The Mystery of the Trinity | Doug Batchelor

[Music] well this is a a special time of year when many of the people in the world are thinking about the subject of the Incarnation and all of the Mysteries that are connected with uh how God could become a human be 100% God and be 100% human and admittedly there's something of a mystery connected with that so I thought it would be appropriate to be talking about the subject of the mystery of the Trinity and so uh we're going to be dealing with this subject and uh I'd like to begin with an amazing fact we have um a picture I think of the James web Space Telescope and it's fascinating to me I love science and this telescope now let me give you a few facts about it launch Christmas Day 2021 it operates now about a million miles from the earth I think it's 980 million or thousand it took the world's best scientist 26 years and 10 billion to build this camera basically it takes pictures telescopic pictures it has the largest mirror in a Space Telescope it's coated with 24 karat gold and it's a thousand times more powerful than the Hubble if I held up a penny now could you see the date if could you see the date a mile away this can see the detail on a penny 24 miles away and so you can imagine what it does up there in space without any interference and when they first launched the Hubble they thought oh well we're going to now find out we'll get to the outer ridges or rims of the Universe I thought maybe the Hubble was seen you know where the forest ends and the ocean of empty space begins but instead what happened is when they started to get the first images back from the James web telescope they thought man we haven't even gotten into the neighborhood yet they thought they'd be seeing these very young galaxies that had just formed that were out near the edges and instead they were very mature and the deeper they looked it went on and on and on now I say that and there's some beautiful pictures there you can see just it's a amazing images how big must the God be that made all of that so today as we venture on Holy Ground to talk about the subject of the mystery of the Trinity I thought about calling it The mindboggling Mystery of the Trinity we are on Holy Ground because as high as the heavens are above the earth Isaiah tells us in chapter 55 my thoughts are not your thoughts nor are your ways my ways says the Lord for as the heavens are higher than the earth how high are the heavens so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts so you know now as we begin to explore what the word reveals about the subject of the godhead admittedly we are on Holy Ground this is a majestic mystery just to give you a few scriptures that help illustrate that in Psalm 145:3 great is the Lord and greatly to be praised his greatness is unsearchable and Romans 11:33 I've got this passage here oh the depths of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God how unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out for who has known the mind of the Lord or become his counselor I mean when we say that we're going to sit down and explain God you realize that we're way out of our pay grade this is something that we're we're entering in on this study with humility job he said in chapter 26:14 indeed these are but the mere edges of his ways and how small a whisper we hear of him but the Thunder of his power who can understand John Wesley said show me a a worm that can comprehend a man and I'll show you a man that can comprehend God so we have to know right out that uh the one who made all of this you would have to be God to be able to Define him and bottle him and explain him but he does reveal something about himself and he says come now let us reason together and so we're going to do our best to study the subject of God the Father the Son and the spirit and I know that this is a a controversial subject I post my my sermon typically every Friday that I'm going to be preaching the next day on my Facebook page and uh a lot of comments when people saw the title but um we're going to go by the Bible right I remember hearing a story about when the Great Theologian Augustine was trying to con contemplate the relationship of the Father the Son and the spirit and the subject of what we call the Trinity that he just was realizing it was such a big issue and he was struggling and studying and writing and trying to get a book together on the subject realized he needed to take a break before his brain exploded and he went for a walk on the beach and while he was walking on the beach he saw off in the distance a child that was running back and forth between the water and the sand and as he got closer he realized the child had a little pink sea shell in his hand and he'd run off to the ocean he'd scoop up some water he'd run back and he was pouring the water down a crab hole then he'd run back and he watched him and he the the kid was so persistent and finally couldn't help and he went up and said uh child what on Earth are you doing he said oh Mister said I'm going to take all that water out there and I'm going to put it in my hole and the Lord spoke to Augustine and said that's what you're doing and trying to say you're going to understand me and Define me uh God is great and much bigger than we can understand but those things that are revealed are for ours and there are some things revealed for one thing the Bible is clear there's one God we are as Christians a monotheistic religion mono one God not stereo now listen carefully there as Moses said in Deuteronomy 6:4 it's called the Great shama here o Israel the Lord Our God the Lord is one you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart all your soul with all your strength you can read where Isaiah says 44:6 thus says the Lord the king of Israel and your Redeemer the Lord of hosts I am the first and the last besides me there is no God go to the New Testament 1 Timothy 2:5 for there is one God how many that's what Paul said course he's Jewish he believed the shama there's one God and one mediator between God and Men the man Jesus Christ well is Jesus just a man or is he speaking about when Christ became a man so first of all recognize a Bible fact that in the Bible when it talks about one one is not always talking about quantity it's sometimes talking about quality for example you read in the Bible that uh many can be one you look in Genesis 2: 24 therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and he will will be bankrupt no a man will leave his father and mother and he will cleave to his wife and they become what one flesh and the word is zad it means one they're United you look in the Book of Judges and I could give many examples in the Bible but I've got so much to cover I'm just trying to give you two or three Witnesses on each point in the Book of Judges 20: 11 so all the men of Israel were gathered against the city United as one man what means they're United and then probably the best evidence is look at what Jesus says in John 17:20 said father I do not pray for these alone this is his great intercessory prayer I don't pray for these alone but for those who will believe in me through their word by the way this is a prayer for you if you believe in Jesus because of the word that you heard he's praying for you that they all might be one talking about the disciples that they might be one and the apostles that they might be one notice how are they one as you father are in me and I in you that they may be one in us that the world might believe that you sent me so we don't want to give up the Oneness of God but just know that one doesn't always mean numerical quantity it's talking about unity and so when we study the subject of what we call the Trinity we're talking the tri Unity or Tri entities now that word was first used um years ago I think it was tarlan back about 150 ad his life overlapped the life of the Apostle John so the idea or the phrase Trinity and as we study this let me make it clear different people when they say trinity it means different things if you talk to me about the word rapture Rapture is not in the Bible the word the teaching of being caught up that's what the word means is in the Bible but if you talk to me about the Rapture i' tell you you I got a different view than my Pentecostal friends about the Rapture do you know the word bible is not in the Bible it's actually biblos when we talk about the Millennium how many of you believe in the Millennium every hand should have gone up if you haven't read Revelation 20 the Millennium is talking about this Thousand-Year period that follows the second coming the word is not there it is a composite of the two Latin words mil enum the Thousand Years nothing wrong with the word Millennium and so the same thing don't be frightened by the word Trinity recognize some people have a different understanding of it and we're going to talk about that but the teaching of these Tri entities that compose who we know as the one God that's what we're talking about Jesus said Matthew chapter 28 go ye therefore teach All Nations baptizing them in what the name of the father the Son and the Holy Spirit notice Jesus said not the names of he uses the word name singular of three Father Son and Holy Spirit now there are some people struggling with various doctrines and there are scriptures they don't like and they say well that scripture doesn't belong in the Bible uh I'm going at every subject believing that they all belong in the Bible otherwise start picking and choosing which ones you want to believe or inspired you're going to really have problems don't ever forget what I'm about to say if you only remember this if you're going to make a mistake of believing too much of the Bible or too little believe too much and you'll be Sav some people start picking and choosing and I actually sat down with a Pastor said something I just could not believe I was arguing a theological subject with him and I quoted Paul and he looked at me said well Doug you know a lot of things things Paul said just aren't true and I thought you're pastoring a church because boy if one thing a pastor has has Square in his mind is that every word of God is pure man doesn't live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God now that's not denying that there are not some interesting verses in the Bible that need deeper study but there's been a lot of study that went into compiling what we have that we might trust it and I believe the Lord intervened in that so um some people argue well Jesus didn't really say that or he's talking about the titles of the Father Son and Holy Spirit and I've heard all kinds of creative arguments but Jesus clearly said baptize in the name of the father Son and the Holy Spirit 2 Corinthians 13:14 notice what Paul says here as his benediction the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God the father and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all Paul seems to recognize that those three entities are used in giving them a divine blessing Hebrews 9:14 how much more shall the blood of Christ who through the eternal spirit offered himself without spot to God to cleanse your conscience from dead works there again you've got the Father the Son the spirit in Revelation 1 verse 4 and 5 right there at the beginning John to the seven churches that are in Asia grace to you and peace from him God who was and who is to come and from the seven spirits it's the holy spirit before his throne and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness so even in the Book of Revelation it begins with a benediction of the blessing of God an introduction I should say and then one of these verses that is what you would call a slam dunk that some people have a problem with 1 John 5:7 for there are three that bear witness in heaven the Father the word and who does John say the word is it's Jesus the Father the word and the Holy Spirit these three are one if that makes sense please say amen amen I always do better when I get your feedback so when we look at nature um we can see something about that God is there it's the what about God it's when you look at the scriptures you learn the who about God with that in mind Paul says in Romans 1:19 because what might be known notice what might be known of God not who is Manifest in them for God is shown it to them for since the creation of the world his invisible attributes are clearly seen being understood by the things that are made people can know something about there being a God by looking through a microscope or a telescope or even looking around you but it's not telling us who God is is you need the scriptures for that nature reveals the reality scripture reveals the personality of God so talk a little bit about the plurality of God Genesis 126 and God said let us make man in our image according to our likeness now this is coming from the Hebrew word Elohim there is a singular word for God it's l and you'll find all the time in Hebrew names when you think of Elijah Elijah means my God is Jehovah Elisha my God is savior Daniel my God is Judge Rachel I could go on on elaser you can see all the L's Nathaniel gift of God and so a lot of L's in the Bible they have a singular word for that whenever you have IM it's plural how many of you know what a cherub is it's an angel right what about cherubim it's more than one you know what a sarap is seems like a special category of Angel perhaps what are sarim more than one you know in Isaiah chapter 6 it says and I saw the Lord sitting on his throne and the right and the left were the seraphim those more than one that you know cover their faces and their feet as they fly and so when you say Elohim it's the plural for God the Old Testament writers use this word to describe God over 2,500 what I 2,500 times instead of the word L because they knew something about why would God say let us make man in our image or they said the man has become like us and so he's evicted from the Garden of Eden and the Tower of Babel in Genesis 11 God went down and saw what man has done and says now nothing will be runed let us scatter them around the world that's Genesis 11:7 come let us go down and confuse their language so often even in the Old Testament first book God is being presented as one God but he's composed of more than one person now why does Moses say here o Israel the Lord our God is one and then God Is Yet revealed in more than one person the the Hebrews or rather the the the Egyptians and the Greeks and the Romans and the Canaanites they worshiped all these different gods that were at odds with each other and they were fighting and tricking each other and have you ever studi Greek mythology going through school or high school or college gods are all doing really mean things to each other and tricking each other and cursing each other and transforming each other and they're they're ones a god of the stone or the Suns or the waters or whatever they have the remains and they're all at War all the time so when Moses says our God is one the way a husband and a wife are one man was made in the image of God a family is made in the image of God it's one family but there may be several personalities with different functions in the family God says we're Made In His Image so you've got God the Father God the son and God the spirit and they are one God but the word Elohim is used over and over again to explain that LS eeve said God does not live in isolation not in the Solitude of a single person but in three persons in essence now everything was created are you with me but at some point we have to say someone had to always be there to kick it all off right I mean if you don't believe in God then you need to believe that everything came from a big bang and you say well what caused the big bang and then you're stumped because there had to be a clause there had to be something that would you know put the gas in the fire together and make it go bang you had to have gas and fire something had to be there something had to decide to toss the Match Into the Fire to create the universe and if you ask physicists what caused a big thing they said well there's a mystery so you can either believe everything you see around you is a result of somehow these gas particles or something triggered this this um Singularity happened just an Adam exploded they there's really no good answer for that question or you can believe there's an intelligent God and we don't know where he came from he said he's Eternal and when you look at the size of the universe it's getting easier to believe in eternity friends that there's just no end to God's infinite space you know it's fun to uh travel around the country but eventually you'll be singing that song I've Been Everywhere but in the resurrection you'll never reach the End Amen you can go on a cruise through the cosmos that will never end God is the Alpha and the Omega he's from Everlasting to Everlasting before the mountains were brought forth when he said Moses said God how shall I explain to the Egyptians who you are which God are you and God said don't try to compare me to their god of the river their God of the Sun or there says I am that I am I mean I am the self-existent one so that's a mystery you know we can't understand that but God's always been there so he's always lived now take just a moment and explain that there are different groups that have different views on the Trinity and they're unbiblical but they may use the word Trinity uh I would respectfully disagree with my Catholic friends uh they say they believe in the Trinity but in reality they believe in what you would call the holy quartet you've got God the father and they always put him as the old man with a beard he's bald I appreciate that and you got Jesus and you got the Holy Spirit and they're crowning Mary and you look at the attributes of Mary and it seems like she's got the attributes of God you pray to her and so forth and U but even without Mary their definition of God uh is a little strange uh Thomas aquinus said the father is the principle without principle well we would agree with that part this means God the father is not caused or generated by another but then you go to the son it says the son is generated by the Father which constitutes the person of the son what does that mean when I hear about the son being generated by the father I think about those car Sals you drive by where they got that wild man that's blown up by air and you turn off the electricity and he goes way you press it on he appears again he's generated and so I'm not sure I like that it makes it sound like he had a beginning which you'll see is not possible and then the holy spirit is uh proceeds from the father and son but not in a generative sense but in spiration spiration means breathing the spirit out again that's different than what the typical Protestant believes about the Divine Eternal nature of the god the spirit um for those who are Seventh Day Adventist Among Us Spirit of Prophecy makes it pretty clear this is from the book first selected messages page 296 this is life eternal that they might Know Thee the only true God and Jesus Christ who you have sent in him was life listen original unborrowed underived didn't borrow it didn't derive it from another always existed some people go to to Proverbs chap 8 and if you look in Proverbs chapter 8 and Proverbs chapter 9 there's a soliloquy that Solomon gives there on wisdom it's a beautiful poem on wisdom wisdom cries out listen to my voice and it goes on talks about wisdom and about a third of way down that chapter it says I was with him in the beginning I was brought forth and they say this is when God created Jesus at the very beginning it's not talking about Jesus at all the whole thing there is talking about wisdom and then you go to chapter 9 again it's talking about wisdom and it's using poetry there so think about this for a minute how could Jesus have a beginning if the Bible says all things that were made were made by him and without him was not anything made nothing was made how much was made without him nothing including himself how many things were made all things and as soon as you say that there is a time when Jesus was not and then he was he becomes a creature and not the Creator and I've got my antitrinitarian friends and there's some good people out there I I don't want to be unkind but uh they say well no no he wasn't created he was begotten I said well you can play with the words all you want if he did not exist and then the father brings him into existence he's a creation and so Jesus was not created all things were made were made by him and another thing not everyone thinks about this if you could describe God or Define him biblically with one word what is that word God is love now if you could go back into the infinite recesses of the past and find the time before God created anything I suspect you'd have to go way back was God still love can you be loved without anybody to love no well who's going to say your love or how do you express your love love is not love if it's not expressed don't forget that gentlemen I sometimes have forgotten that's how I'm telling you it must be expressed and so God has always been love so I don't go along with the um our Catholic version of the Trinity so you tell people you believe in the Trinity say oh you got that from the Catholics and by the way not everything that Catholics believe is wrong so don't fall into that Camp I was just uh touring with um some of our board members are here we were in Rome touring the Vatican and you know what when you go in there they say this is a place where people worship God please be quiet take your hat off you know I wear my baseball cap and they said your hat and hey I'm all for reverence aren't you I think that Protestants have lost the sense of reverence for God God is in his holy Temple let all the Earth keep silent so just because the Catholics believe something doesn't automatically make it wrong and I've had some people take that position then there's some who believe in what you would call modalism a form of trinitarianism where what that means is they say yeah there's one God but he reveals himself three different ways it's like one creature with three faces and sometimes God shows his face through the father sometimes the son sometimes the spirit I got a picture here on the screen they often use the illustration of water water can be in three forms it can be liquid it can be solid it can be a gas when it's frozen it's solid when it's steam it's a gas when it's water it's water and so you've got and they say yeah Jesus is when the father came to Earth and then he's also the spirit and that doesn't work you look at the baptism and here you've got God the Father he's up in heaven because he's speaking and you got God the son who's in the water God the spirit is coming down in the form of a dove unless Jesus is doing ventriloquism when he says this is my beloved Son they're three different individuals and In The Garden of Gethsemane when Jesus prays father not my will but thy will be done you know you got two different Wills you got two different persons which is why we have marriage counseling right can I have an amen am they're different people he had different experience Jesus said I've got my will and father there's your will but I'm not going to do my will I'm going to do your will they're different individuals so modalism doesn't work you look in Daniel 7:13 I was watching in the night visions and behold one like the son of man coming with the Clouds Of Heaven he came to the Ancient of Days and they brought him near before him who is the son of man that's Jesus pre- Incarnation and he's coming to the Ancient of Days who is that it's got to be God the father right and then again you have the baptism of Jesus that explains that by the way the not a lot of people believe in the modalism but if you have any friends that are what you would call Oneness Pentecostals they believe in that and they'll have an issue when you baptize in the name of the father Son and Holy Spirit because in the book of Acts they baptize in the name of Jesus or the Lord Jesus and they say you know you you can't be baptized in Matthew 28 you got to be baptized in the book of Acts and they make a big deal about that they say if you were only if you baptized in the name of the father Son and Holy Spirit you need to be re-baptized because they say that's not true baptism I cover it you know because I used to go to Pentecostal church so when I baptized I don't know if you ever caught it I say in the name of the father in the name of his son Jesus Christ in the name of the Holy Spirit I cover all the bases are you okay with that yes it's worked so far seems like it's sticking then you got another group and they're sub subordinationism and they it's almost like you've got a military order in heaven where you've got God the father he's the commander and Jesus is a sergeant the holy spirit's a Corporal or and um while there may be there are certainly different roles between the father son and spirit and it seems like Jesus has some form of willing uh submission to the father uh I wouldn't call it subordinationism for instance when the Bible says God so loved the world he gave his son doesn't it sound like God the father is taking some initiative there when it says God created all things through Jesus it's like he said Son you want to create it and so the their relationship and their functions are certainly different otherwise why would Jesus say it's expedient for you that I go away because in unless I go away the Holy Spirit can't come I've got to go that he may come and so um there there are different roles but we don't believe in subordinationism and by the way that was John 14:28 you've heard me say to you I'm going away and coming back to you if you love me You' Rejoice because I am going to the father and my father is greater than I so certainly when Christ was on the earth the Bible says as a man folks ask me questions all the time they say Pastor Doug Jesus did not know the day and the hour of his coming you remember Christ in Matthew he says no man knows the day or the hour not the Angels not the sun I say how could Jesus be God and not know the day and the hour of his coming well when he was on Earth he laid aside his divinity and so by the way how would he explain to his disciples yep I'm coming back in 2050 to what they didn't even have AC DC no not not ecdc they did not even have a ad BC back then I mean it would have made any sense to them for one thing so they said what's the date they didn't have dates back then and so but do you think that Jesus now at the right hand of the father is saying and the father's holding a piece of paper like a fortune cookie and he said what's there I got the date of your return oh can you can I show no you can't see it it's a secret I'll let you know when you're ready no of course he knows now but on Earth he didn't have all knowledge swirling around in his head like God the son does now prior to the Incarnation and then you've got what they call aryanism now that's they don't they are certainly not trinitarianism uh trinitarian but um that name comes from Aras who was a Christian presor in Alexandria about 250 to 336 and um he taught that Jesus was created at some point and that the holy spirit is really the force or the power through which God operates we'll get to that in just a minute so here's the big question I'm not going to take as I talk about the father Son and Holy Spirit I'm not going to take very much time trying to convince you that God the father is God uh I don't run into too many Christians that have a problem with the father being God so we all good on that we can move right along here's where the problem is is Jesus God is he fully God what does the Bible say I'll tell you a story before I became a sth day Adventist I just wanted to know what's the Bible say what's the truth and I studied with Latter-Day Saints lot of wonderful people I studied with Jehovah Witnesses and I remember studying with Jehovah Witnesses eventually this subject comes up because they do not believe in the Trinity they believe Jesus was created and they showed me several verses and it kind of shook me up and I I finally came to the place where I said Lord I don't care I had not joined the Adventist Church yet I just said I want to be a Bible Christian so I said if it's true show me and I started studying this subject very carefully and it became very clear to me that their teaching was not correct I showed him in the Bible where it said um when Christ rose from the dead and Thomas falls down at his feet when he finally sees Thomas and he says my Lord and my God they said yeah yeah well he wasn't addressing Jesus he looked at Jesus and said my Lord and then he looked up and said and my God I said well you're reading something into the scripture that's not there so what about in in John first uh first chapter of John where it says and the Word was God they said well here in our New World Translation it says the word was a God and they make it a small God and they had to do a lot of gymnastics with a lot of verses to come up with their teaching I said oh no no no and then I went way beyond that and well let me give you some of my verses here is Jesus God Matthew 1:23 everyone singing this time of year they will call his name Emmanuel which is translated God With Us God came to Tabernacle with us Isaiah 9:6 For unto us a child is born and unto us a son is given who's this prophecy about everyone knows it's about Jesus and the government will be upon his shoulder he will be the king of kings and his name will be called wonderful counselor Mighty God he's just a little G he's Mighty God Big G Everlasting father Prince of Peace he's also our father and that he created all things am Romans 9:5 to them belong the Patriarchs and from their race according to the flesh is the Christ who is God over all blessed forever amen is that clear Paul said Jesus Christ who is God over all I mean can you get a dictionary definition if you don't accept evidence like this what evidence will you accept it's pretty clear God overall Hebrews 1: 18 now here Paul is quoting back to the Old Testament and he said but the he to the son he says thy Throne he's speaking to the son thy throne thone oh God is forever and ever a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of thy kingdom the son is being told your throne oh God is an eternal Throne so another reason I believe Jesus is God does the bible tell us we should only worship God isn't that one of The Commandments did Jesus receive worship he did Matthew CH 28:9 and they went to tell his disciples behold Jesus met them saying all hail that means worship and they came and held him by the feet and worshiped him he did not kick them away and say don't do that he received worship Hebrews 1:6 let all the angels of God worship him right you can see that at the Incarnation the Angels sang and they were worshiping Jesus Revelation 711 all the Angels stood around the throne and the elders and the four living creatures and they fell down on their faces before the throne and it's the Lamb on the throne and they worship God so he's worshiped the Bible says God created Genesis 1 1 in the beginning God created you go to the Gospel of John what do we read in John chapter 1:3 in the beginning was the word and the Word was with God and the Word was God he was in the beginning with God it doesn't say that he came forth then he was there it's present tense all things were made through him without him was not anything made that was made and so it's pretty clear to see that God is eternal then um Ephesians 3:9 God who created all things through Jesus Christ Colossians 1:16 and 17 for by him all things were created that are in heaven and are on Earth how many things created by Him all things visible and invisible that means the Angels whether Thrones or dominions or principalities or Powers all things were created through him and for him and he is before all things and in him all things consist it's his power of God that holds all things together and then I like this Hebrews 1 verse one God who had sunry times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets has in these last days spoken to us by his son who is appointed heir of all things through whom he made the worlds not just our world but all worlds another definition for God the Bible says there's only one Savior and by the way when I was studying with the Jehovah Witnesses a lot of these things this says worship Jehovah only then it says worship Jesus says Jehovah only is our savior but then it says Jesus Is Our Savior Jehovah created says Jesus created and I remember studying with some of my JW friends and they they got a little rattled by that I said so when you're uh when you're talking about Jehovah Jesus is Jehovah this is another name for the one God Isaiah 4311 I even I the Lord and besides me there is no savior Jude verse 25 to God our savior who alone is wise be glory and majesty and dominion and power both now and forever 1 John 4:44 and we've seen and testify that the father has sent the son as Savior of the world other thing about God is the omnipresence of God Jesus said Lo I'm with you always wherever you go is that just me or did he say it to you too so when we all disperse after church is he with all of us that's called omnipresence Psalm 139 where can I go from your spirit Where can I from your presence do you know they say wherever you go there you are but wherever you go God is with you he sees all things he's self-existent John 14:6 he says I am the way the truth and the life no one comes to the father except through me in him John 1:4 in him was life and the life was the light of men in Revelation 18 I am the Alpha and the Omega the beginning and the end says the Lord he who is who was and is to come far back as you can go backwards in the present in the future he's not confined by time that's why God can take a prophet into the future and show him things because God sees all time at one time easily nothing is too hard for the Lord you know there's some churches that believe that our god this is actually the latterday saints that our God was once a Lesser God but he's worked his way up to being God of Worlds and and um you know when I studied with my Mormon friends I said so your God has grown yes said is he all powerful yes said can he learn anything yes so how can it be all knowing and learn something the only other way you can do that is to be a teenager go to school and be all knowing at the same time right no so I said if God is learning anything then he's not all knowing so so that's got serious problems that teaching the other thing is he knows men's Hearts the Bible says God by the way the verse for this is First Kings 8:39 Solomon when he prayed he said Lord you who know all men's hearts for you and you only know the thoughts of men did Jesus know what people were thinking now the devil can tempt you he can put thoughts in your mind and he can look at your body language and your expression and see if he's getting through but he can't read your mind but Jesus knows every thought that you think he knows what's in your heart you can read here in mark 2:8 But immediately when Jesus perceived in the spirit that they reasoned within themselves he answered them when Simon at the dinner was reasoning if this man's a prophet he'd know who and what manner of woman this is that's touching him for she's a sinner Jesus knew what he was thinking and then he responded to his thoughts uh Jesus asked the disciples what were you arguing about on the road they tried to get out of ear sh shot but he knew what they were thinking I said oh we weren't talking about anything they were talking about who was the greatest God knows all things he knows our hearts and what we're thinking John 2: 24 but Jesus did not commit himself to them because he knew all men and had no need that anyone should testify of man for he knew what was in man amen John 5:17 but Jesus answered them my father's been working until now and I have been working therefore the Jews all sought all the more to kill him not only because he broke the Sabbath at least they were accusing him of that because but because that saying God was his father making himself equal with God and by the way not only did Jesus say I am my father are one Jesus said before Abraham was I am and Christ taught his prior existence by saying Abraham longed to see my day and he sought it and so even way back before Abraham Jesus existed he existed in eternity past so um there's no question about that the pre-existence of the Lord in John 1 verse3 this is he of whom I said after me comes a man who's preferred before me for he was before me why would John the Baptist the older say about Jesus he was before me because of his prior existence and then John 17 Jesus makes it clear in verse 5 and now oh Father glorify me together with yourself with the glory that I had with you before the world was so Jesus is eternal Jesus Is God you look at all the definitions of God creator savior all powerful all- knowing omnipresent self-existent uh Jesus Is God now what about the Holy Spirit is where a lot of people struggle and I even hear it in our prayers I'll C myself praying it we sometimes talk about the Holy Spirit like it's a force or that he's just a power but the Bible's pretty clear it says he's a he in acts 5:3 when ananas and Safra lied to Peter Peter said you have not lied to men says you've lied to the Holy Spirit and in lying to the Holy Spirit you have lied to to God so if you're lying to the Holy Spirit you're lying to God John 16:13 however he when the spirit of Truth has come he will guide you into all truth over and over again it says he he he and you know all the way in the beginning of the Bible there chap Genesis chapter 1 it says the spirit of God moved on the face of the waters and if you go to Revelation chapter 22 the last chapter in the Bible it talks about God the words that close the book of are even so come Lord Jesus and just before that it says the spirit and the bride say come you got the holy spirit all the way from Genesis to Revelation he is not just an impersonal Force amen that guides us how many of you have a GPS in your car or your phone that should be just about everybody right it's amazing that we survived without that and you think we would have been extinct based on the way we depend on them now if they were all taken away we might be right so when you're driving down the road and you got your GPS on and I I don't know how you've got yours program mine is a female voice and it says 500 feet turn right well I just remember something else I need to do that's on up the street and I think well I'm going to keep going because I'm going to stop there first get some gas and I drive past the turn it said now that really hurt hurt my feelings I asked you to turn I asked in a very nice way and you just totally ignored me see if I ever talk to you again is that what it does couldn't care less it just says recalculating I saw a really funny commercial one time a little cartoon in a magazine where station wagon is driving up this windy road and steep Mountain Cliff and it goes off the edge through the guard rail and you see this little Cloud blurb and it says calculating or it says make a U-turn matter of fact I sometimes I just have to turn off my GPS because it keeps telling me what to do and I don't want to keep hearing it I know and I almost feel like I need to apologize and say will you be quiet for a minute please I'm going to come I'll turn around I promise isn't that dumb you know why it's dumb it is an impersonal Force but what does the Bible say say in Ephesians chter 4 about the Holy Spirit verse 30 grieve not the Holy Spirit wherewith you are sealed for the day of redemption can you grieve your GPS when you don't turn when it tells you to turn no I won't ask you for a show hands how many of you have one of these Amazon alexas or you've got the Siri or the thing where you talk and it talks to you and and I'll I'll say you know what's the temperature tomorrow and it'll tell me and then it says something I didn't ask for it says would you like me to give you free notifications about your favorite News Channel I say no thank you and I'm thinking why am I saying thank you I say no be quiet someone's like this artificial intelligence is kind of scary isn't it we're starting to talk to these things like they got personality the holy spirit's not AI it's real he is real the Bible tells us it's a hymn you read through the book of Acts it says the Holy Spirit told us to go here and then the Holy Spirit forbat us from going there and Jesus said when he he could have used it Jesus knew the word it he uses the word it other places he could have said Force he said he he he Jesus gives him personality don't try and take it away holy spirit is real when he comes he will guide you into all truth Elijah heard a still Small Voice you know I understand that the um some of the ancient Nomads when they were traveling across the deserts that they would um keep a homing pigeon with them they'd feed it and take care of it but they kept a thread tied it on its leg and they'd get into these sandstorms that were so dense that these Caravans could not see the sun they couldn't calculate where they were but the bird always knew what home was and they'd let the bird go and hang on to the the thread and it would fly like a compass needle directly towards home and they could get their Direction by following the bird and I should also say the different pictures that we're showing about God the Father there is no picture you know these are what you call artist Concepts or AI Concepts these days don't put a lot of heat in that you know we're not supposed to worship images just sometimes we're trying to figure out how do I visualize God the Father the Son the spirit God's always the father we kind of give him the old man look it just wouldn't seem right if he was younger than Jesus right call him the father and then Jesus you know we got our typical visual pictures of Jesus and the Holy Spirit he's a tough one often it's a dove because he came down like a dove on Jesus sometimes fire Pentecost fire Jesus Compares him to the wind in John chapter 3 so it's he's he's a nebulous person he's Spirit spiritual things are spiritually discerned amen you've got to be able to pray for the Holy Spirit to understand God now I'll share a little testimony with you I experienced a miraculous healing this week I had a rapid onset of blindness I was sitting in the amazing facts evangelism meeting listening to all the evangelists in the boardroom give their reports and I was trying to read the material and I could not see and I thought oh I forgot my glasses I put my hand on I had my glasses on and I no matter where I looked I'm looking out and everything is going bad and I thought oh man if my vision has gone this bad this quickly I'm going to be blind in 30 days everything was Fuzzy I was blinking I was rubbing my eye and uh I'm beginning to think how long will I be able to keep my job I'll have them lead me out on stage and I'll preach from memory I'll put an earpiece in my ear I'll pre-record my sermon ments maybe I can learn Braille all this crazy stuff's going through my mind I'm exaggerating a little bit but um then it occurred to me I was videotaping this morning and I've got special glasses I wear for videotaping that don't have any glare because they don't have any lens and here I was sitting there not hearing anything that's going on around me processing how I was going to live a life as a blind man and it was because I didn't have my glasses on them I'm going like this I'm going oh Lord please heal me what have I done I tell you friends I was so happy I didn't tell any of the evangelists they don't know what was going on because you know I thought they're going to say no he doesn't have eye problems he got brain problems and it's much more serious and I put my glasses on I thought praise the Lord I've been healed it's a true story it makes a big difference you see things differently when you got the right glasses on don't you and when you read the Bible you need to make sure that you're reading it comparing spiritual things was spiritual Jesus said the words that I speak to you they are spirit and life and whatever we can understand about God we need to know it needs to be revealed according to the word by the spirit the most important reason that we study this subject Jesus said in John chapter 17 the first three verses this is eternal life that we might Know Thee eternal life is to know him what will the Lord say to the lost they say Lord Lord but he says I never knew you my people are destroyed for lack of knowledge not knowledge about facts but knowledge about who God is there's no higher study than to study God because what is a Christian a Christian is someone who wants to be like Christ who is God we want to be Godly amen we want to be like our Lord and our [Music] savior

Channel: AmazingFacts

Views: 31,394

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Id: hSteVvG3Phc

Length: 53min 21sec (3201 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 17 2024