Second London Baptist Confession 2.1 (Part 3)
Truth for Life • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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-Have you ever been to some tourist spot or a scenic spot where the natural wonders of creation around you just led you to be in awe of its beauty? Maybe you’ve been to the Grand Canyon and were in awe of its immensity. For me, it was years ago when we were in Estes Park, Colorado and got to look at the Rocky Mountains that were breathtaking. At some point, we have seen something that caused us to pause and just say WOW.
-When God revealed Himself in Scripture, it is intended to have a similar effect. When God describes Himself and His nature and His character and His works, the intention is that we would just say WOW and worship Him. The truths that are revealed should catch our breath even more than a Grand Canyon or a Rocky Mountain or a multi-color sunset or a vast blue ocean.
-And, as best as possible, the creeds and confessions that Christians have used try to summarize the grand truths that God has communicated to us in our limited human language. But as they summarize these teachings, these also should have the same effect of welling up inside of us immense awe at God’s greatness and majesty. Just look at how the Second London Baptist Confession of Faith summarizes what the Bible tells us about our great God.
Confessing the Faith: The 1689 Baptist Confession for the 21st Century (II. God and the Holy Trinity)
The Lord our God is one, the only living and true God. He is self-existent and infinite in being and perfection. His essence cannot be understood by anyone but Him. He is a perfectly pure spirit. He is invisible and has no body, parts, or changeable emotions. He alone has immortality, dwelling in light that no one can approach. He is unchangeable, immense, eternal, incomprehensible, almighty, in every way infinite, absolutely holy, perfectly wise, wholly free, completely absolute. He works all things according to the counsel of His own unchangeable and completely righteous will for His own glory. He is most loving, gracious, merciful, and patient. He overflows with goodness and truth, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin. He rewards those who seek Him diligently. At the same time, He is perfectly just and terrifying in His judgments. He hates all sin and will certainly not clear the guilty.
-I’ve previously talked about God being self-existent, having always existed and not being created by anyone, even Himself. God just is. I’ve also talked about the fact that God is spirit and is completely whole in Himself, not composed of parts or components. The confession then starts hitting us with truth after truth that describes God’s existence and character and attributes as best as our minds are able to comprehend it.
-The confession says that God is immortal. This means that God is free from the condition of sin, death, and decay. God cannot die as He Himself is life. God is the source of life and everything that exists finds its life in Him. But He Himself is life—it is essential to His nature and essence, and it can never be taken from Him. God will never die or cease to exist. That being the case, He alone is truly immortal. Paul said:
17 Now to the eternal King, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever! Amen.
-The confession goes on to describe God as dwelling in light that no one can approach. We find this truth in:
16 He alone possesses immortality and lives in unapproachable light, whom no human has ever seen or is able to see. To him be honor and eternal power! Amen.
-This reminds us that God Himself, in His existence, is so pure and brilliant, His glory is such that no creature’s senses are able to penetrate that glory that emanates from God. There is no creature that has seen God in the fullness of His existence. His existence is too bright and brilliant for creaturely eyes to behold. There is no darkness in God at all—and especially now because of our sin we are not able to approach His light. Just think, we can’t even look at the sun and its bright light, how would our eyes be able to behold the light of the Almighty God.
-The confession goes on to say that God is unchangeable. The proper term for this is that God is immutable. As Wayne Grudem explains:
Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Bible Doctrine 2. Unchangeableness
God is unchanging in his being, perfections, purposes, and promises, yet God does act and feel emotions, and he acts and feels differently in response to different situations.
-We are told in Scripture:
25 In earlier times you established the earth; the skies are your handiwork.
26 They will perish, but you will endure. They will wear out like a garment; like clothes you will remove them and they will disappear.
27 But you remain; your years do not come to an end.
-Creatures and creation all are affected by time in some way, and over time they change. I’ve been around over 51 years and I have changed a lot in all those years physically and emotionally and intellectually and spiritually. In my lifetime, God has not changed once. James tells us
17 All generous giving and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or the slightest hint of change.
-God’s nature hasn’t changed. His character hasn’t changed. His knowledge hasn’t changed. God does not change, which is good for us, because it means that God will not change His mind about His plans for us, and more importantly He will not change His salvation of us.
-The confession goes on to say that God is immense. That word sounds like such an understatement at first, but trust me, it’s as good as the English language can get. What it refers to is the fact that God transcends space. We are probably more familiar with the term omnipresence which means that God is not limited in any way by space. Grudem again:
Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Bible Doctrine 4. Omnipresence
God does not have size or spatial dimensions and is present at every point of space with his whole being, yet God acts differently in different places.
-As we tend to say, God is everywhere and He fulfills His plans in every place. God is completely present here and in Beijing, China as well as the furthest planet that there is from earth. And God is doing something here in Harvest, and He’s doing something different in Beijing right now at the same time, and He’s doing something still different in that planet far away. Now we can see why the authors of the confession used the word immense. Listen to the biblical testimony:
23 Do you people think that I am some local deity and not the transcendent God?” the Lord asks.
24 “Do you really think anyone can hide himself where I cannot see him?” the Lord asks. “Do you not know that I am everywhere?” the Lord asks.
-David declared:
7 Where can I go to escape your spirit? Where can I flee to escape your presence?
8 If I were to ascend to heaven, you would be there. If I were to sprawl out in Sheol, there you would be.
9 If I were to fly away on the wings of the dawn, and settle down on the other side of the sea,
10 even there your hand would guide me, your right hand would grab hold of me.
-What an assuring word that no matter where we are in life both literally and figuratively, God is present with us. But it is also a solemn warning that God is with us and is present in our sinful and unholy moments as well.
-The confession goes on to say that God is the eternal God. If calling God immense had to do with His relationship to space, God’s eternity describes His relationship with time. Again, I will allow Grudem to give a definition:
God has no beginning, end, or succession of moments in his own being, and he sees all time equally vividly, yet God sees events in time and acts in time.
-God’s Word declares:
2 Even before the mountains came into existence, or you brought the world into being, you were the eternal God.
-I believe this is one of the most important concepts to keep in the back of our mind. When there are revelations in Scripture that we are not able to come to grips with or if there is a paradox that we can’t seem to reconcile, it is because God is eternal. And because we are not eternal, we cannot fully comprehend the depth of what we are being told—hence, the next word used in the confession, that God is incomprehensible. We will never be able to fully grasp the big picture of God. We understand what we can understand about God because of what He has revealed, but there are some things that are just beyond us and we have to be OK with that.
-I like to say that we have to learn to content to live in the tension that God leaves us in because finite humans cannot grasp the eternal. The Bible says that God elected us and predestined us. The Bible also says that we have to make the conscious choice to believe in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. So, are we elect because we believe or do we believe because we are elect? And the answer is yes—it is a tension that we are left with when we try to explain the dealings of an eternal God. For those who absolutely must understand every facet of everything, the Bible and God are going to be frustrating because there are some things that you just have to take by faith. The Bible says this and it also says that, and my mind might not be able to reconcile the two, but I trust in the eternal God who says both are true.
-God is immense in that He is not limited by space, and He is eternal because He is not limited by time, but the confession also says that He is almighty. God alone has ultimate power. There never has been or can be anything that exists that has more power than God. Anything that exists outside of God was created by God and cannot have greater power than God. He is supreme. This ought to give us comfort to know that nothing will ever be able to knock God off of His throne. There is no threat that exists for God because there is no one who even has one one-millionth of the power that God has. There is nothing that can threaten His will and His plans and His purposes.
-That is why it is so futile for mankind to rebel against God. What exactly are they going to do to Him? . As God confronted Job, He said:
2 “Will the one who contends with the Almighty correct him? Let the person who accuses God give him an answer!”
-Instead of fighting a losing battle against God, wouldn’t you rather rest in the arms of the almighty? That’s why I can’t fathom what Satan was thinking when he rebelled against God or what the angels who followed him were thinking. If I understand a verse in Job correctly, all the heavenly host saw God create the universe. You know that God has that kind of power, and you think you can usurp Him off the throne?
-What they should have done instead is what we are called to do as well—be in awe of this immortal, unchangeable, immense, eternal, incomprehensible, almighty God who dwells in unapproachable light. See God as He has revealed Himself, say WOW, and worship and obey Him, especially His call to believe in Jesus for salvation...