God is Omniscient

“Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit.”

Psalm 147:5

Here again is another attribute of God which only He can posses – perfect knowledge.  He knows all there is to know.  There is not a fact, statistic, law, principle, detail, which He does not fully know and understand.  God cannot learn or discover anything.  Tozer’s Knowledge of the Holy points out, “Because God knows all things perfectly, He knows no thing better than any other thing, but all things equally well.  He never discovers anything.  He is never surprised, never amazed.  He never wonders about anything nor (except when drawing men out for their own good) does He seek information or ask questions.” ¹  Nothing is hidden or unknown to Him.  He knows thoughts as well as actions.  He must in order to be a fair judge.  Hebrews 4:13 states, “Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight.  Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to we must give account.”

Tozer writes further, “God perfectly knows Himself and, being the source and author of all things, it follows that He knows all that can be known.” ²  There are no mysteries to God.  He knows perfectly all cause and effect, all laws that govern an object and make it be what it is.  He can account for everything that has ever happened, is happening and is yet to happen.  He cannot forget anything and does not have to call things into recollection.  He simply exists there.  He simply has all the knowledge.   “From him and to him and through him are all things.  To him be the glory forever!  Amen.” – Hebrews 11:36

God knows the “Why?” –  something science can never tell us.  C S Lewis reminds us in Mere Christianity that science tells us only what happened in a specific setting when something was tested.  Science shows us the pattern of behavior objects, animals, or plants obey – but never really why they obey.  If science knew all there was to know in the universe, it could still not answer the question “why.”  Science mostly answers the question “What happens when…,” but God knows why those things happen because He is the source and author of all things.  Interestingly, this implies that the Bible (God’s written word) is a better source of explanation about why we exist or why the universe was created than science will ever be able to offer.  Science also struggles to answer the question of “How” when applied to the origin of things.  How did the universe come into being?  How did all the plant species and animal species come into being?  How did humans come into being?  Science is held up in time always trying to answer the question after the fact of something happening.  God lives outside of time and as C S Lewis points out in Mere Christianity, He has the ability to see all points in time at the same time.  He can and does interact with all points of time simultaneously. 

Herein lays the problem with discussing the doctrine of predestination, for God no such thing can exist as pre or post a given point in time.  He lives in the eternal now and already knows perfectly what is going to happen for us in time because He is already there.  So for God there is no foreknowledge there is only knowledge – perfect knowledge of all things.  Now if we look at it from man’s point of view, then God foreknows everything about everything, but here we have lapsed back into treating God as if He were captured in time, which He is not.  He knows all things before they happen, so from our point of view, we say he foreknows.  See Romans 8:28-30 I Peter 1:1-2, and Ephesians 1:3-5.

Tozer points out the great fear or wonderful anticipation of mankind with the fact that God knows all the thoughts of a man before the man has them.   “O Lord, you have searched me and you know me.  You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar.  You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways.  Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O Lord.” - Psalm 139:1-4   For the evil, unregenerate man this is a terrifying thought.  For the regenerated man this is an extremely comforting thought for God knows all my wrong doings and His judgments are suspended in Christ.  For the unregenerate man, the terrifying thought of his impending judgment becomes too much to bear.  “This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.” - 1 John 3:19-20

God knows us better than we know ourselves.  He knows the number of hairs on our heads, the thoughts inside our heads before we think them, our actions before we carry them out.  He alone knows all the mysteries of the universe and the unsearchable riches of Christ – and He wants to share them with you.  He wants to make known the deep mysteries of God.  “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business.  Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.” John 15:15

Oh Great and Mighty God, Source and Truth are found in only in You.  Help us to embrace you whole-heartedly.  Help us by Your Spirit to understand the deep things of God (1 Cor 2:9-16) and to marvel again at whom You are.  Oh that One so highly exalted would willingly, lovingly choose to sacrifice for us and call us Your children and share with us Your secrets.  Help us to understand the treasure we have in You – the very source of life, truth, knowledge and all that is good. Amen!

“Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!  How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!” - Romans 11:33

Footnotes

¹ Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. 56. Print.

² Tozer. 56.

References

All Scriptures not specified are quoted from Life in the Spirit Study Bible (NIV). Stamps, Donald C., and John Wesley Adams. Life in the Spirit Study Bible: New International Version. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2003. Print.

Lewis, C. S. Mere Christianity. Audio.

Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. Print.

God is Immutable

“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” 

Hebrews 13:8

“All that God is He has always been, and all that He has been and is He will ever be.”

An Early Church Father

Here is yet another attribute (thing true of) God which only pertains to Him – immutability.   To say He is immutable is to say He is unchanging, that is to say He cannot change.  Change is defined by Webster’s New World Dictionary as “to differ, alter, substitute for, cause to become different, undergo alteration or replacement, undergo variation, to convert.” ¹

Malachi 3:6a says, “I the Lord do not change.”  Psalm 102:27 declares, “But you remain the same, and your years will never end.”  Hebrews 13:8 states, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”  This is a difficult thing for us to picture in our mind’s eye.  Here, on one the one hand, the practical man knows that all living things change.  Is this not part of the definition of what it means to be alive?  Growth implies change.  Hence no growth equals death.  In this world we find this to be true more often than not.  On the other hand, we know God is eternally alive yet without change, alteration, growth or variance.  Only perfection could accomplish this state of life without change. 

A. W. Tozer, in his book The Knowledge of the Holy points out the following:

For a moral being to change it would be necessary that the change be in one of three directions. He must go from better to worse or from worse to better; or, granted that the moral quality remain stable, he must change within himself, as from miniature to mature or from one order of being to another.  It should be clear that God can move in none of these directions. His perfections forever rule out any such possibility…We have seen how God differs from His creatures in being self-existent, self-sufficient, and eternal.  By virtue of these attributes God is God and not be some other being.  One who can suffer any slightest degree of change is neither self-existent, self-sufficient, nor eternal, and so is not God.  Only a being composed of parts may change, for change is basically a shift in the relation of the parts of a whole or the admission of some foreign element into the original composition. Since God is self-existent, He is not composed. There are in Him no parts to be altered. And since He is self-sufficient, nothing can enter His being from without. ²

This concept of immutability leads us down other avenues of thought as well.  We can infer by this that God has perfect knowledge and power and presence.  If He were to learn, this would be a change, hence this would not be God.  God does not think they way we do because He already knows everything.  He does not reason things out or solve things.  There is no mystery unknown to Him.  He does not merely know about all things but is actually the cause of all things.  C. S. Lewis states that all created things have some attribute of Him in them.  If He did not have all power and perfect authority, He could gain or lose some power and thus change.  If He was not all present everywhere at once, He could change position.  God never grows, changes, gets old or worn out.  He is, always has been, and always will be, perfect in Himself.  He requires no change.  He never becomes weak or tired or irritated.  

Tozer points out that God cannot change and man cannot help but change.  That is God never changes and man is in a constant state of flux.  Tozer writes:

The law of mutation belongs to a fallen world, but God is immutable, and in Him men of faith find at last eternal permanence. In the meanwhile change works for the children of the kingdom, not against them. The changes that occur in them are wrought by the hand of the in-living Spirit… yet much as we may deplore the lack of stability in all earthly things, in a fallen world such as this the very ability to change is a golden treasure, a gift from God of such fabulous worth as to call for constant thanksgiving. For human beings the whole possibility of redemption lies in their ability to change.  To move across from one sort of person to another is the essence of repentance. ³

Scripture points out why this attribute of the immutability of God is so important.  “God is not a man that He should lie, nor a son of man, that he should change his mind.  Does he speak and then not act?  Does he promise and not fulfill?” – Numbers 23:19. 

James 1:17 puts it this way, “Every good and perfect light is from above coming down from the Father or the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.”  Here in is the compounded joy that God is immutable:  we can depend on His promises and offers of help to be true and carried out.   We do not have to wonder if He will still want to help us, to save and redeem and sanctify us, tomorrow or next week or next year.  We can depend whole heartedly upon His faithfulness for He will not change.  We can trust and rely upon His love, grace and mercy (all His attributes) to be ever extended to us.  C. S. Lewis writes in Mere Christianity, “God made us, invented us, and He designed us to run on Himself for fuel.  God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself because it is not there.  There is no such thing.”  We are a human machine and God is the fuel that makes us run the best.  Other things can be used for fuel but “the machine conks.  It seems to start up alright and run a few yards but then it breaks down.  They are trying to run it on the wrong juice.” ⁴  He in Himself is the fulfillment of all He has promised.

Oh, Immutable One, how great you are!  Your perfection is unmatched! Thank you for showing us Your unchangeable nature.  Help us to depend on, rely upon, and trust in You; for You change not.  Help us, Lord, to grow in our knowledge of You, in our awareness of Your Presence dwelling in and among us.  Help us appropriate Your great and precious promises.  Help us allow Your Spirit, living with us, to make us more like You.  May our engines run ever longer and cleaner on Your Presence.  Help us understand, embrace, and trust in You as, in a very real sense, You are the answer to all our problems.  Help us to fellowship with and relate to You, Oh Great Unchanging One!  Amen!

Footnotes

¹ Neufeldt, Victoria, and David Bernard Guralnik. "Change." Webster's New World Dictionary of American English. Thrird College Edition ed. New York: Webster's New World, 1989. 234. Print.

² Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. 49-50. Print.

³ Tozer. 52.

⁴ Lewis, C. S. Mere Christianity. Audio.

References

All Scriptures not specified are quoted from Life in the Spirit Study Bible (NIV). Stamps, Donald C., and John Wesley Adams. Life in the Spirit Study Bible: New International Version. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2003. Print.

Lewis, C. S. Mere Christianity. Audio.

Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. Print.

God is Infinite

“All our thoughts about Him will be less than He, and our loftiest utterances will be trivialities in comparison with Him.”¹  Novatian

“Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!  How unsearchable his judgments and his paths beyond tracing out!”  Romans 11:33

God’s infinitude is yet another one of the absolute attributes only God can possess.  Here is why only God can posses such an attribute; the rest of us have limits.  We only live so long, can only do so much, only are so big (or rather small), can only be in one place, can only live in one time (now). God has never ceased to exist, can do anything, is boundless in size, is everywhere at once and in every time and without time all at once.  A. W. Tozer puts it well in Knowledge of the Holy to say, “Infinitude, of course, means limitlessness, and it is obviously impossible for a limited mind to grasp the Unlimited.”²  And further, “Even to try to conceive of it would appear to be self-contradictory, for such conceptualization requires us to undertake something which we know at the outset we can never accomplish.”³ 

The way we try to understand something is to understand its limits.  We say a house has so many square feet of space in size, is a certain style (which is defined by a classification of limitations) and is a specific shape.  These things are what define the house and make it what it is. We cannot conceive of a house that is every size, every style, and every shape.  Try to describe this house to someone and you find yourself trying to describe everything known to man about housing.  It simply cannot be every size, every style, and every shape.  It must be a definite size, certain style, and distinct shape.  The limitations of the house make it unique and define what it is and how we interact with it. 

So here is our dilemma.  When we say God is infinite, knows no bounds, is without limit, and is measureless; how then do we define Him?  We must make reference to the known to describe the unknown and in so doing we continually fall short of understanding who He is.  Tozer puts it like this, “All that He is He is without growth or addition or development.  Nothing in God is less or more, or large or small.  He is what he is in Himself, without qualifying thought or word.  He is simply God.”⁴ 

Novatian writes, “At the contemplation and utterance of His majesty all eloquence is rightly dumb, all mental effort is feeble.  For God is greater than mind itself.  His greatness cannot be conceived.  Nay, could we conceive of His greatness He would be less that the human mind which could form the conception.”⁵

“Because God’s nature is infinite, everything that flows out of it is infinite also” Tozer observes.⁶   And a wonderful observation it is.  What does He offer?  Life eternal, limitless mercy (not getting what we deserve), infinite grace (getting we do not deserve), boundless love, peace which passes understanding, joy unthinkable!  He is the boundless, measureless, limitless one!  He offers us limitless life!  He gives away unbridled grace! 

He has infinite knowledge, infinite presence, infinite power, infinite sovereignty, and infinite existence.  His moral attributes are infinite also: infinite holiness, infinite righteousness, infinite love, infinite faithfulness, infinite mercy, infinite grace and infinite justice.  So this tells us we are not beyond reaching and repairing.  He has infinite resources to put at your disposal as you appropriate His promises as set forth in His Word.

“Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit.”  Psalm 147:5

Oh Great God, Limitless One, we bow before you and humbly ask you would continue to expand our knowledge of You.  We ask, Infinite One, that You would show us ever-increasing measures of Your boundless character, Your measureless power, Your infinite faithfulness, and the fullness of all Your attributes.  Help our limited minds, hearts, souls and spirits to comprehend You to the greatest measure possible and then to stand back in utter awe, absolute wonder and awesome amazement at who You are eternally and all You do as you live in the eternal now outside of time and space!  We are grateful have a God so magnificently majestic as You!  We are privileged to be Your Children and humbled to call You, Father.  As we strive to understand and experience You, make us, Dear LORD, more like You.  In Jesus’ Mighty Name, Amen!

Footnotes

¹ Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. 45. Print.

² Tozer. 44.

³ Tozer. 44.

⁴ Tozer. 45-46.

⁵ Tozer. 44.

⁶ Tozer. 46.

References

All Scriptures not specified are quoted from Life in the Spirit Study Bible (NIV). Stamps, Donald C., and John Wesley Adams. Life in the Spirit Study Bible: New International Version. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2003. Print.

Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. Print.

God is Eternal

God dwells in eternity but time dwells in God  A.W. Tozer

The eternity of God is another one of the absolute attributes only God can possess.  First we must understand what eternity is and is not.  Eternity is NOT the sum of now and every past moment as well as every future moment.  Eternity is NOT the sum of all time. 

You see time is a human construct.  We can live in our mortal bodies only in the now.  We can remember the past and assume that tomorrow will be like today, but NOW is the only moment we can actually live in and change what happens there.  Surely we can do things now which may affect the future but we can not actual dwell in the now and the future and perform change in them at the same time.  Nor can we change the past; it is irrevocably set in the record.  All we can do is affect the now.  Which makes our now decisions of utmost importance. 

Time for us revolves around the known.  We make one trip around the sun and that is a year.  We divide the year into months and weeks.  By the way why is the week seven days?  Because God created the world in seven days.  We divide the time into days by one revolution of the earth in which we see the sun and then the darkness.  Hence is the problem with time it is created just as the sun is created.  There will come a time when the sun and all creation will cease to exist and time will be irrelevant at that point.  A. W. Tozer aptly observes, “Time marks the beginning of created existence, and because God never began to exist it can have no application to Him.”

The eternity of God is defined and implied by numbers of scriptures in the Bible.  Here are but a few.  1 Timothy 1:17 reads “Now unto the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honor and glory for ever and ever.  Amen”  God revealed Himself to Moses in Exodus 3:14 as, “I AM that I AM.”  This reveals Him as above time.  In Psalm 90:2b Moses declares “..even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God.”  He made Himself known to the Apostle John stating “‘I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending’, says the Lord God, ‘who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty” in Revelation 1:8.  This makes sense how could God be the giver of eternal life unless He is Himself eternal?  Tozer writes in Knowledge of the Holy:

The truth is that if the Bible did not teach that God possessed endless being in the ultimate meaning of that term, we would be compelled to infer it from His other attributes, and if the Holy Scriptures had no word for absolute everlastingness, it would be necessary for us to coin one to express the concept, for it is assumed, implied, and generally taken for granted everywhere throughout the inspired Scriptures.¹

God’s self-sufficiency, self-existence, infinity, omnipresence, omnipotence, and omniscience demand His eternalness.  How could He know everything and be everywhere and be all powerful and self-sufficient and self existent and still not be eternal?  He can’t.

Eternity contains time but is not limited by it.  C. S. Lewis suggests that we think of a sheet of paper infinitely extended.  This would represent eternity.  Then on that paper draw a short line to represent time.  As the line begins and ends on that infinite expanse, so time began in God and will end in Him.

God is present at all points of time at the same time, that is, simultaneously.  He is with me now as I am writing, and with me now while I am being born (while this is in the past for me) and with me now while I am dying (while this is in the future for me), and with me now in eternity after I am dead (when I will live in eternity with God).  Tozer observes, “For Him everything that will happen has already happened.”² This thought goes against all we know and experience.  Tozer reasons “He sees the end and the beginning in one view.”³  Yet God alone can say as in Isaiah 46:9c-10a, “…I am God and there is no other; I am God and there is none like me.  I make known the end form the beginning,…”

Oh great King eternal, we accept your offer of eternal life in Jesus Christ.  We join with David and declare “Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, from everlasting to everlasting, Amen.” Ps 41:13

Footnotes

¹ Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. 38-39. Print.

² Tozer. 40.

³ Tozer. 40.

References

All Scriptures not specified are quoted from Life in the Spirit Study Bible (NIV). Stamps, Donald C., and John Wesley Adams. Life in the Spirit Study Bible: New International Version. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2003. Print.

Lewis, C. S. Mere Christianity. Audio.

Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. Print.

God is Self-Sufficient

“Whatever God is, and all that God is, He is in Himself.”¹ A.W. Tozer

Self-Sufficiency is another one of the kinds of attributes only God can possess.  In short God is the only thing we could think of which does not have needs or dependencies.  He is fully complete in Himself.  God’s self-sufficiency is a core part of whom God is.  To suggest God has needs or is incomplete in Himself is to suggest He is not God.  To think of Him otherwise is to imagine something of Him which is untrue.  He does not need us in any sense of the word.  Who wants to serve a God whose needs change or can be influenced?  A. W. Tozer puts it this way in The Knowledge of The Holy:

An elementary but correct way to think of God is as the One who contains all, who gives all that is given, but who Himself can receive nothing that He has not first given.

To admit the existence of a need in God is to admit incompleteness in the divine Being. Need is a creature-word and cannot be spoken of the Creator. God has a voluntary relation to everything He has made, but He has no necessary relation to anything outside of Himself. His interest in His creatures arises from His sovereign good pleasure, not from any need those creatures can supply nor from any completeness they can bring to Him who is complete in Himself.²

Here again we see God in a category He alone occupies.  He interacts with all that is, not out of need, but out of His good pleasure.  It is His desire, not His need.  His interaction is driven by His pleasure not a need to interact or a dependency upon interaction.  Created things have dependencies; the self-existent God does not.  The Westminster Confession puts it like this:

God hath all life, glory, goodness, blessedness, in and of Himself; and is alone in and unto Himself all-sufficient, not standing in need of any creatures which He hath made, not deriving any glory from them, but only manifesting His own glory in, by, unto, and upon them: He is the alone fountain of all being, of whom, through whom, and to whom are all things; and hath most sovereign dominion over them, to do by them, for them, or upon them whatsoever Himself pleaseth.³

God does not need our help.  He does not need our knowledge or perspective.  He sees all things from any and every angle.  He has not necessitated our worship and service to Him.  However, Tozer points out, “…the blessed news is that the God who needs no one has in sovereign condescension set Himself to work by and in and through His obedient children… He needs no one, but when faith is present He works through anyone. Two statements are in this sentence and a healthy spiritual life requires that we accept both.”⁴  So, on the one hand we must hold God as not needing our help, and on the other hand Him accepting our offer of help and using us to help Him.  Notice here how God is using us, but it is still Him doing the work.

To think of it a different way, there is no power He lacks, no knowledge He does not contain, no task too difficult for Him, no glory not due Him, no unmet emotional needs He is waiting to have met.  Had He any of these, He would at that point cease to be self-sufficient and therefore, cease to be God.  There is no input required and no output necessary for Him to function.  He is truly, wholly independent in the most complete sense of the word.  Acts 17:24-25 says, “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands.  And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else.”  God can be the sustainer of all that is because He is self-sufficient.  Romans 11:34-36 putts it this way, “Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has become his adviser?  Who has given him something only to have him pay it back?  For all things are from him, by him, and for him. Glory belongs to him forever! Amen.”  All things are from Him, by Him and for Him (or of Him, through Him and to Him) because He is the self-sufficient One!  Tozer rightly says, “Whatever God is, and all that God is, He is in Himself.”¹

Footnotes

¹ Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. 32. Print.

² Tozer. 32.

³ "Westminster Confession of Faith: Chapter II." Center for Reformed Theology and Apologetics. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Mar. 2011. <http://www.reformed.org/documents/wcf_with_proofs/>

⁴ Tozer. 36.

References

All Scriptures not specified are quoted from Life in the Spirit Study Bible (NIV). Stamps, Donald C., and John Wesley Adams. Life in the Spirit Study Bible: New International Version. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2003. Print.

Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. Print.

God is Self-Existent

“If you ask why we should obey God, in the last resort the answer is, 'I am.'
To know God is to know that our obedience is due to Him.”¹ – C.S. Lewis

“It is not easy to categorize the Attributes of God.  There are clearly two general kinds, but proper words to distinguish them are hard to find.  One kind, only God possesses; another kind, man may possess to a limited degree” ²

Self-existence is the kind of attribute only God can possess.  Scripture shows us God is self-existent, uncreated, and without origin.  John 5:26 says, “For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son to have life in himself.” Here Jesus reveals to us the self-existence of the Godhead.  God reveals Himself in Exodus 3:14 as “I am who I am.”  He always has been, and has always been what He is.  “A more positive assertion of selfhood could not be imagined than those words of God to Moses: I AM THAT I AM. Everything God is, everything that is God, is set forth in that unqualified declaration of independent being. Yet in God, self is not sin but the quintessence of all possible goodness, holiness and truth.” ³  God is the origin of all that is.  Tozer again points out:

“God has no origin,” said Novatian and it is precisely this concept of no-origin which distinguishes That-which-is-God from whatever is not God.

Origin is a word that can apply only to things created. When we think of anything that has origin we are not thinking of God. God is self-existent, while all created things necessarily originated somewhere at some time. Aside from God, nothing is self-caused.

By our effort to discover the origin of things we confess our belief that everything was made by Someone who was made of none. By familiar experience we are taught that everything “came from” something else. Whatever exists must have had a cause that antedates it and was at least equal to it, since the lesser cannot produce the greater. Any person or thing may be at once both caused and the cause of someone or something else; and so, back to the One who is the cause of all but is Himself caused by none. ⁴

Colossians 1:16-17 says, “For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him.  He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.”  God is THE ORIGIN.  He is also THE SUSTAINER.  All that is owes its allegiance to the source and sustainer.

"The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands.  And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else.  From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live.” – Acts 17:24-26

God does not need – from anyone or anything or anywhere.  He alone is self-sufficient.   He is self-existent.  He never has a need and therefore never changes; just as James tells us “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows” (James 1:17).  The Psalmist puts it another way, “Our God is in heaven; he does whatever pleases him.” – Psalm 115:3.  His knowledge alone is perfect.  The creator thoroughly understands what He has created.  He is not in need of someone to advise Him.  Romans 11:34-36 quotes Isaiah 40:13 and Job 41:11 writing, “Who has known the mid of the Lord?  Or who has been his counselor?  Who has ever given to God that God should repay him?  For from him and through him and to him are all things.  To him be the glory forever! Amen.”  God is completely without need in knowledge or power or all else that He is because He is self-existent.  He is wholly other than we can conceive of.  All that we know of beside Him has needs and dependency.  He and no-one else is fully independent.  Where He to withdraw His hand from creation, it would cease to exist.  Remember Colossians 1:17, “…He is before all things, and in him all things hold together?”  God speaks of Himself to Isaiah in chapter 40 and verse 25, “’To whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal?’ says the Holy One.”  Tozer again sums up for us:

To admit that there is One who lies beyond us, who exists outside of all our categories, who will not be dismissed with a name, who will not appear before the bar of our reason, nor submit to our curious inquiries: this requires a great deal of humility, more than most of us possess, so we save face by thinking God down to our level, or at least down to where we can manage Him. Yet how He eludes us! For He is everywhere while He is nowhere, for “where” has to do with matter and space, and God is independent of both. He is unaffected by time or motion, is wholly self-dependent and owes nothing to the worlds His hands have made.⁵

Perhaps some sincere but puzzled Christian may at this juncture wish to inquire about the practicality of such concepts as I am trying to set forth here. “What bearing does this have on my life?” he may ask. ”What possible meaning can the self-existence of God have for me and others like me in a world such as this and in times such as these?”

To this I reply that, because we are the handiwork of God, it follows that all our problems and their solutions are theological. Some knowledge of what kind of God it is that operates the universe is indispensable to a sound philosophy of life and a sane outlook on the world scene.⁶

There is no one else self-existent.  God alone holds this place.  He alone has no need.  He alone is unchangeable.  He alone is independent.  He alone is self-sufficient.  He alone is the origin.  He alone is eternal.  He alone is all-powerful.  He alone is self-existent. 

Oh Almighty Sufficient One, teach us our place of dependence on You.  Help us to understand Your awesome power at work in all creation; indeed at work in us.  Thank You for sustaining all things. Thank You for Your power at work.  We worship You for who You are All Sufficient One!  You are the SOURCE of all good things. We draw strength from You.  We look to You.  We trust in You.  Help us to see you as our Sufficient One and trust in You.  In Jesus', Almighty Name, Amen!

Footnotes

¹ Lewis, C. S. Surprised by Joy: the Shape of My Early Life. New York: Harcourt Brace, 1995. 224. Print.

² Duffield, Guy P., and Nathaniel M. Cleave. Foundations of Pentecostal Theology. Los Angeles, Calif.: L.I.F.E. Bible College, 1983. 69. Print.

³ Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. 25. Print.

⁴ Tozer. 25.

⁵ Tozer. 26-27.

⁶ Tozer. 27.

References

All Scriptures not specified are quoted from Life in the Spirit Study Bible (NIV). Stamps, Donald C., and John Wesley Adams. Life in the Spirit Study Bible: New International Version. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2003. Print.

Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. Print.

God is Three in One

The Trinity

The sovereign God wants to be loved for Himself and honored for Himself, but that is only part of what He wants. The other part is that He wants us to know that when we have Him we have everything -- we have all the rest. – A. W. Tozer

Under the subject who God is we must first talk about the Trinity.  This is one God revealed in three persons for all eternity.  We cannot properly conceive of three in one with perfect unity.  The idea is an oxymoron for us, it is itself contradictory.  I like A. W. Tozer’s idea on this, “The doctrine of the Trinity is truth for the heart.  The spirit of man alone can enter through the veil and penetrate into that Holy of Holies…Love and faith are at home in the mystery of the Godhead.  Let reason kneel in reverence outside.”¹ 

We must endeavor to grasp this on some level in order to attempt to think properly about God.  So put your faith and love into motion and ask God for illumination of the tri-unity of God.  Here are several belief statements we would do well to emulate in our thinking:

That there is one God, eternally existent in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

(Deut. 6:4; Isaiah 43:10-11; Matt. 28:18; Luke 3:22; John 14:16)²

“There is only One True God–revealed in three persons...Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (commonly known as the Trinity).”³

There is but one living and true God.  In the unity of the Godhead there are three persons, of one substance, power and eternity – God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.  The Father is one, neither begotten or proceeding; the Son is eternally begotten of the Father; the Hoy Ghost eternally proceeding from the Father and the Son.⁴

Scripture itself reveals this tri-unity in several places.  Jesus replied, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him”  John 14:23.  “I and the Father are one" John 10:30.  There are a number of instances where the Bible records the three Persons of the Godhead in evidence at the same time.  Jesus is baptized and the Holy Spirit descends and God the Father speaks from heaven in Matthew 3:16 and 17.  Jesus is speaking to His disciples at the last supper and says, “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever— the Spirit of truth.” (John 14:16) and again He says, “But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.” (John 14:26).  The great commission, again spoken by Jesus says “…baptizing them in name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”

“It is most important that we think of God as Trinity in Unity, neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the substance.  Only so may we think rightly of God and in a manner worthy of Him and our own souls.”⁵   “In this Trinity, nothing is before or after, nothing is greater or less: but all three Person coeternal, together and equal.”⁶

“The Persons of the Godhead, being one, have one will.  They work always together, and never one smallest act is done by one without the instant acquiescence of the other two.  Every act of God is accomplished by the Trinity in Unity.  Here, of course, we are being driven by necessity to conceive of God in human terms.  We are thinking of God by analogy with man, and the result must fall short of ultimate truth; yet if we are to think of God at all, we must do it by adapting creature-thoughts and creature-words to the Creator.  It is a real if understandable error to conceive of the Persons of the Godhead as conferring with one another and reaching agreement by interchange of thought as humans do…..That instant, immediate communion between the Persons of the Godhead which has been from all eternity knows not sound nor effort nor motion.”⁷

“A popular belief among Christians divides the work of God between the three Persons, giving a specific part to each, as, for instance, creation to the Father, redemption to the Son, and regeneration to the Holy Spirit.  This is partly true but not wholly so, for God cannot divide Himself that one Person works while another is inactive.  In the Scriptures the three Persons are shown to act in harmonious unity in all the might works that are wrought throughout the universe.”⁸

So there is one essence, three distinct persons, eternally revealed as one God.  I know I fall into the trap often in my thinking that Jesus was separated from the Father or that the Holy Spirit dwelling inside me is somehow separated from the Father and Jesus.  This does a huge dis-service to whom God has revealed Himself to be.  God has given us Himself in the Holy Spirit to live in our hearts and given Himself at the cross for our sins.  Kind of changes your perspective, doesn’t it?  Wow, God lives inside us.  God went to the cross for us.  It is difficult, but not inaccurate, to see all of God doing these things.  He is a unity of three persons revealed in different ways.

Unity of the Trinity⁹

	Father	Son	Holy Spirit
Creation	Gen 1:1	Col 1:16	Job 26:13, Ps 104:30
Incarnation	Luke 1:35	Luke 1:35	Luke 1:35
Christ’s Baptism	Matt 3:16-17	Matt 3:16-17	Matt 3:16-17
Atonement	Heb 9:14	Heb 9:14	Heb 9:14
Resurrection	Acts 2:32	John 10:17-18	Rom 1:4
Salvation	1 Peter 1:2	1 Peter 1:2	1 Peter 1:2
Indwelling of man	John 14:15-23	John 14:15-23	John 14:15-23

Footnotes

¹ Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. 20. Print.

² From Statement of Beliefs of the Fellowship of Christian Assemblies at http://www.fcaoc.org/belief_s.html

³ From the 16 Fundamental Truths of the Assemblies of God at http://ag.org/top/Beliefs/Statement_of_Fundamental_Truths/sft_short.cfm

⁴ From http://www.reformed.org/documents/wcf_with_proofs/

⁵ Tozer. 20.

⁶ Tozer. 21.

⁷ Tozer. 22.

⁸ Tozer. 23.

⁹ Tozer. 23.

References

All Scriptures not specified are quoted from Life in the Spirit Study Bible (NIV). Stamps, Donald C., and John Wesley Adams. Life in the Spirit Study Bible: New International Version. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2003. Print.

Tozer, A. W. The Knowledge of the Holy: the Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1961. Print.