#1 - Wondrous Perfections of the Eternal, Triune God
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Over the next 5 weeks we are going to gather and discuss five big ideas. We will look at 5 more after Christmas. These ideas are taken from our church’s doctrinal statements. Each week we are going to look at the Big Idea from the statement and dig into scripture to find out where these truths come from. We are going to discover truths that we have known to be true in our heads. That is what we know. Then we will apply them to our hearts. Taken knowledge and holding it fast as a driving point for our lives. Once in our hearts, the idea moves to our hands where it will mobilize us to do something with that which we believe and finally our feet where it will move us to be stronger in our faith.
It is my prayer as your pastor to encourage you along in this journey as we look into these truths each Sunday and to spend the week taking the big idea discovered on Sunday and work alone and or with others to expand these truths for our lives.
We have been learning over the past year that a disciple is one who is
seeking to know God, while being transformed into the image of Christ, empowered by the holy spirit in the context of Community.
You see even this statement follows a pattern of Head, Heart, Hands & Feet
Head, seeking to know God. We need to seek who He is and when we continue to understand and grow in our knowledge of God, and we begin to understand what God has done for us through Christ, this knowledge moves to our heart.
In our heart we become transformed into the image of Christ. When our head knowledge impacts our hearts, the truths of scripture move from knowing to believing, we become transformed into the image of Christ. This is a daily process. It’s renewable. It’s transformational.
When our heart is stirred with the truth from God, then the Spirit, which is within us, has one thing.
To move us from heart to hands and feet. It empowers us to do and to go.
It is the strength that we have to accomplish the many things for God.
All of this is done not in a vacuum, but in a community.
The vary nature of God is community. God dwells in community.
Why do we have these statement
Why do we have these statement
You may ask yourselves, why do we hold onto these statements. Who arranged these statements.
These statements are from the Evangelical Free Church.
We are a part of an association of churches that unite to be Gospel sharing people
If you are new to this church, may I encourage you to seek out the ours and the EFCC website.
These statements are 10 statements that we hold to be true. They are statements that we rally around as a local assembly of believers here in Merritt.
The ethos or understanding of this association is simple. If you have walked through our building, you would have noticed this painted on the wall. It’s defined as the associations calling it,
In Essentials Unity; In Non-Essentials Charity; In All Things Jesus Christ
In Essentials Unity; In Non-Essentials Charity; In All Things Jesus Christ
The calling and spirit of the EFCC is summed up well in this famous motto. It both defines our call and expresses our aspirations for the 21st century.
In Essentials Unity
In Essentials Unity
Essential Truths: We are called to embody and proclaim the essential truths of Christianity as articulated in the Word of God, expressed through the centuries in the great creeds of the church and defined for us in our Statement of Faith. We continue in the tradition of our EFCC forefathers who said; “Where stands it written?” These truths have led us to Jesus Christ who said “he is truth” and that the “truth would set us free.”Spiritual Unity -This calling is to a spirit of unity in Jesus Christ, with an affirmation of the priesthood and ministry of all believers, congregational government in the local church where He is Head, meaningful involvement within our fellowship of churches, and cooperation with all who share our call to these essential truths.
In Non-Essentials Charity
In Non-Essentials Charity
Generosity of Spirit: We are called to a generosity of spirit that frees us to embrace a wide variety of Christian brothers and sisters — “simply believers” — some with whom we will not agree in matters that are outside our Statement of Faith. Our spirit is one of warm welcome to all believers who share our commitment to our Statement of Faith and who seek to follow Jesus’ command to love God and love our neighbour as ourselves.Kingdom Minded: This generous spirit encourages us to joyfully work with those outside our own denomination, those of “like precious faith” who endeavour to expand the kingdom of heaven.
This part will become clear as we journey together these next few weeks. We are going to look at some truths, truths that can have different interpretations. Simply put, there may be some statements that we as fellow brothers and sister in Christ agree to disagree.
It always encourages me when after a sermon, I am greeted by the door by some of you who have thought through what was taught and line it up with your thinking and understanding of truth and come out with a slightly different view. That is alright. There are core statements and study on various points of scripture that we can hold true, but have charity for one another.
Folks,
There are many found in the Kingdom of God and when we get to heaven, we may be surprised to be greeted by a fellow believer that we have disagree with here on earth only to discover that the stand they took God had something to say about it.
It is not our intention, not mine, to put down those who disagree with our truths, but to have an open discussion with those who hold onto various interpretations of scripture, while being united in essentials.
The key part in this is determining what are essentials. Which leads us to the last statement
In All Things Jesus Christ
In All Things Jesus Christ
Let me read to you the statement from the EFCC
The Great Command and Great Commission: We are called to a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, who is the Lord God. Through His grace and through His Spirit we seek to fulfill His command to love our neighbour by loving each and every person, especially the poor, the marginalized, and the oppressed. We seek to fulfill His great commission by making followers of Him from all people groups.Godly Living: From the practice and teachings of Jesus, from the present ministry of the Holy Spirit working within us, and from the pietistic model of our forefathers, has grown a spirit that hungers for a closer relationship with Jesus Christ that will transform our hearts, our heads, our hands, and will reveal itself in a Christ-inspired value system and a holy lifestyle.
Big Idea #1
Big Idea #1
God’s gospel originates in and expresses the wondrous perfections of the eternal, triune God.
You will begin to see as we look at these ten statements that each of them hold a common word, Gospel.
You see the world Gospel is defined as
in a common commitment to God’s evangel–the gospel of Jesus Christ, who died and rose again to give us eternal life. To God’s glory, the gospel is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes. Our essential theological convictions are vitally connected to this gospel.- EFCC
So you see the big idea today Starts with God
Who is God
Who is God
Seeking to know God
Have you every been asked by someone, “Who is God”?
Can we hold to the world’s belief that we can have many gods.
It’s alright for you to believe in your God, I’ll believe in mine.
This morning I want to take you through how our understanding of God will drive us to be be Gospel sharing people.
As stated earlier, I encourage you to go deeper this week. We have three directions you can go through this week.
There is a document that you are able to get and it has three ways to study this concept.
You see the full doctrinal statement for this is stated the following
1. We believe in one God, Creator of all things, holy, infinitely perfect, and eternally existing in a loving unity of three equally divine Persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Having limitless knowledge and sovereign power, God has graciously purposed from eternity to redeem a people for Himself and to make all things new for His own glory.
This morning we are going to look at two directions about God. Who He is and His plan
He is one God
He is one God
He is one God.
4 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.
We can translate this verse to ourselves. Here o people, Here Canada. The Lord, Sovereign God. Who sustains us daily.
Who is the one who created us.
He is One.
A while back we had just gone through the names of God. Yaweh was one of these names. He stands alone. Man throughout time has derived various gods that have arisen, but God is the one true God
9 remember the former things of old;
for I am God, and there is no other;
I am God, and there is none like me,
The God we serve, the God that we are to bow down to is like no other.
If you are hearing for the first time that there is a God that is like no other. That is the truth we will learn today.
The God we will be speaking about today is the God who came in the form of Man, the one we call Jesus, the Christ, the redeemer. Who came to the world for us, to redeem us from the bondage of sin and to untie us with God.
The God that comes in the form of the Holy Spirit to
8 And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment:
He will also come to
8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
The one God that gives us a clear picture of Knowledge, Image, and power.
He is a creating God
He is a creating God
Not only is God one, but He is the Creating God.
1 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
This is the starting point of God’s plan. It began with creation.
Many people have described God as needing something so he created us. God was not in need when He created, rather it was a statement of Fact.
Now when we look into the book of Genesis, scholars who are hired to discover the truths found in scripture come to the book of Genesis with many questions.
With those questions comes some answers that may be far different from your understanding of God’s Word.
This morning I am not going to walk you through the various ways to interrupt the creation account, but rather leave you with essential truths.
3 By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.
This is described as
ex nihilo: creating something out of nothing
Whatever you hold to in your understanding of the creation story, we must hold onto this truth.
God didn’t rearrange what was already there. He spoke it into existence.
This weekend is thanksgiving. Its a time to celebrate the many blessings God has given us.
It comes from the time of harvest to celebrate the crop. Nature has once again created new things for us.
The grain, which was once a seed has grown to a full plant full of seeds to make the bread for our meal.
The turkey, once an egg, has grown into a full size creature for us to enjoy.
The potatoes, once a sprout has gone on to produce more for us to mash and smother with gravy.
All of this comes from something.
We celebrated the goodness, the blessings.
But God, the creating God. Created what we see today out of nothing.
The powerful God, the one God, created this world and also sustains it
16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
He created Adam and Eve who fell into sin, and by that act we too have been separated by God and That God’s plan from the moment of Creation was to restore us to him.
It starts with God
You see,
God alone is the Creator, (Heb 1:3)
that their is purpose and order to his creation. ( Ps 19:1)
His creation is good (Gen 1:31, 1 Tim 4:4)
When we know He is one, and that He is the God of Creation, the final part about God is his attributes
I have an assignment for you.
If you sitting beside a spouse or a friend, if you sitting alone think of someone.
Are you ready. Think of the attributes of the person. All of them.
I’ll give you a moment.....
I see some of you are smiling, that’s a good thing.
let’s be honest did you only think of the good attributes. What about those others. The ones we hid, are embarrassed about, or even not aware of our own struggling attributes. Did they come across your mind while you were thinking.
We love you even with them.
But God’s attributes, as we describe them and have come to know them are perfect. All of them.
Have you every meet someone who is angry with God.
If you begin to hear their story and why they describe God, they have a miss understanding of God’s attributes.
You see once you hear and believe that God’s attributes are perfect, it will change how you see and understand God.
3 Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised,
and his greatness is unsearchable.
33 Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!
We can and should never stop discovering God’s attributes. Throughout our lives, God’s attributes will become clearer as we see them working out in our lives.
If you think you have figured out clearly all of God’s Attributes, you should be reminded of Job’s friend as he attempted to know God more
7 “Can you find out the deep things of God?
Can you find out the limit of the Almighty?
8 It is higher than heaven—what can you do?
Deeper than Sheol—what can you know?
9 Its measure is longer than the earth
and broader than the sea.
God is love
God is love
One of the greatest attributes of God is the love that he has. As my good friend Jim would say. God’s unconditional love.
16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
God’s love is not based on our response, it is unchangeable immovable, unwavering.
That doesn’t mean that He is overlooks sin, His Holiness can’t be in the presence of sin yet at the same time have love for one another.
Our one God is Triune
Our one God is Triune
God is described as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
A teaching that can be confusing yet is not. As Caleb is fulfilling his practicum with us, we sit down and talk through some concepts. I have asked him to write out some of what he has been learning to help you understand the various approaches to the trinity.
Our finite minds really struggle with this idea. We come up with ways to explain it, but I am drawn back to scripture as a picture of how this can be
16 And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; 17 and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”
It’s a picture of the Voice of God, the voice that spoke creation into being, the God that Emmanuel, the one standing with us, who was just baptized, and the power of God that is given to us comes descending upon Him.
It is one of the reasons we hold baptisms. It a public display of our acceptance of God in our lives.
It identifying that we have entered into the waters of baptism and come out from Death to life.
May I encourage you, if you are a follower of Christ and have not taken the steps to be baptized, speak to me. I would love to walk you through the teaching on baptism and celebrate with you as you step out in obedience to our calling to make disciples and baptize them. to encourage them.
God’s plan
God’s plan
Finally when we come to begin to understand who God is we will begin to answer the question Why
God answers that questions of why by showing us His Plan.
You must know this, that God’s plan is intentional, purposeful and it is to bring glory and honor to Him.
He is Intentional
He is Intentional
God is intentional in his plan
4 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 is intentional, nothing happens by chance.
Many of us from time to time suffer with self doubt. We look at ourselves and wonder if what we do is of any value.
This is a clear misunderstanding of God’s Word. He choose before He created the world that you would be holy and blameless before Him
God, Almighty set in motion a plan for each one of you. Those times when feelings of doubt and despair come rolling into our thoughts, cling to this verse. IT was God’s intentional plan that you will stand before Him Blameless, not of your own doing, but that of Christ’s work on the cross.
It is Purposeful
It is Purposeful
The book Gospel Truth writes
Even before the first sin spoiled the good world that he made, God knew what he was going to do. He had created human beings in his own image, so that the eternal son of God would be able to take humanity into himself and to enter into a world and become Incarnate as a human being like us. pg 45
Christ came to this world not because of the fall, but to restore the fall. To restore mankind to Him.
14 who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.
You see the Gospel doesn’t begin with us, but what God has done for us. His plan was purposeful and direct. Once again unmovable and unchangeable.
The mystery of God’s sovereignty and free will comes into battle in our own minds as we struggle with the concept of free choice and God’s sovereign will.
An infinite God knows our “free” Choice and works out his will according to his purposes.
If you have ever have watched the movie trilogy of Back to the Future. A story of a person going back in time and affecting the time continuum. His changes in the past affects his present and future.
He goes about attempting to restore the future by the past and in the story-line it changes several times.
God is able to see past, present and future all at once.
11 This was according to the eternal purpose that he has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord,
The purposefulness of God is to bring about Christ into the world for our salvation.
It is For God’s Glory
It is For God’s Glory
The final plan of God is to bring present and eternal Glory for himself.
He is a jealous God,
14 (for you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God),
demanding our praise today and forever more
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
The first part of our church’s mission statement reads
Our mission is to intentionally reach families in our community for Christ
Our mission is to intentionally reach families in our community for Christ
This will bring glory and honor to God.
The Gospel we have to share with those we come in contact with is an outpouring of our understanding of who God is.
It’s the realization that it is God’s plan, that no one should die without the knowledge of God’s salvation, eternity is at stake.
It is this gospel when we sit at the bedside of our loved ones and share the gospel with them that they turn to see God’s Glory.
It is this gospel that we praise God with our worship every Sunday. We worship the One and Only triune God.
Closing
Closing
As the worship team comes forward to lead us in a response, may this be a different response today.
As we discover the Big Idea this week, may I challenge you to take one of documents. Sign up to a cluster group, it’s not too late.
Ask for a digital copy PDF or Word to use.
Take it for your own study.
Remember,
God’s gospel originates in and expresses the wondrous perfections of the eternal, triune God.