superior to the Old Testament, as it was
to the pagan darkness surrounding it.
That is why John, after stating that his purpose for writing this book
was that the joy of believers might be full, immediately announces the truth on
which all Christian joy is based, which is the truth that God is light. This morning we want to examine this primary
message and its meaning. First let's
look at the message itself.
I. THE MESSAGE. John has
built us up to a point of expectation.
He has made great statements of his aim to share with us truths that
will lead to fullness of fellowship, and fullness of joy. We ought to be standing on our tiptoes
breathlessly longing to see what it is he is going to declare. In verse 5, after this stimulating
introduction, John says, this is it!
Here it is! This is the message
that we have received, and now pass it on to you. This is no matter of speculation and theory, this is the message
we have heard from Christ Himself, and now declare to you, and that message is,
God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.
We see a positive and negative side to this message.
A. Positive‑God
is light. This is the strongest
statement in the whole Bible about Gods nature as light. Many text describe the splendor of God, and
the light of His presence, and that He dwells in light unapproachable, and that
He is the author of all light, but here alone do we find the statement that God
is light. Nothing stronger can be said. This is as far as human language can go in
relating God and light. God is
light. Light is of the very essence of
God's nature.
It is important, however, that we recognize that this is not
the whole truth about God's nature. It
is but one aspect of what He is. John
will tell us He is also Law, Life, and Love, and underneath all of these is the
foundational fact that He is personal.
Light is impersonal, and if this was our main concept of God, we would
have only a God who was a great impersonal source of all energy‑a Divine
Dynamo.
We must ever keep in mind
that light and love, and all other attributes of God are attributes of a
Person. This means, it is God who is
light, and not light that is God.
This was the mistake of many
people who began to worship the creation rather than the Creator. They worshipped the sun, moon, and stars,
for they reversed the truth and said, light is God. This is false. The light
of the sun is not God, and the light of all other bodies is not God. God as light is the ultimate source of all
light, but He is not that light. All
physical light is from God, and is a symbol of what He is in Himself.
All physical reality is what it is because God is what He
is. Science can tell us what the sun
does, and how it is the source of all life on earth, but it is the Bible that
tells us why this is so. It is so
because God is light. His creation
resembles His nature. The universe is a
symbol of what God is. It is not God,
but is made by God, and is separate from Him, but it is an expression of what
He is. This is why all life depends on
light, for all life depends on God, and God is light. This is why the earth revolves around the sun which is the source
of all life, because only as men put God into the center of their lives, and
revolve around Him, will they have light and life.
All of this is simply saying
God has made the universe, and physical light, as a pattern of what is true in
the spiritual realm. God is in the
spiritual realm what the sun is in the physical realm. He is the source of all light and life. As light is the absolute in science, so God
is the absolute in the spiritual realm.
Thou art, O God, the life and light
Of all this wondrous world we see;
Its glow by day, its smile by night,
Are but reflections caught from Thee;
Where'er we turn, Thy glories shine,
And all things fair and bright are Thine.
The very first thing that God called good was light. In Gen. 1:4 God saw that the light was
good. It was His first stroke of the brush
on the canvas of reality, and it was a masterpiece already. God did not make anything in the dark. He began His project of creation just as we
usually begin ours, by turning on the light.
Light is the link between the Creator and creation. Light is part of the nature of God, and it
is the foundation of all that God has made.
When you study light, you are into both science and theology. Many of the great scientists have known
this. They have seen that life is
dependent on light, and that the Creator of life had to be a God of light.
Dr. Michael Pupin, the great inventor, philosopher, and teacher,
got his start in scientific research by watching the stars as a shepherd boy in
the Hungarian hills.
All his life, as he studied
light, he was devoted to the God of light.
He wrote,
"I found in the light
of stars a heavenly language which proclaims the glory of God. Each burning star is a focus of energy, of
life‑giving activity which it pours out lavishly into every direction; it
pours out the life of its own heart, in order to beget new life. What a vista that opens to our
imagination! What new beauties are
disclosed in the words of Genesis:
'God...breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a
living soul.' The light of the stars is
a part of the life‑giving breath of God.
I never look now upon the starlit vault of heaven without feeling this divine breath and its quickening
action upon my soul.
Kepler, after discovering the laws that govern the speeds of
the planets, prayed, "Dear Lord, who hast guided us to the light of Thy
glory by the light of nature, thanks be Thee.
Behold, I have completed the work to which Thou hast called me, and I
rejoice in the creation whose wonder thou hast given me to reveal unto
men. Amen."
The power of life is in light, and without light life cannot
continue. We could get into biology
here, but man's new discovery of the power of light is more fascinating. Albert
Einstein back in 1905 wrote a paper on light that won him the Nobel Prize. In it he proved that light is both a wave
and a particle, and so light is a paradox, and has the freedom to be different
things in different experiments. He
predicted then that man would be able to some day use light in a very intense
and focused ray. In 1960 Dr. Theodore Maiman made and used the first laser, and
since this, many new lasers have been developed for doing what man could never
do before. Now, by the power of light,
the life of man is being radically changed.
In our life‑time light has
changed almost every facet of our lives.
The books I checked out to study light were checked out
by means of a laser light. The
groceries we purchase are read by a laser light. Laser light can cut steel and even diamonds. Lasers are used for eye surgery, so that
those who once would be blind are now made to see. Miracles that Jesus did as
the light of the world are now being done by light, which also has Him as its
author and creator. The military uses
lasers in missals and other weapons. The
whole security systems of the world depend on lasers. Laser optical discs can hold the entire Encyclopedia Britannica
on one side. There seems to be no end
to the power and blessings that man is finding in the power of light. If God lets history go on, man will create
a whole new world by the power of light.
And if God ends history soon, the result will be the same, for in
eternity we will dwell with God in that
city filled with the light of His presence.
However the story of history goes, we can be optimists as Christians,
for we are heading for the light.
Georgia Harkness wrote,
Our light grows dim, the air is thick with gloom,
And everywhere men's souls are crushed with fears.
Yet high above the carnage and the gloom
The call resounds across the teeming years,
Lift high Christ's cross! Serve God and trust His might!
I do believe the world is swinging toward the
light.
Light is not only the coming thing, because Jesus, the light,
is coming, but He is already here, and says in John 8:12, "I am the light
of the world: He who follows me will
not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life." Gilchrist Lawson wrote,
The one who made the earthly sun
So full of power of warmth and might,
Can cause the Sun of Righteousness
To bathe the soul in floods of light.
The greatest changes in life are always based on what man does
with his physical or spiritual light.
Jesus was the light that lightens every man said John. He was and is the light of the world. He was and is the source of life that is
eternal, for all life needs light, and He is the only light that can never be
put out, and so He is the only source of eternal life.
Light that we see is self revealing. One does not need to light a match to see if his flashlight is
on. But all men are blind to most of
the light God has made a part of reality.
We see only the six colors of the rainbow which is white light divided
up into its six different wave lengths.
But this is a mere fraction of light.
There are cosmic rays, gamma rays, x‑rays, ultraviolet rays,
infrared rays, television, radar, short wave, standard and long radio waves,
and long electric waves. These ten
different categories of light we cannot see.
But man has learned how to use these invisible sources of light to do
wonders in life. So the challenge of
the Christian life is to recognize there is great power available in the realm
of the invisible. Paul says in II Cor.
4:18, "So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is
unseen is eternal." There is power
for life abundant in the light of Christ's unseen presence, and in the light of
the illuminating power of the Holy Spirit.
We need to pray,
Light of
the world, illumine this darkened earth of Thine,
Till everything that's human be filled with the
Divine.
There is no physical factor in all reality that can better be
used as a symbol of the nature of God, than light, for as Alford, the Greek
scholar said, "It unites in itself purity, and cleanness, and beauty, and
glory, as no other material object does."
Light is the most spiritual of all the things we know in the realm of
the physical. The more we know about
light and its blessings, the more we will understand the glory and splendor of
God, who is light, and the source of all lights.
Then John adds to his positive message a statement which is‑
B. Negative‑in
Him is no darkness at all. The Greek
here is very emphatic. There is a
double negative here, which is permitted in Greek, and would sound like this in
English, "There is not none at all."
This is the concept that is the basis for a common bond among believers,
and is the basis for much joy. The
positive without his strong negative would not distinguish Christianity from
the Gnostics and many other false religions.
The Gnostics, like the ancient Persians, had a dualism in their concept
of deity, in which, there was both light and darkness in God. Many others have also had concepts of God
which while recognizing Him to be glorious, also attributed to Him much
evil. The Christian revelation rises to
the heights of a God who is absolutely pure, and is not the origin of any
evil.
This becomes the basis for our fullness of joy, for the God and
Father of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is light without darkness. Even the sun has spots, but not our God, for
He is perfect light, and the source of all good, but no evil. Any idea of God that implies He is the
source of evil is inconsistent with the New Testament revelation. E. S. Jones tells the story of the little
girl who was playing with a friend when a cloud came up and covered the
Sun. She looked up and said, "That mean old God again,
always spoiling our fun." The
mother heard it and that night she told the father. He was shocked and did not understand where in the world she
would get such a concept of God. They
punished her by making her say her prayers ten times. Imagine, prayers being made as a punishment, and yet they
wondered where she got her concept of a cruel God. Parents may in many ways convey to their children concepts of God
that include spots and shadows of darkness.
This message of John must be our guide.
God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.
We need the light of God to guide us so that we do not blot
His image with the darkness of our own ignorance and faulty faith. Let our prayer be that of Constance Milman.
Lord send thy light,
Not only in the darkest night,
But in the shadows, dim
twilight,
Wherein my strained and aching
sight
Can scarce distinguish wrong
from right,
Then send thy light.
The light of God is known by the fact that in it is no
darkness at all. Satan himself can
appear as an angel of light, and the world uses light to glorify all its evil,
but we need not be seduced by these false lights if we keep this absolute
negative in mind‑no darkness at all.
Wordsworth put it, "But ne'er to a seductive lay, let faith be
given. Nor deem that light which leads
astray, is light from heaven." This then, is the message that is essential
to making our fellowship unique and joy complete. Now, let us consider some further meanings contained in this
message.
II. II. THE MEANINGS. A message like this is filled with more
meaning than we can begin to comprehend.
To say that God is light sheds more light on His nature than we have
eyes to see, but what we can see is important to look at. The first thing we want to look at is‑
A. The Ethical
Meaning.
This is really the primary meaning that John is conveying in
this context. God is absolutely
pure. God is righteousness, and in Him
is no sin at all. That is why John goes
on to say, "If we say we have fellowship with God and walk in darkness we
are liars," for God cannot fellowship with men who walk in darkness. He is light, and light has nothing in common
with darkness, and, therefore, fellowship is impossible. A man living in sin can no more walk with
God than fire and gasoline can have fellowship together. God is absolutely ethically pure, and that
is why Christians must constantly confess their sins and be cleansed by the
blood of Christ, for it is the only way we can truly have fellowship with God.
In this context John makes clear there are two ways of
thinking that are false, and lead to false living. One is to imply that there is any sin in God, and two is to deny
that there is sin in man. The Christian
must be clear on both points. God is
light, and is pure, with no darkness at all, but no man, except he who was God
incarnate, and the light of the world,
is totally pure, and without some degree of darkness due to sin. Christian ethical thinking must be based on
these two truths.
The Gnostics denied them,
and the result was all kinds of unethical and immoral conduct.
Let this principle be a guide. God is far more than we can think, but He is never less than what
we can think. This means, if you can
think of a higher concept of God than the one you now have, the one you now
have is a false concept. God can never
be less than the highest you can conceive.
Whenever men talk about God, you can know if they speak of the true God,
or one of their own making, by simply asking, is the God they speak of the
highest and purest that man can conceive.
If the God they speak of cannot measure up to this standard, he is not
the God who is light, and in whom is no darkness at all.
B. The Intellectual
Meaning.
When we say a person has seen the light, we mean the truth
has been grasped by the mind. Light and
truth are often synonymous. This could
be paraphrased, God is truth and in Him is no error at all. It means, not only that God is absolutely
pure, but He is also absolutely wise.
This is again a basis for great joy, for the believer. He has a resource like no other. Jesus said the Holy Spirit would lead His
disciples into all truth. He can do
this, for as light, He knows all truth.
All
our knowledge, sense, and sight
Lie in deepest darkness shrouded.
Til Thy Spirit brakes our night,
With the beams of truth unclouded.
There is much more meaning in this message‑the
theological, biological, emotional, but we can't cover them all. What we have looked at, however, ought to
make it clear how great a message this is, and how a deeper understanding of it
will lead to a greater fellowship and joy in the believers life. Praise God for who He is, for God is light,
and in Him is no darkness at all.
5. GOD IS
LOVE based on I John 4:7‑12
Tolstoy wrote a story called "Where Love Is, God Is." It
is about an old cobbler named Martin who lived alone. One night as he read the
story of Jesus visiting the Pharisee, and the poor welcome he received, he
prayed that the Lord would visit him. In his sleep he heard a voice saying,
"Tomorrow I shall come."
The next day Martin waited all day for his visitor. He saw a
poor old man sweeping snow, and he called him in from the cold and gave him
some hot tea. He kept looking out the window and the old man asked, "Are
you expecting someone?" Martin told him of the voice. Sometime later he
saw a shivering mother with her crying baby, and he brought them in and gave
them some warm soup and a cloak to shield them from the cold. He told her about
the voice as well.
It was getting late, and still the Savior had not come. He
looked out one last time before closing, and saw an apple woman scolding a boy
who had stolen an apple. He rushed out and made peace. He paid for the apple
and persuaded the woman to forgive the boy, and they departed with the boy carrying her basket. That night Martin
heard the voice again saying, "Martin, Martin, don't you know me?"
"Who is it," he asked? "It is I," and he saw the old snow‑sweeper.
"It is I," and he saw the mother with the baby. "It is I,"
and he saw the apple woman with the boy. Then they all vanished, and Martin
realized that Christ had visited him that day after all, and his heart felt
strangely warm.
Tolstoy was saying by this story that where love is, God is.
The presence of God and the Lord Jesus Christ is directly linked to love. Love is
the fruit of the Spirit, and so if the Spirit is present, the first evidence
will be love. If God is love, then love is a sign of His presence, and lack of
love is a sign of His absence in Spirit.
John say in verse 12 that no one has ever seen God. So how can we know
if God is present? John says we know God is present because of love. If we love
one another that is the evidence that God dwells in us. When you see love, you
see God. When you feel love, you feel God's presence. God is present in love, for God is love. Where love is God is.
The more we love, the more we experience the presence of God.
No wonder the Paul said everything without love is nothing.
Even faith and great knowledge, and even sacrifice, are not worth anything
without love, for love alone is our link to God, and only in love do we
experience the authentic presence of God. Everything we do in worship is much
ado about nothing if it does not lead us to love. Therefore, there is not
greater good than to gain an understanding of what the Bible is saying in this
simple but sublime sentence stated twice in this fourth chapter of I John:
"God is love." The implications of these three words are so vast that
one message on them is like trying to harvest a million acres of corn with a
comb. There is no way to get all of the infinite riches they contain, but we
will at least get a taste of what this love is. First lets taste‑
I. THE INEXHAUSTIBLE
ILLUMINATIONS OF IT.
R. A. Torrey, the great evangelist, said this is the greatest
sentence ever written, and voices without number in heaven and on earth echo
with an amen! Three little words made up of just 9 letters in English, and yet
they are saying something that all the words of every language can never fully
convey. They are giving us an inexhaustible illumination as to who God is. Read
all the books of men, and search the universe, and you will not find a more
important truth about God than these three little words that God is love. It is
the brightest light we have by which to see who God is. Torrey said if he had
to choose one sentence to sum up the entire Bible and is message to man, it
would be these three words.
D. L. Moody, another great evangelist, felt it was the essence
of the biblical revelation as well, and he had it put above the pulpit in the
famous Moody Church in Chicago. This is the Gospel in a nutshell. This is why
God sent His Son to die for us. This is why Jesus paid it all, and why he left
his church here to carry this message into all the world. In this sentence are
included all the unsearchable riches of Christ.
Love strong as death and
stronger,
Love mightier than the
grave,
Wide as the world and longer
Than the ocean's wildest
wave.
This is the love that sought
us,
This is the love that bought
us,
This is the love that
brought us
To gladdest day from saddest
night,
From deepest shame to glory
bright.
If God was not love, there would be no Gospel. Only love could
come up with a solution to the fall of man and the sin problem. Only love would
take on the guilt of the sinner and pay the penalty for their freedom.
We have examples of this kind of love in history. Schanyl,
the great Circassion leader of his people for 30 years revealed the power of
love. Bribery was becoming so prevalent in his government that he announced
that anyone caught bribing an official would receive 100 lashes. Not long
after, his own mother was arrested for bribery. He could not let her go, for
this would make a mockery of justice. His law had to be carried out, and so he
brought her to the whipping post and the whipping began. At the fifth lash he
cried halt. He released his mother. Then he bared his own back and took on
himself the remaining 95 lashes. His love
met the demand of justice, and set the prisoner free by taking the penalty on
himself. This is what Jesus did for all of us, and not just for family and
loved ones, but for the whole world of sinners who were enemies of God.
God's love is unique, for it is not directed toward those who
love him, but even toward those who do not love him. It is of the very essence
of his being to love.
Can ice cease to be cold,
and still be ice?
Can light cease to shine,
and still be light?
Can fire cease to be hot,
and still be fire?
Can humor cease to be funny,
and still be humor?
We could go on and on, and
the answer is no, for you cannot take away the essence of a thing and still
have it. Its essence is what it is, and God is love. Love is not something that
God does, it is something that he is. Love touches all that he is and does.
Every theological idea and concept we have must include this truth that God is
love. If not, you are dealing with some other god than the God of the Bible.
The God of the Bible has given us this truth about himself that illuminates all
other knowledge about him.
Many people who have rejected God have not really done so at
all. They have only rejected some imaginary god of human invention and
speculation. When people say they do not believe in God you need to find out if
the God they do not believe in is love. If not, then you can say you do not
believe in the God they do not believe in either. The Christian does not just
believe in God, but he believes in the God who is love. All other gods are not
God. The gods that people reject should be rejected, for they do not exist, and
they are poor images of the real God.
Everything you believe about God must be consistent with this revelation
that he is love, or you are walking in darkness rather than in the light of his
Word. Hold everything up to the light
of this truth to see if it fits, and if not you can be sure it is not a part of
God's will.
Take prejudice for example. You can never make this evil look
good in the light of God's love. All the arguments about differences in races
and their abilities mean nothing, for no argument for being unloving towards
people can resist being shattered by the laser beam of the light from the truth
that God is love. If you want to be unloving toward anyone, you have to do it
in the dark, for the light will not support you. God not only loves his
enemies, he commands us to love ours, and thereby demonstrate that we are his
children. It is a powerful proof that God is present in our lives when we can
care about those who have no care for us, and who would not be loved, but
hated, by the natural man.
Everyone can love family, friends, nation, and numerous other
values and relationships. This ability to love anyone or anything is part of
what it means to be made in the image of God, who is love. Even lost men love,
for they are still a reflection of God's image. The worst of men still have
some trace of the Creator, and they can love on some level. But John makes the
radical statement in v. 7 that everyone who loves has been born of God and
knows God. This can be interpreted by
the universalistic conviction that absolutely everybody is born of God, for
everyone loves. This has been perverted to teach that since everyone does love
to some degree, that all will be saved in the end, and none will be lost.
This is obviously not what John is telling us. He is giving
Christians a simple way of identifying a child of God. Here is the birth mark that
means you are in the family of God. The mark of the believer is love. It is
love for God; love for the family of God, love for those still lost and not in
the family; love for the needy of the world; love for one's enemies who hate
all these other loves, and then all of the natural loves shared by all
people. We are talking about an all
pervasive love that has no cut off point, but is universal. Christians often fall short of this kind of
love, but when they do they are not being Christian at that point. If one's
love does not rise above the natural love of the world, one should examine his
life to see if he really loves God, for he is not letting the God he loves be
present in his life and attitudes. This
is a test of how much we love God. If we do not have his love in us, we do not
love him very much. It is only when we love like God loves that we are born of
God.
It is not theology that makes us Christians. You can know
enough to defend the orthodox teachings of the Bible, but if you are unloving
you are not an asset to the kingdom of God. People don't care how much you
know. They want to know how much you care. Jesus drew people to himself for a
lot of reasons, but the primary one was because they knew he cared. He had bread for their stomachs, and truth
for their minds, but they knew that above all else he had love for their
hearts. He was living proof that God is love. He was God's visible expression
of love.
Anyone who claims to be a child of God had better exhibit the
key family trait that we see in our elder brother Jesus. That is our birth
certificate. It is our proof that we are born of God. You cannot say you are
born of God is you do not have they key characteristic of God, which is love.
How can anyone say they are born of the Spirit it they do not have the first
fruit of the Spirit, which is love? An apple tree that never has any apples is
an apple tree in name only. A pear tree that never has any pears is a pear tree
in name only. And a Christian without love is a Christian in name only.
John's point is that what God is the Christian is to be. God
is light, and so the Christian is to walk in the light. God is righteous, and
so the Christian is to walk in righteousness. God is love, and so the Christian
is to walk in love. Love is to infiltrate and dominate every aspect of our
lives until we become Godlike. Clement of Alexandria said many centuries ago that the Christian is one who practices
being God. That is a radical way of saying it, but it is the goal. The love of
God can only be seen in us when we practice being God, and being channels of
his love to others. We are not being God, but we are being Godlike, and
Christlike, and this means their love is seen in and through us. This is like
trying to channel the flow of Niagara Falls through a straw. Only a fraction
can get through, but it can be enough to change the world that we touch.
We are never nearer God than when we love, and we are never
nearer to being what he wants us to be than when we love. Love comes from God,
and love leads to God. God's goal is to complete the circle by making us both
the objects of his love, and the source of love for others. We are to be both receivers and transmitters
of love. Love can never be content until it is flowing out to others. When we
are not being loving we are like the parked car, or the light that is turned
off, or the heater unplugged. We are
not functioning for the purpose for which we are born. Martin Luther concluded
that the greatest sin in our lives is simply not being loving. This is
especially true when we are aware of how much God has loved, and does love us.
We can never exhaust the love of God, for it illuminates every
other attribute of God. Love is eternal. Love is infinite. Love is holy. Love
is omnipotent. Love is omnipresent. Love in inexhaustible in its illuminations.
We can never exhaust it for all eternity, and so we will be able to grow in our
knowledge of God forever. But we can know all we need to know to let this truth
fill us with the assurance and security so that we can say with Whittier,
I know not what the future
hath
Of marvel of surprise,
Assured alone that life and
death
His mercy underlies.
I know not where His islands
lift
Their fronded palms in air;
I only know I cannot drift
Beyond His love and care.
The second thing we want to
taste concerning the truth that God is love is‑
II. THE INCREDIBLE
IMPLICATIONS OF IT.
The implications of these three little words are so vast they
are beyond our comprehension, for they are infinite, and they influence, not
only everything we can know, but even those secret things that belong to God
alone that we can't know. One of the really radical implications of this
reality that God is love is that his being love is why the problems of life,
and the evils of the world, are not quickly solved and eliminated. If God was not love, but sheer power without
obligation to love, the problem of evil could be solved in seconds. If God was
a tyrant whose will was done without regard for the freedom of other wills,
there would be no problems in the first place, and any problem that could begin
would be nipped in the bud instantly.
Sometimes we pray as if God is not love, but just such a
tyrant. We assume that being Almighty he can do whatever we feel he ought to
do, or at least what he wants to do. We completely forget the enormous
limitations that love puts on one's choices. A tyrant whose motto is might is
right has only the limitations that are on his power. But to the extent of his
power he can do anything he chooses. He can execute millions of innocent people
if he wishes. He can rob and plunder, and take from other nations, if he has
the power to do so. He is free to the extent of his power.
Love has no such liberty. Love is bound to respect the rights
of others, and love is obligated to act justly and fairly. Love must even go
beyond justice to show mercy, for love keeps the law, but does not stop there.
It seeks to find a way to forgive and be reconciled with the offender. You see,
love really puts a crimp in your style if you are all‑powerful, and
expect to get your will done by sheer power. Someone said, and I think it was
everybody who ever thought about God's relationship to evil,
If I were God,
And man made a mire
Of things; war, hatred
Murder, lust, cobwebs
Of infamy, entangling
The heart and the soul
I would sweep him
To one side and start anew
(I think I would)
If I did this
Would I be God?
The answer is no. You would
not be God. You would not be the God of the Bible, for he is not just power,
but he is love, and love has a totally different approach to problems than does
power.
Power eliminates an enemy by destroying the enemy. Love
eliminates an enemy by making him a friend. This is a whole lot harder and
slower, but the other option is not open to a God who is love. His greatest
asset is also his greatest liability and limitation. His power must be
subordinate to his love, and so he cannot be true to his nature and exploit
people for his ends without their cooperation.
You have the history of God's own people. They were blessed
like no other people ever, and yet they were also judged like no other people
as well. God could have by sheer power taken them out of Egypt and brought them
to the promise land, but he could not by sheer power make them obey him. They
had to choose to do that. God could not treat them as mere pawns on a
chessboard. It would make the game of history go faster and be more efficient
if he could, but he cannot do it without ceasing to be love, and God cannot
cease to be love, for that is what he is. Jesus could by sheer power still the
raging sea, but he could not by power alone make the rich young ruler sell all
and follow him. He could not make the people of Jerusalem accept him. He said,
"I would, but you would not."
Power was not enough, for they had to choose to believe, and they
wouldn't do it.
It is superficial when we think that because God has all power
he can do as he pleases, whenever he pleases. That is why people blame God for
everything that goes wrong. They assume that he could prevent it if he chose to
do so. This is practicing theology in the dark, and not in the light that God
is love. It is like trying to put together a thousand piece puzzle in the pitch
blackness of an underground cave. You do not know God, says John, until you
turn on the light and recognize that God is love. We are so hung up on power that we think that is the answer to
everything. It is not.
I have the power to open my sons mail before he comes home. It
comes before he gets here, and it would be no problem for me to simply open it.
But I do not do it, not because I lack the power to do so, but because it would
be an unloving thing to do. My love for him and respect for his privacy limits
my power. Power that is not limited by love is dangerous. God's power is
limited by his love, and the paradox is that this is what makes the world a place
of such widespread evil. God cannot in power just rid the world of evil, for
his love makes it necessary to try and save those who are doing the evil.
It is amazing to read in Rev. 2 of how Jezebel has corrupted the
church, and has led Christians into all kinds of idolatry and immorality, and
then listen to Jesus say in verse 21, "I have given her time to repent of
her immorality, but she is unwilling." What kind of nonsense is this? A
God with all power, and who can wipe out the whole planet as fast as we can
wipe a drop of sweat from our forehead, and he is going to give this evil
person a second chance? But this is the kind of God we are dealing with in the
Bible. It is the greatest wonder in the universe that a hell‑bound sinner
can become a heaven‑bound saint because God's power is under the control
of his love. We sometimes find this
hard to take, and prefer the hero to take the evil guy out and ride off into
the sunset victorious. God's love is sometimes so slow, and he seems to give
the bad guy too many chances. That is
the price you pay for God being love.
In Uncle Tom's Cabin, the slave George Harris says, "They
buy and sell us and make trade of our heart's blood and groans and tears, and
God lets them, He does; God lets them." It makes man mad that God lets
them, and their are a thousand other evils God lets them do as well, and we do
not like it. God stirs up man to fight the evil, and eventually slavery gets
eliminated, and eventually the haters of history are pushed off the stage, but
where is the lightning? Why all the delay? Why not damnation by dawn instead of
by decades?
The answer is, God is love. What this means practically is
that not even God can have his cake and eat it too. He cannot damn the sinner
at the moment of his transgression, and yet still in love provide a way for the
sinner to be forgiven and restored to fellowship. We do not like what it does
to a world to have God choose the way of love, for it gives too much freedom to
evil, but we would like it a whole lot less if he chose the alternative. It
would eliminate all evil in the world if God judged all sin and evil on the
spot. The only problem is that all of us would end up in hell, and forever
separated from God. It is God's love
that keeps the life of every sinner going long enough to be forgiven and
restored to fellowship. This leads to a world full of suffering because of
evil, but remember, God is the one who has to suffer the most. He had to give
his Son, and the Son had to give his life in great agony to atone for the sin
of the world. The cross is the physical symbol of the fact that God is love.
The cross says to us that God takes being love very seriously.
He would rather pay the price of the cross than to be unloving. God had other
options. He could have never made man in the first place. He could have made
him a machine incapable of choosing evil. He could have made him with no plan
to save him. The only problem with all the options are that they are not
choices that a God of love would make.
A God of power alone could have made the other choices, but a God of
love had to make man as he did, with freedom to choose, and a respect for that
freedom that would let it be exercised.
It is hard on all of us at times that God is love, and it is harder on
him than anyone, but that is who God is, and we must see all of life, and all
truth, in the light of this reality that God is love.
6. GOD IS
MERCIFUL based on Acts 17:16‑34
In 1867 a bearded Norwegian named Lars Skrefsrud, and a Danish
colleague found two and a half million people called the Santals living in a
region north of Calcutta, India. He quickly learned their language and began to
proclaim the Gospel. To his utter amazement the Santals were expecting just
such a message, and they were excited and enthused about it. One of the leaders
said, "This means Thakur Jiw has not forgotten us after all this time.
Thakur means genuine and Jiw means god. The Genuine God has not forgotten us.
Lars was dumbfounded, for he expected to tell these pagans
about a God they never heard of, and instead, he finds they have heard of the
one supreme God. He asked them how they knew, and one of the elders told him
of their oral tradition. "Long,
long ago thakur Jiw, the Genuine God created the first man and woman. They were
tempted and fall, and knew that they were naked and were ashamed. They had 7
sons and 7 daughters, and founded 7 clans. But the people became corrupted and
so God hid a holy pair in a cave and destroyed the rest of mankind with a
flood. The pair that was saved multiplied and God divided them into many
different peoples.
"The Santal people once obeyed Thakur Jiw, but as they
made their way through the Khyber Pass they became discouraged with the
hardships of the mountains, and they began to pray to the spirits of the
mountains, and then to the spirit of the sun. They just drifted away from
Thakur Jiw. They still recognized him as the one supreme God, but they developed
their religion around lesser gods."
The missionary could not believe his ears. Here was a people
who had the same experience as the Jews. They had the truth of the supreme God
in their tradition, but went after other gods, and their religion became
corrupted. When the Gospel was proclaimed they recognized it was their supreme
God showing mercy on them, even though they had forsaken Him. If this was only
an isolated case we could put it into the category of the freak accidents and
coincidences of history, but it is not isolated. Don Richardson, author of
Peace Child, in his book Eternity In Their Hearts reveals how the belief in one
true God is a part of the tradition in hundreds of cultures throughout the
world.
This one true God has many names, but he is always the Creator
and Sustainer of all, and supreme over all. The missionaries who confront these
people have to make a decision as to whether the name of their God is the name
of the God of the Bible, or not. In many cases they have concluded that it is,
and the result is God has a great many names.
It all started with Abraham and Melchizedek in Gen. 14.
Abraham had just come back from a victory over some kings and Melchizedek, the king
of Salem, brought out bread and wine and blest him. He was the priest of the
Most High God, and he said to Abraham, "Blessed be Abraham by God Most
High, Creator of heaven and earth." This God was El Elyon. This was a
Canaanite name, and Abraham was being blest in his name. Abraham did not say,
"Hold on there, my God is Jehovah, and not El Elyon." He not only did
not say that, but he gave this high priest of El Elyon a tenth of all he had.
Heb. 7 makes much of this and shows Jesus Christ to be a priest forever after
the order of melchizedek. El Elyon became associated with the God of the Bible
and God was named in the Bible as Elohim, and El Shaddai.
This same thing happened in the New Testament world. Zeus was
the king of the gods, but he was so corrupt that he could not represent the one
supreme God. But the Greek writers, like Plato and Aristotle, used another name
for the supreme God which was not contaminated. They used Theos, and this
became the name the translators of the Old Testament into Greek used for God,
and this is the name Paul used in his New Testament letters for God. The pagan
peoples of the Gentile world had names for the supreme God that were kept pure
enough to become the names of the God of the Bible.
So getting back to Lars and the Santal people‑he decided
if Abraham and Paul could do it, so could he, and so he accepted Thakur Jiw as
the name of Jehovah. He said it felt strange at first to be proclaiming Jesus
Christ as the son of Thakur Jiw, but after a couple of weeks he felt
comfortable. The response was overwhelming as thousands of Santals wanted to
learn how they could be reconciled to Thakur Jiw through Jesus Christ. They
were averaging 80 baptisms a day. Lars baptized 15,000 during his years in
India, and 85,000 were baptized by others.
There are many amazing missionary stories like this, but now
we want to look at the amazing experience of Paul as the missionary on Mars
Hill in Athens, Greece. Nowhere do we see Paul more eloquent as he faces the greatest
intellectual audience of his career. He stood on the very spot where men like
Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle stood, and he had to persuade the best minds of
Greece. Gordon Lewis said, "Here is one of the most dramatic moments of
history as Jew meets Gentile, Jerusalem confronts Athens, Christianity faces
philosophy, faith meets reason." Athens was the capital of the
intellectual world, as Rome was the political capital, and Jerusalem the
religious capital. By his approach here Paul teaches us how the Christian is to
approach this world in fulfilling the Great Commission. You begin by‑
I. FINDING COMMON GROUND.
This calls for being observant, and doing some research. On
the surface it would seem that Athenian polytheism and Christian monotheism
would have nothing in common. Athens had so many gods that it became a proverb,
"As well haul rocks to a quarry as bring another god to Athens." It
was the god capital of the world, and you would need the yellow pages to keep
track of them all. The streets could be deserted of men, but their was always a god around on every street.
It is the same story over and over again all through history.
Once a people stray from the one true God in favor of lesser deities, they soon
discover there is an inflation factor in idolatry. They need more and more gods
to fill the shoes of one supreme God. You have to come with a god for every
detail of life and nature, and this becomes an endless process. The result is that even the most intelligent
people become utterly ridiculous in their multiplying of idols. The Greeks were
scholars and philosophers of the world, but in their wisdom they became fools.
Athens had an estimated 30,000 gods, which was more than all the rest of Greece
put together.
Paul could have stood
up and said, "You stupid superstitious screwballs." He could have
lashed out at their folly, but he did not take that approach. He took the wiser
approach and began his message by saying, "Men of Athens! I see that in
every way you are very religious." He was saying this, not with a
sarcastic voice, but with a note of appreciation. He was saying we are one in
this, for I too am very religious, and I have a religious message to share with
you. He then selects a specific object of their worship as a jumping off point
to share the good news. Paul had walked around the city, and he had observed
the idols and altars everywhere. He found one to an unknown God.
Paul was looking for some common ground from which to begin,
and he found it in this altar. Don Richardson says there is some common ground
in every religion and culture, for God in his mercy has given every people an
insight into the truth that enables them to understand the Gospel when it
comes. It is the missionaries task to find that common ground, just as Paul did
here.
The unknown God was perfect, for his goal was to share with
them the revelation of God in Jesus Christ. They did not know this, and so the
God of the Bible was an unknown God to them. Paul says this God whom you
worship as unknown I am proclaiming to you so you can know him. The unknown God
whom Paul made known was not just another god, but he was the supreme God. He
is not one of the gods of gold, silver, and stones, or a god who lives in temples
made with hands. He is the God whom all peoples instinctively know as the God
of all. He is the God who created all, and the God of all nations. He is the
God in whom we live, move, and have our being. Paul quotes one of their own
poets who said of this God that we are his offspring.
Paul is saying by his approach to the Athenians that there is
common ground for all people who believe in God. In all the religions of the
world where there is a belief in God, there are universal truths held in common
by all. No matter how corrupt and perverted a religion becomes there is always
the concept of a supreme God who is the Creator of all, and the Lord of all
men.
Paul is saying that this is, in fact, the God of the Bible. He
may be called many names, or even the unknown God, but logic demands that since
there is only one God, all concepts and names of the supreme God in other
religions are the names and concepts of
the God of the Bible. All the religions of the world then have a concept or
name for the one true God who is the God we proclaim as Christians. This
becomes the common ground on which Christians stand with all the peoples of the
world. It is the key to reaching them. Mission minded people are ever seeking
to find that in the culture of other people which becomes a link to the God of
the Bible. God has never left himself
without a witness. Man has natural revelation that gives them a concept of an
almighty and all wise God over all creation.
Even the religious writings of the world convey much of the
truth that God wants all men to have, and which opens them up to receive the
greater truth in Christ. Paul quotes
the poet Cleanthes in verse 28. Paul
read this pagan poet and said to himself, "This is good. Here is a pagan
who says some things I can use, for he sees what in universally true." Let
me share a part of the hymn to Zeus that Paul is quoting from.
"O God, most glorious,
called by many a name,
Nature's great King, through
endless years the same;
Omnipotence, who by thy just
decree
Controllest all, hail, Zeus,
for unto thee
Behooves thy creatures in
all lands to call.
We are thy children, we
alone, of all
On earth's road ways that
wander to and fro,
Bearing thine image
wheresoe'er we go,...
He goes on to speak of God as King of Kings and universal
Word, and the one who makes the crooked straight, and chaos into order. The point is, even a pagan poet can know
much about God, and it is a Christian obligation to find out where people are,
and from that common ground open up the new light God has given in Jesus
Christ.
The reason the Christian is to go into all the world and
preach the Gospel is not because the pagan world has no light. There is much light in the world. There is so much good religion and morality
in the world, and so much that is true and wise, but none of it will save
without a Savior. God is not willing
that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance, and this can
only happen as people hear the good news of what the supreme God has done for
them in Jesus Christ.
It is the mercy of God that motivates missionaries. People know much of God all over this world,
but they do not know that God provided a sacrifice for all sin, and that He
conquered death in His Son, and that they can have assurance of eternal life by
faith in Him. The full and final
revelation of God is in Jesus Christ.
Other revelations are marvelous and true, but they are not
complete. Judaism is one of the most
marvelous religions of the world. They
have more truth about God by written revelation than any other religion of the
world. They actually have more than
Christians, for the Old Testament is much larger than the New Testament. Quantity, however cannot take the place of
quality. The final and complete
revelation of God is found only in Jesus Christ. The mercy of God compels us to have missions to the Jews, for in
spite of all their truth, they do not have the final revelation of their
God.
It is the same with all other peoples. They have much that is true, but they do not
have the Truth. Christians are to go, not in pride as if we are better than
others, for we are not. What we have we
have received, and it is our obligation to pass it on. Dr. Richardson was a missionary for 13 years
to the people in New Guinea. He makes
it clear that the more you study the religions of the world, the more you
realize that God has not left Himself without a witness. All people have general revelation, and many
have traditions which link them to the biblical past when all men worshipped
the true God. It is amazing how much
biblical truth there is in the folk religions of the world. The Christian does
not go into all the world because other religions have no value and truth. He
goes because they need to hear of the ultimate and final Truth of God's
revelation in Christ.
The second thing you come to realize is that all religions
are under law. Paul writes in Rom.
2:14, "Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things
required by the law, they are a law for themselves....they show the
requirements of the law are written on their hearts." This means that every religious person on
this planet is basically in the same place as the Jews were. They had the law as a foundation, but their
religion was not complete until they had a Savior who satisfied the demands of
the law, and saved them by His grace.
This is what all of the religious people of the world need, and mercy is
to motivate us to meet that need by getting the Gospel to them.
Mercy is the ready inclination to relieve misery. The world is in misery trying to save
themselves by religion, by works, and by obedience to law. No one has ever been saved by that route
yet, not even when it was the revealed religion and law of the Old
Testament. The Christian mission is a
mission of mercy. It is taking the good
news to all the world that God has not forgotten or forsaken them, even though
they deserve it, but He has made it possible for them to be saved, and released
from the bondage to their religion of law.
Mercy is not only the motive for missions, but it is the
motive for witnessing in our own land.
We tend to think that because the American people know so much about
Christianity and the truth of the Bible that they do not need witnessing. But we need to see that all around us the
religious people in our land are just like those in the rest of the world. They have all kinds of wonderful truth,
morality, and insights into life, but it is still a religion of law. They expect to be saved by their good works
and obedience to the law. They do not
know the freedom of being saved by trusting in the finish work of Christ. Jesus is not only the completion of Judaism;
Jesus is not only the completion of the religions of the world; Jesus is not
only the completion of the unknown God, Jesus is the completion of Christianity
as well.
There are millions of religious Christians who have an amazing
knowledge of the true God, but who have never gotten in on His mercy and been
saved by personal trust in Jesus Christ as their Savior. Mercy must compel us to share this with
people so that they can have God's best and be complete in Christ.
What is mercy? I see
it as God's friendship in action. In
mercy God gets involved in our lives and in our world. He blesses where we do not deserve it. He rescues us from our own folly, and
forgives us when we are worthy of condemnation. Mercy is what we see the father of the Prodigal practicing. He didn't deserve a place in the barn, or a
dish of leftovers, but the father restored him to full dignity as a son, and
made him the honored guest at a banquet of celebration.
It was all mercy, and the father even pleaded with the elder
son to come in and join the party. This
too was mercy, for he deserved to be shut out for his bitter attitude. The father is the friend of both of his
boys, for his dominant attitude toward both was mercy. His best was available to both because of
his mercy. This is the message the
whole world needs to hear, for the one prayer that is always heard and answered
is, "God be merciful to me a sinner." The best proof of this is the dying thief upon the cross who
mercy sought and mercy found. He was
the first in paradise, even though he was hell‑bound. The poet wrote,
When Christ, my Lord, hung
dying,
Dying on the shameful tree,
Men in all their madness
mocked Him,
Yet no word at all said He.
But when at His side a
sinner,
Hanging there in shame to die,
Pleading, sought his loving
favor,
Swiftly came love's glad reply.
When thou comest to thy
kingdom,
Lord, he cried, remember me.
Yeah, to‑day, with me in
glory,
Jesus answered, thou shalt be.
Was not this most wondrous
pity,
So to bless a dying thief
Even amid his own deep
anguish
Thus to give a soul relief?
Tell it in the highest
heaven,
Tell it in the depths below;
Tell it to the lost and
outcast;
Tell it in the haunts of woe:
To the ver chief of sinners
Let the blessed tidings go.
He who asks the Savior's
mercy
Shall the Savior's mercy know.
Author unknown
Not only are we saved by mercy, but we are sanctified, guided,
delivered, and protected by mercy. It
would take over an hour just to read all of the text in the Bible dealing with
God's mercy toward us. Let me just
share a few. Daniel asks his friends to
plead for God's mercy in revealing the king's dream so that they are not
executed. Whenever God gets involved in
our lives to rescue and protect us, it is His mercy in action.
In Neh. 9 the history of Israel's departure from God, and God's
compassion and deliverance is rehearsed.
It happened times without number, yet he says in verse 31, "But in
your great mercy you did not put an end to them or abandon them, for you are a
gracious and merciful God." If God
was not merciful there would be only one book of the Old Testament. It is long because God's mercy endures
forever.
It is one of the most frequent prayers of the Psalms. "Remember, O Lord your great mercy and
love. Do not withhold your mercy from
me O Lord. In our great mercy turn to
me." Over and over, and over again
in trials and troubles of all kinds the cry for mercy goes up. It is a prominent aspect of prayer in this
world where so much can go wrong. The
fact that anything goes right, and that you escape many of the evils of life is
due to God's grace and mercy. The
greatest need of every human being is for God's mercy. There is no salvation without it, and there
is no victory or happiness without it.
Here is a major need of every person.
Jesus said that to get it we must give it. He said, "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain
mercy." It is by being channels of
mercy to others that we receive the flow of mercy into our own lives.
The Christian life is to be a life of mercy. We are to have compassion on people who are
lost, and in mercy share the light that leads out of darkness into life. We are to have compassion concerning every
human need. We are to put friendship
into action, and let mercy abound in loving service. Mercy is the motive for missions, and every compassionate concern
for a needy world. The incarnation was
a mission of mercy. The life of Jesus
was a ministry of mercy. His death and
resurrection was the master plan for universal mercy. The great commission is every Christians command to take the
mercy of God to all people. Mercy is to
be our motivation to help everybody we can to find God's best in Christ. Everything we experience, and everything we
share is because God is merciful.
7. GOD IS
OMNIPOTENT PART 1 Based on Rev. 1:1‑8
Alfred North Whitehead, one of the philosophical giants of
the 20th century, said, "The glorification of power has broken more hearts
than it has healed." He warns
against the glorifying of even God's power.
For the abuse of power all through history makes this attribute produce
fear rather than faith.
If the authority figures in one's life have been people who
abused power, than power will be seen as negative. For people who have lived with a tyrant father, or under a
political tyrant, the concept of an all‑powerful God is frightening. Whitehead points out that power is not good
or evil in itself. It can be used for
both, and so it is not worthy of worship in itself. Satan too has great power, but he is not worthy of worship
because of that power, for his power is devoted to evil, and the destruction of
all that is good.
Back in ancient Greek history men knew that power was
dangerous, and that it was not a good thing even in the hands of the gods. Aesclyus wrote Prometheus Bound, and in it
he tells of how Prometheus helped Zeus dethrone the Titans, and become the
supreme God. But soon Prometheus was
disillusioned, for Zeus used his power to rule lawlessly. He cared not for what was good for man, but
only about sheer power. He was nothing
but a big bully abusing his power.
Prometheus loved man, and he saw sought to help men by giving him fire
and general help in the use of his gifts and reason.
Zeus despised him for his love of man, and he chained him and
tortured him. Prometheus would not bow to the power of Zeus. He became the hero of all who fight and
resist tyranny. He said, "Worship,
adore, court him who is now in power, But I, for Zeus less than naught do I
care." He predicted that the chief
God was doomed to fall in spite of his power, for power corrupts and leads to
weakness. He said again,
"Then bravely there
Let him sit trusting in his
heavenly thunders,
With hands that brandish his
fire‑breathing blot.
Naught shall avail these to
prevent his falling
Ignoble with a fall
intolerable."
Here is a pagan poet teaching us that power is not worthy of
worship. If the pagan mind can come to
this conclusion, then we need to be extremely careful in how we promote the
omnipotence of God. It has often been
so portrayed that it stimulates rebellion toward God rather than attraction. That which makes God attractive and worthy
of worship is not His power, but His goodness.
The Bible does not exalt power for power's sake, but, rather, exalts the
moral qualities of God. It is the
goodness, holiness, righteousness, and love that control the power of God. His power is always devoted to overcoming
evil with good.
He has the power to judge and condemn, but that is always the
last choice after He has exhausted every avenue to prevent it by His grace and
mercy. He is not willing that any
should perish, but that all should come to repentance. In His grace He has made it possible for all
to repent and be forgiven. His first
use of power is always positive. It is
used to prevent the negative use of power.
The primary task of the prophets was to warn Israel and the other
nations round about, so they could respond in repentance and obedience and not
have to endure the power of God's judgment.
The whole Gospel is the power of God unto salvation. It is the story of God's power in providing
a Savior, and God's power in overcoming Satan and death that there might be
adequate provision for every sinner to become a child of God, and escape the
judgment of God. God's power is
directed toward a positive purpose, and it is limited by love. In other words, although God is all
powerful, He cannot use that power for that which is inconsistent with His
moral attributes. He cannot be unloving
and unholy, and in any way be inconsistent with those attributes that make Him
honorable, admirable, and worthy of our worship.
The God of the Bible cannot be a Zeus, who arbitrarily uses
power to achieve selfish ends regardless of who gets hurt, and how unjust and
immoral it might be. God cannot be a
tyrant. All of His power must enhance
the goals of love, and this is what makes the God of the Bible the God who
alone is worthy of our love and worship.
We only love God because He first loved us. If we do not present to men a God whom they can love, they will
not love Him. That is why it is so
important for us to understand the omnipotence of God. Lack of understanding, and misunderstanding,
does great harm to the cause of God in the minds of men.
It is possible to pay God such great compliments that you
destroy His glory in the minds of men.
God is indeed almighty. This is one of the familiar names for God in the
book of Revelation. John uses it 8
times. It is used only one other time
in the entire New Testament. Paul uses
it in II Cor. 6:18 as he quotes God saying, "I will be a father to you and
you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty." The Greek word is pantokrater, which means
all‑powerful. In the Old
Testament the Hebrew word for almighty is used 48 times. All together God is called Almighty 57
times. These are sufficient to make it
a part of the Apostle's Creed, which is quoted by millions of Christians all
over the world as they repeat, "I believe in God the Father
Almighty."
The problem comes when these millions of Christians assume
that what they mean by this is that God can do anything. If that is what they really mean, then they
have rejected the God of the Bible, and they have substituted a god of their
own creation, and in doing so they make millions of people reject the God of
the Bible in the process, because they are saying that their god is the God of
the Bible. If God can do anything, then
He is not worthy of our worship, for He can lie, deceive, break His promises,
do evil, and give us no assurance that He will always be good. A God who can do anything is a God to be
feared and not loved, for He can by mere whim decide to prefer evil over
good. He can abuse His power just as
Zeus did, and like Zeus, be rejected as unworthy of worship.
Thank God that the Bible does not reveal a God who can do
anything. All His power is power with a
purpose, and that purpose is determined by His total nature, and not just His
strength. Power is not His primary
characteristic. God is holy, good,
just, and righteous, and all of His power is directed according to these
qualities. His nature limits Him so
that He cannot do what violates His nature.
He is truth, and so He cannot lie.
He is holy, and so He cannot do evil.
R. A. Torrey in his book What The Bible Teaches writes, "The
exercise of God's omnipotence is limited by His own wise and holy and loving
will. God can do anything, but will do
only what infinite wisdom, holiness, and love dictate."
Only limited power is good power, and only that kind of power
can be honored and admired. You would
not admire me if I used my power to do all the things of which I am
capable. I have the power to throw a
brick through the neighbors window. I
have the power to stand on the organ and stomp its keys until they break. I have enormous power to be destructive, but
I keep that power under control because it is a foolish use of power. It is not wise, helpful, or loving, and so I
choose not to do what I could do. In
sane people power is always under the control of their higher attributes of
reason and common sense. Nobody who is sane does all they have the power to do.
The power to do evil is not a strength, but a weakness and
defect if you choose to use it that way.
When we become totally like Christ in our resurrected bodies, we too will
be perfected, and it will be impossible for us to lie, or choose any other
evil, for our nature will hate all evil.
What we need to see that there is a great paradox here, and that true
omnipotence is not being able to do everything, but being able to do anything
that is good, true, and beautiful, with the negative ability to be able not to
do anything that is destructive of the good, the true, and the beautiful. It is the very impossibility of God to do
anything that destroys and hinders His perfect purpose that makes Him truly
omnipotent.
A God who can do anything is
not nearly as powerful as a God who can do only what achieves His purpose.
The God who can do anything can do that which destroys and
hinders His purpose, and this makes Him weak, fallible, and a dangerous
power. The God who can do only what
achieves His goal is a joy and pleasure to Himself, and such a safe and secure
God for man that He is ever worthy of worship and praise. This is the God of the Bible. He is the God who cannot do what is immoral,
illogical, absurd, stupid, or self‑contradictory.
If power is the ability to achieve purpose, then being all
powerful as God is the ability to achieve all His purposes with no defect that could
taint the purpose, and achieve it in any way that is inconsistent with His
nature. Nothing is power that does not
achieve His purpose, and so any evil in God, or inconsistency, or deviation
from the goal which is unholy and unloving would not be power, but
weakness. God has no such
weakness. All His limitations are a
part of His power. What He can't do is
a major aspect of His omnipotence.
Could He do anything that was not consistent with His purpose and
nature, He would not be omnipotent.
This means that the list of things God cannot do are all
valuable aspects of His power, for they define His purpose and make it
clear. It is because He cannot be or do
anything contrary to His purpose and character that He will achieve all of His
purpose. If He could lie, He would have
a weakness that could hinder His goal of truth, and He would not be
omnipotent. What God cannot do is just
as vital to His omnipotence, as is what He can do. I can tell the truth, but I can also lie, and because I can lie I
have the ability to not achieve the goal of always being truthful, and so I
have a defect and weakness in achieving this goal. It is not an absolute certainty that I will. God cannot lie, and so it is an absolute
certainty that He will achieve the goal of always being truthful. That is what omnipotence is. It is the absolute power to achieve a
purpose.
The most powerful are those who have the ability to limit
their power. The absolute dictator is
really very weak. He has to keep a gun
and a knife at everyone's throat constantly, for soon as he fails to keep
control of everyone he risks losing his power.
He is a slave to his power as much as all those he enslaves by his
power. There is no comparison to the
man who gives his power away and lets his people share it. He is loved, and has far greater power than
the greedy dictator who grabs and grasps for power. Self‑limitation is the key to true power, and is the finest
expression of power. Which is the
greater power? The miser who hoards his
wealth so no one else can be blest by its power, or the philanthropist who
gives money to others that they might share in the blessings of his
wealth?
All truly great power, and good power, is power that is limited
by values that are greater than power.
If I choose to relate to a dog or cat I limit my power. I am obligated to care for, feed, and
provide shelter for these lesser creatures.
My freedom is conditioned by my love and care. There can be a great price to pay in this choice to care for
pets. They often do not do what it is
your will for them to do, and more often than not it is on the carpet. People do not have to put up with this sort
of thing, but by the millions they do.
They deliberately choose to limit their power in order to relate to an
inferior creature.
We could follow through and show how every relationship that
is developed with friends, mates, groups, and neighbors imposes limitations on
your power. But in love we choose all
of these limitations because the values of love are greater than the value of
totally independent power. We feel this
way because we are made in the image of God.
God did not have to create man, nor did He need to create him as a being
with freedom. He could have maintained
total power and control on this earth had He made man like the planets. They are easy to control, and they obey the
laws of God perfectly, and He has no problem whatever with them. But God choose to limit His absolute power
and control by making creatures who were free to even say no to Him. The only reason for such a choice is because
God's nature is dominated more by love than by mere power. Had power been the ultimate in God there
never would have been the risk of creating beings like man. We only exist because God is love.
Once you love, you put a limit on your power, and it no longer
becomes the dominate issue. When you
marry you make a covenant of love, and this means power can no longer be the
main issue in your relationship. If
power was number one, then I could always have my way for I have no doubt I can
take Lavonne in a fight. By shear power
alone I can win any dispute and have total control of all that we do. But power is not the issue. Love is the
issue, and if power is not loving, then it has to be set aside or shared. Power is always limited by love.
This is the key to understanding the power of God. If His omnipotence was exercised without
regard for His love, and His sharing of freedom with man, there would not be
any evil in the world. And all‑powerful
God could rid the world of all evil in seconds. Like lightening, God could solve all the problems created by evil
in this world. But since He does not do
this, it leads to complex questions about His power. Take murder for example.
Everyone agrees murder is evil.
God either wills murder, or He does not. If He wills it, then He is not the God the Bible reveals, for the
God of the Bible forbids murder, for it is contrary to His will. But if God does not will murder, as the
Bible says, why then is there still murder if He is all powerful? And all‑powerful God who does not want
murder to be a part of reality should be able to prevent it from every
happening, but God does not prevent it from happening. It would seem that God is not all‑powerful. In order to avoid this conclusion many have
gone to the extreme position of saying that God is the cause of evil as well as
good. All that is, is because God has
willed it to be as it is.
This kind of thinking leads to exalting God's power above all
of His other attributes, and destroys all that makes His love and goodness
superior to power. Even a non‑Christian
like Albert Einstein could see where this kind of omnipotence in God leads to a
God that does not fit the Bible description.
He wrote, "Nobody, certainly, will deny that the idea of the
existence of an omnipotent, just and omnibeneficent personal God is able to
accord man solace, help, and guidance; also by virtue of its simplicity it is
accessible to the most undeveloped mind.
But, on the other hand, there are decisive weaknesses attached to this
idea in itself, which have been painfully felt since the beginning of history. That is, if this being is omnipotent‑that
every occurrence, including every human action, every human thought, and every
human feeling and aspiration is also His work; how is it possible to think of
holding men responsible for their deeds and thoughts before such an almighty
being? In giving out punishment and
rewards He would to a certain extent be passing judgment on Himself. How can this be combined with the goodness
and righteousness ascribed to Him?"
He is asking, how can you have your cake and eat it too? How can you say God is all‑powerful,
and so all that is and happens is His will, and yet say that He condemns those
who do what He does not will? There is
a clear contradiction here that forces us to recognize God has had to limit His
omnipotence in terms of its control of free‑willed beings. He controls their destiny, and so there is
no way they can escape His power, but He does not control their choices. He has limited His power to control their choices. It is not that He lacks power to do so, but
He does not use it because His goal is not achievable by mere power. If God had to make everybody do what He
wills, He would be so power oriented that He would not be free to achieve His
goal of having a vast family of children who freely love Him by choice.
Mere power cannot achieve this goal, and so if God was all
powerful in the sense that He made everything to be as it is, then He would not
be omnipotent in the biblical sense, for in the biblical sense God's
omnipotence is His ability to achieve His purpose. This means the ability to limit His power and share it with
others, and so risk sin, disobedience, and evil, with the assurance of reaching
the goal of a vast family of men who freely love Him and worship Him, and serve
Him forever and ever. The God who has
full control of every event, and who by sheer force of His strength makes
everything go His way, is no match for the God of the Bible who can limit His
power by love, and risk even rebellion, and yet come out a winner with redeemed
people out of every tribe, tongue, and nation praising and serving Him for all
eternity. This is biblical
omnipotence. It is God's power to
achieve His loving purpose without inconsistency in His love, holiness, and
goodness.
The only way God could achieve His purpose was by the power of
love. If He had not had the power to
choose to sacrifice His Son, and had Jesus not had the power to lay down His
life and pay the ultimate price for sin, the whole plan with free will beings would
have become a disaster, and God would have been proven to be impotent in this
experiment. But God had the power to
win, and His omnipotence is established forever. He can do anything that He wills to do. Thank God there is much He does not will to do, and thank God He
is not compelled by His power to do anything contrary to His nature.
It would have been easy for God to have willed to make man a
machine, and then control him by law like the rest of the universe. But God chose the infinitely harder task of
making man free. The cost to God was
infinitely greater by choosing this way, but He had the power to pay that cost
and achieve His purpose. So God took
both roads. He took the easy way of law
to control His creation, and the hard way of love to control man, and He
arrives where He wills by both routes.
That is what omnipotence is all about.
It is the power to get where you want to go regardless of the difficulty
of the route you choose. That is the
only kind of power that really matter in the long run, and that is the kind of
power the Bible reveals to be the power of Him we will call forever, the
Almighty.
Continued in GOD IS
OMNIPOTENT Part 2.
It is a great paradox, but the fact is, the real test of
omnipotence is what it can do when it limits itself, and gives up absolute and
total control. Absolute and total
control means the power is not shared with other being. All is just as you will, and there can be no
freedom of choice made by any other will.
That is one concept of omnipotence, and it is a powerful picture, for
there is no power other than the one with this kind of omnipotence. This would seem, on the surface of things,
to be the ultimate in power. To have
all power so completely that there is no other source of power in
existence. It would seem that you could
go no higher, or could there be a higher way?
Yes there could be!
Just do as God does in the Bible.
He creates other beings who also have power. Some of them have very great power, like the angels and
archangels. Satan had enough power to
challenge his creator, and even take a vast host of other beings with him in
rebellion. Then God created man with
the power of free will, and it is also capable of choices that are not His
will. This is all so risky, for it puts
God's omnipotence to the test. The God
who takes no much risk, but keeps all in His own control, is no where near as
powerful as the God of the Bible, who can take these kinds of risks, and still
be able to have ultimate control, and victory in achieving His purpose.
The God of the Bible has the ability to give up control, and
still win and achieve His goal. God
takes on enormous limitations to His power.
He cannot let men be free to choose, and at the same time force them to
choose only good. He could have, had He
made them mere machines, but He made them persons in His own image, and so they
are free. This puts a limit on His
power. God says that they are not to
steal, but gives them the power to steal.
They will have to pay for their disobedience, but they are free to
choose. Cannot God stop people from
stealing? Yes He can, but He will not,
for His purpose is not to force people into obedience, but to persuade them to
choose obedience.
If God has really created beings who can choose, then there is
a multiplicity of power sources in the world.
He can no longer then be the only cause for all that is. There are now other power sources who can
cause things to be that He does not will to be. Since He chose this sharing of power, He can also freely change
it if He chooses. His limiting of His
own power does not in any change His sovereignty, He is still the source of all
power, and He can make all other sources of power cease to be. But by going through with the plan to the
end, God will demonstrate a far greater omnipotence than a God who fears to
take a chance, and holds onto all power for Himself. That would be taking the easy way out, but the God of the Bible
is a risk taker.
If love, justice, holiness, truth, and beauty are the end
result for all eternity after the risk of evil, hate, war, injustice, and all
the ugliness of sin, then God will have demonstrated an omnipotence that is not
a mere victory of power, but of love and wisdom, and this is the kind of
omnipotence that is worthy of our love, worship, and praise.
So now we have a logical answer to all of the why
questions. Why doesn't God do something
to stop or prevent all the evil? All
such questions are based on the omnipotent God concept which we have shown is a
philosophical illusion, and is not the God of biblical revelation. All such questions imply that God can do
whatever He wants. This leads to all
sorts of false conclusions. God can do
whatever He wants, but He does not want to take full control of all power and
end His experiment of giving freedom to other powers. Those who condemn God for doing so would not want the alternative
of all humans being mere robots programmed to do everything as God wills. We do not like the evil that freedom
produces, but we also would not want to give up our freedom, and so we live in
a world where much is evil, and not what God wills.
The biblical concept of omnipotence reveals a God who not only
cares about the suffering that evil produces, He enters into the suffering
Himself. We seldom think of it, but God
has problems that He must solve also.
The problem He had was in how to save fallen man, and the only He could
justly do it was to enter the world of suffering Himself. The cross was the price that God had to pay
for allowing man to be free. It was that
important to God to keep men free.
Jesus was the only one who could pay the price to redeem man, and He did
it with joy because of the eternal fellowship He would have with all of those
who would receive His salvation by faith.
An omnipotent God who can do as He pleases, and who would
still send His perfect Son into the world to die and endure hell for sins not
His own, would be a sadistic tyrant impossible to admire. If He could save man by sheer power, and
then chose the way of the cross, it would be as immoral as I would be if I had
a rope tied to my valuables as my house was burning, and all I would have to do
is pull it and they would be spared, but instead I would send my son into the
flames to get them, and he dies in the effort.
Do not say God can do anything He pleases lightly, for He if could have
saved man any other way, He had a moral obligation to choose it. His Son even prayed, "If there is
another way let this cup pass from me."
God had no other choice.
In His omnipotence He could have sent ten thousand angels to
spare His Son, but there was nothing that power could do to save the world of
sinners. Only love could do that, and
not all the power of heaven. But that
is the very point I am making. Power
limited by love is not less power, but it is greater power. The mere power concept of omnipotence could
not save man. It was only the love
limited power of the God of the Bible that could. Love limited power has to be distinguished from total power. If might is right, then God can do
anything. But if what is right is a
matter of respect for the freedom of other persons, then God cannot have His
own way by the mere fact of being the strongest of persons. God has to play by the rules of His own
making. He has to allow His opponents
to play by those same rules, and this means they have the right to will what He
does not will.
Those who have a concept of the absolute omnipotence of God
with no limits so not realize that logic forces them to accept some limits. If
God can make rules that bind him to them, then He has limited Himself by those
rules. If He cannot make such rules, and must be always free to do anything,
then He is also limited by not being able to make such rules. Either way, God
cannot be conceived as having no limit whatever to His omnipotence. If He is a
God who cannot make other creatures who have wills that can freely obey or
disobey Him, then He is limited in His omnipotence. There is no way to have a
biblical image of God without self‑limitations to His omnipotence, and
again, thank God it is so.
God had the absolute omnipotence before He created the
universe. He was free to make any decision that was possible, and there was
nothing existing to hinder that absolute control. But once He chose to make
other creatures with a will of their own, He gave up total control, and imposed
limits on His power to get His own will done all the time. Unqualified
omnipotence is what He was willing to give up in order to have an eternal
family of children who freely chose to love Him. So history is filled with much
that is not His will, because He cannot let man be free and still force him to
do only what is right and good.
Do men have rights that God cannot dissolve by sheer
power? Of course they do. It is God's own gift to them, and He is no
Indian giver who will take it back as soon as they express the right to choose
what is not pleasing to Him. That would
be like me giving you a gift of a radio with the demand that you listen only to
Christian stations. You are free to use
it as you wish, but as soon as you turn to any other than a Christian station,
I will take it back. If it is truly a
gift, and you are truly free to use it as you wish, then I cannot control your
use of this gift. I may have the power
to so control it, but if I love you, I will not exercise that power, but leave
you free to make your own choice.
So God respects our freedom to choose that which is not
Christian, and not according to His will.
It is not that He cannot for lack of power prevent our foolish choices,
but He will not for His is not the omnipotence of the tyrant, but the
omnipotence of love. The omnipotence of
the tyrant is most costly to the subjects.
The omnipotence of love is most costly to the King.
The true image of God is always the highest conceivable by
man. He will always be more than we can
conceive, but never less, and so the highest conception is always closest to
the truth. Is it the highest conception
to imagine God as a ruler over puppets who can do nothing but what He decides,
or is it a higher conception of God's power and wisdom to imagine Him ruling
over a world of free beings who can choose to cooperate compete with Him? We could put this on a more human level and
ask, which is the greatest trade‑to operate a machine, or to raise a
child? You have the choice of a God who
operates by sheer power, or a God who operates on the basis of love, and if you
are choosing the God of the Bible, you will choosing a God who operates on
love, for God is love.
We need to stress that the love of God does not weaken His
omnipotence. It is the view of those who make His omnipotence absolute who make
Him weak. They reject the idea of freedom in any other. There is no freedom but
in God, and all is in His control. This seems like a God exalting view, but it
degrades God terribly. It means that even though God has all power and is the
only will that can determine what is, we still have a world that is full of
evil, suffering and folly beyond measure. This makes God look like an omni‑incompetent rather than an all wise ruler. What king can
be adored who has full control of all power, and yet has a kingdom filled with
evil and suffering that is destroying his people. There is nothing exalting in
the view that God is fully in change and responsible for everything being just
as it is. If this is true of God, then He is also the One who wills for some of
us to undermine this view and exalt Him as the God who has the courage to let
other wills make choices in the freedom He grants in love. A self‑limited
God is a God who is lovable, but an all ‑powerful God who can do anything
He chooses, but does not choose to prevent the evils we see daily in this
world, is the God so many atheists do not believe in, for they would rather
there be no God at all than such a God as that.
A father can gain the obedience of his children by sheer
power. He can make it clear that they will suffer instantly if they step out of
line. He can follow his threat with instant and severe punishment to the first
offense. His children will live in fear, and they will conform to his will,
even though they may be filled with resentment and even hate. By sheer power he
has them in control. Another father may take the approach of warning, but be
more open to forgiving if the children come and confess their disobedience. He
may allow them more liberty, and less severity when they do fall, encouraging
them in love to learn from their mistakes to avoid future falls. They may be
like the father of the Prodigal and give them freedom to be very foolish, but
always have an open door for them to return and be forgiven. If you study the discipline and judgment of
God all through the Bible you discover He is like the second father. He gives
much warning and time to repent before He punishes. He allows much freedom, and
is ever open to the repentant sinner to return and be restored to fellowship.
In other words, we see omnipotence of love rather than omnipotence of just
power.
I want to conclude this study of God's omnipotence with a
focus on His self‑imposed limitations based on His character and essence
as love. Thank God He is limited, or rather that He has limited Himself. If He
was not limited, it would mean that everything in the world is just as He wills
it and desires it to be. Even all the evil and tragedy of life is just as God
wants it. This is hard to swallow, and so we know that much in life is not
God's will, and, therefore, God has chosen to limit Himself, and not always
have everything just as He desires. Those who will not accept the reality of
God's limitations make God the author of all evil.
The reason people have a problem with the limitations of God
is because they jump to the false conclusion that if He has limits, it means that
He is not all powerful, and He is not God Almighty. This is foolishness, for
you can have limits because you are weak, as is the case with all of us, but
you can also have limits because you chose to limit yourself. You can have self‑imposed
limits. I do not read my sons mail, not because I am weak and cannot do it, but
because I choose not to do all I am capable of doing. God has the power to do
many things that He does not chose to do. He has the power to send a sinner to
hell as soon as he sins, but He chooses to give the sinner time to repent and
be forgiven, and to escape judgment. It is not because He is weak, but because
He is love, and not willing that any should perish.
When God created free willed being He chose to limit His own
will. He made it possible for other wills to choose things that He would not.
He gave them power to defy His will even. He could not make this choice without
limiting His own will. God cannot make us free and then still force us to do
only what He wills, for then we are not free. God does not make our choices for
us, but allows us to make them, and this means His will is not always done. Why
would Jesus teach us to pray, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in
heaven," if it was always done anyway? It is not always done, and that
means God does not always get His way in the world.
But what about texts like Luke 1:37 which says, "Nothing
is impossible with God." Or Matt. 19:26, "With God all things are
possible." There is no conflict when you look at the context, for these
texts are dealing with what man cannot do, but which God alone can. They are
saying what is impossible with man is possible with God. He can do anything that can be conceivably
necessary to achieve His purpose. They do not mean that He can even do what is
contrary to His nature and what destroys His purpose. Those are the limitations that we are focusing on, and not that
there is anything impossible for God to do to achieve His purpose.
These texts are for the encouragement of man. They are not
telling us that God is capable of folly and sinful actions contrary to His
nature, for that would be discouraging. The texts that tell us what God cannot
do are for the same purpose, so that we can count on Him to never change, but always
be good and loving and just, and never evil.
It is impossible for God to make blunders that do what destroys His
chances to achieve His purpose. The two sets of verses that say all things are
possible, and those who say some things are impossible are for the same
purpose. They are two sides of the one coin of God's omnipotence. He can do
anything consistent with His purpose and nature, and He cannot do anything that
is inconsistent with His purpose and nature. He is covered both ways for the
assurance of His people. We can have absolute assurance is such a God.
The Bible gives us a number of things that God cannot do. He
is limited by two things. He cannot do what is contrary to His nature, and He
cannot do what He has chosen not to do.
The ability to do something does not mean one has to use that ability.
There are many things that God could do, but He chooses not to do them. He is
free to not do whatever He does not choose to do. John the Baptist said to the
Pharisees in Matt. 3:9, "I tell you that out of these stones God can raise
up children for Abraham." As far
as we know God never did that, and likely never will. It would be a marvelous
miracle, but there is no reason why He could not choose to do it. But now we
want to look at things that God cannot do because of the self‑imposed
limitations of His omnipotence.
1. He cannot lie according
to Heb. 6:17‑19 and I Sam. 15:29, and so cannot destroy the world with
another flood, for He promised not to.
2. He cannot deny Himself
says II Tim. 3:13.
3. He cannot have respect
for persons, or show favoritism‑Rom. 2:11, James 2:9
4. He cannot save man
without a Savior, who is Jesus. John 14:6. If there would have been another way
to save man without the sacrifice of His Son, God would have taken it, but
there was no other way.
5. He cannot be pleased
apart from faith, for, "..without faith it is impossible to please
God.." Heb. 11:6, James 1:5‑8
6. He cannot refuse to
forgive one who confesses and repents. I John 1:9.
7. He cannot be tempted by
evil, nor can He tempt to do evil. James 1:13‑15. God is light and in Him
is no darkness at all, and so God cannot do anything that is sinful and
contrary to His nature of holiness. If He could sin He would deny Himself,
which is impossible.
8. He cannot do certain
things until other circumstances are in favor of it, or in other words, He
cannot break His promise. Gen. 19:22
9. He cannot do away with
the freedom of man to choose the path of sin over the path of obedience. Rom.
6:16; Rom. 8:5‑13; Gal. 5:19‑21. This means He cannot make a choice
men make not to have been made. He cannot make one who has murdered not to have
murdered, or restore a prostitute to virginity.
10. He cannot make any other
of His sons equal to the eternal Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. John 1:1, 14, 18
You can call these the top ten things God cannot do, but there are many other specifics, because He cannot do anything that is contrary to His nature, and which enables the forces of evil to finally win the war of good and evil. In other words God cannot lose. He is a winner, and He will in His sovereignty win the war against evil and accomplish His purpose for history and for men. The self‑imposed limitations do not make Him weak, but instead, make Him a loving victor. It is because He is omnipotent that He could risk letting other beings be free. Thomas Aquinas wrote, "To sin is to fall short of a perfect action; hence to be able to sin is to be able to fall short in action, which is repugnant to omnipotence. Therefore it is that God cannot sin, because of His omnipotence." If He was not omnipotent it would have been a foolish risk, for He could have ended up losing to evil forces and Satan would end up ruling the universe. He knew that could never happen, because He always had the ultimate power to overcome all evil, because He could never be tempted to yield to evil. He will demonstrate His ultimate power in the final judgment, but meanwhile He patiently endures the folly of evil because many will come out of darkness into light when they hear the Gospel of His free offer of forgiveness in Christ.
Let me illustrate once more how self‑imposed limitations
are not a loss of power, but are rather an expression of power. The man with no
money has no power to give money to others, or to loan it and invest it. The
man with money has the power to limit what he does with his money. He can give
it away, loan it, or set up a trust fund for someone. In other words, he can
limit his control of his money, and share the power to use it with others. Does
this mean that he has less power than one who is a miser and just keeps all
control to himself? Not at all! By giving up control he has expressed the power
of love to include others in his abundance. His power is used as a means of
expressing love for others. That is a far greater power than that of
maintaining full control of one's money for pure selfish end.
It is the person whose power is under the control of love who
is the most worthy person. And so it is with the omnipotence of God whose power
is always under the control of His love. God will only do what power can do
lovingly, and this means that judgment of evil is love for the good. Nothing in
God's judgments is contrary to His love and goodness. His greatest judgment on
sin was at the cross, and it was also His greatest expression of love. God had
to win men by means of love and sacrifice for power cannot do it. Someone said,
"A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still." In
other words, you can force a man to conform to your will, but you do not
control his inner man. You do not win his love. God was willing to limit
Himself, and even go to the cross in order to win man's inner heart to love.
The love of Jesus expressed in His sacrifice for sin accomplished this when
nothing else could. That is omnipotence in action, and that is the Bible image
of God's omnipotence.
9. GOD IS
OMNISCIENT MATT. 11:20‑24