God is

Personal Revelation 2-11-2018 Sunday

Continuing Revelation of God

God is!

Over the years man has tried to explain the Being of God with his carnal understanding of the Scriptures. Having done so the end explanation is that God has been likened unto carnal man in His nature. Of course, this couldn’t be farther from the Truth as God “made” man in His image and likeness, not the other way around. If we only stick to Scripture and tarry for knowledge or wisdom God will surely give it according to His will for that time.

James 1:2-8

2My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into diverse temptations; 3Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. 4But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.

5If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. 6But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. 7For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord. 8A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.

God looks for those who “diligently” seek Him to “reward”. That reward is first with a clearer knowledge of who He really is and second with spiritual power to “manifest the Truth” of His Word and prove His existence. This is a “faith” application that must be tested to produce the patience that it takes to “tarry” till one receives what they ask for. When faith is “perfected” then we will be “lacking nothing”. In the next verse we see that this is applied to “wisdom” that God will give liberally if one asks in faith, “nothing doubting”. Anything outside of faith is sin so one who asks and doubts at the same time is asking in sin and is a double minded man who will receive nothing. First: we must believe by faith that “God is” and that He will reward us, “ask and you shall receive” is the promise if the desire is asked “in faith”. But there is another side to “receiving” the reward from God. This one is highly contested as to its necessity as man would rather rely on his own “thought” process then on God’s Word. It must be said that God spoke His Word, wrote His Word, and made a body for Jesus Christ out of His Word. So, it bears note that only He can “reveal” His Word to man and that comes by His Spirit.

1 Corinthians 2:9-16

9But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.

10But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. 11For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. 12Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. 13Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.

14But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. 15But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man. 16For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.

Well if that don’t tell it all! So what’s all the fuss? If you say you are going to “teach” Scripture then you better have the one who teaches you which can only be the Holy Spirit. That “mind of Christ”. Without Him you cannot understand the “deep things of God”. You can only “construe” your opinions and pass them off as accurate.  “What knoweth the things of man, save the spirit of man which is in him”? “even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.”

Lets take this another step…….If you don’t believe in the Scriptural command to be “filled with the Holy Spirit” then you don’t have the mind of Christ and the Scriptures are hid from you. Period. If you haven’t been baptized “in” the Holy Spirit (with the evidence thereof) then you shouldn’t be preaching or teaching or doing anything with God’s Word but reading it to yourself or out loud as an exposition. God’s Word will not come back void and that is all that you have going for you. All things in Christ come to us through the Holy Spirit and He is absolutely necessary to “receive” anything from God. “He has come to teach us and remind us of all things Christ said and done”.

I would like to establish one point clearly before I go on and that point is : God is!

What does this mean?

God is eternal and creation is temporal, in a time restraint. In other words we are (as is creation) “started” and “finished” during a set period of time that God has ordained for His purpose. That purpose being to show His Unconditional Love to His creation which He knew was going to turn wicked before He “called it from nothing”. The creation we live in has an end and that is clearly marked in the Book of Revelations. In fact God knew that He would have to judge His creation for sin and bring it to an end because of it’s wickedness, like Sodom and Gomora. All this was “started/began” by God who knew that His Unconditional Love would triumph over sin and death “for those who would believe”. That is why we need absolute perfect understanding of His Word, because His Word is what saves us, redeems us, secures our guaranteed place in heaven with Him. We have confidence in His Word by faith because He, His Word, is Truth and the “Truth” shall set us free from sin and death, if we believe by faith. How can we be secure in our promised “eternal life” if we have believed a lie and the Scriptures are wrested? How many over the millennia have walked away from the Truth and salvation because they weren’t taught about the Holy Spirit and never received any personal revelation? Over the years they couldn’t work out the understanding of “why am I important” so they became frustrated and walked away? They couldn’t see how short “life” is and didn’t feel it was important enough to tarry for the anointing of the Holy Spirit so that He could “work through them” so that their faith was satisfied as the Scriptures promise.

Hebrews 11:1-3

 1Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. 2For by it the elders obtained a good report.

3Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.

The four parts of faith are: substance and hope, evidence and things not seen. Faith makes us hope for the substance of what we need and is its own evidence of what we have not received yet.

Verse 3 is a deep insight into faith:

3Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.

That insight is simple: faith for us is replicated in creation by the fact that the Word of God called forth all that is from nothing, the same as believing/faith of a substance hoped for and an evidence not seen. Jesus said: “these things I do you will do also (by faith), faith is merely “walking as Jesus walked”, full of the Holy Spirit and being obedient to the “we small voice”.

Creation has three dimensions to it: past, present, and future. It started, it is now, and it will be until God brings it to an end. All these facets have a substance to them and an evidence that they exist proven by the fact of our reliance on time. Creation, the same as time, is real to us because we had our beginning and will have our end in it. That sets our thinking and lives in this reality. But creation is only a half truth as it itself exists within the timelessness of eternity which is the dwelling place of God. Creation was so designed for one purpose: “that we might know the number of our days”. It’s only natural then to “set” creation/time as the standard by which all other concepts are judged by. But God doesn’t fit into this concept as God is actually the “reality” of life as He is endless and so is that eternal life which we view as “set in time”. Our experiences place this time of creation that we live in as the only understandable valid way of looking at things, wherein the eternal reality shows/proves that God’s dwelling place is that eternal home and the only True reference of life. So, we see that we are carnal limited in life by this creation and God is eternal not limited by time, us, or anything but understanding meaning that in order to “see clearly” God’s nature we must “receive revelation” from Him about Him and His purposes set for us in His “time limited” creation.

That being said we now try to illustrate the Truth about God and His existence.

 We start out with “God is”.

What does the Scripture show us about this statement?

God is:

God is Love,

God is the Way, the Truth and the Life/Light,

God is Holy,

God is most High,

Then there is “I am,”

I am who I am,

I am He

I am Alpha and Omega

I am the Lord your God

This is not all the Scripture about God’s nature but it will give us an idea of what tense God is described in the Bible. In fact there is no “God” that “was” mentioned outside of an inference of creation. “In the beginning God created”, no reference to past, present or future. When God speaks of Himself it is always in the present.

John 1:1-5

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2The same was in the beginning with God. 3All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made.4In him was life; and the life was the light of men. 5And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

This reference does not denote time as to the beginning of God’s existence as He always was and ever will be “eternal”. But has to do with “In the beginning of creation. The Word (Jesus) was present with God and was God (already present) in the beginning of creation. Jesus, God and the Holy Spirit has always been one being but at creation God sees fit to show Himself as all three so that we can understand and see all three to be necessary for His plan of redemption to work. God the Father creates the perfect sin sacrifice in Christ and calls all men to Christ by the Holy Spirit. We need this presentation because we are in “His image and likeness” in order to understand our resemblance to our Creator.

Now to make the difference clear about God’s eternal existence and our time bound creation.

Acts 17:28

“For in him we live and move and have our being.”

This reference in the Book of Acts shows the relationship between in His creation (time bound), and God (He) in His eternal (not bound by time) existence enveloping His creation wherein we, man exists. So creation is just a small “time capsule” surrounded by the presence of our Eternal Timeless Father God.

Put this in the thought that God has never aged, never was younger, never changes, and always exists in the same space (Heaven). He is not grey haired, He is Spirit. Only we experience birthing, aging and death. But because we are so bound to time we tend to put everything in the same light. The normal projection mankind gives to God is that He is like us, started at some time, aged through time, and it’s hard to imagine that he can continue forever. But He can, and will, never changing ever. We are the ones that need to change in our thinking. No, excuse me, we need to receive a “revelation” of who God is by the Holy Spirit so that we can “know Him”, the way He exists, and gain wisdom on how His existence is tied to this creation and our lives.

Trying to give Light on this subject translating it from “divine revelation and a vision” is truly a challenge. The more one receives from the Holy Spirit about God our Father and how Jesus fits into the application the more “rooted” we become in our faith. The more we see in our spirits about the actual “relationship” we have with God through Christ by His Spirit the humbler we become realizing what an honor it is to serve “such a Master.” It’s even a greater state of humility when we realize that we have no strength to perform His objectives on our own, but He provides the “Power” through the Holy Spirit, the name of Jesus, and His Word not coming back void, to accomplish all those “exceedingly above and beyond all that we can think or imagine” works.

Personal revelation is mandatory to maturing in the faith and serving God. It’s likened in Scripture to a man and a woman.

They meet and find a need for each other. We meet through Christ with God and have a need for each other.

We court our spouse. We court God by the Holy Spirit.

We learn about our spouses. We learn about God by His word and the Holy Spirit.

We commit ourselves to our spouse in matrimony. We commit ourselves to God by being born again.

We continue to Love and experience our spouse until death do us part. We continue to Love and experience God on a deeper level daily until death brings us into eternal fellowship.

This is a great mystery “Christ and His church” the Groom and His bride.

People divorce because they become bored with each other. They stop learning or experiencing each other to a greater level each day.

Many believers become bored with the Christian faith because by either teaching or unbelief they stop learning or experiencing (in the spirit) about their Father in Heaven.

God is a rewarder of those who “diligently seek Him” and that reward is a closer experience with Him. More of His non-optional Spirit. We should be like Jesus: “Filled with out measure” with the Holy Spirit.

Then we will see the revelation of God that He wants us to have to “possess the land”, set people free, and turn the world upside down.

Love

J&E in Tn