Who is God?

“What you think about God is the most important thing about you.”- AW Tozier. Some of us don’t believe in the God of the bible for different reasons. May I kindly invite you to open your heart to listen to the God I’ve come to know, and trust and love?

Transcript

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Hello everyone, uh my name is Daniela. If you're on this channel and you watch my other videos, um you will assume that I love talking about a lot of things, but I really love talking about Jesus and the Bible. And um it's because Jesus has changed my life, and that's what this podcast is about. It's a podcast to know Jesus and to understand all that he has for us. So in the on this podcast, I expect to hear more of like teachings. Um I am I find have found that my spiritual gift, one of my spiritual gifts um in building the church is teaching. And um I will use that, I will practice that as I share with you what God, what the Holy Spirit, um, I believe the Holy Spirit wants me to teach all of us. Yes. And so I want to start first this episode with asking with sharing with you um a quote, and that quote is what you think about God is the most important thing about you. And this quote it comes from A. W. Tozer from his book, The Knowledge of the Holy. And in that book, he argues that part of the reason why, maybe the main reason why, there are many problems in this world, it's because we don't really know God. And he doesn't just talk about having heard of God. In the Bible, there are different depths to knowing something. There is recognizing, there is seeing it, and there's experiencing that thing, and there's also, I think the deepest one is through intimacy, and that's usually seen in relationships. Uh, and so I want us to know him, and um to echo Paul the Apostle in Philippians chapter three, he says, I want to know him in his suffering and know the power of his resurrection. And I recognize as well that some people don't believe in the God of the Bible for different reasons, but may I just in gently invite you to open your heart to hear the God that I have come to know, to love, and to trust, which has been a process. He's been very gentle with me. Uh, I believe that we listen to a plethora of voices, and those voices actually give some concrete advice, and some advice have transformed my life. But for some reason, the more I listen to those voices, the more overwhelmed, emotionally exhausted, fearful almost, and at some point I feel behind, confused, and it also feels like I have to betray a part a part of me to fit into this mold. But yet, for some reason, every time I spend time with this God, every by through reading his word, and every time I I I under I hear what he has to tell me, I feel like I'm at home. It feels like it's where I'm supposed to be. I actually feel more grounded, I feel more at peace, I feel more like me. And when I really got to know him for myself, not the way the church portrays him to be, although the church does uh preach some biblical and theologically based sermons, and not even the way people around me portray him, it's when I really got to know him from his word and I got to discover his wisdom. I've come to see that he is the fulfillment of my heart's desire. As the book of Psalms says, he is the desire of the nations. When our heart cries out for something, we are actually crying out for him. As Augustine says, our hearts, he says it better. This is a paraphrase version, the Daniela version of Augustine's words. He says, Our hearts do not find rest until they find their rest in you. And that's what I found. Let me tell you a little bit of what he's done in my life. He's delivered me from guilt and fear. And uh, as a follower of Jesus, just a little bracket, you will hear me say the term follower of Jesus and not Christian, because I've come to see that the word Christian has lost its meaning. It's almost derogatory and it doesn't really exemplify the character of Christ. Instead, you will hear me say the words follower of Jesus because that's how the early followers of Jesus call themselves. They call themselves followers of the way. And funny thing is, I don't know if you knew, um, the outside world actually called the followers of the way Christians. It wasn't themselves. And that's what I'm gonna reference myself to be as an apprentice or a disciple of Jesus. I don't want to be someone who just knows him and says I believe in him, but do not follow his teachings. And that's what this podcast is about: following uh his way through the giftings and the lessons that I believe the Holy Spirit is sharing and inviting me to share with you. So this God has delivered me from fear and guilt. And as a follower of Jesus, the the great thing about it is that it just doesn't belong to me anymore. It does not, and I used to know it more intellectually in my head, but when I actually messed up or when something scary occurred, I feared and I cowered within myself. But now I'm starting to really believe that in my body. He also has given me a reason to keep going and to live when times are hard. This God also has given me hope in moments of tragedy. He has given me peace, supernatural peace that cannot come from this world. And he has strengthened me when I felt at my weakest. And more importantly, he has given me a vision, a hopeful vision for who I am supposed to be in him. When I'm overwhelmed, when times are hard, I he is the place I can stand on. And that's the God that I want you to know personally, and the thing as well, the great thing about this is that he wants you to know him too. And perhaps you have found all the things that I've listed, you know, not feeling guilt anymore, not feeling shame anymore, and even having a hopeful vision through different things and different means. May I just gently invite you today? No, may I just gently inform you actually that this God is different from anyone and anything you've ever encountered. I promise He is like no one else you've ever encountered. In fact, he calls himself Yahweh, and that word means I am who I am. I am like no one else. You cannot put me in a box. I'm I am in a class all by myself. And I love talking about that because that's the basis of my faith. That's the basis of what makes me me and what keeps me going. And uh speaking of God being like no one else you've ever encountered, this God is He who transforms you into who you were made to be. Jesus is the way out of slavery, out of our bondage. He's also the way through in our journey out of bondage. Because you know, there's some people who just show you, okay, the way is over there, but they don't walk you through the path. Jesus will be there with you. And he's also not only the way in our deliverance, he he's the one who guides us through every single Jesus is the one who guides us in every single stage of our healing and of our freedom. In fact, it shows, illustrates that all throughout scripture, but um one of the main passages that it shows this theme in is in the book of Isaiah, uh, chapter 35, verses 8 through 10. It talks about a highway where sorrow, let me actually read the last few um sections, he says, they will enter Zion with singing, everlasting joy will crown their heads, gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee away. On paper, it looks too good to be true, but as I was reading um in Isaiah chapter 35, we see that God is God does not rejoice when we're sorrowful, and He wants us to be free. I'm going to conclude this episode with sharing with you the qualities and the attributes of this God. And my invitation for us as we conclude this episode is for you to just listen and then see if there's an attribute of God that speaks to you. I invite you to lean in and to, out of faith, invite God to come into your life. You don't need to pray a long prayer, you do not need to even fully understand the complexities of what the attribute means. But if there's an attribute that you're like, oh, I wish someone was that to me right now, I need some of that right now. You know what I mean? Like you see someone drink something or eat something really good, and you're like, wow, this looks really good. This type of food looks good. If there's a word or something that kind of is like, I really need that, just receive it, and I just invite you to pray that it does not need to be poetic, God does not need poets, God needs real and vulnerable people who are in need of Him. The first attribute of God is that He is our deliverer. In Psalm 70, verse 5, we see this word, this theme, that God is He who delivers us from all things, and that He keeps us from anything He does not have for us because He's a good father. He's a father to those who accept Him and accept His Son's sacrifice and accept him as Lord, which I will talk about later on. This God is also our redeemer. In Isaiah chapter 12, verse 2, we see that it's he who buys us again for the purposes of restoration. You know, there's people in our lives that have used us as means to an end, but this God, when he buys you, he bought you again through his son's sacrifice, he buys you again for the purposes of restoring you back to who you really are. This God is also a restorer. In Psalm 23, verse 3, it says that he restores our soul, he restores us completely, and he is also our strength when we are weak, when we don't know what to do. When we are weak, um he strengthens us. And we see that in um Isaiah chapter 12, verse 2. In Proverbs 3, verse 6, we see that he's our guide. He says, Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways, acknowledge him, and he will make your path straight. I'm in the stage of my life where I'm like, God, if you don't guide me, I'm gonna lose it. And so he has been showing me that he's my guide. In the book of Isaiah, chapter 9, it tells us that he is our wonderful counselor. We have counselors in our lives, and this word counselor is not necessarily therapist counselor, it's more of someone that has a grand master plan for something, and it's gonna blow your mind away, which I like things that are bigger than me. And so if you've been lacking purpose, he promises to be your wonderful counselor. He's also our peace. Um, in Philippians chapter 4, verse 7, we call him the God of peace. And in moments where nothing in our lives makes sense, we hear things on the news, everything in our lives is crushing in, and we can't even think or breathe correctly, his peace that surpasses all understanding, guards our hearts and mind in his son, Christ Jesus. In Proverbs, in Proverbs 18, 10, it lets us know that this God is our strong tower, that when we turn to him for protection, he promises to give us shelter. And we see him accomplish that through the lives of his chosen ones, David, and many other people. In 1 Corinthians chapter 1, verse 24, it lets us know that he is our wisdom. When we lack it, he promises to give it in abundance, as the book of James tells us. And that he is our everlasting father. In Isaiah chapter 9, verse 6, it lets us know that he is forever, he is eternal. And I don't know what wounds you have when it revolves around the word father, but may I just gently tell you today that you have a heavenly father who is like no one else. And I know that it's sometimes it's easy to project our hurts and our pains from other people onto this holy God, but the good news is that he's different, he's different. Give him a chance to introduce himself to you today, and he has a lot more names, these are just a few that have given me comfort in these moments and this moment of my life, and the way that we have a relationship with this God, the way we really get to know all that he is and experience him, it's through accepting his sacrifice. There are three persons in this God. I'm still understanding the Trinity. So if you want to correct me in the comments, please feel free to do so. I'm no expert, but I am a curious disciple of Jesus and I want to get this correctly. But the scriptures show us that um that we have there's God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, and they're all one, same attributes, still all of them are kind, gentle, every, they're all the same, but they're different. And so the Father has a they all they have God has a standard of holiness that is different from our standard of holiness. And so when we hurt each other, when we curse his name, when we hurt our neighbor, when we kill um uh other people, when we lie to one another, we are sinning, which we are missing the mark that God has for us. And so God in his holiness, he's a God of justice, he has to punish, and he's looking for people to punish. He should have punished me, but guess what he did? He's too kind, he sent his son. He asks, it's as if like imagine God the Father asking himself, who should I I need to punish something, I need to pour out my wrath for justice because these human beings are ruining my good planet, but I don't want to ruin them, I don't I don't want to hurt them, I don't, I don't want to banish them from my presence forever. I want them to experience me because they were made for me. And so he sends his son Jesus so that he can be sin who knew no sin, so that we can become the righteousness of God. And when we accept Jesus, we get what Jesus deserved. And everything that happens to Jesus happens to us. And so that's what the scripture says. We die with Jesus and we are resurrected with him. And when we accept him, when we confess our sins to God, telling God, God, I messed up, God, I know that I have sinned. The Bible calls us being a sinner, someone who sins, and I have missed the mark of your holiness, but I know that you're good and I know that you're forgiving. And so, God, right now I ask that you may come into my life, that you may transform me, help me receive your son sacrifice. I invite you as not just savior, but as the master of my life. And let me tell you, God is a good master, he's not like any master you've ever seen, and he will guide you, he will lead you, but more importantly, he will lead you to himself, which is what you were made for. And so, who is this God to you? That is my invitation for you today. Remember that while you think about this God is the most important thing about you. I invite you to do what uh the book of Psalms says, to be still and to know that he is God. If you know God already, I invite you to comb through these and iron these into your heart. Pray the reality of his character and let that transform you and lead you to him. Uh, blessings, everyone. I pray that the Lord may bless you and keep you, and that he may keep his face shining upon you, and that you may receive his peace and his hope. It's available to you. Blessings, everyone. Bye.