A few years back I was sitting in a coffee shop across the table from a friend of mine who is an atheist. We had gotten into another deep discussion about spiritual things, and she suddenly asked me a pointed question about why so many Christians in her life cared so much about what she believed. It was something along the lines of, "I'm happy. Why can't you all just be glad for me that I am happy?" Why indeed? It was a good question. At the time, it threw me off balance, and I didn't have an immediate answer for her. Then it hit me on my drive home as her question lingered in my mind: "I not only want you to be happy - I want you to be happy forever."

God is eternal, and it is this attribute that lends permanence and meaning to all of his great promises, which find their fulfillment in Christ, including that of eternal life. The fact that he is eternal means that he never had a beginning and he will never have an end. He has existed from eternity past, and will for eternity future. As God revealed through his servant Moses, "From everlasting to everlasting you are God" (Psalm 90:2, emphasis mine). Revelation speaks of four creatures who constantly cry out before God's throne:

"Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty,
who was and is and is to come!" (Revelation 4:8).

Though dwelling on this truth may stretch our finite minds to exhaustion, it is also the basis for our hope. As a result of sin and death coming into the world through the Fall, human life is fleeting. Yet, we long for, and were made for, eternity. God "has put eternity into man's heart" (Ecclesiastes 3:11) and this is a longing that can only be satisfied in Christ. Praise God that his grace "now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel" (2 Timothy 1:9-10)!

There is coming a day when all people who ever lived will be resurrected - some to eternal life, and others to eternal death and torment (1 Corinthians 15:52-57; Revelation 20:12-15). Those who trust in Christ's finished work on the cross to justify them before God have an eternity with him to look forward to, and this eternity will be filled with unspeakable joy:

"You make known to me the path of life;
    
   in your presence there is fullness of joy;
    
   at your right hand are pleasures forevermore" (Psalm 16:11).

Complete and total joy that knows no end; our hearts will be satisfied with nothing less. This is why we care about what others believe. We have the only truth that brings full, eternal joy - joy that runs far deeper than any temporal happiness.

God is entirely self-sufficient, which means that he does not need anything, or rely on anything, outside of himself. He is the only being of whom this can be said. We, on the other hand, are not sufficient in ourselves, but are instead the dependent ones. God is dependent on nothing and no one.¹ The Apostle Paul spoke of this truth in his sermon to a group of Athenian philosophers, in explaining how the true God was far superlative to any of their false gods:

"The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything" (Acts 17:24-25).

Paul makes it clear here that God, being the Creator and Ruler over all the earth, does not need anything, including humans or our service! Instead, he is the glorious Provider of all our needs.

God Delights in Being the Giver

Because God is the Supreme Giver from whom all things flow, we cannot offer him anything good that did not first come from his hand. Even when we offer him things - our time, money, abilities - they are things that he first gave to us. Consider Romans 11:35-36a: "Who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid? For from him and through him and to him are all things." There is nothing we can possibly give to God that could turn him into the beneficiary, or obligate him to us in any way. No one can claim to have put God in their debt.

Instead, God takes great pleasure in displaying his perfect sufficiency by doing for us what we cannot do for ourselves. He delights in being the Giver! This is seen most clearly in the gospel. Jesus Christ, through his perfect life, substitutionary death, and glorious resurrection, accomplished for us what we could never have done for ourselves. Our sin had left us in a hopeless state apart from God's intervention. In fact, there was nothing that we could possibly bring to the table of reconciliation with God except our sin. We receive salvation as a gift from God's hand when we forsake relying on ourselves, and instead rely on Christ whose finished work on the cross is entirely sufficient for our salvation. This removes all cause for boasting (Ephesians 2:8-9).

How Then Should We Think of Service?

To say that God is not in need of us or our service does not mean we should neglect to serve God, or that it is okay to sit on the sidelines. There are some wonderful and serious things that God has given us to do with our lives. However, this comes as a necessary adjustment to our thinking if we have been imagining God to be in need of us. It glorifies God when we rely on him and look to him as our great Giver and Provider - for our salvation, for power to live the Christian life and to serve him, and for all of our needs. John Piper, in Desiring God, explains it well:

"God is not looking for people to work for Him, so much as He is looking for people who will let Him work for them. The gospel is not a help-wanted ad. Neither is the call to Christian service. On the contrary, the gospel commands us to give up and hang out a help-wanted sign (this is the basic meaning of prayer). Then the gospel promises that God will work for us if we do. He will not surrender the glory of being the Giver." ²

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The Origin of Life Has No Origin

The question of where life came from has consistently emerged from the human heart throughout history. As a result, countless creation myths have emanated from cultures around the world, and recently many have turned to science for some sort of explanation as well. We all long to know where we came from, because tied up with this is the question of life's meaning. Thankfully, God does not leave us in the dark, but reveals to us in the Bible that life originated from he who has no origin, and that it is all about him (Colossians 1:16-17).

I AM WHO I AM

In the beginning, God was already there (Genesis 1:1; John 1:1). He is the only being who has not been created, but instead is self-existent. This sets him wholly apart from everything else. When Moses encountered God for the first time in the burning bush, and God called him to lead his people out of Egypt and into the promised land, Moses asked him his name. God responded, "I AM WHO I AM" (Exodus 3:14). From this we learn that God is a wholly independent being who relies on nothing and no one for his existence. In him, this independence is right and good.¹

The Perverse Declaration of Independence

However, as created beings, our own declaration of independence from God is utterly sinful. In reference to the sin of our first parents, Adam and Eve, A.W. Tozer says, "This act violated the relationship that normally existed between God and His creature; it rejected God as the ground of existence and threw man back upon himself...Sin has many manifestations but its essence is one. A moral being, created to worship before the throne of God, sits on the throne of his own selfhood and from that elevated position declares, 'I AM'".² The first sin set in motion a catastrophic turn of events in which all humans afterward have been born with the perverse bent toward elevating self over God. All, that is, except for One.

I AM the Resurrection and the Life

Jesus Christ, the God-Man, came to rescue us from our hopeless state. He is the only one born without a sin nature, and the only one who ever perfectly obeyed God. He is both the I AM who has existed from eternity past, and the new Adam who came to be our representative and pay the price for our sins (John 8:58; Romans 5:18-21). Over and over in the gospel of John, Jesus makes "I AM" statements that proclaim his deity. One of them is "I am the resurrection and the life" (John 11:25). The fact that God is the only one who is life is a major aspect of his self-existence. It is also great news for us, because he is the only one who can bring those who are dead in their sins to life in Christ (Ephesians 2:4-6), and he promises those who trust in Christ a future, glorious resurrection body (1 Corinthians 15:20-22).

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^{1, 2} Tozer, A. W. "The Self-Existence of God." Knowledge of the Holy. London: Harper and Row, 1961. 29-30. Print. 

Long, long ago, before there were stars in the sky, before humans walked the earth, before anything that we can see existed, there was Love. There was God. 1 John 4:8 and 16 tell us that "God is love". This tells us something of his very nature, something that has always been true of him. Saint Augustine once pointed out that this can only be the case because God is Triune. In order for love to exist, there must be at a bare minimum a being that loves and a being that is loved. He didn't have to create us in order to love, because he is God in three persons - Father, Son and Spirit - who have perfectly loved each other from eternity past. He didn't create us out of need, so as to cure any loneliness or deficiency on his part, for he has no need or deficiency. No, he created us, as Jonathan Edwards once said, because fountains have a way of overflowing. He created us to glorify him by sharing in this love that has existed before time began.

The Deepest Pain of the Cross

There has only been one time when the perfect fellowship of the Trinity was broken. This was no accident, but was the culmination of the rescue plan that God the Father made before the foundation of the world, and that God the Son fully agreed with and submitted to in perfect obedience. God knew before he even created us that we would fall short of glorifying him - that we would rebel against him, and would need rescuing. That is why, at just the right time, God the Father sent God the Son to take on human skin and live as the only person who never rebelled against God, but obeyed his every command. Then, on the cross, Jesus Christ the righteous one, bore the wrath of God for the unrighteous, so that we might be declared righteous through him (2 Corinthians 5:21). The greatest pain inflicted on him in this moment was not the crown of thorns on his head, or the nails driven into his hands and feet, or the fact that he was slowly suffocating. While all this was excruciating, it was nothing compared to the searing pain of being separated from his Father and bearing all his wrath against sin. The agony of this separation is expressed in his cry, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46). What could have driven God to experience such misery on our behalf? Nothing less than his astonishing love for rebels like us (Romans 5:8).

The Same Love

Through faith in Christ, we not only receive God's forgiveness, but God is also making us into the sort of people who can begin to share in the same love that the Trinity has enjoyed for eternity. Romans 5:5 tells us that, "God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us." When we receive the Holy Spirit, we who were once dead to the things of God are brought to new life, and we now have the capacity to share in the love of the Trinity and extend that love to those around us, though still imperfectly. This was Jesus' prayer for us before he went to the cross: "Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world... I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them" (John 17:24,26). ¹

¹ Piper, John, Tim Keller, and Don Carson. "Only the Triune God Is Love." The Gospel Coalition. N.p., 16 July 2012. Web. 10 Aug. 2012. <http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tgc/2012/07/16/only-the-triune-god-is-love/?comments>.

We are in this series on the attributes of God because God has revealed much about himself through his Word, and he wants us to know him. Learning more about him leads to greater confidence, peace and hope in God. Today we are going to dive right into the deep end of the theological pool by starting with the Trinity!¹ Although the word Trinity does not appear in the Bible, the concept surely does. In Doctrine, authors Mark Driscoll and Gerry Breshears define it this way: "The Trinity is one God who eternally exists as three distinct persons - Father, Son, and Spirit - who are each fully and equally God in eternal relation with each other".²

Let's take a look at the basic elements of this doctrine.

There is only one true God

The testimony of Scripture repeatedly affirms that God is one, and that he is the only true God. One such example comes from an address that Moses made to Israel after delivering the Ten Commandments to them: "Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one" (Deuteronomy 6:4). Earlier, he says to them, "To you it was shown, that you might know that the Lord is God; there is no other besides him" (Deuteronomy 4:35). The New Testament affirms this truth as well (see 1 Timothy 1:17; John 5:44; Romans 3:30; 1 Corinthians 8:4-6; Galatians 3:20).

God is three distinct persons, and each is fully God

While Scripture is clear that God is one, it is also clear that God is three distinct persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

The Father is repeatedly declared to be God throughout the Scriptures. For instance, Jesus, in his high priestly prayer to God the Father, says, "And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." (See also 1 Corinthians 8:6; 2 Corinthians 1:3; Ephesians 1:3; 1 Peter 1:3).

The deity of Jesus Christ has proven much harder for many to accept over the years than that of the Father, probably because it challenges us to believe something we cannot fully understand: that Jesus is both fully God and fully man. In fact, it was his claim to deity that incited his murderers to kill him, as they considered it blasphemy. However, Jesus was no liar, and Scripture gives us many examples of both Jesus claiming to be God (Matthew 26:63-65, John 5:17-18; John 8:58) and of others recognizing his deity (Matthew 28:9; John 1:1-3; Romans 9:5; Philippians 2:10-11; Colossians 2:8-9; Titus 2:13).

Summer Salad Splash: Mark your calendar for a pool party event to get to know more about GBC's Women's Ministry: August 18, 11 am to 1 pm at Julie Davidson's home in Clifton. All ladies (members, newcomers, friends, and family) are invited. Bring your favorite salad to share and come prepared to lounge by the pool, swim, and visit with other women. There is no cost and carpooling is encouraged since parking is limited. Contact the Women's Ministry for specific location of the event and any other questions you might have This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

There is a great difference between knowing someone and knowing about someone. For instance, imagine if I told you that I know Carrie Underwood. Your response would probably be one of surprise, followed by an incredulous, "How do you know her? How is that possible?" Then suppose I told you that I read about her all the time, every news and magazine article I can get my hands on! That I know all the latest rumors and even what her favorite drink is at Starbucks. "But when did you meet her?" you might ask. "Oh, I've never actually met her." To which you would (hopefully!) correct me: "Then you don't actually know her."

In a similar way, there is a great difference between knowing things about God and actually knowing God. It is possible to study the Bible for years and not truly know God. Jesus called out a group of religious Jews in his day for this very thing: "You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life" (John 5:39-40). Notice that Jesus does not reprimand them for searching the Scriptures, or for knowing their Bible too well. Likewise, this should not discourage us from seeking to know more about God through his Word. Jesus' rebuke is for the fact that, despite their extensive search of, and familiarity with, the Scriptures, they refused to come to the one who the Scriptures are all about. They missed the point. Our study of the Bible should never be reduced to mere academics, but should instead lead us into relationship and deepening fellowship with the hero of the Bible: Jesus Christ.

Faith, which is itself a gift from God, is the distinguishing factor between those who know God and those who merely know about him. The religious people in the above scenario knew a great deal about him, but did not have genuine faith (John 5:37-38, 46-47). We first come to know God when we recognize that we are sinners in need of a savior, and entrust ourselves to Jesus Christ as our God and Savior, fully believing that he accomplished salvation for us by taking our sins on himself on the cross. Those who receive him go from being enemies of God to being adopted as his beloved children (John 1:12). Once we come to know God we have the amazing privilege of getting to know him more and more. My prayer for us as we begin studying the attributes of God next week, starting with the nature of the Trinity, is that we would respond to these amazing truths in faith and worship, and that it would deepen our fellowship with our Creator and Redeemer.

The Question

We are embarking on a series on the attributes of God, but first we need to ask ourselves, "How can we really know anything about God?" This is an important question, and the answer is stunning. God, the one who created us, the universe, and everything in it, is so wholly above us in every way that it would be impossible to know him if he chose to remain hidden. Thankfully, he does want us to know him, and has taken the initiative to make that possible. From the beginning, he designed humans in such a way that we could comprehend to some degree who he is. He even wove clues about himself into the fabric of his creation. For example, Psalm 19:1 tells us, "The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork." This is an example of general revelation, through which God reveals himself, in part, to people everywhere.

The Problem

Then the first humans brought sin into the world by rebelling against God's perfect and loving rule, and this sin has distorted our minds and hearts so that we do not know God, love God, or worship God as he deserves. Ultimately, the consequence of sin is separation from God and spiritual death. The revelation that God proclaims about himself in the heavens and the skies, and all of creation, now only gives us enough knowledge to condemn us (see Romans 1:19-20). It tells us enough to be held accountable before a holy God, but not enough to save us from his holy and just wrath. We need something more.

God's Solution

Amazingly, God has not given up on humanity, but continues to pursue us. He has acted throughout history to seek and save a people for himself, and he has recorded all that we need to know of himself and his redemptive work in the Holy Bible. God the Holy Spirit accomplished this through numerous human authors who came from various backgrounds over the course of many years. It would be a great mistake to attribute this work of God to human invention. The Apostle Peter explains, "knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone's own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." (2 Peter 1:20-21). 

The Old Testament anticipated the startling moment when God the Son, Jesus Christ, came to live among us by taking on human form, in addition to his divine nature. As the writer of Hebrews explains, "Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature..." (Hebrews 1:1-3a). The Apostle John explains it this way: "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth...No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father's side, he has made him known" (John 1:14,18). John calls Jesus the Word, because Jesus himself is God's Word to us. Everything he said and did during his time here on earth perfectly expressed who God is. Furthermore, it is the good news of his life lived in perfect obedience to God the Father, his death on the cross in our place for our sins, and his glorious resurrection, that has the power to save us if we will trust in him alone. 

Now, those of us who have placed our trust in Jesus Christ alone for our salvation experience the help of the Holy Spirit in understanding the things of God (1 Corinthians 2:11-12). He is the best possible teacher of the Bible, because he superintended its writing, and he is always with us! As we seek to learn more about our awesome God in the coming weeks, let's rely on his Spirit to help us understand these great truths.

Welcome!

Welcome to the Women of Grace blog! Today we embark on a journey together to explore deep truths of God's Word, and see how relevant they truly are to our everyday lives. This pursuit of God through studying his Word is the greatest pursuit of all, and for that reason, it is the intended focus of this blog. The goal here is to help bring good theology to bear on the lives of women. My greatest desire is that this weekly blog would be an encouragement to you, and that God would use it to make you thirsty for more of him.

What Do You Think About God?

A.W. Tozer once said that "what comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us" (The Knowledge of the Holy, p. 1). How about you? What comes into your mind when you think about God? Some of you may live such frantic, busy lives that perhaps it may be difficult to even remember the last time you thought much about who God is. Others may think of him almost constantly, and worship him throughout everyday life. Wherever you may fall on this spectrum, you have ideas about who God is, and what he is like. These ideas can be formed by a variety of sources: our culture, our upbringing, our friends, sermons we have listened to, books we have read, and, hopefully, the Bible, to name some. Sometimes we may not even be aware of the sources that shape our thinking. Regardless, what we think about God will shape us and greatly influence the direction of our lives.

In the midst of our frenetic activity, many of us may be tempted to skip theology and start with pragmatics. We want to know what to DO. How can I be a better wife and mother? How can I manage my time better? How can I stop overeating and get in shape? So we often turn to self-help strategies for answers, hoping that they can fix our lives. However, these self-sufficient attempts often fail. That's because these approaches fail to address the heart, which is the wellspring of our thoughts, motives, words and behavior (see Luke 6:45), and they fail to address our greatest problem of all: our sin. The biblical pattern as seen in the epistles is to start with who God is and what he has done, and go from there into what our response should be. We must start with good theology and then allow it to inform our practices.

For this reason, in our first series we are going to take a look at the attributes of God laid out in A.W. Tozer's classic book, The Knowledge of the Holy. I highly encourage you to consider reading this book as we explore these attributes together. Before looking at these attributes though, we need to do two things. First, we will take a look next week at how we can possibly know anything about God at all, and the following week we will look at how we can know God personally.

How to subscribe to the blog:

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Ladies (high school age & up) are invited to join us for a study of 2 Peter on Tuesday nights from July 10 - August 21, 7:00-8:30pm at GBC. This letter (2 Peter) is Peter's last will and testament and his warning about false prophets. The study will be led by Lisa Fisher and Joy Elliot and the cost is $5. Childcare will not be provided. Ladies who have daughters in high school are encouraged to consider bringing them to this study. You can register here for this study.

Details

Who:           Women's Ministry
What:          Study of 2 Peter
When:         Tuesday Nights from 7 - 8p starting on 7/10 - 8/21
Where:        GBC
Other:         Please register; no childcare provided 

Registration Tips

• You may need to create a free account, if you have not already done so
• If your information has previously been entered in Fellowship 1, then you should see your family information present, if not, you'll need to do this for the first time

REGISTER HERE

You are invited for dinner and fellowship on Tuesday, February 21st at 7:00 pm. We will meet and have dinner at Tokyo One, 9443 Lorton Market Street, Lorton, VA. Sign up will be in the foyer this Sunday, February 5th and next Sunday, February 12th. If you have questions, please contact Melody Langone at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Hope to see you there!