Just Like Papa: In the Likeness of the Father
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INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
START WITH SLIDE 1
Story of Travis and his son in the Garage:
My friend Travis loves spending time in the garage
In his free time he is fixing things around the house, fixing the car, and making excuses to use the power tools in the garage.
One day he was working on his old car.
He had all his tools out for this job, the lights are up, shining on the car, the jacks are all at work, It is a mess, but it is his mess
He goes to the back of the car which is poking out of the secondary garage door, when he steps on something, slipping, almost falling down.
He looks down to find his son’s toys.
His toy cars are all in a row,
his toy tools are spread out
It looks like a miniature version of what is happening in the garage.
At first he is angry, and calls for his son
His wife comes out at that same time asking what happened?
Dad says, “Maybe he wants to be a mechanic when he grows up.
The responds by saying, “No, he wants to be like you.”
Today we honor our Dad’s!
(Ask Dad’s to Raise their Hands)
-This morning we come as a body of believers, a family of God to honor our dads, daddy’s, papa’s, pops, old man… our fathers.
-As we take a moment today to give some love and attention to our dads, we can’t help but stop and think about our heavenly father.
- Today will be talking about God the Father, in his greatness, power, might, an eternal God that has no beginning or end. A God that is personal, and loving. Today we honor our God.
Let’s pray.
(Quick opening prayer)
Slide 2
- A survey was taken where they asked kids what was one thing they loved about their daddy’s.
Here are just a few quick answers that the kids shared:
Slide 3
Kids expressed how strong their daddy’s are. They could pick them up, throw them to the sky, and open things. Daddy is strong!
Slide 4
Daddy is a great protector. When I am scared, I run to daddy.
Slide 5
When I fall down, he makes me feel better.
Dad’s have amazing attributes of safety, comfort, security, dedication. It is a perfect example of how we as humans, have attributes of God the father. Because we are made in His image.
So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.
This is the book of the generations of Adam. When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God.
and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.
Today we are going to be diving into God’s word. Why? Because in order to start this journey of understanding the character, the attributes and the uniqueness of God, we must know His word. We must use the tool he has given to speak to us in order to understand who he is.
God is powerful, mighty, sovereign, just, and merciful. God is personal, kind, Good and love. let’s examen some of these truths of God this morning.
QUESTION: WHAT IS GOD LIKE?
SLIDE 6
God has attributes that display his divineness, and his nature.
God has attributes that only God possess’ .
God has attributes that we also have due to our creation in his likeness.
LETS START WITH INCOMMUNICABLE ATTRIBUTES
THE INCOMMUNICABLE ATTRIBUTES OF GOD:
SLIDE 7
God is Omnipresent: God is everywhere
God is not limited or confined with respect to physical space.
God’s presence cannot be spatially compressed or geographically confined.
“But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you; how much less this house that I have built!
Where shall I go from your Spirit?
Or where shall I flee from your presence?
If I ascend to heaven, you are there!
If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!
If I take the wings of the morning
and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
even there your hand shall lead me,
and your right hand shall hold me.
In Acts, Paul insisted that God cannot dwell in idols or temples...
The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man,
Don’t mistake this for panentheism, which proposes that God lives IN EVERYTHING. The biblical testomony of God is that God exists everywhere, in creation while remaining distinct from creation.
2. God is Omnipotent: God is almighty, and he has all might and all power.
a. Gabriel tells Mary that nothing will be impossible with God (Luke 1:37
For nothing will be impossible with God.”
Matthew 19:26
But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
‘Ah, Lord God! It is you who have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and by your outstretched arm! Nothing is too hard for you.
Take a bunch of hyssop and dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and touch the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin. None of you shall go out of the door of his house until the morning.
Victory is declared in the gospel is contingent on a God whose intentions cannot be thwarted. Paul says in Romans,
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
3. God is Omnicient: God is ALL-Knowing.
The absolute knowledge of God over all things is called divine omniscience
God knows the thoughts and feelings over every person all the time (psalms 44:21; Mark 2:8)
And immediately Jesus, perceiving in his spirit that they thus questioned within themselves, said to them, “Why do you question these things in your hearts?
But even the hairs of your head are all numbered.
God knows all things - Past, present & Future - But God also knows all possibilities.
The extent of God’s knowledge is boundless, endless and God uses his knowledge PERFECTLY.
START WITH SLIDE 8
4. God is Eternal
With God, there is no beginning or end. He is Alpha and Omega
Who has performed and done this,
calling the generations from the beginning?
I, the Lord, the first,
and with the last; I am he.
“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”
God existed before the world:
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
God is the one who lives forever, and is immortal:
who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.
5. God is Immutable:
Divine immutability is the doctrine that God is changeless in his nature and character.
They will perish, but you will remain;
they will all wear out like a garment.
You will change them like a robe, and they will pass away,
but you are the same, and your years have no end.
The children of your servants shall dwell secure;
their offspring shall be established before you.
even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love
This is a beautiful notion in terms of our relationship with God through Christ, and is also a very serious notion.
Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.
God NEVER changes.
6. God is Omnibenevolent: The Goodness of God.
We sings songs like the Goodness of God, or old classics like God is so good, however, what does that mean?
The Goodness of creation derives from the goodness of the Creator himself
And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
Oh, how abundant is your goodness,
which you have stored up for those who fear you
and worked for those who take refuge in you,
in the sight of the children of mankind!
and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come,
THE COMMUNICABLE ATTRIBUTES OF GOD:
SLIDE 9
Personal - Yes God is light, and an all consuming fire, But those adjectives primarily designate God’s goodness and power.
God is an intimately relational being, a triune being no less, subsisting as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. That there are personal relationships within the Godhead means that relationality is essential for what it means for God to be God. God exists as persons in loving communion with each other, who in eternity past decided to share the Godhead’s internal love outwardly with their creation.
This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.
For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.
God’s relationships outside of himself are normally expressed in covenantal terms. God has a covenant with creation (Gen 9:9–10), Abraham (Gen 15:18), Israel (Exod 19:5), and the church (Matt 26:28)
“Behold, I establish my covenant with you and your offspring after you, and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the livestock, and every beast of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark; it is for every beast of the earth.
On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your offspring I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates,
Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine;
for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
2. Holiness: Holiness is the only attribute that is said of God three times with “holy, holy, holy” (Isa 6:3). Yet God’s holiness is notoriously hard to define. Several suggestions are often given, such as God’s moral uprightness, integrity, set-apartness, or transcendence. In some respects, God’s holiness encompasses all of these, but somehow it is even more than all of them put together.
God’s holiness is both in his nature and in his character
thrice-holy is to say that Yahweh is the ultimate in the supernatural, extraordinary, uncreated, heavenly.” In a second instance, holiness possesses a quasi-moral dimension. The word is not merely a synonym for righteousness, but it is more of a near indescribable transcendent sanctity, perhaps an incandescent goodness, beauty, and purity. In sum, God’s holiness is not only God’s state of otherness and his overall metaphysical magnificence but also his moral relation to his creatures.
God elects his people in holiness and for holiness, their standing in the world is meant to be a living parable of divine holiness.
The holiness of God’s people is positional in that believers are uniquely devoted to God by no less than God himself
Then Joshua said to the people, “Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you.”
And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.
God’s holiness is ethical in that as God’s people are set apart from the world and commanded to live uprightly before both God and all people
Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.
Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness,
3. Faithful: God’s faithfulness means that he is true and trustworthy and that his Word can be taken as reliable
As surely as God is faithful, our word to you has not been Yes and No.
Therefore let those who suffer according to God’s will entrust their souls to a faithful Creator while doing good.
God’s faithfulness guarantees that his plan and promises about the future will come to fruition
God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.
4. Justice: God is just and always works in righteousness. God works in internal righteousness and external justice, meaning whatever he does is right.
He has told you, O man, what is good;
and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?
For the Lord is righteous;
he loves righteous deeds;
the upright shall behold his face.
“But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and every herb, and neglect justice and the love of God. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others.
What is righteous? What is justice? It’s The will, the works and the purposes of God.
5. Love: God’s special covenant love is uniquely expressed in his affection for Israel, Jesus, and the church
“You have led in your steadfast love the people whom you have redeemed;
you have guided them by your strength to your holy abode.
The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
Paul knows that there is nothing in creation, in any realm or dimension, that could “separate us from the love of God
nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
There is NO Way we can truly experience these attributes in our lives, and to live them out in his likeness, without changing our lives, laying them down, and learning to live our lives transformed by the grace of God, the salvation, that comes from God the Father through His son Jesus Christ.
We give our lives to him, knowing we are sinners. We fall short.
We ask God to transform our lives to be more like him.
We start to see the fruits of His likeness in us through the Fruits of the Spirit.
SLIDE 10
Let’s Exam the Fruits of the Spirit
But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.
These fruits of the spirit are attributes, characteristics and realities of God the Father, shining in our lives as we learn to submit and transform our lives to be more like God.
Jesus is the perfect example for us of each and every one of these fruits of the spirit… because he IS GOD. He is our example
1 Peter 2:21–25 (ESV)
For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.
Let us be God’s example in God’s Glory, Holiness and Love
In the gospel we see a God who is holy, a God who will not allow evil to indefinitely persist, a God who demonstrates his love for us by sending his own Son as a sin-offering, so that his redeemed people would praise of his glorify Him.
The gospel is the prism into which God’s holiness, love, and glory, like beams of light that are bent together, converge in the death and resurrection of the Son of God.
- We behold a God whose holiness will vanquish the darkness of sin, a God’s whose love will triumph over all rebellion, and a God whose glory is the end of all things.
God is not consumed with his glory like some kind of cosmic narcissist making much of himself. To the contrary, God’s glory is the depth and power of his love for all that he has made.
Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to your name give glory,
for the sake of your steadfast love and your faithfulness!
CLOSING and PRAYER