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godhead Meditations study

Knowing That God, In All Three Persons, Is Love and Holy and…  

There is a mistake of saying that God is mainly Love or mainly Holy. This mistake tames God in our merely human eyes because we can easily understand people like that—who are mainly loving. What God shows in Scripture is that God, in all three persons, is the glorious definition and perfection of all his attributes.

  • The Father loved the world and gave his Son to satisfy God’s holy punishment of sin (John 3:16; 1 John 2:2; Rom 8:3)
  • The Son only does the things He sees the Father doing so he loved us and gave Himself for us as the one who rightly can condemn sin (John 5:19-20; Eph 5:2; John 5:22; Rom 8:34)
  • The Holy Spirit, as knowing the mind of God by being God, and taking the place of the Son on Earth, creates fruit in the lives of God’s people by creating love, holiness, purity, and godliness (John 14:16; 1 Cor 2:11; Gal. 5:22; 1 Peter 1:16; 1Thes 4:7)

This tells us that God, in all three persons, is: love, holy, truth, light, life, (and so on) all at the same time! There is no person in the Trinity that is love while another is holy, and another is judge. There is no attribute that is more indicative of who God is in His essence, than any other. God is love through His holiness and He is holy through his love and both through His truth and all through His life and life through all. That is a confusing sentence but also starts to reflect the bigness of God.

God is not loving or holy or truthful because there is some concept of love, or holiness, or truthfulness out there in space. God is the definition and example of all His attributes. We can only love or tell the truth or do right or be kind because God, in His essence, known in all three persons, is the meaning of those things! Christian, shudder! Stand back in awe! Shut your mouths in utter wonder! This is the basis of the constant Biblical refrain: the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom!

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godhead Meditations study

Knowing that God is A Plurality

From the earliest chapters in Scripture, God refers to Himself in a unique way.

  • God’s single name is written in the plural form. (Gen 1:1)
  • God refers to Himself saying, “Let US make man in our own image” (Gen 1:26) then the text proceeds to say that God made man in His own (singular) image (Gen 1:27).
  • God commissions Isaiah saying, “Whom will I send? who will go for US?”! (Isaiah 6:8)
  • The Lord’s anointed says He is in the beginning with God, and that He and God’s Spirit are sent by the Lord God (Isaiah 48:16)

God is, in the cases listed above acting of His own power and authority and referring to Himself at the same time as ONE and MORE-THAN-ONE. Unlike Allah, the one God of the Muslims, the Living God knows what it is to be in a relationship! Yes, he’s the only God, there is none beside him, but He is not a lonely god.

Of course, this wasn’t very clear in the Old Testament. God’s self-revelation wasn’t made crystal clear until later. For now, we can come to terms with this truth.  In our loneliest and darkest moments, we can take comfort in the fact that God, making us part of His family, does not start a relationship but rahter brings us into a truly unique and eternal relationship.

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study

Missing the Gospel with “The Gospel”

I’ve said it before: there are multiple ways of being seduced by false teaching. With our inward bend, and enticed by the enjoyments of sin, the holiest of us can easily be lured away. It’s not just a problem for people listening to preachers. The fiercest pulpit pounder can find himself aiming to scratch the ears of an adoring audience. Thing is, I’ve long noticed a trend that I’m not sure if it’s false teaching, but it does lay a trap for the listeners that makes it possible for false teaching to come in.

Ironically, it’s in the most surprising place: preaching about the Gospel. Make sure to re-read what I just wrote.

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christ church salvation scripture study

Things Are Actually Better

During a seemingly bad situation, it’s hard to see the better. Seeing the better in the situation or in those around us is hard. I’m not talking about wishful thinking or silver linings. Like, when sick, thinking, “oh, I’ll get better in four days” or “at least I’m not dead!”.

Even During Tough Times, Things Are Actually Better

“Better” is a comparison word. It only works when it’s put up against something else. That’s important.

The writer to the Hebrews wrote to believers who were going through a rough patch. To fix their situation, some thought they needed to jump ship.  Some stopped coming together (Hebrews 10:25). Some probably feared to suffer (Hebrews 12:4). All of them needed encouragement (Hebrews 13:22) to stand firm (Hebrews 12:12). They needed this letter where the author pits the choices against each other to show the better.

Not a better imaginable situation. Not a silver lining. Rather a re-aligning of their thinking.

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study

Biblical Requirements And Responsibilities Of Local Church Elders

Audio version of the following article.

Ever since I started these long-form articles, I’ve had some challenging situations and questions that have come up. I’ve been working on these articles for a while now, but the situations have so percolated that I just had to make an actual post about it. This one is on elders. You can read my other long one on deacons.

Today, people sometimes confuse the office of deacon and elder. At other times, they make a distinction between the pastor from the elders. In the early church, after the apostles’ time, elders were church officers second to bishops. During the apostles’ time, elders were crucial. Paul made the elders’ appointment a core aspect of his team’s work after the gospel had born fruit and resulted in a local assembly.

We need to dig deep but mind you, I can’t cover it all. Books exist that do a much better and thorough job. This is just me, working through some things and assuming some things (some of which I’ve already covered in other posts) to see where I land.