All right, we come now to lesson number 23 in our study, our survey of Christian doctrine. And today we come to a most important lesson, and that is the lesson entitled God, the study of God himself. And I want to begin with a statement that you should see on your handouts from A.W. Tozer. And this statement has always been helpful to me over the years. And he writes the following, he says, what comes into our mind when we think about God is the most important thing about us. That's a pretty powerful statement from Tozer. The reality is this, when you think about God, what comes into your mind is the most important thing about you. That's a very, a poignant truth that we need to wrestle with. A good question for us to think through is this. If if a little seven year old child came to you and said, tell me about God, tell me who is God and what is God like? Well, what would you say to that child? Right. What thoughts would come into your mind that you would express to that child to explain to that child who your God is? Right. And even in me asking that question, you're probably thinking, wow, what would I say? Well, that's what we're gonna do tonight. We're gonna study the doctrine of God, right? So we can answer that question helpfully, but most importantly, that we would have right thoughts about God. It's very important. Because to have wrong thoughts about God, the very definition of that is idolatry, right? And the first commandment is what? To have no other gods before God, right? So that's very important. Notice the second part of your handout there says one theologian, John Calvin, has said that man's heart is an idol factory. And so the question is this, what is an idol? What is an idol? We've all heard about idols, right? Some of you may have said you had a sports idol when you were a child. That's kind of a benign use of the word, usually, sometimes. But what is an idol? When we think of the word idol, what does that mean? Yeah, it's something that you worship, it's something that you that you ascribe worth to, you honor in a very particular way. So an idol is something that you worship, and in particular, it's something that you worship that is not God, right? Because God's not an idol in that way. So it's anything that you would worship other than the one true God. And so in keeping that definition of an idol, the next question on your handout is this, why are wrong thoughts about God idolatrous? Why are wrong thoughts about God idolatrous? Okay, attacking the character of God. So if you have wrong views of who God is, are you then actually thinking about the one true God? No, the God that you are thinking about is something that you created in your own mind. It's not the one true God. And therefore, even though you may call what you worship God, you're not worshiping God. Therefore, you are committing idolatry, right? And so back to Tozer's point, right? What comes into your mind when you think about God is the most important thing about you. OK, it's absolutely essential that when we think about God that we have right thoughts about who he is. OK, now the next question then is this. Well, how can we learn to have these right thoughts about God? Do we just have to discover it on our own? Do we have to just grope out into the darkness and try to just find out by happenstance? How do we have, how do we fill our minds with the proper truths and thoughts about who God is? Right, so who's the best place to go to to learn about God? Well, it'd be God himself, right? And where has God revealed himself? Well, we know he's revealed himself in nature, right? So we do learn from God from nature, but most specifically and most thoroughly he has revealed himself to us in scripture, right? So the answer is the Bible. Turn with me to Hebrews 1. I believe we looked at this verse last week. So let's go back to Hebrews 1. Chapter one verse one, it says long ago. At many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, so he revealed himself. To the people through through prophets, right now, if you go back to Romans one, we will do that now, but Romans one tells us that the prophets spoke about who? About Christ, right? But says here now, so in the in the latter days in the Old Testament times, God revealed himself to us through the prophets, and the prophets spoke of Christ, right? It says here, though, in the last days, that is, these times that we're in, he has spoken to us, how? By his son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom he also created the world. Notice what it says about Jesus here in verse three. It says that Jesus is the radiance of the glory of God. and the exact imprint of his nature. And he upholds the universe by the word of his power. Remember Thomas, right? When he asked Jesus, you know, Jesus, show us the father. What did Jesus say to him? If you've seen me, you've seen the father. So it says in these last days that God has spoken to us. He's revealed himself to us by his son, right? And so we have the perfect revelation of God in the person of Jesus Christ. And where is Jesus Christ revealed to us? Right here in the scriptures, right? So where do we go to have these right thoughts about God? We go to Holy Scripture. We go to the Bible, to the Word of God. That leads us to the next question on your handout. Why is it a great indictment against us that we do not know more about who God is? Why would that be a great indictment against us? Yeah. Exactly. We have everything we need, right? We've got, we have his word, okay? And not only do we have his word, now his word's most important, but we also have the church, right? We have the local church that's, that proclaims that word, right? It's the pillar and buttress of that truth of the word. We have, So many resources today. We have so many Bible teachers in our day that are solid and good. Now we have a bunch that are not good. We have to understand that and have discernment. But we have resources coming out of our ears, right, in our day. There's no excuse for us to not know more about God than what we know. And I include myself in that, right? If the most important thing about us is what comes into our mind when we think about God, then it's of utmost importance that we have right thoughts about God, which means it's of utmost importance that we go to the right source to learn these thoughts about God, which is Scripture, which means that it's of utmost importance that we actually study the Scripture, right? And how often do we not study Scripture? Some of us at times can even go days and weeks and maybe longer at times. without really studying the Scripture. And that ought not to be the case, right? Let's go down to the first section here. That was our introduction. Now we're going to go to theology proper. Now what do I mean by theology proper? Now when we talk about studying theology, we mean in a broad way studying all kinds of doctrines, right? The study of Scripture, the study of God, the study of man, the study of salvation, study of sin, the study of the spirit, the study of the church, the study of last things, all these things that we study, right? All of that falls under that broad category of studying theology. But what is theology proper? Now, what I mean by that is think about the word theology. Theology means the study of, right? Of Theos, right? God. Okay. So theology proper is the study of God, the being of God, okay? That's what we mean by theology proper. And that's what this particular chapter in the confession is about. It's about theology proper, the study of God himself. So what is theology? Number one, it is the study of God. Number two, now why should we study theology? To know God, right? That's the answer, right? Yeah, the catechism, right? So we are commanded to know God and it's our great sin to folly if we don't know God by studying theology. But ultimately it's to know God. Now turn with me to John 17 3. And you'll notice when I said, you know, and you gave the right answer, Brother John, the answer is not to know about God, but rather to know God. Look at John 17, 3. There it says, and this is eternal life. So Jesus is about to give us an answer, right? He just says, okay, He's given us a term, eternal life. What does it mean to be saved? What does it mean to be a Christian, right? He gives us the answer here. And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. So what does it mean to be saved? What does it mean to have eternal life? It's to know God, right? But let me ask the question. We already read in Romans 1, It says, for although they knew God, they did not honor Him or give Him thanks. So, do those people have eternal life? No. It says they knew God. Satan, does Satan know who God is? Right? But does Satan know God? The answer would be, of course, no. So the word no here, K-N-O-W, is a relational term, right? Ultimately, it's a covenantal term. Do you have a covenant relationship with the one true God? Is he your God? Is he your father? Do you know him in that way? Has the Spirit called you to cry out Abba, Father? So the point of theology, the purpose of theology, yes, we need to know about God. We need to know the facts. But the point of knowing the facts is so that we might know this God personally. that we might have a true saving relationship with the one true God. So the end goal of studying theology is always to know God at that personal level. That leads to number three here. So right theology, the right study of God, it leads us to right worship. What's the highest calling of any man? worship God, right? To honor God, to glorify God. Okay, that's the highest calling of any person. And so, right theology leads us to right worship and also to right living. Notice number four. Men, this is very important, men, mankind, can never rise above their view of God. You think of some of the animalistic tribes, right? They have a very low view of God, don't they? They think of God as the sun god, or the river god, or hippopotamus god, or whatever views they have, right? They have exchanged the glory of the immortal God for the images of creeping things, right? Beasts and things. Created beings, okay? They have a low view of God. And, of course, that results in what? Their culture can't rise above their low view of God, okay? Now, think about our culture. Would anybody in here say that American culture has been getting better in the last generation or worse? Worse. We all say worse, right? Now, do you think what do you think the relationship? OK, if if the state of our culture is doing this, right, what would be the state of our culture's knowledge of God and view of God? Right. Right. And so when we see a downgrade in people's knowledge of God, a downgrade in people's understanding of who God is, a downgrade in theology, we see a downgrade in culture, right? So men will never rise above their view of God. Also, our worship can never rise above our view of God. You think worship in 21st century American churches is more reverent today or less reverent than in times past? Less reverent in many cases, right? And when you look at it just in a general way, we would say that worship in general was far less reverent than it has been at other times in our culture. And there's a direct relationship to that with regards to people's view of God. The lower our view of God is, the more worldly our worship becomes, right? So our worship will never rise above our view of God. Now, I think through me with that. So if you're going to you come to worship God, so you come together with God's people to worship him. Well, what are you worshiping God for? What truths about God are causing your heart to soar in worship of God? For what, though, when we think of the being of God? who he is, right? We think of his power and his wisdom and his love and his mercy and justice and grace and all these truths about God, right? Well, guess what? If you don't know, for example, that God is all powerful, you can't worship him for being all powerful because you don't know that. If you don't know that God is a God of grace, you can't worship him for his grace, right? And so the more you know about God and more importantly, the more you know this God on a personal level, the higher your worship will be, right? The more true and beautiful your worship will be. But if you have low views of God, you're gonna have very low worship, right? Okay? The next part there is a quote from, I believe it's R.C. Sproul, and I've always found it to be a very helpful quote. It says, the mind is the feeding trough of the heart. Now, we all know what a feeding trough is, right? You fill it up with food and the animals come and eat. Now, if you have a trough there and there's nothing in the trough, is that doing the animal any good? None, right? But if that trough is full of good grain or whatever, good corn, whatever you're feeding your animals, then they're going to be some happy animals, right? Well, in the same way, if our minds are empty, if it's devoid of truth about God, what can our heart feed on? Nothing, right? Or if our mind's full of trash, what do our heart beat on? Trash, right? So therefore, it's absolutely essential for us to fill our minds with the truth about who God is, right? And therefore, our heart can then feed upon those truths, leading and expressing itself in God-honoring worship, right? If you come into the worship service with an empty head or head full of trash, then your worship is going to be that way too. It's going to be either emptier or worse. So we must fill our minds with the truth about who God is so that we can worship him properly. One of our memory verses is what? Romans 12 2. Part of that verse is that we are to be transformed. How? By the renewal of our minds. Filling of our minds with the truth about who God is, theology, so that our hearts can feed upon that truth and we can be transformed, right? Therefore, how important is it for us to study theology? Very important, right? And we live in a day and time, particularly among men, particularly among men who are the blue collar sort. Well, I don't need to study theology. Yes. You know, that's that's not what I need to do. You know, people, that's too complicated. I don't want to do all that. But it's essential. If you're going to worship God properly, you're going to live in a way that pleases God. You need to know about God. You need to give yourself to the knowledge of God. And the only way to do that is to study theology, to study him in his word, right? So we must give ourselves to this. OK, well, now with that in mind, let's go to our confession. We're going to look at chapter two. And I will try to go over the deepest. And most beautiful chapter in the entire confession in just a few minutes. So we won't be going into as much detail as we certainly could. It's gonna be a very quick 30,000 foot overview of this doctrine of who God is. Let's first just read paragraph one, and then you'll notice I've got each paragraph is, I've got it basically outlined out, and we'll just answer a few questions as we go. So let's read paragraph one, and then we'll go over paragraph one, and then so on and so forth, okay? So paragraph one says, The Lord our God is but one, only living and true God, whose subsistence is in and of himself, infinite in being and perfection, whose essence cannot be comprehended by any but himself, a most pure spirit, invisible without body, parts or passions, who only have immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto, who is immutable, immense, eternal, incomprehensible, almighty, every way infinite, most holy, most wise, most free, most absolute, working all things according to the counsel of his own immutable and most righteous will for his own glory. most loving, gracious, merciful, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin, the rewarder of them that diligently seek him, and with all most just and terrible in his judgments, hating all sin, and who will by no means clear the guilty." Well, that is a powerful paragraph, right? So if you were to answer the question, well, who is God or or what is God like? There's a good there's a good summary statement of that, right? OK, just think about reading that a seven year old that. Yeah. And we ought to, right? We ought to read that to even to a seven year old. And I'm going to give us a good summary statement, I hope, of of a way to break some of these down for us. So let's go through our handout here. And you notice there's letter A through H. We're gonna be looking at different sort of categories of his attributes, okay? Now this is not exhaustive. There could be more that we could look into. I think I counted like 38 different attributes here. If I counted it right, 38 or 39. And so obviously we don't have time to look at each one in depth. But first, we'll notice the singularity of God. It's the very first phrase in this, this paragraph it says that our that our God is but one only living and true God so God is singular in that way there's only one God is what's being said okay there's only one being who is God okay now we are a category of beings called human beings right there's lots of human beings billions upon billions upon billions of human beings there's only one divine being right? He's singular in that way. Okay. That's what Deuteronomy 6 4 says. The Lord your God is one. Okay. Notice the next phrase says whose subsistence is in and of himself. Now, what is that referring to? That refers to let her be there and that is the independence of God. God is self existent. And that's a phrase, I mean, we say that, you know, just because we know what the word means, but we really can't grasp what that means. Self-existence? What does that even mean? Because we're the opposite of that, right? We didn't exist from ourselves, right? We come from God, right? Ultimately, and then at a more basic level, we come from our parents, okay? Our existence depends upon others, right? But God's existence depends upon no one. Who existed before God? well the answer is there is no there was no existence before God because there well there doesn't make sense and it's a it's a non-sensical statement right God has always been there's but there's never been anyone before God right so he is self-existent he is independent his subsistence his existence is from himself next we go to the incomprehensibility Says he is infinite and being and perfection whose essence whose being cannot be comprehended by anybody himself. Only God can comprehend God. That raises up a very important question. OK, only God can truly know God. The question is this, can we? No God at all. The answer is yes. Now, can we comprehend God? No, only God can comprehend God, right? But we can know about God, OK? The question is, well, how? If God is incomprehensible. OK, we can't know all the details about who God is, but how can we know God at all? Because he's revealed himself, right? We can know God to the point of what he's revealed to us about himself. A good analogy I like to think of with this is a tree, okay? Now, is anybody in here, I haven't been out there, I want to go one day, but has anybody ever went and saw like the redwoods or the sequoias? You have? Okay, can you comprehend that tree? By comprehend, can you take your arms and wrap all the way around a sequoia? Not even close, right? In the same way, you can't wrap your mind around God, but can you touch a sequoia? You can, right? You can apprehend, you can know something about that tree. You can't get your arms all the way around that tree, but you can touch it, right? And know, oh, this is a sequoia. And the same thing with God, right? We can't get our whole minds around God, but we can know truths about who God is, right? And we can actually know God in a personal way, okay? And so we need to understand that, right? We can't know everything about God, but what we can know about God is true, okay? We can truly know about God. And even more important, we can truly know God, okay? All right, next is spirituality or simplicity. Picking up in the paragraph, it says he is a most pure spirit. He's invisible. No man has ever seen God, why? He's invisible, for one, and it says no man can see God and live, right? He's invisible, right, to the physical eye. He's a most pure spirit, okay? It says he is without body. He's without parts or passions. So he has no body, right? We have bodies, right? But he has no body. He has no parts. What do I mean by that, he has no parts? So we are a composition of a bunch of different parts, right? Number one, we have a body, we have a soul, okay? But not only that, our bodies are composed of all these different parts, okay? Now, if I were to, we're talking about before class started, with your brother, he lost one of his fingers. Is he still your brother? So, but did he change? Yeah, he changed, right? He lost a finger. He's different than he used to be. But still, he's still him, right? Well, that can't happen with God. God can't change because God's not made up of different parts. You can't take a part away from God or add a part to God. OK, he's not he's not a composition of different parts. He's just he just is. Right. And now we can't really comprehend that this goes above our heads of being able to comprehend what that means. But God just is. He says, I am that I am. OK, he's not he's not made up of different pieces and parts and therefore he can't change. OK, so it goes to the question here. What does it mean that God is without body parts or passion and then passion? That's important there. Something that we often overlook, but. I can go from being sad. To angry, right, too happy, too depressed, and what causes those changes, generally speaking? Emotions, but usually outside, right? Something happens, some circumstance happens, and I react to that circumstance in such a way that my passions go up and down, right? But God is independent of his creation. God doesn't change based off of external stimuli, okay? Right, you can't influence God. That's a good way to put it. We're easily influenced, right? Often far too easily. For many of those who struggle with addiction, it's because of the fact that they're too easily influenced. But you can't influence God, okay? And so God's love is constant and steady. It doesn't go up, it doesn't go down. He's most loving all the time, never changes. Okay? But that's true of all of his attributes, right? His justice. He's most just all the time and it never changes. Okay? He doesn't fluctuate, right? He's the same all the time. Okay? Now again, we can't comprehend that, right? He's incomprehensible. When you begin to think through that, oh, I can't understand that. But it's helpful for us. And the question is, well, how is that a comfort to us? It would be very bad if you could change. Yes. Think of Malachi 3, for example, where it says, I, the Lord, do not change. Therefore, Israel, you are not consumed. OK, if God was fluctuating, if God was a moody God, that would not be good news for us. Right. He's the same yesterday, today and forever. Right. He's constant and he never changes. But moves to letter either in affinity pick up in our reading there. in our we left off with without body parts or passions says he who only have immortality dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto who is immutable that means unchangeable he is immense that is he's omnipresent he's eternal he's incomprehensible he's almighty as his omnipotence is every way infinite okay most holy, most wise, most free, most absolute. OK, so. A good way to describe that is this. God is great. God is great. We think of God, whatever attribute you think of God. I love how the confession books most. OK, you raise it to the highest level. OK, God is most whatever he is, he's most OK. So he's in, but he is great. He's omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient. He's eternal. And so we ought to worship God and fall in awe of who this God is. He is the infinite God. Next, we have sovereignty. Notice what it says. He's most wise. So he's most holy. He's most wise. He's most free. Working all things. So the sovereignty is God's power worked out, right? God has all power, all authority, and then he expresses that authority, right? So he works all things. So his sovereignty, then it extends to what? Everything, all things. He works all things. According to the counsel of his of his own unchangeable and most righteous will. So his sovereignty, his rule is according to what? The council of his own will. And his will is a goodwill, right? Perfect. OK, so he has all power to work out all things, but he works all things according to his own holiness and his own will. And then lastly, to what end does God work all things? Says here for his own glory, OK? So the goal of God's sovereignty is for his own glory. He works all things according to the counsel of his own will for his own glory. OK, letter G love of God. Here, a good good description that we got is good. And I just kind of gave you, you know, the prayer, right, that all the time the little children are taught. God is good. God is great. If you can get those two truths. Into your head. into your heart, that's very important, right? To really believe that God is great. God is able, God is powerful, right? And God is good. God's a loving God, right? He's a kind God. He's a compassionate God, okay? He's a God who always does that which is right and just, okay? That's what it says here. He is most loving most gracious, merciful, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin. Now we come to justice. God is a just God. He is the rewarder of them, it says, that diligently seek Him. The Bible says that if you confess your sins, that God is faithful and just to forgive you of your sins and to cleanse you from all unrighteousness. That if you diligently seek after God, with all your heart, says you will find him, right? If you believe upon Christ, the Bible says you shall be saved, okay? God is just to reward those who diligently seek after him. That ought to be an encouragement to you. If you diligently seek out after God, you will be rewarded, it says. But at the same time, he's also most just and terrible in his judgments. He hates all sin, and he will not clear the guilty. And so he is the punisher of the wicked. And so without any doubt or deviation, God will save all those who come to him by faith in Christ. And without any doubt or deviation, God will punish all the wicked who remain outside of Christ. All right, now we got to speed up because it's 7.25. So we got to go through the next two paragraphs fairly quickly. Unfortunately, but that's what we got to do. So paragraph two, God having all life, glory, goodness, blessedness in and of himself is alone in and unto himself all sufficient, not standing in need of any creature with which he is made, nor deriving any glory from them, but only manifesting his glory in, by, unto, and upon them. He is the alone fountain of all being, of whom, through whom, and to whom are all things. We started right, Romans 11. And he hath most sovereign dominion over his creatures, to do by them, for them, and upon them whatsoever himself pleases. In his sight all things are open and manifest. His knowledge is infinite, infallible, and independent upon the creature. So as nothing is to him contingent or uncertain, he is most holy in all of his counsels, in all of his works, and in all of his commands. To Him is due from angels and men whatsoever worship, service, or obedience as creatures they owe unto their Creator, and whatever He is further pleased to require of them. Now that's a big mouthful, right? We're going to break it down here real quick into five main points. And I'll just give you the answers here for time's sake. So first, we see from this paragraph that God is self-sufficient from His creatures. The title of the paragraph here is The Relation of God to his creature, to his creatures, right? Okay? Well, first, he's self-sufficient. He's independent from his creatures. It says here that he has all life, glory, and goodness in and of himself. Okay? We, on the other hand, we have our life from him. God is the fountain of all being, right? But there is no fountain that calls him, okay? He's the first cause. He's the source of all things. Secondly, his sovereign dominion is over all of his creatures. Not some of them, all of them. Next is he has absolute knowledge of his creatures. Says there's nothing that is hidden from him. That's a that's a terrifying thought to the wicked. To the righteous, it's meant to be a great comforting thought. God knows all things. There's no darkness to God. He sees everything. You can't hide anything from God. He sees your innermost thoughts. He knows what you're going to say before you say it, okay? And yet He still loves you. And for the wicked, they can't hide their wickedness from God. We can pull the wool over people's eyes. We can appear to be something that we're not before men, but we can't do that with God. God knows everything about us. All things are open and manifest to his sight. Further, his knowledge is independent from the creature. Now what does that mean? His knowledge is independent from the creature. Yeah, a good way to think of it is this. Has it ever occurred to you that nothing occurs to God? God doesn't learn anything. When we learn, when we get knowledge right, we receive it from outside of ourselves, right? God doesn't receive knowledge from outside of himself. His knowledge is from himself. It's independent of the creature. And we'll get more into that next week when we talk about God's decree. But that gives you a taste of next week. Our next is utter sanctity before them. It says that he is, picking up in the paragraph, he is most holy in all of His counsels and in all of His works. That word sanctity there means His holiness, right? His utter sanctity. When we think of God, we ought to think of God being holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. And then notice letter E. It's the fifth point of this paragraph. And that is His intrinsic claims upon His creatures. This is the last part of the paragraph. It says that His commands or sorry, to Him is due from angels and men whatever worship, service, or obedience as creatures they owe unto their Creator, and whatever else He's pleased to require of us. In other words, because we are the creatures of God, because He is Creator and God, we owe Him worship, we owe Him service, we owe Him obedience, and we owe Him whatever else He's If He says to do anything else, we owe Him that too, right? He is the complete and total master over us. And therefore, all of our lives is meant to be at His disposal, okay? And simple men don't like to hear that. But redeemed men, men who have been saved by the grace of God, they love to hear that, right? And our great desire, our great goal is that we might worship and serve our Savior. All right, so let's move now to The Trinity, and we're going to cover the Trinity in like two minutes. In some ways, it might be the safest way to do that. So paragraph three. It says, in this divine and infinite being, so we've been studying about this divine being, right? Paragraph one, we saw his attributes, what he is like. Paragraph two, we saw how he interacts with and his relationship to his creatures, right? And now, We learn more about this God. It says paragraph three in this divine and infinite being one. There are three subsistences or persons, the father, the word or son and the Holy Spirit. And these three persons or subsistences are of one substance, one power and eternity, each having the whole divine essence, yet the essence undivided. The Father is of none, neither begotten nor proceeding. The Son is eternally begotten of the Father, the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son, all infinite without beginning, therefore but one God, who is not to be divided in nature and being, but distinguished by several peculiar relative properties and personal relations, which, doctrine of the Trinity, is the foundation of all our communion with God and comfortable dependence on Him. So very quickly, we'll run through a few basic points from this paragraph. First, we learn that there's only one true God. It says in this divide, an infinite being, one, okay? There's only one God. However, this one God exists eternally in three persons. Now, who are those three persons? God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit. Now, there's only one God, and yet there's three persons, okay? There's not three gods, there's not three divine beings, there's only one God who exists in these three persons. But how do we distinguish between these three persons? According to the paragraph here. says they're distinguished by several relative properties and personal relations. Now, what are the relative properties it gives here? Well, notice very carefully, it says. Says the father is of none. Neither begotten nor proceeding. So that's a relative relative property of the father. He is the unbegotten one. He is the begetting one, right? But the son, however, is eternally begotten of the father. Because it's the eternal generation of the son. That's one of his properties. That's not true of the father, right? In one way, the father is not begotten. The son is begotten. And then the spirit says, proceeding from the father and the son. So the father is the one who begets. He's the unbegotten one. The Son is the one who is begotten and the Spirit is the one who proceeds from the Father and from the Son. The Son doesn't proceed from the Spirit. He's begotten of the Father, right? But the Spirit is the one who proceeds from the Father and the Son. So those are their relative properties and their personal relations, okay? Very important. The Son is not the Father of the Father, okay? The Father is the Father of the Son, right? We can distinguish by these personal relations that they have. But it's very important that we understand that all three persons, letter G on your handout, all three persons are truly God in every way. OK. The three persons are one substance. One power, one eternity, each having the whole divine essence. So everything we read about in paragraph one and in paragraph two, all of that is true of the Father, it's true of the Son, and it's true of the Spirit. Make sense? Very important that we understand that. And yet this essence is undivided. So it's not like it's, you know, you got one essence and you break it up in three clumps, okay? And all the clumps are the same. No, it's still one God. This is a mystery, right? It's a divine, it's a mystery that goes above our heads. There's no way we can truly understand that mystery. There's one true God, one divine essence, yet in three persons, okay? And that's all I'm gonna say about it for now. All right, so conclusion. And this is the important part I want you to think through. In practical ways, so we've studied about God here for the last 45 minutes or so. We've studied about God. Well, in practical ways, How does your view of God relate to prayer? Something very practical, right? We all pray. Well, how does your view of God relate to prayer? And maybe ask a question more directly. Why pray? Why do you pray? You believe all things are of Him, through Him, and to Him. And also, John 1, I think, in the beginning, word and their word was with God. Talk about. Without him, there was nothing. So. You're powerless. Yeah, OK, he's your rock. He's the only thing that. So what are some truths, though, that that would lead you to pray? No, let's think of God's sovereignty, OK? If God was not sovereign, right, if God was not powerful, if God didn't have all power, Would that encourage you to pray? No. So one of the things that encourages us to pray is that we believe that God is actually able to answer our prayers. Right. OK, because he cares. Yeah. And that leads to the next one. Right. So or to another truth is we actually know that we can we can have we can talk to this guy. Right. He's a personal God. He's not he's not a force. Right. He is he is a being a personal being. that we can have a relationship with, right? We can communicate with this God through his son, the Lord Jesus Christ, the only mediator between God and man, right? So he's a sovereign God. He's an accessible God through Christ. That's why we pray in Christ's name. But next, another truth about God is this, that God is a loving God. He's a compassionate God. He's a God who cares about us, right? If we had this all powerful God who didn't care about us, would you want to pray to him? No. But because you know the truths, right? Theology, he's a sovereign God, he's an accessible God, he's a compassionate God. Those theological truths become, they're not so much just abstract academic terms, are they? In fact, they become the very bedrock and foundation of why you pray, right? Yeah. And so now you, that's just a very basic example of why theology is important, right? You think a lot more theologically than you realize you do. Every time you pray, you're assuming a lot of theological truth. You see that? Let's move to number two. We live in an evil world where bad and terrible things happen. And one day all of us in this room is going to die. It's pretty bad news. So in a world full of suffering and death, how can you have hope? What truths about God give you hope? God is eternal. This is not the end. We know that because God has said so, right? Okay, so that's a that's a truth, right? So we believe there's going to be that there's there's life after death, okay? Yes. So we have all these truths, right? All the truths that undergird the doctrine of salvation, right? All of these things help us to have hope, right? in spite of all the fact that we live in a fallen world. But if you don't know those things, you have no hope, would you? That's why it says in Ephesians 2 that the Gentiles were without God in this world and they were without hope, right? So if you're going to have hope and all of us need hope, we need to know the truth about God, right? So you see how theology is important. Number three, the scripture says, if you repent and believe in Christ, that you shall be saved. What truths about God make you believe this to be true? Yeah, so God is trustworthy, right? God is truth itself. Okay, God does not lie. All these truths about God help us to believe that to be true, right? Number four. If you believe you are saved today, what truths about God give you hope that God won't later decide to send you to hell anyways? So I believe in Jesus my whole life. I've trusted in Christ. I'm trying to follow after God. What truth about God gives you confidence that on the day of judgment, when you stand before God, he said, yeah, I know you believe in Jesus. I don't care. I'm sending you to hell anyway. Right. So that's a theological truth, right? What about God being immutable? God does not change. What about God being faithful? Yeah, what about God being just? You being a covenant keeping God. All these truths about God give you this confidence, right? But if you don't know these truths, then you'd be sitting there thinking, well, maybe he would do that. See that? And then lastly, number five, why is the doctrine of the Trinity? We said about the Trinity, right? There's one God exists in three persons, Father, Son, Holy Spirit. The last part of the paragraph of chapter three says, or paragraph, chapter two says, that this doctrine of the Trinity is the foundation of all of our communion, relationship with God, and comfortable dependence upon him. So how could that, what is meant by that in the confession there? Well, again, think of prayer. I'm gonna go back to prayer, prayer being a very basic thing. When you pray, you pray to the Father, right? We got the Lord's Prayer. OK, our father, which art in heaven. So we address our prayer to the father. Through who? Through Christ, there's only one mediator between God and man. That's Christ, right? That's why we pray in Jesus name. So we pray to the father through the son. By the power of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit is the one who enables us and gives us the grace to do to have this relationship with God. OK, So just every time you pray, your communion with God is based upon the doctrine of the Trinity, right? What about salvation? Doctrine of salvation? Truth that, well, God, the Father is the one who chooses, right? He chooses to save the people before the foundation of the earth. He sends his son to do what? To accomplish the redemption of those people, right? He came to live the perfect life and died on the cross to save his people from their sins. And what does the Holy Spirit do? The Holy Spirit comes in and applies that salvation through the effectual call to the people of God. So you have the Father appointing, the Son accomplishing redemption, and the Spirit applying redemption. And so, in many, many ways, our relationship with God is based upon this doctrine of Trinity. But if you don't know about the doctrine of Trinity, you wouldn't know those truths, would you? Right? And it would be harder for you to have a proper relationship with God. In fact, that would be impossible for you to have a proper relationship with God. Well, we could keep going on. We're all probably closing on our here. So let's close there next week. We'll pick up in Chapter three on the doctrine of God's decree and and move forward from there. Ask Brother Griffin, would you close us in prayer at this time?