Video Transcript: Lesson 2 Exploring Further

Welcome to this presentation in Christian basics. This particular presentation is exploring  further in lesson two about what the Bible says about God. The writer of the material that  you're going to hear and read on the screen is Dr. Ed Roels as he wrote it, and I'm David  Feddes, the presenter of the material, and I'll be adding some thoughts of my own as we go  

through what Dr. Roels has written.  

Question number one, what are some of the most important things we should believe about  God? Well, among the most important truths about God are the following. There is only one  true God. This one God is eternal, all knowing, everywhere present, spiritual, invisible, all  powerful, wise, patient, compassionate, loving, just holy, and unchanging in his being. He  exists as three persons whom the Bible reveals as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  These three persons together form the Holy Trinity, the one true God. God created the world  in the beginning as a perfect world, which he himself said was very good. He created a man  and a woman in His own image, and put them in charge of the earth and all creatures on the  earth. He continues to maintain and sustain the world, but will eventually judge all people who have ever lived. In his mercy, God will grant everlasting life, to all those who have repented of  their sin, and put their trust in Jesus Christ for salvation. In his justice, God will destroy those  who refuse to repent, and refuse to put their trust in God and His Son Jesus, the Lord will  then establish a new heaven and a new earth, and will reign forever with His redeemed  people who will live in perfect and never ending joy, and peace. Many, many other things can  be said about God. But when you think about God, and when you're called upon to  communicate about God to others, it's important to know how to say in just a few sentences,  what are the main things about God who he is his character? And what he has done?  

Question number two, can we fully understand everything the Bible teaches about God? No,  because God is eternal, infinite, and triune, that is three and one. There are many things we  cannot fully understand about God or His ways. We should not expect to be able to  understand everything about God with our human limitations, and finite existence any more  than animals can fully understand us as human beings. It's important therefore, that we do not reject something which the Bible says simply because we can't understand it or don't like it. If  we reject something which the Bible clearly teaches, we're making ourselves judges of the  Bible. Rather than submitting our limited knowledge and understanding to the eternal truth of  God's Holy Word. God's truth stands eternal, and supreme, whether or not we can  understand all of it. So if you're reading the Bible, and you're thinking about God, and you say to yourself, I've got it all figured out, I understand everything. The fact is, you're probably way,  way off. If God fits in that tiny space between your two ears. If you can take all the reality of  God and think you've contained in your little head, you are fooling yourself. God is much  bigger even than what the Bible has to say about him. The Bible reveals the essential things  about God that He wants us to know. And God himself is vastly beyond all of that his thoughts are not our, our thoughts, and he is just beyond anything we could understand. And it's very  good of him, to communicate with us to speak with us in the Bible. But we are fools if we think that we've got him all figured out. And we are equally foolish. If we began to judge the Bible, if we take what God has said to us and decide, Oh, that can't be true. The fact of the matter is,  there are some things that if we think they can't be true, we probably misunderstood it. And  other things, we may have understood it partly, and we're just wrong, that it can't be true,  simply because God's wisdom goes beyond our wisdom.  

Question number three. Why is it significant for us that there is only one true God? Why does  it matter? If there were more Gods than the one true God, each God would be extremely 

limited by the existence and power and authority of the other gods. We would live in constant  uncertainty concerning the power and authority of our God in relation to other gods. And we'd  probably often wonder if the gods were jealous of one another, or in conflict with one another  as people are, if there actually were many gods, it would be impossible for us to love and  

serve each one. With all our heart, soul, mind and strength, our loyalties would always be  somewhat divided. And we could never find the peace and confidence and joy that we now  have in knowing and serving the one and only true God. Some of you may be familiar with the old legends about the Greek gods, or the Norse gods, or the Roman Gods, and Goddesses.  You had these various gods and goddesses. And oftentimes, they were manipulating things  behind each other's backs and trying to pull tricks on each other and pull tricks on humanity,  and they're squabbling. And meanwhile, the poor humans on Earth, don't know whether  they're coming or going, they're keeping one God happy. And then all of a sudden, another  God comes along and ruins everything for them. polytheism the belief in many gods is a very  confusing thing, very distressing thing to live with. By the way, it's also very bad for science. If  you think that the universe was made by a squabbling committee, how are you ever going to  look for patterns of order throughout the whole universe? And so belief in one true God is vital for our own, personal and emotional well being. And it's also vital for the intellectual pursuit of  the patterns of the universe. It's not a universe, if there's more than one God, then you'd call it a multiverse. It would just be all sorts of strange things in chaos, or squabbling of the various  gods, but the fact is, one God made it all. And when we know him, we come to understand  many things about the world he made, as well.  

Question four, what would your life be like if there were no God? Well, in one sense, that's  kind of a dumb question. If there were no true God, we wouldn't exist at all. So what would  your life be like you wouldn't have one. But just supposing we somehow existed, and God did  not, we'd have to depend completely on ourselves or on other human beings for everything,  there'd be no way to find genuine forgiveness, no sure hope for the future. No divine power to bless, encourage comfort and strengthen us no divine power to administer justice, and no one with divine love and compassion, to be concerned about our present, or future wellbeing we'd  be alone in the universe with nobody that cares. The ultimate power on earth would be found  in the persons with the greatest wealth, prestige or influence, and no one could contest their  judgments, their decisions, their actions, there might possibly be some earthly authorities or  powers, who would encourage people to act justly and compassionately. But their powers  would be very limited, and their influence would be very temporary. Relatively few powerful  dictators in history have been genuinely kind and benevolent. And that's putting it pretty  mildly. Whenever humans come into great power and great influence, they usually are terrible rulers. Think of the recent dictators that we've had in the last century or two, they've been  uniformly pretty horrible. So when humans get absolute power, they are deadly. And  fortunately, none of them has stayed in power for more than at most a few decades. If there is no righteous and powerful judge, the evils of this world would never be set right? Life would  have little meaning, and mankind would have little enduring hope. As the Bible says in I  Corinthians 15, if there is no resurrection of the dead, let us eat and drink for tomorrow we  die. So if there's no God, and no eternal life, do whatever you can get away with, have a blast while you last. And most of us really won't have much of a blast, because we'll be too busy  destroying each other in our selfish pursuit of our own ends. Life without God, again and  again, has been devastating. We've got evidence of that. Take the Soviet Union, or China, or  Cambodia in the last century, when their governments were officially atheistic, and did as they pleased 10s and even hundreds of millions of people slaughtered because of the power of 

humans who did not look to the justice and reign of God to which they're responsible to  recognize human rights.  

Fifth, what would your life be like if there was a God but you did not know him personally. And  regrettably, there are millions and millions of people who do not know the true God. Some of  these people live reasonably comfortable lives as they focus on their earthly activities, and do  not even try to deal with guilt, sin or moral failure, and do not believe in or bother with the  possibility of life after death. As far as they're concerned, this life is all there is. Some of those  who believe this way do demonstrate a significant concern about others and seek to help  them make the most of their earthly life. others focus on getting everything they can for  themselves without bothering at all about others. Whether they're kind or selfish, however,  they miss the greatest blessings possible for us on this earth, knowing the love and mercy  and grace of God, they totally cut themselves off from the incredible eternal blessings, which  are promised to those who know and love and trust God, as He has revealed Himself to us in  the Bible, and in His Son, Jesus Christ. There is an old statement of faith where the first  question and answer says, What is the chief end of man? The answer is, the chief end of man is to glorify God, and enjoy him forever. That's the point of being human. At the end of the  Bible Book of Ecclesiastes, it says, now all has been heard, here's the conclusion of the  matter, Fear God and keep His commandments for this is the whole of man. This is what it is  to be human is to know God to reverence Him, and to follow His guidance. If you don't know  God, you just missed the whole point of your existence. And if you know God, if you honor  him, if you delight in him, then you are truly fulfilling your purpose in life and you're going to  have the joy that comes with that.  

Question six. Why is it wrong to make idols or images of God? Well, because God says not to That's the short answer. God has strongly and repeatedly commanded us in the Bible, not to  make images or idols of himself. There is no way in which any image or idol can even begin  to meaningfully represent the eternal, almighty, infinite, Compassionate Creator and judge of  our world. Every image your idol, no matter how big, or artistic or expensive would be little  and misrepresent God, the Eternal Spirit besides, if someone was able to make a beautiful  idol of some kind. Many people would soon be worshipping the idol, rather than the God  which the idol supposedly represented. Throughout history, people have been led astray by  their idols and images. God has never been glorified or honored by any human efforts to  represent him with a physical image, as Jesus Himself said, God is Spirit. Those who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth. God wants us to know Him as He has revealed  Himself in His word, not by the pictures we dream up, or the images that we form of him. God  wants us to trust him, and his great mystery and then listen to him, as he speaks to us and  not try to reinvent a god to suit our own imagination, or form a God that we can manipulate  and control.  

Question seven. What are some of the things people can learn about God if they do not have  a Bible or someone to teach them? While they're not stuck knowing absolutely nothing. God  has revealed himself in history, through his work of creation, through miracles, through  changing the lives of those who trusted in him, and through his divine intervention at various  points throughout history. Even without the Bible or a teacher, people can know from the  created world, that God is real, Mighty, Wise, orderly, and glorious. You look at the stars and  the galaxies, and you know that whoever made that vastness must be unimaginably great.  When you study the patterns of creation, and the amazing order and design, you say, Wow,  he must be wise and orderly. When you see the beauty of some of the splendid things God 

has made you say whoever made that has got to be glorious. We can know from the growth  of crops, the taste of food, and the enjoyment of other pleasures that God is generous, and  delightful. People can know from their own conscience, that God is righteous, because their  

conscience can sense that right and wrong, are defined by someone outside ourselves, we do something that's wrong, and something in us tells us it's wrong, even though we chose to do  it. And that's telling us that something outside ourselves, is presenting us with a standard of  right and wrong, our sense of right and wrong is a clue to the reality of God's righteousness.  Another thing by seeing that all people die, and that all governments eventually fail. People  can see that God is just and punishes sinful humanity with death. It is obvious that the human  race lives under the sentence of death, we all die. And that tells us something about God that  He is just and that he punishes sinful humanity. People can know from hearing about  miracles, or observing transformed Christians that God is supernaturally active among people still today, and you can learn all of this without actually having read the Bible or having  someone taught you a great deal about the Bible. It's true, of course, that many people do not acknowledge God or praise him, even though they see God's handiwork in creation or taste  God's goodness in daily blessings, or sense God's righteousness through the voice of  conscience, or observe God's just wrath in the reality of death. However, even when people  suppress their knowledge of God, those who do so are without excuse, as Romans 1:19 says, So, the Bible is valuable, it reveals a great deal, we need it. But there are some things in fact,  some very important things that God shows to us even apart from the Bible. And we are  without excuse if we pray and pretend that there is no God, and that we know nothing about  him. The fact is, even in many civilizations that had many gods and goddesses, a great many  of them believed in one Creator God, one great God, who was beyond all those lesser gods  and goddesses they talked about even such civilizations knew that there is one real true  Creator.  

Number eight. What can you learn about God from the Bible that you can't learn in any other  way? The Bible teaches us many spiritual truths that cannot be taught through nature or  natural events. For example, the Bible teaches us about the love and righteousness and  holiness of God as well as other attributes of God. It also teaches us about right and wrong,  obedience and disobedience, punishment, justice, forgiveness, compassion, hope, heaven,  hell. It teaches us these things. Now, apart from the Bible, we can know certain things about  right and wrong because God impresses it on our conscience or we learn about it from others, we can learn certain things, but even what we can know apart from the Bible comes in much  clearer focus in the Bible. And of course, there are many things the Bible teaches us that we  couldn't have guessed or come up with, apart from the Bible. The Bible clearly teaches about  Jesus, the way of salvation through Christ alone, and the person and work of the Holy Spirit.  The Bible also describes the kind of life that honors God and teaches us what displeases or  dishonors. Our conscious can tell us a lot. But because we're sinners, our conscience can get distorted. And we need the Bible to tell us the real deal about right and wrong. In the Bible, we read stories that encourage us, warn us, inform us and enable us to better understand the  ways of God in this world. And in the lives of his people. If we just look at events, we can learn some things. But when we hear God's perspective on events, as God describes those stories  in the Bible, then we understand them much better. The Bible teaches many other things that  we do not learn just by observing nature or history, things about holiness, mercy, prayer,  personal sacrifice, dedication, family, marriage, government giving, witnessing, and other  parts of daily life. So again, there are some things we can learn, even apart from the Bible if  we're paying attention, but the Bible makes even those things much more clear, much more  detailed, and it shows us many, many things we never could have come up with, on our own. 

Question Nine, if you had only 20 minutes to teach someone about God, what are the things  that you would talk about? That's quite a question, isn't it? Well, your answer may depend to  some extent on a person's age, background, education, interests and circumstances.  However, there are certain basic or fundamental truths about God, which are so important  that every person young or old, well educated or uneducated, rich or poor, weak or strong,  should, know included would be such things as the fact there's only one true God, who's  perfectly holy and just the creator of the world, the divine and righteous judge of every person  and the God of mercy, forgiveness and love. Everyone should also know that God sent His  only begotten Son into the world to give his life as an atonement for our sin, and to give us the joy and hope of eternal life with Him in glory. Some helpful scripture verses would include  such passages as John 4:24, I Timothy 6:15-16, Exodus 34:6-7, and John 3:16, passages  that have all been quoted in earlier presentations. The primary purpose of asking this  particular question, if you had 20 minutes to talk about God, what would you say? The  primary purpose of asking is to help you focus on some basic truths that you should be able  to present to any person at any time without hesitation and with strong biblical support? So  my encouragement is, don't just watch this video, and say, Okay, I'm done with that. I'm done  with that lesson. Now on to the next one. Yeah, there's an element of that but spend some  time thinking about God, adoring him and thinking about what are the key things that I would  want to tell somebody else? If I had only a short time to speak of him that helps you to sort  out what you find most important about God and what God has declared to be most important about himself when he speaks to us in the Bible.  

Question 10 What are some of the truths about God which are most important to you,  personally? Just think about this. meditate on God's awesome reality, and explore what truths  of God have stirred your heart.