I know I’ve quoted this before, but I really love this quote from A.W. Tozer, “What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.” And it’s true! If you believe that God doesn’t exist, you will live your whole life in a way that shows that you believe God doesn’t exist. You will live for self, and ultimately, though you might be held to rules and laws of the society you live in, you will find no other reason to grow as a person except to fit into society and culture.
But if you believe what is right about God, it changes the very core of who you are and how you live. You live for God’s glory and seek to do His purposes which are higher than man’s. You are held to a higher way of living as well, a higher code of morality and it comes not from a desire to just fit into society, but rather from a deep love for God that is shown in your love for others who are created in His image.
And this is true for every other belief in between as well. If you believe God exists but doesn’t care about you or your life, you will live life accordingly. If you believe God is an oppressive, judgmental God waiting to smite you, you will live your life accordingly. And so on.
From the early days of Christianity, Christians have made doctrinal statements of faith about what we believe and hold true as Christians. One of the earliest examples is the Nicene Creed adopted in 325 AD. You’re probably familiar with it, even if you don’t know that it’s called the Nicene Creed. The very first version of the creed says this, “We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father [the only-begotten; that is, of the essence of the Father, God of God,] Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father; By whom all things were made [both in heaven and on earth]; Who for us men, and for our salvation, came down and was incarnate and was made man; He suffered, and the third day he rose again, ascended into heaven; From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead. And in the Holy Ghost.”
Even if you’ve never heard all of it, you’ve probably heard some simplified version or heard something very similar. Even before the Nicene Creed, Christians have been putting together statements to say what we believe, and we do this in part to fight false teachings and heresies that may come up. But the greater purpose is to make sure that as Christians, we know what we believe and where it comes from in the Bible, so we can stand firm in our own faith, be sustained by faith, and be able to defend our faith.
The Nazarene denomination has statements of belief as well, and we call them our Articles of Faith. The first Article of Faith has to do with our beliefs about God, who He is, what He’s done, and what His character is like. This is our statement about God:
“We believe in one eternally existent, infinite God, Sovereign Creator and Sustainer of the universe; that He only is God, holy in nature, attributes, and purpose. The God who is holy love and light is Triune in essential being, revealed as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”
This is what we believe, and I want us to dig into this statement to fully grasp what we believe about God, so we’re going to take this statement piece by piece.
You’ll notice you have three sections in your bulletin we’re going to go over today, “we believe”, “one”, and “eternally existent, infinite God”; and we’ll take the next two weeks to finish up the rest of the statement. So let’s jump in.
We believe. This is the first part of our statement, and it’s actually the first two words of all of our Articles of Faith. I won’t go over this part when we look at other Articles, but for this first statement, I think it’s important to remind ourselves of what this means when we say, “we believe”.
When we went through the book of James, we talked a little about what belief really is, what faith really is, and we discovered that there are two components to belief: faith, and ACTION. The two must both be present for belief to be true and real, and faith and action must work together.
1 John 5:4 helps us with the faith part of it, “That’s because everyone who is a child of God has won the battle over the world. Our faith has won the battle for us.” (NIRV) John tells us that faith is what gives us victory over the world. He says this in the context of talking about false teachings. Faith gives us victory over the doubts of the world, and the alternative viewpoints the world offers up when it comes to beliefs about God. Faith secures us, it anchors us in the truth that we read about in Scripture. Faith is important, it’s good to know what the Bible says, and it’s good to believe in that truth. But when we say, “we believe”, we’re saying more than just “this is what I know to be true”, or “this is what I think is true.”
Action must be coupled with our faith, with our knowledge of what we know is true. Matthew 5:16 says our actions should point the way to God, shine His light so that others will give God glory and believe as well. So our actions are meant to be give God glory and point others to Jesus, but our actions are more than that.
James 2:17, and 20 says, “It is the same with faith. If it doesn’t cause us to do something, it’s dead.; You foolish person! Do you want proof that faith without good deeds is useless?” (NIRV). Action is so much a part of belief that if it is not, then that faith is dead. It is not a saving faith.
Action is a sign, to others, and most importantly to ourselves that our beliefs, our faith have taken root in our hearts and changed us. I just started reading a book and one of the characters makes the point that you can fake anything, you can do anything and say anything, but if you don’t think that way then it’s not true. Belief should be so rooted in our hearts and minds that we are changed, truly different, we think different and feel different, and therefore act different.
When we say, “we believe”, what we say is that we not only believe that this statement is true, but also that it has taken root in our hearts so deeply that it has fundamentally changed who we are, how we think, how we feel, and how we act.
Another thing that’s important to note about the statement “we believe”, is that we understand that there may be some things about our belief statements that we don’t fully understand, but we believe anyway because we are smart people and we know that if some of it is true, it all has to be true. For example, when we talk about the Triune nature of God, three-in-one, Father, Son, Spirit, we come up with all sorts of clever ways to try to help us understand this and grasp it, and we do to some extent, but I don’t think we can fully grasp what that means in its entirety the way God understands it.
So what approach do we take? Do we just say, “Well I don’t fully understand and I can’t fully understand so I’m not going to believe?” Some do take this approach. Others, smart people like us, just understand that everything else that the Bible says about God is true, so this must be true too, even if we don’t fully comprehend it.
When we say “we believe”, we’re taking a TAKE it or leave it approach. If some of it is true, it must all be true. You either believe it or don’t. Either take it or leave it. But for us, we believe.
We believe in one eternally existent, infinite God. Let’s look at the word “one”. Where do we get this in Scripture?
Look at Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” God. Singular, not plural or multiple. There is one God at the beginning, and if you look at Revelation, you’ll see that this doesn’t change, and there is still one God at the end. Any teaching that teaches something other than this is false.
Deuteronomy 6:4 says this, “Hear, Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one!” (NASB) This passage echoes the thought that God is one, but here we see two different titles for the one God, we see the title Lord in small caps and we see God. These are just two of the titles we see throughout the Bible. Lord is a stand in for Yahweh, God’s covenant name, which shows the special, personal relationship He desires to have with His created people. God is a stand in for Elohim, creator of the universe. So even though we have different titles for God, different roles He takes with us and His creation, He is still one. Any teaching that teaches something else is false. And just a cool side note, that if you are ever curious about having the original titles of God in your Scripture reading, you can access the Names of God Bible translation through biblegateway.com, and it will put all the original Hebrew titles for God back into the passages. It’s similar to the NIV in terms of how easy it is to read and its accuracy, so it’s pretty cool.
Now let’s look at Isaiah 40:18-20, “How can we describe God? With what can we compare him? 19 With an idol? An idol made from a mold, overlaid with gold, and with silver chains around its neck? 20 The man too poor to buy expensive gods like that will find a tree free from rot and hire a man to carve a face on it, and that’s his god—a god that cannot even move!” (TLB)
Regardless of what we make our idols of, Isaiah states that nothing can compare with God. No idol we can imagine or fashion, no thing that is that we honor or devote ourselves is like God. All other “gods” we might come up with or make are ultimately the product of HUMAN imagination. He does not share glory with other gods because there are no other gods. He’s it. He is one, He is the only. Any teaching that teaches something else is false.
This is a teaching that, as I said before, is consistent throughout Scripture, both Old and New Testaments agree on this point that there is one God, only one. 1 Corinthians 8:6 says, “But we know that there is only one God, the Father, who created all things and made us to be his own; and one Lord Jesus Christ, who made everything and gives us life.” (TLB) Here, even though Jesus is called Lord, we know from other places in Scripture that explore the Triune nature of God, that though Jesus is God, there is not more than one God. Any teaching that teaches something else is false.
And we believe in one eternally existent, infinite God. Look at Isaiah 40:28, “Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth Does not become weary or tired. His understanding is unsearchable.” (NASB) This passage calls God the EVERLASTING God. Everlasting, or lasting forever, is another way of saying eternal. In philosophy one of the most basic things they teach you is how to make philosophical statements to argue your logic and reasoning. So here’s my statement to show my thinking here, and the thinking of Biblical scholars as they use this passage to understand God’s nature, if God is eternal then He has no beginning or end. That’s what eternal means, right? That’s what everlasting means. If something goes on forever, that means it had no start point or stop point. I know this is difficult for us to grasp or understand because we are limited by time as physical beings. This is one of those things that we have to understand as best as we can through Scripture, and then say, “okay, if the rest of what the Bible says about who God is is true, then I have to either take this as truth too, or all of it is a lie.” God is eternal, He exists eternally, without any beginning or end. Any teaching that teaches something else is false.
1 Timothy 1:17 adds this, “Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.” (NASB) Here again we see God’s eternal nature listed, but Paul also adds immortal to how we look at God’s eternal existence. He is immortal, He does not die. Here’s another if-then statement, if He cannot die then He will exist after everything else passes away, and He continues to exist past time. Any teaching that teaches something else is false.
Finally, John 3:16 adds, “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish, but have eternal life.” (NASB) And Matthew 28:20 adds, “Teach them to obey everything I have commanded you. And you can be sure that I am always with you, to the very end.” (NIRV) Here He promises to be with us always, offers eternal life to us. Quite simply, He cannot give something He is not or does not have. If God isn’t eternal, or infinite, He couldn’t promise to always be with us, and He couldn’t promise us eternal life. Any teaching that teaches something else is false.
We believe in one eternally existent, infinite God…and next week we’ll dig into the rest.
1. Since our message deals with our beliefs about God, what aspect of God’s attributes so far are most encouraging to you? How does knowing that this is who God is affect your life and your relationship with Him?
2. How do these beliefs about God affect how you should treat other Christians?
3. How do these beliefs about God affect how you should treat those who don’t believe?