Doctrine 2023 Session 2 | Doctrine One: God Exists, The Godhead, The Trinity Big Ideas: • Who is God? • What is the Godhead/Trinity? Different Approaches to Argue God’s Existence: • Cosmological Arguments (arguments based on the cosmos) • Teleological Arguments (Intelligent Design) (Every design has a designer. The universe and life exhibit design. Therefore, the universe and life have a designer.) • The Moral Argument (Every law has a lawgiver. There is a moral law. Therefore, there is a moral lawgiver.) • The Ontological (being) Argument (God is a being of which none greater can be conceived. It is greater to exist in reality than just in the mind. Thus, God must exist in reality.) • Theological Who is God? To the Atheist. A person who denies or disbelieves the existence of a supreme being or beings. To the Agnostic. A person who holds that the existence of the ultimate cause, as God, and the essential nature of things are unknown and unknowable or that human knowledge is limited to experience. To the Deist. Deists believe that a supreme being who is not a part of the universe created everything that exists, but essentially this being is uninvolved in any further way with creation. They understand God to be a master clockmaker who designed the world, wound it up and since then has let it run on its own. A person with this view would not bother to pray to God for anything. In this view God, is an impersonal being who has left us to make it on our own. To the Pantheist. God is an impersonal power that exists and was created by the universe itself and will one day be reabsorbed by the universe. In this view, an entity or being called God does not actually exist. God, they say is a cosmic life force that includes all the substance of the universe. Nature and the idea of God are the same. Eight percent of teenagers who identify themselves as conservative Christians embrace this new-age philosophy. Furthermore, this cosmic life force empowers us to be God and one with the universe. They use the phrase God is all, and all is God. The movies Avatar and Star Wars and celebrities like Oprah Winfrey have popularized this in our culture. Pantheism-Panentheism-theism (picture) Ex: · God is all, and all is God. · We all have divinity within us we need to find the road to release it. · God is seen in creation vs. God, and creation is one and the same element. To the Christian. God is a personal being that existed before time and space as we know it. He spoke the world that we know into existence by the power of His will. “When Christians say “God”, we don’t mean an old man on a cloud, a big angel, or a more powerful and bigger version of yourself (like a superhero). We are talking about the uncreated, eternal being who created all things and sustains all things. In other words, God didn’t just create the universe, He keeps it going from moment to moment.” Hollywood Heroes-Frank Turek A General Definition of God. The eternal, independent, and self-existent Being: the Being whose purposes and actions spring from himself, without foreign motive or influence: he who is absolute in dominion; the most pure, the most simple, and most spiritual of all essences; infinitely benevolent, true, and holy: the cause of all being, the upholder of all things; infinitely happy, because infinitely perfect; and eternally self-sufficient, needing nothing that he has made: inconceivable in his mode of existence, and indescribable in his essence; known fully only to himself, because an infinite mind can be fully apprehended only by itself. In a word, a Being who, from his infinite wisdom, cannot err or be deceived; and who, from his infinite goodness, can do nothing but what is eternally just, right, and kind. (Mentally overwhelming? It should be) Although we cannot know God exhaustively, we can know Him truly, sufficiently, and with confidence because of what he has revealed about Himself to us. Many people have concluded (as it pertains to God) that if they cannot have the physical evidence or proof that He exists, they won’t believe. Hebrews 11:6 But without faith, it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. Your belief in or non-belief in God does not change the Truth that He exists. Many of us know about God and worship what we know but we don’t know him. Some Classical Theological Characteristics of God God is Eternal. Eternal means without beginning or end. There is never a moment when God didn’t exist or will ever end. That is impossible for our minds to grasp. God is Omnipotent. God is Almighty and powerful. If He wants to do something, He can do it. There is no one more powerful than God. God is Omnipresent. God is ever-present. His presence encompasses all the galaxies, while at the same time He is with you right now where you are. Because we are finite beings, it is hard to imagine a Being who is everywhere present, but this is a characteristic of God. The ever-present God spans the reach of the universe and yet is there to hear you whisper a prayer. God is Immutable. God, by His very nature, can always be counted on because He will not change. In a physical world that survives by continual change, we can rest in confidence and peace that the God we serve is constant and is the same yesterday, today, and forever. God is Omniscient. God knows all. Everything past, present and future, He knows. He has infinite knowledge. Such awesome knowledge is beyond us. Imagine the hard drives of a trillion computers filled with all the information known to humans . . . it wouldn’t even scratch the surface of God’s knowledge! God is Personal. Even though God is the eternal, Almighty, ever-present, unchanging and all-knowing God, He is also a God who desires personal interaction. God has revealed Himself to us in Creation and His words are passionate about wanting a relationship with us. I think this is exactly what people are searching for in life; they want to experience and be accepted by God. God is Active and Involved in His Creation. He entered our world in the form of a human in Christ and at the moment of salvation, He enters our lives in the form of the Holy Spirit. He answers our prayers and gives us strength. He empowers us to overcome weakness and resist temptation. He reveals His love in our hearts and empowers us to share it with others to point them to Him. God is a personal, interactive God who longs for a relationship with you. God is Holy. To say that God is holy means there is no trace of evil in Him. Part of His holiness includes being cut off from evil and sin. Holiness and sin cannot exist in the same space. God often emphasized His holiness to those He revealed Himself unto. The Godhead. Isaiah 46:5 To whom will you liken Me, and make Me equal and compare Me, that we should be alike? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQLfgaUoQCw (St. Patrick’s bad analogies) There are no adequate examples that our finite minds could analyze to understand the Godhead/Trinity. One description calls it a “beautiful mystery.” (Commonly used poor examples: water, ice, and vapor or son, father, husband.) (Braided hair) We believe that God is a complex unity and exists eternally in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and that these, being one God, are equal in deity, power, and glory. We believe that God not only created the world but also now upholds, sustains, governs, and providentially directs all that exists and that he will bring all things to their proper consummation in Christ Jesus to the glory of his name. We believe that God has exhaustive foreknowledge of all future events, including the free choices of all moral agents, both angelic and human, that he hears and answers prayer, and that he saves from sin and death all who come to him through Jesus Christ (Isaiah 40:1-48:22; Psalm 104:1-35; Psalm 139:1-24; Matthew 10:29-31; 28:19; Acts 17:24-28; 2 Corinthians 13:14; Ephesians 1:9-12; 4:4-6; Colossians 1:16-17; Hebrews 1:1-3; Revelation 1:4-6). We believe that Jesus Christ is God incarnate, fully God and fully man, that he was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of a virgin, lived a sinless life, and offered himself as a substitutionary sacrifice for sinners. By the blood of his cross he satisfied the wrath of God, obtained for us eternal redemption, the forgiveness of sins, spiritual adoption as sons and daughters, life everlasting, and defeated the powers of darkness. He was raised bodily on the third day and ascended to the right hand of the Father, there to make intercession for the saints (Isaiah 53:1-12; Matthew 1:18-25; John 1:1-18; Romans 8:34; 1 Corinthians 15:1- 28; 2 Corinthians 5:21; Galatians 3:10-14; Ephesians 1:7; Philippians 2:6-11; Colossians 1:15-23; 2:15; Hebrews 7:25; 9:13-15; 10:19; 1 Peter 2:21-25; 1 John 2:1-2; 3:8). We believe that the Holy Spirit is fully God, equal with the Father and Son. The primary ministry of the Holy Spirit is to glorify the Godhead. The Holy Spirit also convicts unbelievers of their need for Christ and imparts spiritual life through regeneration (the new birth). The Spirit indwells, sanctifies, leads, illumines, and graciously empowers for godly living and service all who come to faith in Christ. We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ baptizes believers in the Holy Spirit, in whom also we are sealed for the day of redemption. Subsequent to conversion the Spirit desires to fill, empower, and anoint believers for ministry and witness (Matthew 3:11; John 1:12-13; 3:1-15; 15:26-27; 16:7-15; Romans 8:9; 1 Corinthians 12:12-13; 2 Corinthians 1:21-22; Ephesians 1:13-14; 5:18). “The Trinity is a mystery that cannot be comprehended by human reason but is understood by faith and is best confessed in the words of the Athanasian Creed which states that we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity; neither confounding the Persons: nor dividing the Substance. That we are compelled by the Christian faith to confess that each distinct person is God and Lord and that the deity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit is one equal in glory, coequal in majesty.” -Athanasian Creed “Let those who have any doubt whether Elohim, when meaning the true God, Jehovah, be plural or not, consult the following passages, where they will find it joined with adjectives, verbs, and pronouns plural.” Genesis 1: In the Beginning (God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit) Genesis 1:26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in our image, according to our likeness;” Luke 3:21, 22 When all the people were baptized, it came to pass that Jesus also was baptized; and while He prayed, the heaven was opened. And the Holy Spirit descended in bodily form like a dove upon Him, and a voice came from heaven which said, “You are My beloved Son; in You I am well pleased.” 1 Thessalonians 5:23 Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely; and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. God created us in His image and used a plural word to describe the Godhead. Man is also a triune being as we see over and over in Scripture. We are spirit beings which is the real us. We have a soul, which is made up of our mind, will and emotions. Our spirit and soul are different, but closely related. We are housed in a physical body. When the body dies, the spirit and soul are no longer present. Genesis 3:22 Then the LORD God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever” Isaiah 6:8 Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: “Whom shall I send, And who will go for Us?” Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.” God: Elohim. The original word Elohim, God, is the plural form of la El, and has long been supposed, by the most eminently learned men, to imply a plurality of Persons in the Divine nature. As this plurality appears in so many parts of the sacred writings to be confined to three Persons, hence the doctrine of the TRINITY, which has formed a part of the creed of all those who have been deemed sound in the faith, from the earliest ages of Christianity. Nor are Christians singular, in receiving this doctrine, and in deriving it from the first words of divine revelation. An eminent Jewish rabbi, Simeon ben Joachi, in his comment on the sixth section of Leviticus, has these remarkable words, “Come and see the mystery of the word Elohim; there are three degrees, and each degree by itself alone, and yet notwithstanding they are all one, and joined together in one, and are not divided from each other.” He must be strangely prejudiced indeed who cannot see that the doctrine of a Trinity, and of a Trinity in unity, is expressed in the above words. The verb arb bara, he created, being joined in the singular number with this plural noun, has been considered as pointing out, the unity of the Divine Persons in this work of creation. In the ever-blessed Trinity, from the infinite and indivisible unity of the persons, there can be but one will, one purpose, and one infinite and uncontrollable energy. Philippians 2:9-11 Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, 10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, 11 and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Revelation 19:11-16 Now I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse. And He who sat on him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and makes war. 12 His eyes were like a flame of fire, and on His head were many crowns. He had a name written that no one knew except Himself. 13 He was clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God. 14 And the armies in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, followed Him on white horses. 15 Now out of His mouth goes a sharp sword, that with it He should strike the nations. And He Himself will rule them with a rod of iron. He Himself treads the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God. 16 And He has on His robe and on His thigh a name written: KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS Take Away: 1. What is my perspective on the God of the Bible? 2. Do I have a healthy reverence for God and an intimate fellowship with Him?