Thursday, October 14, 2010

What is God?


In the shorter catechism question #4 asks, "What is God?"  That is not an easy question to wrap your arms around!  The catechism does a good job putting an answer into words.  It says, 'God is a Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable, in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth.  The first three are attributes that God alone has.
*Infinite-He is not limited by time and space, He is unmeasurable
*Eternal-He has no beginning and no end
*Unchangeable-He is the same today, yesterday and tomorrow.

In our delusional state we can often times think we have loads of time, that the season of life we are in will never change, that a lifestyle or relationship will be the same tomorrow as it is today.  But that is not the case!  We are limited by our resources, our time, and our flesh!  We SHOULD live in a state of humility and humbleness if we fully understood our place in God's economy.

God was under no constraint, no obligation, no necessity to create.  That he chose to do so was purely a sovereign act on his part, caused by nothing outside himself, determined by nothing but his own mere good pleasure; for he 'worketh all things after the counsel of his own will' (Eph. 1:11).  That he did create was simply for his manifestative glory...God is no gainer even from our worship.  He was in no need of that external glory of his grace which arises from his redeemed, for he is glorious enough in himself without that.  It was, as Ephesians 1:5 tells us, 'according to the good pleasure of his will.'...The force of this is that it is impossible to bring the Almighty under obligations to the creature; God gains nothing from us.  This is an excerpt from A.W. Pink, The Attributes of God.


The last seven traits; being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth of God are, to one degree or another, attributes that abide in us as well.  Being made in His image these are pieces that he has placed in us.  We desire these personality traits and as we grow in our spiritual maturity a reflection of Christ shines through us.

Worship Him today for He is a powerful Lord!

In Him Alone,
E.W.

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