Sermon Tone Analysis

Good morning and welcome to another week of church here at the Bridge.

I am so glad that we could be joined together in worship this morning.

I have a question for you this morning.

Something i want you to take some time to think about.

How do you picture God?

Have you ever really thought about it.

When you try to picture God in your mind how do you see him?

What images come to mind.

For many when they think of God they think of...

The Grandfather

They think of the old white haired man with nice beard and with flowing robes of white.

This is a person of authority and power and an image that draws respect.

Some people might have the image of God as

Mean Kid with a magnifying glass

He is just there to make my life miserable.

He could fix everything in less than a minute and my life would be perfect but no he just wants to watch me squirm as he gets me.

Yet, others when they picture God think of Jesus and for many when we think of Jesus we think of...

Anglo Jesus

This well kept handsome man.

Now this image can come in many different forms but they all are similar with some minor changes.

He might have blond hair and blue eyes, he might be brown haired.

Most though picture him as a long beautiful locks of hair and a perfect beard.

Now many have pushed back on this because they think that we should represent Jesus as he probably actually was.

“Real Jesus”

Now this image is a popular one on the internet because it depicts what is thought to be the most likely representation of what Jesus would have looked like.

It is based on the idea of where he came from in the world and what the population of the world looked like from skin tone, hair, and facial features there are people who feel that this is a better representation of who Jesus really was.

Is it Jesus though?

Can’t really say can we because we don’t have any pictures of Jesus.

Is it possible?

Sure, because the truth is that yes it matches a lot of what you would expect out of that region of the world.

Here is the real question though.

Does it matter?

Have you ever thought about it.

Does it matter how you view God?

If you are saying no I have some bad news it absolutely matters.

Yet, I think i may have tricked you because as the same time it doesn’t matter.

Let’s clarify the question.

Does it matter if Jesus looks like the one on the right or the one on the left?

Honestly no.

The physical appearance does not make one bit of difference in our understanding of who Jesus and who God is.

This applies to both Jesus and to God.

However, does it matter how we see God.

Absolutely.

Because if we aren’t careful we can create an idolatrous image of what we want God to be.

Don’t believe me get online for a few minutes in todays world and you can find many descriptions of God that are just flat out wrong.

The reality is that we have this problem that if we aren’t careful we can force onto God what we want to see and not who God really is.

We can think that we are following Him but in reality we are creating an image of God that is not biblical.

How do we know than who God is and how we can view him?

How should we imagine God?

How should we see our relationships with him?

Let’s turn to Romans...

God the Father

It is the classic and most common understanding of who God is.

It is the image of Father.

If we have come to faith in him and what he does for us many people turn to the classic image of God as Father.

This passage helps us to frame that relationship that we share with him.

Is God only a Father though?

Is that really all he is?

Let’s take a moment and be honest.

Paul was and is using Earthly language to describe our relationship with God.

Is God as Father always a perfect analogy.

Honestly.

No.

For many this is a struggle and we can’t deny that.

This could be because of bad relationships with earthly fathers.

So the idea of God as father can come with some baggage.

I don’t want to deny that but we can still see past that and recognize what is really being shared here.

The image of God the Father here is a powerful one.

This is a image that opens us up to adoption into the family of God.

This is the source of our inheritance.

Not only that but it draws us to the intimacy of the relationship that we can share with God.

Abba Father

Paul uses this specific phrase to draw us to what it means for us when we allow the Spirit to enter into our life and the relationship that ensue because of it.

We are able to call God Abba Father.

Abba Father is a very intimate way of addressing God.

It is compared to the idea of a child talking to their papa or Dad.

It presents an image of fondness and intimacy that we are able to address the creator of the universe in such a way.

We are able to call him Papa.

The Shack

A few years ago now the book the Shack came out and it was a book of some controversy because it depected God in some unique ways.

One of them was that God was presented as A large Black women.

That by no means is the normal way that God is depicted for most people.

One of the most important ways that the book references God though is as papa.

In this story about a mans personal struggles and his relationship with God it was this image of papa that stood out.

It drew me back to this passage.

This reminder that God is there for us.

That we can have an intimate and personal relationship with him.

So much that we can share in calling him Abba.

Abba Father

Jesus was able to call on God and he did so as Abba Father.

It was through the spirit that we are able to join in our relationship with God in such a way that we can draw closer even in the darkest of hours or in the best of hours and call on God as Abba.

As Papa.

It is amazing to think about that we can have all of this.

That we can be close to the creator.

That we can be loved by the creator and embraced by the creator.

It was in this that i was thinking about how is this possible?

We Can draw close because of the Spirit

We are able to come to our relationship with papa because of the Holy Spirit.

Today is Pentecost Sunday.

Today is the day that we celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit into our lives.