“Who Is God?”


Isaiah 43:13 (NLT) “From eternity to eternity I am God. No one can oppose what I do. No one can reverse my actions.”

Not long ago I saw a list of responses a class of children gave when asked “Who is God?”

One boy wrote, “God is the guy who watches everything we do, waiting for someone to start having fun so He can put a stop to it”.

It gets worse; oh, so much worse than that.


           The glib statements people make in casual conversation,

                      the depictions of God in movies and television programs

                      that are supposedly based on who God is and how He deals with men

                      all have one thing in common.


                      They prove how far from God, and knowing about God, mankind is.

Without fail, the concept of God that we see in the world today, is that the only way to be acceptable to Him, is to be good.

           And those who are honest and fair and stick up for the little guy

                      (even if their defense of the weak is to soundly thrash and humiliate the bully)

win God’s favor and get rewarded for their noble behavior.

In one episode of “Highway to Heaven” with Michael Landon, there saw a scene where two bullies get out of their very pretty classic sports car and pick on some mousy little man in the parking lot.

                      Then went into the store laughing.

 

When they came back out, the ‘angel’, Michael Landon, had turned their car upside down.

The message: those acting according to God’s character, will apparently stoop to the level of the bully,

                      to get revenge on the bully, and even commit misdemeanors, in the doing of it.

The truth is, God is misunderstood and misrepresented by the world, and all to often by the church.
           Most people go though life being afraid to approach God.

           This morning, I want us to try and come to a better understanding of just who God is.

                      What is He really like.

                      Should we be afraid to approach Him or not.

 

Let’s take a look at God, going from a general view to a specific view of God, as given to us in the Bible.

GENERAL View of God - God Is!
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
The Bible starts there.

                      It doesn’t begin by saying, “In eternity past, there was God”.

           But the Psalmist says: “...from everlasting to everlasting, you are God” (90:2)

           And of Himself, God says through the prophet Isaiah, “I have always been God.” (43:13 NCV)



                                 God always was.

           He has no beginning, and He will have no end.

                      He does not exist in time.

                                 He exists independent of time and space.

                                 Those things are created for us.

 

After all that has been prophesied is fulfilled and God creates a new heaven and new earth, there will no longer be any need for time.


                      God transcends time and space.

 

Another concept that is hard to get my brain around.
God is a spirit.


           The bible uses anthropomorphisms to describe Him, so our brains don’t blow up.

 

It uses expressions that represent God as having hands (Heb 1:10), feet (Genesis 3:8, Psalm 8:6), eyes (I Kings 8:29), ears (Psalm 34:15); but Jesus said in John 4:24 that God is Spirit.

 

And then in Luke 24:39 He confirms that spirits do not have physical attributes.
“…a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have”. NASB

He is invisible, at least to the eye of flesh.

                                 John says “No man has seen God at any time (1:18), NASB

and Paul calls Him the invisible God.

“Christ is the visible image of the invisible God. He existed before God made anything at all and is supreme over all creation.” Colossians 1:15 NLT



There are three terms used to describe God in Judeo-Christian theology.

 

He is Omnipresent, meaning He is everywhere at once, and there is nowhere that He is not.
Omniscient, meaning He knows all things, and there is nothing He does not know.

Thiessen’s systematic theology says this,

“He knows things immediately, simultaneously, exhaustively and truly.”

Omnipotent, meaning He is all powerful.

                      He is able to do whatever He wills;

                                 everything that is in harmony with His perfect nature and character.



God is holy, God is righteous, God is good, God is truth, in the most complete and perfect sense of all those terms.
           This is not by any means an exhaustive study of essence and attributes of God,

                      but it gives us a sort of detached working knowledge to proceed from.

           But if you can get just an inkling from these things, of the immensity and eternal nature of God,

                      it should make the things we’ll study about Him next, even more astounding.


           How can this amazing Being, condescend to take any active role in the lives of men?

                      How is it, He can even notice us?

I am aware, in our information age, that there are microscopic creatures in and around me everywhere.

           But without a special aid, I can’t see them, and there’s precious little I can do to affect them.

                      Even microbiologists, who work with them on a daily basis, can’t relate to them.


                      They can’t send them a message, they can’t warn them of approaching antibiotics.

                      They can’t communicate with them at all.

 

And you have to understand, that the difference between the God who created this universe and us, makes the relationship between us and micro-organisms, look like schoolmates on the playground.


Yet He is intimately involved in the affairs of men, and deeply concerned with what concerns us.


           Let’s get…

MORE SPECIFIC View of God - God has Personality!

More specifically, God is a Person who exhibit’s the attributes of personality.

           He is self-conscious.

Not in the way we generally think when we say, “My ill-fitting jeans made me self-conscious”.


                      We mean that He is conscious of self.

                                 “I AM who I AM”, He said to Moses (Ex 3:14) NIV,

and through Isaiah He said, “I am the Lord, and there is no other; apart from me there is no God” (45:5) NIV

           And He is self-determined.

                      That is, He makes His choices, according to His motives and desired purposes.

“But He is unique and who can turn Him? And what His soul desires, that He does” (Job 23:13) NASB


 

The scriptures reveal a God who has intellect, sensibility, and volition.

           He is represented as speaking, seeing, hearing, being angry, jealous, and compassionate.

He is said to be creator, upholder, ruler, and sustainer of all things.

We know that He loves, and time does not permit, nor am I inclined to try and list all the passages of scripture that talk about His love.

John says “God is Love” and that pretty much covers it.
Let me read just one passage: "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life. 17 "For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through Him. John 3:16,17 NIV



           Paul assures us that God wants our fellowship.

Acts 17:24-28 (NIV) "The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. 25 And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. 26 From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. 27 God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 28 'For in him we live and move and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.'

 

                      Paul tells us that God wants us to seek Him out and find Him.


                      God created man to love Him.


The unimaginable, uncreated, Master, Maker and Monarch of eternity,

                      wants a love relationship with His creation,

                                 and He has stopped at nothing to regain that relationship;

even the sacrifice of His only begotten Son.

Does this speak of stern, scowling, fault-finding scrutiny, from a far-off lofty throne?

Let’s get…

EVEN MORE SPECIFIC View of God - Jesus Is God!

Philip was quite a guy.

           The day Jesus called on him to follow Him, the first thing we see Philip doing,

                      is seeking out his brother and saying, “We’ve found the Messiah! Come and see!”

           He was quick to believe, and wanted others to believe.

                      Later we see him running up to the Ethiopian in his chariot, to give him the good news.

He was bold too. And inquisitive.

In John 14:8 he makes a request, that I don’t remember reading anywhere in the Bible since Exodus. “Lord, show us the Father” NIV

 

The response he got, is very significant for all of us to comprehend and cling to, as we relate to God. “…He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (14:9) NIV


           Now we’ve already touched on the fact that God does not have a body;

                      that He is Spirit and invisible, and all things are contained in Him.

 

So Jesus did not mean, that God the Father looks like the person that was standing before the disciples at that moment.

What did Jesus mean?

           Well, first of all, He was establishing in their minds, that He Himself was God.

                      

           Do you want to see the Father?

Look at Jesus. Not the body. But who He is.

Witness His compassion,

                                 as He calls the man with the withered hand to the front of the synagogue,

or as he extends forgiveness to a woman He’s just saved from stoning.

See His wisdom,

At age 12 his is in the temple astounding the religious elite with his questions.


                      Observe His power,

                                    as demons shrink back at His presence,

                                 and blind men grow new eyes,

                                 and dead people come back to life

                                 and at the sound of His voice, the elements themselves worship and obey.

                      Watch in awe,

                                 as a multitude of men fall back on the ground, when He tells them His real name,

                                 and a leper is instantly pink and clean at His mere touch,

                                 and a tortured woman is healed of a long-term hemorrhage,

                                            just by brushing His garment with her fingertips,

                                 and a fisherman’s net is filled to the breaking point at His command.

 

Do you want to see the Father?

Hear His harsh rebuke of the hypocrisy that is all around Him.

                                 His words of anger, when His Holy place of prayer is defiled.


                      See the tears stream down His face,

when He considers the suffering of the unrighteous, due to their hardness of heart.

Hear the urgency in His voice, when He cries out,

                                 “If you are thirsty, come to me!” John 7:37-38 NLT

“Come to me, all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest!” Matthew 11:28 NIV



Jesus was the specific revelation of the Father.

           

Do you want to how to approach God?

           Whether or not He cares about you, and will be there when you need Him?

 

Whether He has the power to order your steps properly, and lead you in the everlasting way?

Look at Jesus.

“When a man believes in me, he does not believe in me only, but in the one who sent me. When he looks at me, he sees the one who sent Me” (Jn 12:44,45) NIV

                      “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30) NIV

 

In the Person of His Son, Jesus Christ, God the Father forever erased the need to wonder:

           what He is like,

           where He is,

           what He expects,

           what He offers,

           whether He cares,

           whether He cares for me.

           In Jesus Christ, God said to the world,

“Hi, I’m God, and if you’ll come with Me, I have such wondrous things to show you, you can’t even imagine them until I make you like Me. Oh, and by the way, I love you and I will heal all your diseases, answer all your questions in time, be your closest friend, blot out all your transgressions and wipe away all your tears.

Let’s get…

 DOWNRIGHT PERSONAL View of God - Seek To Know Him!

Through the writer to the Hebrews, God justifies His displeasure with the Children of Israel who wandered in the wilderness:
“...Today, if you hear his voice, 8 do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion, during the time of testing in the desert, 9 where your fathers tested and tried me and for forty years saw what I did. 10 That is why I was angry with that generation, and I said, 'Their hearts are always going astray, and they ‘have not known my ways.’ 11 So I declared on oath in my anger, 'They shall never enter my rest.’” Hebrews 3:7-11 NIV

In Deuteronomy 5, all of Israel is gathered at the foot of Mt Sinai, and the people ask Moses to go up and hear what God has to say, and come back and tell them.

Because, they were afraid. Afraid.

Now, God had just demonstrated His judgment on Egypt for her harsh treatment of His people, with 10 plagues that laid the land to waste and the destruction of the Egyptian army in the Red Sea.

 

But now, at the foot of the mountain, when God comes down to be with His people, they don’t trust Him.

                      ‘You go up, Moses, and speak and hear for us’.

God’s chief complaint against His people…
Are you listening, Christian?
…His chief complaint, is that they study and see His works;

                      they want answered prayer,

                                 they ask for miracles,

                                            they seek help in all their troubles

                                                       and they pray for blessing all day long…


           …but they don’t want to know His ways.

                      They don’t want to know what ‘makes Him tick’, if you will.

                                 They don’t want to know HIM!



Look at Jesus, and see the Father.

           He is real, and He is a person with feelings,

                      and He wants you to know His ways.

He wants you to know Him.

He wants you to feel so comfortable around Him,

                      that at any point during the day, you might just spontaneously speak to Him

                                 of whatever is on your mind or what inspires you, or what concerns you,

just because you are as aware of His presence,

                                                       as if He was standing visibly by you.

He wants you to love Him, as more than a friend, more than a lover, more than anything or anyone.

           He wants you to love Him so much, that He can at any moment say,

                      “Do this for Me”, and you will rush to do His will

because you delight in serving the One you Love.

Don’t be afraid of Him.

                      Love Him.

                                 Know His ways, and be amazed.


Who is God?

           The important question is, ‘who is God to you?’