The Goodness of God

Last week we looked at the goodness of God in the confession of the people when they read the law of the Lord.

Now we are going to continue with the confessions of the goodness of God.

Nehemiah 9:6 ESV

“You are the Lord, you alone. You have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them; and you preserve all of them; and the host of heaven worships you.

Playing God

Advances in technology have allowed scientists to come closer than ever to the physical origins of life. But they are as far away as ever from defining life.

Several research teams around the world are trying to create life out of chemicals, and they estimate they will have success in three to ten years. "We're all sort of thinking that the next origin of life will be in somebody's lab," say Dr. David Deamer. But the biochemistry professor from the University of California at Santa Cruz also says it is better to describe life, not define it.

One Christian scientist says it's going to be impossible to define life apart from God. Francis Collins, the director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, says, "It's an important but ultimately frustrating question if one expects to come up with a nice clean shiny answer; it ain't going to happen." Collins believes that those who "play God" in the laboratory usually don't believe in God.

But Mark Bedau, a professor with his feet in both disciplines, disagrees. Bedau is a philosophy professor and also works at a synthetic biology firm. His team is trying to make single-cell organisms from chemical components. "We are doing things which were thought to be the province, in some quarters, of God," said Bedau, "[things] like making new forms of life." Bedau is optimistic about future possibilities. "

Life is very powerful," he explains, "and if we can get it to do what we want…there are all kinds of good things that can be done. Playing God is a good thing to do as long as you're doing it responsibly."

WHAT ARE WE SAYING WHEN WE SAY THAT GOD IS GOOD

Recently I started to observe the phrase, “And all that good stuff.”

What do we mean about all that good stuff?

Note: God’s Goodness is Revealed in all that He says and does.

Nehemiah, the author of the following book, records that this interpretation of the Old Testament’s story was spoken by the Levites, who are depicted praying this prayer to God, starting from Creation. Having praised God in 9:5, they begin in verse 6 with God Himself.

Note: You will hear the phrase several times at the beginning of the text this morning “You alone are the Lord,” or better translated, “You alone are Yahweh.”

This is similar to what we read in Deuteronomy 6:4

Deuteronomy 6:4 ESV

4 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.

“Yaweh our God, is one.”

Note: a prevalent view today is God changes throughout history depending on the culture and its situation.

Note: This week professing atheist or pantheist at best took me that he believed that Jesus was a good man. I asked him how he could call Jesus could if he didn’t believe he was who he claimed to be. Would that not make him a bad and deceitful person?

Malachi 3:6 “For, I the Lord do not change….”

Hebrews 13:8 “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.

If God does not change then the character of his goodness does not change. (It does not depend on the situation or social construct we live in at a given time)

1. God is good in how He Reveals Himself through His Creation.

We live in one of the most malcontented and discontented Generation.

Remember that the people had chosen not to remember all of what God has done for them. Therefore, they are now confessing all that he has done.

Begins with a quick summary of Genesis 1-2. God made everything that is. There is nothing that God has not made. Last week we talked about the confession of the people. True confession arises from a renewed appreciation for who God is, and that is very much the starting point for this prayer.

He revealed Himself through His Creation.

Romans 1:19–20 ESV

19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.

God has now revealed Himself as the only one worthy of all blessing and praise. He alone is the Lord of all Creation.

The use of the second person pronoun “you” did all of this for your Glory and your Honor, and your fame.

This is a far cry from the culture of first person pronouns flying out of our mouths today.

Look what I have done, look what we have done ourselves. Without the aid of any other being in the universe. It is all about me and what my own self can accomplish to become the best version of myself.

We stand in awe of ourselves and all that we have achieved in this small corner of the universe that we live in today.

What does “You are Lord” really mean?

Generally speaking, a lord is someone with authority, control, or power over others; to say someone is “lord” is to consider that person a master or ruler of some kind. In Jesus day the word lord was often used as a title of respect toward earthly authorities; when the leper called out to Jesus “Lord” in Matthew 8:2, he was showing Jesus respect as a healer and teacher.

The statement “Jesus is Lord” means that Jesus is God. Jesus has “all authority in heaven and earth. At the resurrection Thomas said to him, ‘My Lord and my God?’

Jesus referred to himself many times as “Lord.” And when we compare the Old Testament with the New, we find several times when the LORD (Yaweh) of the Hebrew Bible is equated with the “Lord Jesus” by the apostles.

While here the reference is to “God is the Lord,” the same truth is found in “Jesus is Lord,” this objective truth does not change the fact that Jesus is more than Messiah, more than the Savior; He is the Lord of all including Creation. And one day at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord..... (Philippians 2:9-11).

What do you Stand in Awe of?

To Stand in Awe of is to: Respect and Revere someone or something. “a feeling of reverential respect mixed with wonder or fear.”

Difference between standing in Awe of God and standing in Awe of things of this world detached from God.

Being in awe of God implies that we have a respect toward Him as well as an attitude of worship and admiration. Apparently in scripture the fear of the Lord and awe for God are closely connected.

The question in our worship of God as our creator have we become to familiar with God. Have we unwittingly lost our sense of the fearful and wonderful awe of God in our worship?

I’ve stood in Rome and gazed at the magnificent David statue, I’ve stood in the palace at Versailles and stood in wonder at the Mona Lisa. I have hiked to the top of the Andes Mountains and gazed out over all that God has creation.

The difference between standing in awe of someone or something detached from God as apposed to standing in awe of God is the reaction our heart and mind have when we see something that is worthy of awe. Do we see it as part of God’s divine handiwork or do we see it as man’s attempt to be their own god and creator.

Scientists Discover New Marvels of God’s Creation Scientists studying two different parts of God’s awesome creation—the oceans below and the sky above—have made two startling discoveries.

First, (in January 2022), an underwater mapping project off the coast of Tahiti took an unexpected twist. Deep sea explorers discovered a sprawling, two-mile long coral reef resembling a bed of roses. The remarkably well-preserved and pristine reef is the largest ever found at its depth. One scientist called it a “dream.”

Then, two months later (March 2022), astronomers working with the Hubble Space Telescope photographed a record-setting image showing the most distant individual star ever seen.

The star lies 12.9 billion light-years from Earth. It is believed to be about 50 times as massive as the sun and millions of times brighter. The scientists expressed awe and surprise at their own discovery.

Individual stars far from Earth are often too dim to be seen even with powerful telescopes. But Hubble was able to spot the massive star with help from “gravitational lensing,” in which light-bending gravity from massive celestial objects functions as a magnifying lens. The star was dubbed Earendel, which NASA said means “morning star” in Old English

As Long as you live you will never exhaust the goodness of God, and you cannot stand in awe of anything good without standing in complete awe of God.

2. God is good in how He reveals Himself through His Choosing.

Nehemiah 9:7–8 ESV

You are the Lord, the God who chose Abram and brought him out of Ur of the Chaldeans and gave him the name Abraham. You found his heart faithful before you, and made with him the covenant to give to his offspring the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Perizzite, the Jebusite, and the Girgashite. And you have kept your promise, for you are righteous.

Out of all the people that God chosen of all the nations of the earth he chose Abram and called him out of the pagan nation of Ur. God see’s things that we do not see. He looks at the Heart of a man.

“You Found His heart to be Faithful.”

Nehemiah is Giving a History Lesson

Before Abraham had his name changed he was Abram and his home was in Ur of the Chaldeans, an area steeped in idolatry. Abram had no knowledge of the true God or His plans to choose a special people for Himself, nor did he know that the Savior of the world would be among his offspring.

WHY DID GOD CHOOSE ABRAHAM?

1) To make him a blessing, first to the nation that would come from him - the Israelites - and eventually to all the people of the earth.

2) To prepare the way for the Messiah. God foreknew and created Abraham for the purpose of the promised Messiah through whom all the people of the world would be blessed with the opportunity of eternal life. We read about this awesome promise in Galatians 3:16

Galatians 3:16 ESV

16 Now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, “And to offsprings,” referring to many, but referring to one, “And to your offspring,” who is Christ.

2) To reveal His faith as an example for us. “By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. He went not knowing where he was going. By faith Abraham obeyed and it was counted to him as righteousness.

WHY DID GOD CALL YOU?

Ephesians 1:4–5 ESV

even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will,

What does it say to you that God was working for your salvation before the foundation of the world.

Psalm 139:14–16 ESV

I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.

What do you think of when the psalmist says that His eyes saw my unformed substance.

3. God is good in how he Reveals Himself through His Protection.

Nehemiah 9:9–15 ESV

“And you saw the affliction of our fathers in Egypt and heard their cry at the Red Sea, and performed signs and wonders against Pharaoh and all his servants and all the people of his land, for you knew that they acted arrogantly against our fathers. And you made a name for yourself, as it is to this day. And you divided the sea before them, so that they went through the midst of the sea on dry land, and you cast their pursuers into the depths, as a stone into mighty waters. By a pillar of cloud you led them in the day, and by a pillar of fire in the night to light for them the way in which they should go. You came down on Mount Sinai and spoke with them from heaven and gave them right rules and true laws, good statutes and commandments, and you made known to them your holy Sabbath and commanded them commandments and statutes and a law by Moses your servant. You gave them bread from heaven for their hunger and brought water for them out of the rock for their thirst, and you told them to go in to possess the land that you had sworn to give them.

God saw His people as they were fleeing Egypt at the Red Sea.

God made a name for himself as He parted the red sea so the nation of Israel could walk through on dry land. And God cast their puruers into the depth of the sea.

David wrote lots of great Psalms about God’s protection for us.

David should know for he was the representative of His protection. Beginning with the wild beasts of the wilderness he was protecting his fathers flocks.

The next step in protection came when he killed the giant Goliath.

He projected him when king Saul was after his life.

Dad Protects Infant Son While Making Epic Catch A Cincinnati Reds baseball fan Jacob Kingsley told reporters, “(As a dad) you have to always be expecting the unexpected and be ready for anything to be flying out of whatever.” He should know. On Tuesday, April 26th, 2022, Jacob and his wife took their 11-month-old son Shepherd to his first Cincinnati Reds game. Jacob told his wife before the game he would protect their son if a foul ball came close to their seats, which were located about 15 rows from the field. Ms. Kingsley said she was anxious about the ball hitting their son and told her husband to be on constant lookout for foul balls. She said, “The entire game I was like, ‘Are you watching, are you watching?’”

Then a foul ball actually zoomed in their direction. Shepherd was strapped to his father’s chest in a baby carrier and was enjoying a bottle when a foul ball popped over the protective net and headed in their direction. “When I saw the ball, I was like, ‘OK, this is my time,’” Jacob said in an interview. “I gotta step up.”

The ball continued flying in the direction of Jacob, who was using his left hand to feed his son his bottle. His right hand, however, was free. “It was just coming right towards me, and I was like, ‘I can’t not try to catch it,’” said the 26-year-old Cincinnati resident. “So I just reached my hand out—there wasn’t anybody right next to me—and I made the catch.”

People on social media praised Jacob for his deft catch. “Bottle didn’t even come out. Legend,” one user tweeted. Another said: “Highlight of the Reds season so far.

This is exactly what God does for His children. He steps up the hour of need and catches the ball.

God’s protection was also in while we were still dead in our sins Christ died for us.

Romans 8:28 “For those who love God He is causing all things to work together for our good.”

He is so aquainted with all of your ways that he see’s what is coming in your life before it even happens..

4. God is Good in how He reveals Himself in His Mercy.

Nehemiah 9:16–21 ESV

“But they and our fathers acted presumptuously and stiffened their neck and did not obey your commandments. They refused to obey and were not mindful of the wonders that you performed among them, but they stiffened their neck and appointed a leader to return to their slavery in Egypt. But you are a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and did not forsake them. Even when they had made for themselves a golden calf and said, ‘This is your God who brought you up out of Egypt,’ and had committed great blasphemies, you in your great mercies did not forsake them in the wilderness. The pillar of cloud to lead them in the way did not depart from them by day, nor the pillar of fire by night to light for them the way by which they should go. You gave your good Spirit to instruct them and did not withhold your manna from their mouth and gave them water for their thirst. Forty years you sustained them in the wilderness, and they lacked nothing. Their clothes did not wear out and their feet did not swell.

“The people acted presumptuously and stiffened their necks towards God and His commands.”

Basically the people presumed on the goodness of God that had always gotten them out of difficult situations before, so they continued their rebellious ways expecting God to bail them out.

They were presuming on the goodness of God. Verse 27 reminds the nation of Israel that God gave them into the hands of their enemies and led them into exile.

They refused to obey and were not mindful of His wonders. The writer remembers back to when they grumbled in the wilderness and said take us back to Egypt this journey to the promised land is not worth it.

Note: They lacked for nothing but were still not satisfied with the good gifts that came from God.

Illustration: How many come to church every Sunday and see it as ONV (Of no value).

It makes no difference or impact on their daily lives. How many people see their Old way of Life as better than the new life they have in Christ.

Therefore, they go back to their old way of life. They say you know I don’t think Egypt was that bad. This calls into question whether you are truly living as a regenerate fallowed of Christ at all.

Many of us are like the boy who was standing up in the seat of the car and the mom smacked him on the bottom causing him to sit down and start to cry. And in rebellion he says to his mom, I may be sitting down on the outside, but I am standing up on the inside.

Look at what Paul tells us about preying on the goodness of God while we continue to stiffen our neck and live in sin.

Romans 6:1–4 ESV

What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.

Begins with a List of questions.

What shall we say then?

Are we to continue living in sin that grace may abound?

How can we who died still live in sin?

Do you not know that you were baptized into Christ’s death?

So, that we might walk in newness of life.

Notice that Paul sadly does not say so that you will walk in newness of life. If there is one thing Paul is, it’s a realist. He knows from experience that few followers of Christ actually walk in newness of life.

The most frustrating thing for Jesus and His apostles are those who profess to follow Christ but fail to live it out in our daily walk.

What is your plan to walk out as a disciple of Christ.

God’s goodness and mercy do have an expiration date here on earth.

The only reason that God is delaying in opening the floodgates of heaven and returning for His victory lap is you.

Note: many people who misunderstand the goodness of God use it as a crutch or an excuse not to come to Christ.

If God is truly good then why did …….. happen, you fill in the blank.

Or they use it as a crutch to remain in their sin, “God will always be there for me therefore, it doesn’t matter how I live my life now.

Problem with Secular Culture: They try to define goodness out of a social construct instead of a part of the very nature of who God is.

SOCIAL CONSTRUCT: a concept that exists not in objective reality, but as a result of human interaction. It exists because humans agree that it exists.

God’s Goodness and Mercy (according to David)

Psalm 23 ESV

A Psalm of David. The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

David addresses God as his shepherd, we read in John 10:11 Jesus says that he “is the good shepherd who lays down His life for His sheep.”

He restores my soul. (From the pit of sin and death)

He lead me in paths of righteousness. (Sanctification, as we grow)

His rod and staff bring me comfort. (The rod and staff were used to help direct the sheep, even in his discipline)

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.

You anoint my head with oil.

David acknowledges that his standing with the Lord is not like a visitor who is entertained once and then must leave or as one who is invited to return only occasionally. No, David rejoices that he has been given a perpetual place setting at the Lord’s table.

Anointing a person’s head with oil was an ancient custom of courtesy, respect, and hospitality shown toward guests. In Psalm 23, David sees himself as an honored guest of the Lord, who invites him to dinner, favorably anoints him, and pours out such lavish abundance that David’s cup is filled to overflowing.

David’s good and merciful shepherd is the same shepherd that passes in front of Moses.

Exodus 34:6 ESV

The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness,

He is the same God that Israel cried out…

1 Chronicles 16:34 ESV

Oh give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever!

Nehemiah 9:31 (EJEN): We now come to these words that the Levites know from Israel’s past to be the hope of Israel’s present and future. The opening words of Nehemiah 9:31

Nehemiah 9:31 ESV

Nevertheless, in your great mercies you did not make an end of them or forsake them, for you are a gracious and merciful God.

Nehemiah 9:31 (EJEN): This mercy is what they are banking on. They have rehearsed God’s great mercies (ESV) or abundant compassion (HCSB) in verses 17, 19, 27, and 28, because they look at the history of disobedience and rather than being depressed by it, they see God’s overflowing mercy.

Don’t be discouraged by the history of disobedience in your life.

Use it to highlight the great mercies of God. That’s what it’s for. It’s for you to know how merciful the Lord is. It’s for you to celebrate the greatness of this good God. Verse 31 continues,

Confession of God’s Righteousness

Nehemiah 9:33–35 ESV

Yet you have been righteous in all that has come upon us, for you have dealt faithfully and we have acted wickedly. Our kings, our princes, our priests, and our fathers have not kept your law or paid attention to your commandments and your warnings that you gave them. Even in their own kingdom, and amid your great goodness that you gave them, and in the large and rich land that you set before them, they did not serve you or turn from their wicked works.

Note: notice in 34 all of those who have sinned are listed by name.

God was good to them and they were unfaithful to Him.

Current Predicament

The Levites describe their own condition

Nehemiah 9:36–37 ESV

Behold, we are slaves this day; in the land that you gave to our fathers to enjoy its fruit and its good gifts, behold, we are slaves. And its rich yield goes to the kings whom you have set over us because of our sins. They rule over our bodies and over our livestock as they please, and we are in great distress.

Nehemiah 9:36–37 (EJEN): Israel had been enslaved in Egypt, and God had delivered them. So this cry from the Levites to God that they are enslaved, this statement of their “great distress,” functions to call on the Lord to deliver His people anew. They are asking Yahweh to show mercy to them as He did to previous generations.

CONCLUSION

Jesus died on the cross for your sins, and the immensity and density of the weight of your sins keeps piling up and hovering over you like a massive weight, and it is only the mercy of God that keeps it from crushing you.

Consider that all of that weight all of that immensity resting on the shoulders of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

We read in Isaiah 53:10 that it was the will of the Father to crush His only son under the weight of yours and my sin.

Gods word tells us that if we will only come to Him with the yoke of our sin and slaver, all of that crushing weight, He will take it nailing it to the cross once and for all.

If you’re not a Christian, when you feel that weight of justice hanging over you, look to Christ. Seek the Lord who acts according to His great mercy and forgives people. Trust Him to do that for you.

If you are a Christian but you struggle with guilt, look to Christ. Celebrate God’s great mercy, and live in that mercy. No wrath remains for those who hope in Christ.