I have been studying Isaiah 40-53 for a while. I find myself strangely drawn to this section of the book, and am reading it over and over again. It is the "mountain top" of the book. It contains some amazing claims. In this section God makes claims that must be addressed by those who are truly seeking after God.Here's just one of God's claims in this passage:
Isa 45:5 "I am the LORD, and there is no other; Besides Me there is no God. I will gird you, though you have not known Me;
Isa 45:6 That men may know from the rising to the setting of the sun That there is no one besides Me. I am the LORD, and there is no other,
Isa 45:7 The One forming light and creating darkness, Causing well-being and creating calamity; I am the LORD who does all these.
This whole section of scripture is filled with this kind of language. God is trying to make as clear as possible this one fact- HE IS THE ONLY GOD! Now, in a politically correct world that is not accepted well, yet God said it. The very concept of "GOD" means that there can only be one...there isn't room for more than one sovereign creator. The God of the bible is claiming that place. He claims to be the only GOD.
He continues on in Isaiah to say something like this, "Let me prove I am God. I will tell you what is going to happen before it does (Omniscience). I challenge any other "gods" to do the same thing." Prophecy is one of the great evidences that God is God...he tells us what's coming before it does. No other "god" has ever done that.
I have also been reading Revelation. I am amazed to watch as God reveals himself as GOD to the world in days ahead, and still they reject him. So it's no surprise that the only God who exists is rejected for cheap copies, gods we can control. It's much easier to worship a "god" you design rather than the one who insists on being king in our lives.
I talked about this on Sunday, and am still feeding on the idea of God as king...king of everything, and longing to be king in me. I'm so blessed that the God who is has reached out to us, and wants to have a relationship with us as father, as God and as king.
Isa 45:18 For thus says the LORD, who created the heavens (He is the God who formed the earth and made it, He established it and did not create it a waste place, but formed it to be inhabited), "I am the LORD, and there is none else.
8 comments:
mike, i really enjoyed your series these past three weeks. thanks for continuing your thoughts here. your teaching has really been good for me.
Stephanie,
Thanks for your encouraging words. I really enjoyed the opportunity to teach. I'm blessed that God was able to use me. Thanks.
I have been chewing on this idea lately, too. I had an interesting discussion with one of my sons about one of his difficulties and we were able to work through his situation by applying what you said on Sunday - that God is Lord over his situation and we have to trust that He is working in that situation. I'm glad he heard the message, too. It was a great discussion. (And some would say the Bible isn't applicable today! Phooey!)
Mike, At the beginning of your series you suggested we read: The Knowledge of the Holy by A.W. Tozer. I followed your suggestions and WOW. Though I'm not done it is amazing what I have learned. I certainly know that I have not thought rightly about God in the past. It is horrible to think that I have "...reduced God to manageable terms"
However, it is heartening to learn that God constantly encourages us to trust him in the dark. God says: "Trust me and be not afraid." With the goodness of God to desire our highest welfare, the wisdom of God to plan it, and the power of God to achieve it, what do we lack?
-R
The subject reminds me of this poem. Tozer wrote many books another clasic is 'The Pursuit of GOD' He was a true christian mystic. Amazing.
THE TYGER (from Songs Of Experience)
By William Blake -1794
Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare sieze the fire?
And what shoulder, & what art.
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & what dread feet?
What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?
When the stars threw down their spears,
And watered heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?
Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
-Dave
Though they're all good, I haven't enjoyed other Tozer books nearly as much as the little volume on God's attributes. It's life-changing. I guess it's time to pull it off the shelf and read it again, to remind myself- God is God alone.
Huge thoughts for my small brain! One of the hardest things is wrapping my brain around the notion that since God is King its possible he not only "allows" storms in my life but creates them....for his purposes. Nothing comes into my life that hasn't passed through His hands.
Big stuff.
You know, I love how you read the Bible, Mike. You taught me to read it to know God better, not just to know stuff. I read it now not to become more theologically astute or to gain knowledge; those are peripheral. I read the Bible so that when I am ever asked, "Who is God?" or even more scary, when God asks me as he did Peter, "who do you say that I am?" I have an answer that goes deeper than whats in my brain.
Thank you brother.
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