Discussion: Attributes of God

Thank you for my brother Andy to always be prepared Thank you

You are fortress our refuge Here and listen help us to Needed in our lives

So as we've been doing, you know, we've looked out a couple of men I was thinking again this morning how

There's a tendency at times as you start to look at different characteristics with different attributes of God that we begin to Compartment eyes them and and we should not right because if you think about it, they're all they're all

Attributes of God in absolute perfection and and they all kind of link together, right? So if God is omnipotent, well, then that leads us to the reality that That he's omnipresent if he's omnipresent and that leads to the reality that he's omniscient

And that's what we're gonna look at this morning. And then maybe if we have time, we'll look at the goodness of God because that is another character of God that that I think many times becomes overlooked or not looked at enough the fact that God is good and and That's something that many many people, you know that basic conversation that people have

Is man basically good or is he basically evil and you know, it's it's really kind of hard to convince people that Men are basically evil, right?

it really goes against the flow of this world because this world really wants to say that that God is is is

That man is basically good and Well, I'll tell you what reading a newspaper kind of Shoots that down and just just listen.

I'm just reading last night about another mass killing in In California, right?

Yeah, some guy shot up another Some ballroom or something like that and the other day somebody shot up a mauler

Just it just goes on and on and on but anyway So I want to look at the omni omniscience of God this morning and again

Hooking them all together or linking them all together in a way that we can get a better view and a better understanding of this

God that we worship and I just don't think that we ever really To me it's it's expansive for me to think these this way isn't it something that that you and I Can contemplate a

God who is beyond ultimately? Understanding in full

That that's a glorious truth when you think about it that that God Surpasses all our thoughts, but as far as the omniscience or the omnipresence of God, let me

Let me read a little bit of what Sproul said because I thought it was pretty good He said this when we speak of God's omnipresence.

We usually mean that his presence is in all places there is no place where God is not yet as Spirit God does not occupy any place in the sense that physical

Objects occupy space. He has no physical qualities that can occupy space

The key to understanding this is that is in terms of another dimension and we talked about this that God is is

Have being the great other he's able to God is ever

Present and God is ever present in absolute completeness and so, you know as we think about that and then we move into this thought of that that God is the

God who Knows all that is something that I think becomes

Astounding the more we think about it. Here's what I was thinking I was thinking about if you think about the complexity of the world we live in And then you think of the diversity of the world we live in And then we we add to that the reality that that God knows it all

He doesn't know most of it. He doesn't know 99 % of God knows it all because he's ever -present, right?

And if you think about that, but but just from that from those two standpoints of both the diversity that we see in the world

We'll just take our own lives so there's only a couple of us sitting here and yet we live such diverse lives, don't we

From the simplest things to the most complex things You just take it in in what people do on Thanksgiving everybody has something different and everybody has a different palette and everybody has different tastes and everybody has

Does it this way in that way and and you think about that and then you add to it the complexity of it all and Yet God knows every single aspect of it and and again to to to my way of thinking that is of such

Magnitude that I really struggle. I struggle with it I don't know how it is with you, but I and I don't mean struggling the wrong way

I mean struggle in a way that it's just it's so amazing. I find myself more and more

Saying God, are you really that big and and I and I don't know if that's

Not saying it in the right way, but have you ever thought that God are you really that are you that big and that immense and that that you not only

Are all powerful, but you and all present but you all knowing and Again to me and you know, the scriptures are very clear about that I was thinking about that verse in Acts which says known unto

God from all eternity or all his works known to God from All eternity or all his works or he knows the end from the beginning in the beginning from the end

And we were talking this morning right and I don't know why but I've been thinking lately how long do

I get to live What's what's the day that's been a member of which

I asked what Job said right the God had appointed a day for him and God knows exactly what day it is and There's there's a sense of comfort to me in that But there's a sense of awe

That that rises out of me and and you know and I know brother Bert you and I had talked about this a couple weeks ago that these are the very things that So many people spend so little time

Considering. I mean we'll we'll talk about and I'm not opposed to it

We'll talk about well What this means what that means in the

Bible and and We'll try to interpret certain things And those things are great in and I think we should right

We should search the scriptures out to see if if the things that we believe is so But I do think that many times we just bypass the very things that Are The anchor are the things that hold us the rock solid things that just like it said when

Jesus said Those that built the house on the rock They don't they don't fall they stand and again,

I'm not opposed to it, but I do think something like this that If you were to sit and to just meditate on the fact that God knows everything

About everybody in Totality and then throw if you want throw another layer on it and say

God not only knows everything about everybody in this country But God knows everything about everybody in this whole world

And then if you want take that and throw another layer on top of it and say no God knows everything from about everybody from every culture and in time past and and And again, you can just continually

I think of it I don't know if you guys why I know you you remember color forms

You remember how? You you don't know what I'm talking about. Yeah. Okay.

Do you do you? Remember Yeah, yeah and used to be able to take these little figures and put them put characters on the on the

It was like a sticky kind of thing. And so you would have they had animals and And the thing about it that was you can continually add layer on top of layer on top of layer and then pull them off It was it was like magnetic.

It wasn't it was like stickers sister but anyway, they used to sell cold forms and they always had a subject matter whether it would be the jungle or Little Jill and whatever whatever it was

But but I think about that and I think about at times when we think about this fact that God not only knows the end from the beginning but in absolute totality

Did that truly is it just you can add layer on top of layer not only that but think about it from Well How about in the future?

How about in eternity? How about when we cross the river? How about when? Does not

God know exactly? Everything that's going to take place in eternity

Is it is he again? Is he that big? is he truly one who is not only all -powerful, but all -knowing and and As we consider it and as we think of it and I thought of what it says right and it's familiar to us

But in this context my thoughts are not your thoughts and neither are my ways your ways So my thoughts are higher than your thoughts and my ways are higher than your ways.

And so when you think about that and you think about the reality of of how

God knows everything and it really should be the

I Think it should be We can discuss it for me.

I think it ought to be the thrust if you will of our personal study not not just that God is but who

God is and that the more that we can grow in the knowledge and Learn the height and the depth and the length and the breadth of the love of God which is in Christ Jesus that the more we will become able to Function and not only function but prosper, you know and Again, maybe maybe it's a different way for for different people.

But for me, I I've always found meditating on the very character of God to be not only challenging but comforting and and Causing me to to want to know more of him

Again not just merely what the scriptures say about him, but to really kind of sit and meditate

Do you think that that people actually? Do that? Brother But I tell you

I think this worldly life robs us a lot of a lot of that contemplation

Because we're so tied right now. We don't like to admit that but we are we're tied

Sure in many forms and in many ways. Yep, and sometimes I don't

And then others I think think I think of it out of drudgery so much and I can't believe our

Christian could look at it That way right. It's eternity, man. Yeah I mean you're talking about something that we have little

God has just decided not to tell us that much about right, right and and yet we can anticipate it with an

Expectation right, but I do think you're right. This world has a way of kind of diluting or stealing from us just The reality of not only that God is but who he is

Yeah Absolutely, it's a draw to to Because he's he's inexhaustible and and many things in this world that they are there they

There's an end to it. There's a there's a finality about it. But when we think about God, there is no finality.

There is no Getting to the point where you could say I got this Because God cannot be gotten and certainly we've looked at scriptures like that Right that he dwells in the light that no man can approach and and in those different things

And so I do think there is a deficiency when it comes to people contemplating the being of God and and the

The fact that he is everything in absolute perfection and so, you know you read something like In Ezekiel 11, it says

That he knows the things that come into your mind. I find myself more and more

It's just the four of us. I don't know we're on We're on air so I got to be a little bit I find myself more and more confessing my thoughts

In in I always did but I find myself more the more

I consider the immensity of God and the greatness of God and ultimately his character and his being in the goodness of God and the holiness of God, I find myself more and more struggling with my own thoughts

Because they're so small they're so They're so worldly I'm not trying to say

I'm well I'm in center and needed to save you right and so but I think that's part of maturity, right?

I do think we should become just like it says where John the

Baptist said it that He must increase and we must decrease right and I wonder if sometimes if people really consider that as In order to see him clearer we have to see ourselves clearer and the more we see ourselves

Man I'll tell you It's ugly to look at yourself. I don't know how it is for and then

I wonder sometimes the mighty only one is doing this No, right because that's really the

Christian walk is to get to the point where God becomes the all -in -all and That's the problem with religion right because religion just won't do it you were talking about, you know, the

Roman Catholicism aspect of it Those kinds of things never really lead you they lead you to a system

They don't lead you to a person Right and when you don't have someone to look to but rather you're looking at something

It changes it. So, you know all these attributes of God and all these characteristics that we

Seek to understand concerning God and I think The more you learn especially knowing he's

Eternal knowing that he's he knows all things. He's all things Doesn't learn he doesn't learn anything pretty normal things, right but Increases it the more you learn.

I mean in our society man. We're so self -sufficient as men We can we can do things and we a lot of times we just like we try to figure things out our own, right?

Yeah, when we instead of going to God and I'm just terrible at this instead of going God first Cindy gets mad at me

I try to figure it out first and do that kind of thing first and then When nothing works because it's not supposed to work.

I go to God right last resort I think I would knowing the study right knowing here or helps increase our faith.

Yes with him. Yeah Yeah Yes, we do

Yeah Yeah, I think you're right when you say it that way and that's one of the tendencies of our own hearts right it's to say either

I can't figure it out Lord. So I need your help now Or I got this and I don't really need you at this moment, right?

I'll call on you when when it gets really rough and and you you begin to think about that and then you think about Something like that that God knows the end from the beginning and God knows

Look, what does the psalm say in Psalm 139 says? I I know the thoughts that come into your mind every single one of them and there's not a word on my mouth

Did you haven't already? considered and I believe so.

I really do. I think that that's part of the sanctification process that You know,

I was reading I've been reading just for whatever reason one of the things I've been doing I've been reading through 2nd Samuel again

And I was reading in chapter I want to say it's either 13 or 14

But I was reading where David continued to go out in battle and It was one thing after another was the

Philistines and then there was this nation in that nation But there was two times in that chapter.

I think it's chapter 13 2nd Samuel 13 where it says the Lord preserved

David wherever he went And and then I read a couple more verses

He fought a couple more people and then it said the Lord preserved David wherever he went

And I thought about that and I thought about the context of the reality that God knows the end from the beginning and God knows all things and again, such a

Such a marvelous thought and to your point How often is we neglect that we shoot right past that it's almost like we're going so fast and so hard That we don't even stop to consider

That he not only knows but that he cares for us Right casting all our cares on him for he what he cares for us

And he's just as much as he preserved David Is he's preserving me and preserving you and preserving you and preserving you and preserving all his people and such again, these kinds of thoughts are not easy to Maybe let me ask you this way.

Did you ever get to the point where you almost have to say What I can't

Handle anymore right this moment It's like it's you know, people call it like an epiphany

People say I had an epiphany, but I've gotten and I can't say many times in my life

But there have been times in my own personal life Where I've almost had to say Lord It's it's too much to me at this point and and and then

Be careful what you ask for Yeah Usually you just go and then you want it back, right?

But there's this reality and again things like this that God knows the very thoughts of our mind and our heart and Descriptions really kind of settle us down In that great that that's what the scriptures in part that's what it does

Would you and I say that we become more and more settled as we go on with the

Lord? as we press on and Where's it in Hosea where it says?

That we press on in knowing the Lord Trying to think of that scripture

It's in my Hosea 4 or 5 where it says we'll press on in the knowledge of God and and and the more you do

That the more you become Yeah, you looking it up brother

Yeah Yes Yes, yes If you looked up knowledge it probably well,

I'm gonna find it now because It says Go forward or something something of that nature.

I know it's in there now. Isn't that cool? That's I don't know about you, but I do that, right? Do you do that?

Yeah, when something comes into your mind and then you can't remember exactly where it is. You got to go find it

You got to have it Yeah, it's in but it but it's what it's really talking about is the fact of Press it on in the knowledge of God and now

I'm gonna One of my biggest struggles as far as lack of faith is

Leaving Putting my my boys in the hands of God and me not trying to control every aspect of their life

That's it Good no, yeah, just go, you know, just not putting not putting my boys in the hands of the

Lord and me trying to Direct their lives and sir, what and whatever I do, you know, you can't do this here

You can't do that and they're grown men, right and I'm still trying to do stuff, right? Cuz I because I wonder and then in me personally,

I wonder like where did I go wrong with it? Because I was in the military. I was gone so much. Hmm that my boys turned out the way they were

Yeah, you know because they're brought up man, you know Christian. Yeah, and I know you yeah, you have the same stuff going on but um just Put him in the

Lord's hand. It's just tough because It's almost like I think at times we almost want it.

We're almost trying to coach God Like Lord, I know you're in control, but but here's my suggestion right and it always leads to Life being easier for me.

Yeah, absolutely And there are there issues makes my life hard or good

Because it involves all it always involves us it's because it again ultimately it's

It really is what we want right, not what we need but what we we want and so Again at times

I do think we try to coach God, but that's your right sister. That's what it is It says six months has come and let us return to the

Lord for he is torn, but he will heal us He has stricken but he will bind us up after two days he will revive us on the third day

He will raise us up that we may live in his sight. Let us know Let us pursue the knowledge of the

Lord is going forth is established as the morning And he will come to us like the rain that that scripture about Let us pursue the knowledge of God And again not knowing about God knowing

God Right to that point of what Jesus said, this is life eternal what to know you?

The only true God in Jesus Christ whom you sent and so when you think about these things And I agree what you're saying and and it's a comfort to me to hear other people at times confess that they struggle with the same things that I'm struggling with right because it helped because I do think the devil

Wants to separate us right and if he could separate us by making us think that we are oddballs in our thoughts

Well good, then he's already accomplished what his purpose is and that is to separate us but when we start talking about these things and we start talking about the realities of how this fight goes on within us and We are honest about it rather than dishonest or hiding it and you begin to think about all those things and I can really relate to what you just said as far as We are at times trying to Make things happen right and We'll use sometimes we'll use any means

Right to whatever to get to that end but it is really a selfish and because is it really for God's glory or is it for Your comfort your peace your sense of that exactly of getting rid of anxiety

You know, and I think we all have that in certain ways and yet God knows all of that He knows

Not only does he know the end He knows the means To that end right in the most minutest detail

You know, I think it's enjoy I know it's a joke where it says that God knows when when the deer gives birth

In the on the top of the mountain or to go gives birth on the top of the mountain. No one else knows

But God knows And again those kinds of thoughts I don't know how it is

It almost lifts me off the ground of this world because again this world has so much

Of gravity to kind of pull us down and and when you can escape if you will

Into the very presence of God to contemplate him and his character and his being

It is something that I think a lot of people they miss They don't enjoy maybe

I put it that way don't enjoy God They might worship God they might serve

God they might obey God, but but how many people truly enjoy the fact that God is who he is and again,

I Don't know Yeah And it's true and and I'm not saying you special I think that that what does it say and I say it says you will keep them in And I was thinking about this last night because I was troubled about something you will keep them in perfect Peace whose mind is stayed on me because you trust me and then

I started to I was thinking okay So I don't have peace right now, and I didn't have peace at the moment

But I was contemplating and then I said, okay So is that not a promise of God that he will keep me in perfect peace?

Whose mind is stayed on you because I trusted him so that means what work backwards that means

I'm not trusting him And the result of that is I can't find peace And again, a lot of it is because I'm still trying to insert my will my desire my end gold my agenda right and just doesn't

In that sense God doesn't bend like we've been and God doesn't you know, he is

He is Unchangeable and again that goes back to the very attributes of God And so when you think about that,

I thought about this it says in 1st Samuel It says for the Lord is the God of knowledge

Not not any knows all knowledge the knowledge that knows when the deer gives birth on it on the mountain, right

The knowledge to know that when I was thinking about for whatever reason

I think about when my dog's gonna die I Mean she's 11 years old and she's got some issues and whatnot

God knows exactly the end of that right, he knows when the bird falls from the sky and When you consider those things

It kind of flattens Some of the tension away at least for me it does

And so again, that's why I think that as we consider who God is great is the Lord and mighty in power and then in Psalm 147 5 it says his understanding is infinite

That's exactly what it says. This great is our Lord and mighty in power and his understanding is infinite

And when you and I think about that and consider it Take it from two standpoints

Take it from the believers standpoint take it from the standpoint of having not only

An understanding of who God is but then and on top of it that he's for us If God before us who could be against us and again the bigger

God gets and Then the reality of if God before us who could be against us that grows at the same time, right?

They're hooked together and Then you think about it from an unbelieving standpoint I know we've talked about this and I think all of us where would how could you live?

In a world and not know God Right. Just think about that.

How many people do not know God and what it must be like and again

It's like once the lights are on How you begin to understand how could it be that people dwell in darkness

And not only do they dwell in darkness But it says they love the darkness and you're more content in the darkness than they are in the light and yet the light is

So spectacular Why would anybody not want to come?

to a God of infinite power a God of Infinite worth a

God of all goodness and Just to me again, it's

It becomes more it becomes more and more of a One put it this way

Walking with God is a journey, isn't it? It truly is and the more you the more you grow in it and Even unknown to ourselves at times we become

Fuller in our appreciation of who God is, right? If you had to measure on a scale and I I try to think about things like this if I had to measure on a

Scale, how often do I really think about God? I'm not saying that You go around 24 hours every second and you're fully conscious of it

But but the reality is how many times when you drift do you drift to the

Lord? rather than from the Lord And to your point where you I think you were saying before this world has a way

About taking us and drifting us away from the very attributes of God in the very character of God and Don't we

We think there's some well, there's just innocence in social media there's innocence in communication

Innocence and all this but yeah, there is some but you know

Like a hammer it can be used to hammer a nail or be the person to death. Yeah It just depends. Yeah, you know what you're doing with it

I'm afraid even as Christians were not doing what we should be doing with it. I Mean I asked my kids my high school kids how much time they spend on social media or video games

You realize it's four to five hours a day And we wonder why they're that generation is like They're numb.

Yeah, they're numb. They have no comprehension of life much less

God much less God to the point right like EJ or are you weary not so much but EJ he's a gamer.

He loves that stuff It just infiltrates his life, right? He just loves it. And that's our fault because we're in charge of it

So we I like another day I got convicted with this with his gaming I got convicted like dude you got you

We're not we're gonna read we're gonna read we're gonna read an hour or 20 minutes 30 minutes hour

What every day and get off that thing, right and then like last night I taught yesterday.

I told him Not roadblocks could be already kicked him off roadblocks for that's bad But what's your little bit?

Minecraft The stuff that they taught I was I was he fell asleep and he was watching some minecraft and he had these commentaries

I don't know if you've seen it, but you may not have but they these grown men Usually like 20 sweater there.