SPEAKER_00: John chapter four.
SPEAKER_00: We have been preaching through the Baptist Catechism, and all that is just a simple uh it's just a structure of questions and answers.
SPEAKER_00: And this morning I want to take up a topic that I have never preached on before.
SPEAKER_00: The title of my message today is What is God?
SPEAKER_00: And yes, you heard that right.
SPEAKER_00: Not who is God or what is God's will, but rather what is God.
SPEAKER_00: You know, when you and I think about God, we often think about his attributes.
SPEAKER_00: We think about his holiness, his wisdom, his sovereignty, that he has all power, that we think about the fact that he is uh just, that he's merciful, that these are God's attributes.
SPEAKER_00: This morning I want to take up and look at the topic of what is God?
SPEAKER_00: Well, Brother Josh, why would we take up a subject like that?
SPEAKER_00: Why would we preach on something like that?
SPEAKER_00: Brothers and sisters, in the Bible tells us what God is, and there's a lot that not only that we can learn from that, but it helps us to praise him more, to know him more, to glorify him more.
SPEAKER_00: That is our end goal.
SPEAKER_00: Because our whole life is supposed to be about the glory of God, and so it helps us to glorify him more.
SPEAKER_00: So the question is, what is God?
SPEAKER_00: And we want to start out this morning in John chapter 4.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna begin in verse 7.
SPEAKER_00: But the first point today is God is spirit.
SPEAKER_00: God is spirit.
SPEAKER_00: What does that mean?
SPEAKER_00: It means that Father, and we're specifically this morning, we're talking about the first person of the Trinity.
SPEAKER_00: We're talking about Father God, that God is spirit or a spirit.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, his form that he assumes is the form of a spirit.
SPEAKER_00: God does not have a physical, mortal body as Father God.
SPEAKER_00: We know that Jesus Christ is God made flesh.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: That it was Jesus Christ, you know, Jesus uh was when he was speaking to others, he said, If uh if you have seen me, you have seen the Father.
SPEAKER_00: So we know what the character of God, the personality of God, if God were made human being, what would God look like?
SPEAKER_00: What would God act like?
SPEAKER_00: What would God speak like?
SPEAKER_00: Well, that is the person of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: He is the express image of God made flesh or made man.
SPEAKER_00: And we know that God chose to enter into the world, you know, approximately 2,000 years ago in the person of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's the second person of the Trinity.
SPEAKER_00: Well, we also know about the Holy Spirit of God, who has been left after Christ ascended, and the Holy Spirit is the one who literally takes up residence inside the life of a believer, and he is the third person of the Trinity.
SPEAKER_00: So we are not talking about, in that sense, the person of Jesus Christ or the person of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: What we are talking about is what, again, not God's attributes that he's all-powerful, he's holy, he's just, he's righteous.
SPEAKER_00: No, we're talking about the being of God, of Father God.
SPEAKER_00: What form does he take?
SPEAKER_00: Does he choose to take?
SPEAKER_00: And according to the Bible, God is a spirit.
SPEAKER_00: So let's begin reading in John chapter 4, and we're going to see a conversation that Jesus Christ had with a woman at the well.
SPEAKER_00: Now, you will know that, uh, or maybe remember, that uh it was the practice of the Jews that they were, the Jew, the Jews as a people, were extremely prejudiced against the Samaritans.
SPEAKER_00: And they were a very, very prideful people.
SPEAKER_00: And the Samaritans were half Jews.
SPEAKER_00: Um, they were the Samaritan people, uh, one of their parents, either mother or father, would have either a Jewish father or a Jewish mother, and then their other parent would be a Gentile.
SPEAKER_00: And so therefore, the Jews looked down on the Samaritans as second-class citizens, that they were impure Jews, and the Jews were very, very prejudiced against the Samaritans, and the Jews, uh the Jewish people that were quote unquote all Jewish, they wouldn't have anything to do with the Samaritans, so much so that if a Jew were traveling and had to go uh in the direction of Samaria, typically they would go all the way around Samaria and not go through Samaria, even though it was a shorter route.
SPEAKER_00: And so they were that prejudiced against the Samaritans.
SPEAKER_00: Well, Jesus Christ in John chapter 4, that uh he mentioned that it says in uh John chapter 4, verse 4, and he must needs go through Samaria.
SPEAKER_00: Well, that would have been something very strange to the apostles, because most Jewish men, and especially a Jewish teacher, Jesus Christ being a rabbi, the word rabbi just simply means teacher, but him being a great teacher, that uh that would have been something that uh Jews would not have done.
SPEAKER_00: But here in John chapter 4, the Bible gives us account that it says in John 4.4, that uh, and he must needs go through Samaria.
SPEAKER_00: Well, why was it needful that Jesus go through Samaria?
SPEAKER_00: Well, he had a particular engagement, a particular date, a particular person that uh Jesus wanted to encounter, that he wanted to affect their life, to bless their life, to benefit their life.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus had an appointment with a person, him being uh God in the flesh, uh he there was a particular woman who was a Samaritan that he wanted to meet.
SPEAKER_00: And so that's what this uh story is about, a true story.
SPEAKER_00: So we'll begin reading there in John chapter 4, uh verse 4.
SPEAKER_00: And he must needs go through Samaria.
SPEAKER_00: Then cometh he to the city of Samaria, which is called Sikar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph.
SPEAKER_00: Now Joseph's well was there, in other words, a well that Joseph had dug.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus on the well, and it was about the sixth hour, that was noonday, that was high noon, it was the hottest part of the day.
SPEAKER_00: Now Jacob's well was there, Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus on the well, and it was about the sixth hour.
SPEAKER_00: There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water, Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink.
SPEAKER_00: So Jesus engaged with this woman at the well, and again, y'all know this story, and for time's sake we'll just kind of summarize some of this.
SPEAKER_00: That, you know, this woman was coming to the well at noonday, that would not have been done.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and this woman was coming by herself, that would not have been done.
SPEAKER_00: Uh why is that?
SPEAKER_00: Well, number one, for safety reasons.
SPEAKER_00: Women didn't travel by themselves.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, they also did not go during the hottest part of the day to do labor, that would have been illogical.
SPEAKER_00: Why would you uh why you know why wouldn't you go to the garden early in the morning and pick things during the cooler part of the day or late in the evening?
SPEAKER_00: Uh, you know, you would normally go in the morning to get your work done and get done before the sun was at its hottest part.
SPEAKER_00: So why was she going during uh noonday?
SPEAKER_00: Well, it's because this woman was not only a half Jew, she was a Samaritan and she was in Samaria, so she could have gone with the other women of Samaria the well, but she couldn't do that because she was a woman of ill repute.
SPEAKER_00: She was a woman who was not accepted among even the Samaritan women.
SPEAKER_00: So not only was she not accepted by Jewish women, she was not even accepted by Samaritan women, because we're going to learn in Jesus' encounter with this woman that she had had five husbands, and the lady and the man that she was living with now was not her husband.
SPEAKER_00: So this was a uh a woman of questionable character, as it were.
SPEAKER_00: We'll just leave it at that.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus was, you know, he must needs go through Samaria.
SPEAKER_00: He knew that he would meet this woman here at this hour, and it was his desire to minister her.
SPEAKER_00: And so he engaged her, he being dressed as a Jewish rabbi, a Jewish teacher, a Jewish man, uh, and now he asked this woman for a drink.
SPEAKER_00: A Jewish man would not have done that.
SPEAKER_00: Number one, he wouldn't have gone through Samaria, and number one, he would not have spoken with a Samaritan woman and asked for a drink.
SPEAKER_00: That would have been a no-no.
SPEAKER_00: That would have been a social taboo, that the Jews would have viewed them as unclean, and then uh just by social uh uh it would have been like a uh man going into a city and uh interacting with a woman who was very scantily dressed on a street corner, and uh, in other words, a man who could obviously tell that this lady is a prostitute or this lady is a woman of terrible character, uh, a man of reputation would not have wanted to quote unquote interact with somebody like that.
SPEAKER_00: And so here is Jesus, the godly Jewish teacher, who purposely is interacting with this woman.
SPEAKER_00: So that's the stage being set.
SPEAKER_00: So he says to the woman of Samaria, or the the woman, after he says, you know, give me to drink, for the disciples were gone away in the city to buy meat.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus was staying here resting.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 9, then saith the woman of Samaria unto him, How is it that thou being a Jew askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria?
SPEAKER_00: Question mark, for the Jews have no dealing with the Samaritans.
SPEAKER_00: She understood, she understood that it was not uh socially appropriate for him to ask her to drink.
SPEAKER_00: You know, you don't have anything to do with us.
SPEAKER_00: You consider us to be dogs, you consider us to be unclean.
SPEAKER_00: Why are you talking to me?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, that's him, by the way, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink, thou wouldest as ask of him, and he would have given thee living water.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, if you knew who I was, you would want to be here, and you would be asking of me to give you to drink.
SPEAKER_00: Basically, he was telling her that, look, I'm the Messiah, I'm the Savior of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: If you knew who I was, you would be asking me for help, not me just asking you for a drink.
SPEAKER_00: He wanted to interact with this woman.
SPEAKER_00: And by the way, isn't that a beautiful thing?
SPEAKER_00: Uh this is a real encounter that our real Savior had with this woman.
SPEAKER_00: And she was a lady of ill repute, of lesser character, and he went to her.
SPEAKER_00: Brothers and sisters, the Lord comes to you and I as sovereign God, and he knows exactly who you and I are.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: He's not coming to good folks, he's coming to folks like me and folks like you, amen.
SPEAKER_00: And you and I are the woman at the well.
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't come to good folks.
SPEAKER_00: You know, the Pharisees thought that they were better than everybody else.
SPEAKER_00: Well, Jesus said they're whitewashed sepulchres, that those people are uh those are graves full of dead men's bones.
SPEAKER_00: Those men don't want to have anything to do with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Instead, he goes to this lady who by the Jewish people is considered a dog.
SPEAKER_00: He purposely came to her to save her, to give her knowledge of himself.
SPEAKER_00: How merciful, how gracious, how wonderful, how beautiful.
SPEAKER_00: And that's exactly what he's done for you and I.
SPEAKER_00: And he meets us where we are, he meets us as an outcast in noonday when society has said, I don't want anything to do with that old throwaway person.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus says, I that throwaway person is one of mine.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: How beautiful is that.
SPEAKER_00: And you and I are the throwaway persons.
SPEAKER_00: So was she.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus was showing her grace and mercy.
SPEAKER_00: So the woman saith unto him, Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep.
SPEAKER_00: For whence then hast thou this living water?
SPEAKER_00: In other words, she's being very practical.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have anything to draw water out of the well.
SPEAKER_00: How are you going to give me water?
SPEAKER_00: Art thou greater than our father Jacob, which gave us the well and drank thereof himself, and his children and his cattle?
SPEAKER_00: In other words, are you a man that's greater than Jacob that actually dug this well?
SPEAKER_00: Well, the answer to that question is yes.
SPEAKER_00: He is absolutely a man that's greater than Jacob.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus answered and said to her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again.
SPEAKER_00: You know, you're going to have to come time and time again to get physical water.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 14, but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst, but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up unto everlasting life.
SPEAKER_00: Well, now her interest is piqued.
SPEAKER_00: The woman said to him, Sir, give me this water that I thirst not, neither come hither to draw, but she still doesn't fully understand.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, well, you know, you're telling me all these things.
SPEAKER_00: Well, give me this water that you have.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus saith unto her, Go call thy husband and come hither.
SPEAKER_00: Well, we'll we'll tell him about this water too.
SPEAKER_00: The woman answered and said, I have no husband.
SPEAKER_00: Well, Jesus saith unto her, Thou hast well said, I have no husband.
SPEAKER_00: For thou hast had five husbands, and he whom thou now hast is not thy husband, in that sayest thou truly.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, you're living with a man that's not even your husband, and you've had five previous husbands.
SPEAKER_00: He said, So you answered well when you said you have no husband, because you're you're shacking up with a man.
SPEAKER_00: You're you're living in sin with a man.
SPEAKER_00: So you did answer truthfully when you said you do not have a husband.
SPEAKER_00: Well, then the woman said, Well, you know, she's thinking in her mind, well, how does this man know this?
SPEAKER_00: The woman said to him, Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet.
SPEAKER_00: That thou hast knowledge that you that most normal men don't have.
SPEAKER_00: So you're not a normal man.
SPEAKER_00: So then she goes on to say, Well, since I perceive that you're a prophet and that you have knowledge that other men don't have, she said, Our fathers worshiped in this mountain that's in the background here, near this Jacob's well, the mountain that's near Samaria.
SPEAKER_00: Our fathers worshiped in this mountain.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, talking about her non-Jewish side of her lineage, that they had high places and they had places of worship that were near there.
SPEAKER_00: And she said, And ye say, in other words, him being a Jew, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus saith unto her, woman, believe me, the hour cometh when ye shall neither in this mountain where your relatives say, nor yet at Jerusalem worship the Father.
SPEAKER_00: And so in other words, there's coming a time when you don't have to go to that specific high place, or you don't have to specifically go to Jerusalem in order to worship Almighty God.
SPEAKER_00: So he said to the woman, verse 22, ye worship, ye know not what.
SPEAKER_00: We know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, look, in your Gentile lineage, y'all worship butterflies and birds and the sun and the beasts, and in other words, you don't know what you worship.
SPEAKER_00: Y'all are all over the place.
SPEAKER_00: Y'all, wherever the wind blows, that's what y'all are worshiping.
SPEAKER_00: And all these pagan forms of belief, y'all have worshiped every thing literally under the sun.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, the Jews, we actually know what we worship, because God set up his temple at Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: So we know that we are quote unquote worshiping the one true and living God.
SPEAKER_00: But he says, verse 23, but the hour cometh and now is when the true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth.
SPEAKER_00: For the Father seeketh such to worship him.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 24.
SPEAKER_00: Here's your first point of what God is.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said about his father, he says, God is a spirit, and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.
SPEAKER_00: The woman saith unto him, I know that Messiah cometh, which is called Christ.
SPEAKER_00: When he is come, he will tell us all things.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am He.
SPEAKER_00: I am Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, he revealed himself to her, and we know it's a wonderful thing, and she went and told everybody else in the community about it.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord saved this wayward woman.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: But the part of that that I wanted to get is when Jesus is talking about his Father, he says in verse 24 that God is a spirit.
SPEAKER_00: What that means is, is that, again, now this is different than the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: What Jesus is talking about is the form that Father God has chosen to take.
SPEAKER_00: God is a spirit.
SPEAKER_00: And what does that mean?
SPEAKER_00: It means that God Himself, Father God, does not have a physical body.
SPEAKER_00: That God Himself has not chosen to interact with people as a physical being, a terrestrial being.
SPEAKER_00: See, you know, an animal, like an ox, is of the earth earthly.
SPEAKER_00: It is only terrestrial.
SPEAKER_00: So when that ox dies, the ox body decays and goes back into the earth from which it was made, right?
SPEAKER_00: So the ox is terrestrial.
SPEAKER_00: It is of the earth earthly.
SPEAKER_00: It is made of carbon.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord made that creature.
SPEAKER_00: So is a dolphin or a whale.
SPEAKER_00: Well, now what about an angel?
SPEAKER_00: Brothers and sisters, the angels are spirits.
SPEAKER_00: They are celestial.
SPEAKER_00: They are of the heavens.
SPEAKER_00: They are not of the earth earthly.
SPEAKER_00: They are different than the ox.
SPEAKER_00: Those creatures are immortal.
SPEAKER_00: When that ox dies, the ox dies.
SPEAKER_00: That ox is just a.
SPEAKER_00: That's why you and I are allowed to eat such creatures as birds and goats and sheep and cattle and things like that and fish.
SPEAKER_00: They are just of the flesh.
SPEAKER_00: Well, God, brothers and sisters, is spirit.
SPEAKER_00: His Son, God chose to become a man, and so at that point, the eternal God became a form of a man, an earthly being.
SPEAKER_00: Well, see, that's also why men, brothers and sisters, are unique, men and women.
SPEAKER_00: Because you and I are dual creatures.
SPEAKER_00: We have a spiritual nature, a soul, right, that is eternal, that is immortal.
SPEAKER_00: And the only reason that we have it is because God gave us a spirit.
SPEAKER_00: You know, we read in the Old Testament, when a man dies, his spirit returns unto God who gave it.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, you and I are not like the beast of the field.
SPEAKER_00: You know, modern-day scientists want to think themselves intelligent and think that men are only physical earthly creatures, but we are not.
SPEAKER_00: Men are mortal souls that are dwelling in physical earthly bodies, and our physical earthly bodies have a timestamp on them that you and I at our very best might live to be a hundred years old, about or less, most of us less.
SPEAKER_00: And our physical bodies decay and they wear out and they age, and then our bodies die, and then they were uh you and I are made of dust.
SPEAKER_00: And to dust we will return.
SPEAKER_00: However, the soul that God gives is immortal.
SPEAKER_00: It is celestial.
SPEAKER_00: It is heavenly.
SPEAKER_00: It is given of God.
SPEAKER_00: And so you and I are dual creatures.
SPEAKER_00: We have a physical body, and then we have an immortal soul, which is our spirit.
SPEAKER_00: You know, think about the person who is languishing away in the uh, you know, the in their later years, like they're they're on their deathbed and they're about to die, and they're in their very late, late age, and you know, they can't get up and they can't walk around and they can't cook themselves, they can't do for themselves anymore.
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, that person's body is decaying.
SPEAKER_00: That person's body has given up.
SPEAKER_00: But, brothers and sisters, that person is not just a physical body like the beast of the field, right?
SPEAKER_00: That person is a soul, that person has a spirit.
SPEAKER_00: You know, my grandmother or your grandmother who's passed away, their spirit has returned unto God who gave it, but their body lies in the ground here on this earth.
SPEAKER_00: Their body has returned unto dust.
SPEAKER_00: Well, why don't you tell us all that, Brother Josh?
SPEAKER_00: Because when Jesus Christ was explaining unto this woman that, look, that, you know, in times past, your Samaritan Gentile relatives, they worshiped in the high places up in that mountain.
SPEAKER_00: And the Jews, they had to go specifically to Jerusalem, to the temple, to worship.
SPEAKER_00: There is coming a time and now is when the true worshipers of God are going to worship him in spirit and in truth.
SPEAKER_00: Well, how does that work?
SPEAKER_00: Well, as Brother Don mentioned earlier, you and I have this Bible that is the word of God, that is the truth of God.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: So this tells us who God is and how we're to worship God.
SPEAKER_00: We have this is absolute truth.
SPEAKER_00: It is not subjective.
SPEAKER_00: Well, Brother Josh, you know, I just uh I don't think we ought to worship God like that.
SPEAKER_00: Well, no offense, brother.
SPEAKER_00: I really don't care about your opinion.
SPEAKER_00: Instead, I care about what the Word of God, what God has self-revealed to us about Himself and about how He wants to be worshipped, how we're supposed to do that.
SPEAKER_00: That is the more important thing.
SPEAKER_00: And so we worship in truth, and He tells us how to worship here.
SPEAKER_00: But we also worship in spirit and in truth.
SPEAKER_00: Brothers and sisters, y'all are here today, not as some of the scientists of the world to say that you and I are like the chimpanzees and the oxen and the whales, that we're only fleshly, and there's no more to us, that we're just a physical body and being, and when we die, we just go back in the ground.
SPEAKER_00: That is incorrect according to the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: We are a dual creature.
SPEAKER_00: One side of us is physical, and we will die like those creatures, but the other side of our being is spirit, it is soul, it is immortal, and God gave that to us.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what?
SPEAKER_00: Is it any surprise that God gave us something that is like Him?
SPEAKER_00: God is spirit.
SPEAKER_00: He does not have a mortal body, but He made His Son like us, so that we would not have a high priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but instead was tempted in every way like as you and I have been.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, He understands the things that you and I go through, being partial soul and partial body.
SPEAKER_00: Christ understands exactly what you and I have gone through.
SPEAKER_00: But this morning we are talking about Father God.
SPEAKER_00: And Father God, the form of his being that he has chosen to inhabit is the form of a spirit.
SPEAKER_00: So Jesus told this woman, God is a spirit, and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, that is why the man who does not have his spirit awakened to the things of God does not understand the things of God, because God is a spirit.
SPEAKER_00: That's why men must be born again, that they might see and understand the things of a spiritual God.
SPEAKER_00: Alright?
SPEAKER_00: Let's look at John chapter 1, verse 17 and 18.
SPEAKER_00: John chapter 1, verse 17 and 18.
SPEAKER_00: John writes, For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.
SPEAKER_00: So there's several things here.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus Christ is the express image of God according to Hebrews chapter 1.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, if you want to know what God thinks, what he would look like if he's a man, or what his character is, what his heart is, if you had any question about who that is or what Father God would act like is a man, look at Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: And that's also.
SPEAKER_00: Let me say this before I get ahead of myself.
SPEAKER_00: Brother Josh, why are you preaching a message like this that is about what is God?
SPEAKER_00: Well, let me tell you this.
SPEAKER_00: The very reason I want to preach a message like this is because, brothers and sisters, I want y'all to understand who God is and the character of God and the person of God, so that when you and I hit our darkest hour, we don't falsely accuse God and we don't uh get embittered against God because there's a lot of people that actually do that.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: That is a real thing.
SPEAKER_00: Well, so when Jesus Christ said, if you've seen me, you've seen the Father, I know that I've mentioned this several times before, but anybody here want to raise their hand and say, Brother Josh, I'm willing to get mad at the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody.
SPEAKER_00: Not a soul.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter what you and I have gone through, if you and I are Christian, nobody is going to volunteer to get mad at Christ, amen.
SPEAKER_00: But there are plenty of people that want to be mad at Father God, amen, because they see him as some grandfather, all-powerful, you know, sovereign figure in the sky sitting on a throne somewhere, and they just want to, well, they can be mad at him because, God, you should have done this and you should have done that, and you should have intervened, and you should have saved so and so, and you didn't do that.
SPEAKER_00: And so man chooses to get mad at Father God.
SPEAKER_00: But you know what?
SPEAKER_00: We're wrong when we do that.
SPEAKER_00: Because if you've seen Christ, you've seen the Father.
SPEAKER_00: So when we love Christ for his great mercy and grace, grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: When we see him and we love him so much, how can we love Christ so much but get so mad at Father God?
SPEAKER_00: They're one in the same.
SPEAKER_00: Father God chooses to inhabit Spirit, again, not the Holy Spirit, different person.
SPEAKER_00: But Father God has not taken on him a physical body.
SPEAKER_00: Christ did.
SPEAKER_00: So we see him, but here we learn in John 1, 17, 18, that Jesus, uh John tells us no man has seen God at any time.
SPEAKER_00: No man has laid eyes on God.
SPEAKER_00: The only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.
SPEAKER_00: So whatever you see Jesus do, Jesus is a reflection of what Father God would do.
SPEAKER_00: Perfectly, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because he was sinless.
SPEAKER_00: Well, Brother Josh, so what you're telling me is what is God?
SPEAKER_00: God is invisible.
SPEAKER_00: We don't see him.
SPEAKER_00: I want to throw a little caveat in here.
SPEAKER_00: Do you also know that's why idolatry is unacceptable?
SPEAKER_00: When a man goes out and he fashions any kind of idol, it doesn't matter what form it is, he can make that idol huge.
SPEAKER_00: Did y'all know that some of those idols from some of the pagan folks are huge?
SPEAKER_00: Like some of these Buddhas and some of other world, uh some of other countries.
SPEAKER_00: Some of those things, brothers and sisters, are just like multiple stories tall.
SPEAKER_00: They made these idols to represent a quote-unquote powerful being, you understand.
SPEAKER_00: That's why they made them so big.
SPEAKER_00: And then some of them, they even went to the great expense to cover them over with like gold leaf.
SPEAKER_00: And so not only are they huge, but they're also very expensive.
SPEAKER_00: So that, wow, this idol that I've made, you know, whether it be very, very little, about the size of this little recorder, or whether it be, you know, the size of this church, they're trying to convey that, oh, look how powerful, look how glorious he is.
SPEAKER_00: Well, see, you understand that that's one of the reasons why idols are unacceptable, because no man has seen God at any time.
SPEAKER_00: So tell me what man is going to make a representation of God and make it accurately.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody.
SPEAKER_00: Ever.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if you want to know what the character of God and the person of God looks like, look at the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That's also why the Bible tells us that Jesus Christ was very plain in his appearance.
SPEAKER_00: He looked, if you want to know what Jesus Christ looked like, he looked like a plain Jane vanilla Jewish man that would have lived 2,000 years ago.
SPEAKER_00: That's exactly what Jesus Christ would have looked like.
SPEAKER_00: There was nothing comely about his appearance, he just looked like an ordinary Jewish man.
SPEAKER_00: And that's the way that God chose to reveal himself unto the world, but we are not supposed to make any images of God because God himself is invisible and no man has seen him.
SPEAKER_00: Well, wait a minute, Brother Josh.
SPEAKER_00: Wait a minute.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't there a story in the Old Testament?
SPEAKER_00: Didn't Moses see God?
SPEAKER_00: That when, I think it's in Genesis chapter 33, that God revealed his glory unto Moses, and he hid Moses in the cleft of the rock.
SPEAKER_00: And then God put his hand over the cleft of the rock, and then he passed by, and then he allowed Moses to quote unquote see the glory of his hinder parts.
SPEAKER_00: Well, Brother Josh, right there.
SPEAKER_00: God has a hand, and God has hinder parts, not in physical form, he doesn't.
SPEAKER_00: That was an expression.
SPEAKER_00: That he allowed Moses to see his glory.
SPEAKER_00: And he came down off the mountain glowing from the presence of God.
SPEAKER_00: And he specifically told Moses that you would not be allowed to see my face.
SPEAKER_00: Why is that?
SPEAKER_00: I want y'all to think about something.
SPEAKER_00: Y'all remember in Isaiah, y'all go back and read Isaiah chapter 6, and then in Isaiah chapter 6, and the year that King Uzziah died, and that's also the passage of scripture in verse 3, when it talks about that they had the angels that are before the throne of God, and those celestial, immortal, powerful beings, that the ones that are standing in the presence of God, it says with two wings they flew, and with two wings they covered their face, and with two wings they covered their feet.
SPEAKER_00: The angels that are standing and are flying, rather, in the presence of God, they can't even be fully exposed to the glory of God.
SPEAKER_00: They themselves would be destroyed.
SPEAKER_00: They had to cover themselves in the presence of the holiest of holies.
SPEAKER_00: As it says there, holy, holy, holy in Isaiah chapter 6, the very celestial, immortal, powerful beings that are in the presence of God all the time, they have to cover themselves in the presence of God.
SPEAKER_00: No man has seen Father God any time.
SPEAKER_00: God allowed Moses to be exposed to the very minutest amount of God's glory, and he came down off the mountain literally glowing with the Lord's glory.
SPEAKER_00: If he would have allowed Moses to actually see him, he would have been destroyed in an instance.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because Moses was a sinful man.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: And God is holy, holy, holy.
SPEAKER_00: Even the very angels that are in his presence have to cover themselves.
SPEAKER_00: And the people, when they saw Moses, they said, You've got to cover yourself.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because they couldn't be exposed to that amount of the Lord's glory and not feel shame.
SPEAKER_00: Brothers and sisters, the Lord is God, is spirit.
SPEAKER_00: He is invisible.
SPEAKER_00: No man has seen him at any time.
SPEAKER_00: And that is also why there is no idol ever that would ever be.
SPEAKER_00: Could you and I build an idol large enough?
SPEAKER_00: Could you and I design an idol beautiful enough?
SPEAKER_00: Could you and I construct an idol that would adequately convey the glory and the grandeur and the power and the enormity and the immensity of God?
SPEAKER_00: Is there, could you and I build a tower high enough or paint a picture most beautiful enough to no.
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: And again, no.
SPEAKER_00: There is no creation or invention of man that could convey the being of God.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: Do y'all know that you know another thing that God is?
SPEAKER_00: God is light and God is life.
SPEAKER_00: Do y'all know that I was fascinated as a kid with science?
SPEAKER_00: And I remember when my uh when my professor, professor, when my teacher in high school told us to uh bring a drop of water from home and uh, you know, either out of a puddle or out of the sink or whatever, and we looked at it under a microscope.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what I did?
SPEAKER_00: I went down to the pond and got some pond water and brought it.
SPEAKER_00: And brothers and sisters, when you look at that pond water under a microscope, it is literally teeming with microorganisms.
SPEAKER_00: Brothers and sisters, we're talking about water, okay?
SPEAKER_00: I'm not, you know, y'all folks are here today.
SPEAKER_00: I love y'all's beautiful smiling faces.
SPEAKER_00: I love the brown hair and the blonde hair and the gray hair, and I love the beards and the clean shaven and the glasses and the no glasses and the red and the pink and the check and the zebra and all the different things.
SPEAKER_00: My point is, brothers and sisters, y'all are all different.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: God has made us all different.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what?
SPEAKER_00: My mom loves flowers and, you know, all the orchids and the daylilies and the Easter lilies and the roses and all the, you know, and I love all the creatures.
SPEAKER_00: You know, I was a kid, I was fascinated with the great white sharks and the dinosaurs.
SPEAKER_00: Brothers and sisters, God is creator, but he is life.
SPEAKER_00: Everything he does is alive.
SPEAKER_00: Tell me who could make an idol, no matter how big.
SPEAKER_00: You could make the thing out of pure gold or platinum or the most precious diamonds, and brothers and sisters, it would be a shame to make something that cost more than you could spend the entire amount of money in the entire world.
SPEAKER_00: And it would insult God with his great value and strength and wealth and glory and grandeur, you understand.
SPEAKER_00: That's why idolatry is a sin.
SPEAKER_00: We're about out of time, and I'm not even halfway done, so we're not gonna get done.
SPEAKER_00: Let's just get a couple more things.
SPEAKER_00: Oh.
SPEAKER_00: First John, chapter one, and verse five.
SPEAKER_00: God is light.
SPEAKER_00: First John, chapter one, and verse five.
SPEAKER_00: This then is the message which we have heard of him and declare unto you that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.
SPEAKER_00: You know, so y'all will remember all the way back to Genesis chapter 1.
SPEAKER_00: You know, Brother Don made a very wise statement that, you know, if you don't believe Genesis 1-1, then you don't believe the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: In the beginning, God.
SPEAKER_00: That God is, God exists, God is creator.
SPEAKER_00: What was the first thing God made?
SPEAKER_00: God spoke into the darkness and created light.
SPEAKER_00: Brothers and sisters, God is light.
SPEAKER_00: And not only does that mean that he is the creator of light, in the Bible, light exemplifies purity.
SPEAKER_00: It exemplifies holiness, it exemplifies knowledge, it exemplifies righteousness, and it's always compared to darkness.
SPEAKER_00: We're referred to as the children of light.
SPEAKER_00: That we've been translated into the kingdom of light.
SPEAKER_00: We've been translated out of darkness and into light.
SPEAKER_00: God put us into that.
SPEAKER_00: But what I want you to understand is that, again, why are we preaching a message like this?
SPEAKER_00: Brothers and sisters, do y'all know that when it talks about that God is light and in him is no darkness at all, God has never had a wrong thought, a sinful thought, an impure thought.
SPEAKER_00: God is the definition of purity, you understand.
SPEAKER_00: Like, Rajash, what is pure?
SPEAKER_00: God is pure.
SPEAKER_00: Rajash, what is holy?
SPEAKER_00: God is holy.
SPEAKER_00: Rajash, what is righteousness?
SPEAKER_00: God is righteous.
SPEAKER_00: But Bhajash, what is justice?
SPEAKER_00: God is just.
SPEAKER_00: You understand, he is the very definition of those things.
SPEAKER_00: God cannot do injustice or things unjustly.
SPEAKER_00: God cannot, you know, that again, y'all remember like in Paul's logical dissertations, when he says that, you know, you will accuse God of unrighteousness because he did such and such, or he didn't do such and such.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, Paul is saying, you can't do that because everything that God does is right.
SPEAKER_00: It is righteous, it is correct, it is pure, it is unadulterated, it is unpolluted, it is holy.
SPEAKER_00: You and I, with our sin-tainted minds and sin-tainted experience in this world, at times you and I will actually have the audacity to question God.
SPEAKER_00: God, why did you do such a thing?
SPEAKER_00: Or why did you not do such a thing?
SPEAKER_00: Who are we that we might question God?
SPEAKER_00: Our motives are actually impure.
SPEAKER_00: Our judgments are impure.
SPEAKER_00: Our thought process is impure.
SPEAKER_00: Our knowledge is imperfect.
SPEAKER_00: You and I don't understand the full measure of whatever it is that you and I are talking about or thinking about or trying to figure out.
SPEAKER_00: God is light.
SPEAKER_00: He is holy.
SPEAKER_00: He is pure.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, he is the creator.
SPEAKER_00: You and I have a righteous seed within us, the spirit that you and I have been given from God, and it's the only good thing about us.
SPEAKER_00: And it comes from Him.
SPEAKER_00: What does James say?
SPEAKER_00: Every good and perfect gift that cometh down from above from the Father of light.
SPEAKER_00: Everything good comes from God.
SPEAKER_00: And we're out of time.
SPEAKER_00: I'll just tell you what some of the other ones are.
SPEAKER_00: God is infinite.
SPEAKER_00: You know what that means?
SPEAKER_00: It means without limits.
SPEAKER_00: It means unbounded, not limited by time or space, never ending.
SPEAKER_00: God knows, sees, hears, and understands everything always.
SPEAKER_00: God is unchangeable because he's perfect.
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't need to change anything ever.
SPEAKER_00: And that's also why his Son, Jesus Christ, is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't need to change anything.
SPEAKER_00: He's perfect.
SPEAKER_00: God is eternal.
SPEAKER_00: That means that God did not have a beginning and God does not have an end.
SPEAKER_00: And by the way, we can't wrap our minds around that one.
SPEAKER_00: Every single thing that you and I know or have ever known had a starting point, right?
SPEAKER_00: God did not have a starting point.
SPEAKER_00: Every single thing that you and I understand, you know, in this earth has a time frame.
SPEAKER_00: The dinosaurs died.
SPEAKER_00: You know, the Babylonian Empire ended.
SPEAKER_00: Grandma and grandpa died.
SPEAKER_00: One day I will die.
SPEAKER_00: One day my car and house will burn and disintegrate and fail.
SPEAKER_00: It had a beginning, it had an end.
SPEAKER_00: God had no beginning.
SPEAKER_00: God has no end.
SPEAKER_00: We cannot fathom that in our human understanding.
SPEAKER_00: God is eternal.
SPEAKER_00: God is also self-existent.
SPEAKER_00: Existent.
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't need anybody or anything.
SPEAKER_00: He told the Jews, he said, I am that I am.
SPEAKER_00: That's who I am.
SPEAKER_00: I am self-existent.
SPEAKER_00: I exist.
SPEAKER_00: So we go all the way back to where we started.
SPEAKER_00: So, Brother Ross, you're saying in my religion, whatever religion that is, I shouldn't be making any kind of idol or any kind of thing that I bow down to.
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: You should be worshiping the one true and living God.
SPEAKER_00: He is spirit.
SPEAKER_00: He did not take a human form.
SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_00: He in his fatherhood did not take a physical form.
SPEAKER_00: He came in human form as Christ.
SPEAKER_00: He stayed in human form as Holy Spirit that indwells us.
SPEAKER_00: But God is a spirit.
SPEAKER_00: And no man has seen him at any time.
SPEAKER_00: But yet you and I know that he exists.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because he put spiritual life in us and he wrote part of himself in our hearts and minds.
SPEAKER_00: If I were to nail any of y'all down today, would y'all say, do y'all believe that Father God exists?
SPEAKER_00: Yes, Brother Josh, I know that he exists.
SPEAKER_00: How is it that you know?
SPEAKER_00: Because he's put life and a spirit inside of you, part of him.
SPEAKER_00: God gave you spirit.
SPEAKER_00: You know that he exists.
SPEAKER_00: But you've never laid your eyes on him.
SPEAKER_00: You've never even seen Christ.
SPEAKER_00: But you know without a shadow of a doubt that he exists.
SPEAKER_00: Because he's real.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is a substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
SPEAKER_00: Your believing faith that Christ gave to you is evidence of the fingerprint of God in your life that God touched you.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: He's been there.
SPEAKER_00: We'll have to pick up there next time.
SPEAKER_00: With what God is.
SPEAKER_00: Well, what does that translate to you and I and practical Christianity?
SPEAKER_00: You know, y'all, brother Susan, I want to tell y'all, y'all pray for me because uh, you know, over the years I've seen that preachers preach different ways.
SPEAKER_00: I tend to be kind of a uh a big picture preacher.
SPEAKER_00: I tend to try to give you the thousand-foot overview, and sometimes I don't bring it down to ground level where I should, where the rubber meets the road.
SPEAKER_00: But I do know this.
SPEAKER_00: Where the rubber meets the road, this message is this is that, brothers and sisters, you and I should love God and we should glorify God, and we should be in awe of God every day of our lives, and we should never, never, never try to confine God to make him this thing or that thing or that put him in this little box because we can't do that.
SPEAKER_00: Because he is spirit, he is light, he is unchangeable, he is infinite, he is God.
SPEAKER_00: To him be the glory forever and ever.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: I hope this has been an encouragement to you.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna ask Brother Don if he would come up and help us close in a word of song.
SPEAKER_00: May you and I serve him better every day of our life.