What's Ahead Is Better Than What's Now
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Start with the notion that God has a plan and hope for the believer’s life.
Remember the context…first century and the idea of future glory that is imminent and just around the corner. The timing that brings about new creation and a renewed creation.
Suffering as the means for this glory.
As you all know, we began the year reading the chronological Bible plan. And I really love reading the Bible, because when I was discovering my faith, I had to have answers to really hard questions. I could not read the Bible and pretend like I did not read something I didn’t like. During those moments, I had to be able to ask questions and find logical answers to those question in order to maintain faith in Christ. This is why I love reading the book of Job.
Last week was our time to read through the book of Job. As you all know, Job was a fortunate and protected child of God who endured a series of tragedies at the invitation of God who desired to prove to Satan that Job was a noble man—fearing God. The 42-chapter book is a philosophical dialogue between Job and his friends who are trying to understand why and how God could allow the suffering of a righteous man. Job argues his innocence and his friends assume Job must have done something wrong to deserve such devastating things in his life. As we read this account, we are left with a question: Who is God? And what is He like? J. Owen Carroll would answer this question with 9 attributes:
God’s goodness- the perfection of his nature and moral excellence
God’s love- the divine attribute that indicates God’s disposition to be self-giving and for the good of the other
God’s mercy- God’s focused disposition of compassionate forgiveness toward his people, especially in light of their distressful and dire circumstances
God’s grace- unmerited divine favor, favor which comes with many gifts
God’s holiness- God as completely separate from his creation and, at the same time, to his pure and utterly incorruptible nature
God’s veracity- God’s truthfulness—that is, his identity as the source of all truth and the unfailing conformity of all divine action and revelation to this identity
God’s wisdom- the perfect divine judgment and insight arising from his infinite knowing—and this wisdom is something he shares with his creatures according to their need and for their good
God’s wrath- his revulsion against evil, his settled displeasure with sin and sinners
God’s righteousness- God’s character, specifically in regard to the coherence between his revealed will and his actions on behalf of his people
All of these attributes are things anyone would expect from a real God. We suspect God is loving, good, merciful, gracious, holy, veracious, wise, and even wrathful at times. However, it is the claim that God is righteous that leads to the greatest skepticism.
Essentially, the Bible claims God performs the highest standard of right every time. Therefore, justice is the coming together of God’s will [what he desires] and God’s behavior [what God does]. When God’s will and behavior comes together, the Bible calls it righteousness. When we use the word righteous what we mean is God is just or “justice-bringing.” But we are intending to say, “God is fair.”
Most of can settle with the idea that God is fair, in the general sense. However, when we think about our lives, we are compelled to ask the question, is God fair to me? When we read about natural disasters, we wrestle with the claim of God’s righteousness. When our kids face a life-altering disability, we wrestle. When we find ourselves living from paycheck to paycheck while working 2, 3, 4 jobs…we wrestle. When we find ourselves in a broken marriage or a broken family after giving all we have…we wrestle with this claim of God’s righteousness.
It’s easy to declare God’s righteousness when everything is going well in your life. But what happens when our lives are in shambles and it seems God is irresponsive to critical concerns in our life? Is God fair then? (Reference Psalm 37, 73)
Romans 8 Movements
Romans 8 Movements
Paul is living in a world that is completely in shambles. The world is broken, and there seems to be very little room for hope.
Paul viewed sin as the cause for creation’s brokenness (Romans 5:12-21).
God’s solution is a life led by the Spirit within God’s new creation (Romans 8:1-16)
The Spirit is given to the children of God
Tension: Inheritance in the new creation comes through suffering (Romans 8:17)
How is this fair?
Answer: 1) What’s coming is better than what has been and currently is, 2) God helps us by His Spirit (Romans 8:18-30)
Conclusion/ Invitation
Conclusion/ Invitation
The blessings we have just read is only promised to those who repent and follow Jesus Christ. If we want our lives to change, we must begin with a relationship with Christ—a committed relationship with Jesus that demonstrates our love and obedience to Him.
1 Peter 1:3-7
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because of his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you. You are being guarded by God’s power through faith for a salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. You rejoice in this, even though now for a short time, if necessary, you suffer grief in various trials so that the proven character of your faith—more valuable than gold which, though perishable, is refined by fire—may result in praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
Commit or recommit today!