Read the transcript below video...
Today we’re returning to the series on the Character of God; Looking at Who God is and What God is like.
It’s been a little while since our last session, so I want to do a little review by going back and digging a little deeper into some of what we’ve seen, and to think more about what it means for us today.
Who is God? What is He Like ?
We started by thinking about certain aspects of God that give us a clearer understanding of what He has always been like.
We’ve thought about God in Eternity and how that can help us get to the heart of Who He really is.
We saw that some terms can be more helpful than others.
For example, we can think of God as the Judge who will one day judge all of us, which is true.
But let’s think about this through the lens of Eternity.
God has always been good and just; and yet in Eternity no one had done anything wrong, so there was no need for judgement. We don’t see God as a Judge in Eternity, because there was no evil to judge.
You could say the same for mercy and grace in the way we can typically think about these words; Mercy meaning not getting the judgement that we do deserve, and instead getting kindness we don’t deserve; which is Grace. [1]
To make this clearer, think about the Trinity; God as Three in One. In Eternity there was no one else apart from the One God in Three persons.
Was there ever a time when part of the Trinity didn’t deserve to be treated well; A time when they needed Grace? Was there ever a time in Eternity when The Father, The Son or the Holy Spirit had done something wrong and needed Mercy and forgiveness? The answer is obviously NO! God cannot do anything wrong.
So I think it’s safe to say that God’s judgment, God’s mercy and even God’s grace, could not be expressed without a fallen creation.
Looking back, there was a past time beyond time, a time called Eternity, when only God existed; a time before evil, before sin and death.
And looking forward there will be a future time after these things, a time beyond sin, death and judgement, when we enter into Eternity with God.
Let’s look at some other terms:
God has always been creative, imaginative and artistic, with a full understanding of mechanics, biology, chemistry, physics and engineering, etc, and a full capacity to artistically express Himself, and yet do we see these aspects of God in Eternity?
It is true that God expresses Himself through creation. It is true to call God “Creator,” and yet in some way even that description doesn’t go far enough, I think, to get to the very core of Who God is.
So these terms don’t adequately define the essence of God, even though they do reveal something of His nature.
It’s been said that “the true test of a man's character is what he does when no one is watching.” [2]
Well, what is God like when no one is watching, or better yet, what was God like before there was anyone else to watch Him. What has He always been like throughout Eternity, before being Creator or Judge?
There are aspects of God that have always been there and didn’t have to wait to show themselves when He created the universe, or in His interactions with His creation since then.
That’s what I want us to dig into a little today.
And I believe it starts with looking at the Trinity.
God has always been Trinity - One divine being, God, eternally existing as Three United Persons - The Eternal Father, Eternal Son, Eternal Holy Spirit; Being with, relating to and connecting with each other through all Eternity.
So God has always been and will always be Relational in nature. Relationship (in it’s most healthy and ideal sense of the word) goes to the very heart of Who God is.
As we think about what God’ Relationship is like in Trinity, there is one word in Scripture that stands out more than any other; One word that defines what this relationship is like.
That word is Love.
How do we define love?
How do you define love?
There are different kinds of love and different aspects of love, but we can speak of love between people in a general sense.
Here’s my definition:
Love is wanting the best for another; caring for someone that comes out of a deep concern for them; and tends to be accompanied by deep affection for that other person. Love is concerned with what’s best for another, rather than what’s best for self. Love is more than doing good for others, although it shows itself through goodness. Love is more than affection and feeling, but can you call it love, if those emotions are never there on some level (Cf. 1Corinthians 13; John 3:35; 5:20)? [3]
John tells us that “God is love” (1 John 4:8,16), and my question to those who accept the Bible, but deny the Trinity is this: When did God first love? When did God begin to BE Love?
God being Love only makes sense in light of the Trinity. [4]
In the Trinity there has always been someone else to love. That’s why the Bible can say 43 times, “[God’s] love endures forever”.” [5]
God’s love is Eternal; as Eternal as God Himself, because God has always been in loving relationship; Father with Son, Son with Father; Love reflected to and from each other in the Spirit Who is Love.
Can you imagine being in a perfect loving relationship where there is mutual love, respect and care for each other? What would that be like?
They’re the kind of relationships God desires for us to have.
There are good reasons why the two Great commands are to Love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength, and to love our neighbour as we love ourselves; And why the New Commandment is to love one another the same way Jesus loves us; because to Love is to be like God Himself, and as John again says, when we love, it is because we have been born of God and know God, and if we don’t love then we don’t know God, because God is love (1 John 4:7-8). [6]
What does it actually mean to BE love?
It might be helpful to look at another aspect of God’s character which is directly linked with His love; That is His goodness, or righteousness. God always has, and always will, do what is right and good.
Why? Because He IS Good, because He IS Love.
Ten times the Scriptures tell us that “[God] is good” and nine out of those ten times they immediately add that common phrase, “for His love endures forever”. [7]
Even though many English translations don’t bring it out, the original Hebrew is clear in all nine of these verses: “[God is Good, BECAUSE His Love endures forever.” Some of the more literal translations do bring this out, like the ESV, WEB, and the KJV and NKJV. [8]
Aside from the fact that goodness and kindness are themselves part of the clear definition of the Hebrew word translated love, it is also clear just from the context that God is good because of His love. His goodness flows out of His love.
God is Eternally Good because His Love is Eternal.
God’s Goodness, His righteousness, is eternally linked to His Love. Love really does go to the core of Who God Is.
And it’s from God and His love that we get our understanding of what it means to be good.
So what does this love look like?
Love is patient, love is kind. Love does not envy, Love does not boast, Love is not proud. Love does not dishonour others, Love is not self-seeking, Love is not easily angered, Love keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. Love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. (1 Corinthians 13:4-8a)
Love summarises the Fruit of the Spirit and includes patience, kindness, goodness, humility, loyalty, gentleness, and control over self, as well as joy and peace (Galatians 5:22-23). And all these come from God and His Spirit of Love.
We can get caught up in the idea that doing good is the same as being good; that doing the right thing makes us right; or that doing a loving action says that we have love.
That may be the case, but what happens if we flip the order around?
Although it is true that love can be shown by doing good to help others, Paul says that we can do good things without love. We can give away all our possessions to those in need, or sacrificially pour out all our energy into helping others, but if we do good things without love, Paul says it’s all a waste of time and effort; that it means nothing (1 Corinthians 13:3).
Doing good without love is not really good, at all, is it?
So love is more than simply doing loving things.
God doesn’t do good to make Himself good. He does good because He is good.
He doesn’t do the right thing to make Himself right. He does right because He is right; He is righteous.
And He doesn’t love to make Himself love. He loves because that is Who He is. God is love.
It can be easy to get these around the other way, because when we look at love it looks like doing right, good, and kind things.
But that’s not the way it works with God, and it’s not the way it works with God’s children.
We know, don't we, that we aren’t accepted by God because of any good that we do, but because of Who God is, because of His love and faithfulness, and because in His love He made the way, through the life, death and resurrection of His Son, Jesus; [9] He made the way for us to come to Him, know Him and become LIKE HIM; children of God known by our love. [10]
The good and loving things that we do now flow out of His love and His goodness in us.
When we know God, He brings us into His family; He makes us one of His own and He fills us with His Spirit and with His love (Romans 5:5).
He changes us from the inside out, not from the outside, in.
Jesus said, “Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognized by its fruit.” (Matthew 12:33)
The fruit that comes out of a tree shows what kind of tree it is. Whether an apple tree, orange, or lemon, we know them by their fruit.
You can’t make a tree good by trying to give it good fruit.
Apple Nailing Illustration by Paul David Tripp [11]
Paul David Tripp uses an illustration to make the point that focussing on outward behaviour does not get to the root of the issue.
It’s like trying to put good fruit on a bad tree and hoping that will change the tree.
Paul Tripp tells this illustration of having an apple tree that only ever grows hard, inedible, hockey-puck like apples. So his solution in the illustration is to cut off all the bad apples, and use a nail gun to nail beautiful red delicious apples to the tree.
Now the tree might look good from a distance for a while, but the good apples will rot because they have no life source, they’re not actually part of the tree; and the following year the bad apple tree will continue to produce bad, inedible fruit.
Changing the outward behaviour of fruit does not change the tree.
“Make a tree good and its fruit will be good.” If the tree is made good then the fruit will also become good.
But tell me, how do you make a tree good? Have you ever tried that? How did that work out for you?
The reality is that we can’t make that kind of change. Can we?
And yet how often do we try to change our behaviour or someone else’s behaviour as a way of trying to change who they are down at the root level?
We can’t make ourselves to be more like God by trying to act more like God. Only God can make this change.
Listen to God’s Words from Isaiah 55:
My intentions are not always the same as yours, and I do not go about things as you do.My thoughts and My ways are above and beyond you, just as heaven is far from your reach here on earth.For as rain and snow can’t go back once they’ve fallen, but soak into the ground, and nourish the plants [and trees] that grow [there], providing seed to the farmer and bread for the hungry, So it is when I declare something. My word will go out and not return to Me empty, But it will do what I wanted; it will accomplish what I determined.And so you will go out in joy, and be led home in peace. And as you go the land itself will break out in cheers; The mountains and the hills will erupt in song, and the trees of the field will clap their hands.
[What kind of trees?]
Prickly thorns and nasty briers will give way to luxurious shade trees like cedars and myrtles, sweet and good trees. And those good trees will remind you of the Eternal God and how God can be trusted absolutely and forever. (Isaiah 55:8-13, based on The Voice)
Only God, the Creator, can make a tree good, changing a prickly, thorny bush to a beautiful, majestic cedar. Only God, our Creator and Saviour, can change us on the inside, so that we also change on the outside.
And only the God who Is Love, wants to make all of this possible and we trust that He will finish what He started, His work of transforming us into the image of His Son. [12]
We love because (and only because) He first loved us (1 John 4:19). We can only really love by being connected to the One Who Is Love, because all real love is from God (1 John 4:7).
That’s why in John 15, Jesus tells us to Remain in Him as He Remains in us, to let His Word, His Truth, Remain in us, and for us to Remain in His Love; That is how we will bear much good fruit, and then we will keep His commandment to love one another (John 15:4-5,7-12,17).
As the Trinity has always related to each other in Love throughout Eternity, it is by relating to and connecting with Jesus, that His presence, His Truth and His Love will transform us to become more like Him.
What God does flows from Who He is; and in a similar way, what we do, flows out of who we are, in Him.
And now what we do is motivated by God’s love in us, “For [it’s] Christ’s love [that] compels us, because we are convinced that One died for all, therefore all died. And He died for all...” (2Corinthians 5:14-15a)
Love is the key attribute of God and everything else God is and does flows from that love.
My hope today is that as we think more about God and Who He is, and as we allow ourselves to know Him and His love more, that we will continue to be shaped by Him, and will grow in our relationship with Him and in the freedom that He has given us because of, and through His love.
What does it mean to you that God IS Love and has always been Love?
How does this increase your understanding of Who God is?
How is Jesus’ love, truth and presence in your life shaping who you are today?
Blessings,
Mike Smith
P.S. Can't see the video above? See it on Youtube.
Footnotes:
1. Cf. Psalm 25:6 - “Remember, LORD, your great mercy (Rakam - compassion, tender love or mercy, pity, by extension- the womb (as cherishing the fetus), bowels (“moved with compassion” - where do you feel deep compassion?) based on Strong's #7356) and love (Chesed - loving-kindness, goodness, kindness), for they are from eternity.” God’s Eternal “Mercy” is not limited to our simple definition of mercy. ↩
2. John Wooden - https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/203719-the-true-test-of-a-man-s-character-is-what-he↩3. What is God’s love like? E.g. 1Corinthians 13; John 3:16; Romans 5:8-10. We often tend to think of God’s love as restricted to "Agape" love. It’s interesting to note that this isn’t the only word Jesus used to define God’s love for Him. “The Father loves (agapaó) the Son and has placed everything in his hands” (John 3:35); “For the Father loves (phileó) the Son and shows Him all He does.” (John 5:20a). https://blog.logos.com/2015/11/how-to-pronounce-logos-and-what-agape-really-means/?utm_source=blog.logos.com&utm_medium=blog&utm_content=logospromostusedwords&utm_campaign=promo-logospro2015 ↩
5. 26 of these 43 verses appear in Psalms 136, with the phrase showing up in every verse. https://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?qs_version=NIV&quicksearch=his+love+endures+forever ↩
6. God’s commandments have a point. Commandment = Instruction with End Result in mind, Directive toward an aim or purpose (give direction), Objective (Outcome/Result). See Helps Ministries, HELPS Word-studies, https://biblehub.com/greek/1785.htm ↩
7. 1 Chronicles 16:34; 2 Chronicles 5:13; 7:3; Ezra 3:11; Psalm 106:1; 107:1; 118:1, 29; 136:1. The only one it’s not in is Psalm 73:1 ↩
8. E.g. https://biblehub.com/interlinear/psalms/136-1.htm ↩
9. E.g. Ephesians 2:4-9; Romans 3:23-24; 5:8-10 ↩
10. E.g. 1Peter 3:18; John 17:3; Romans 8:29; 1John 3:1-2; John 13:35 ↩
11. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgXHgKa1ei4; https://www.paultripp.com/articles/posts/getting-to-the-heart-of-your-words ↩
12. Philippians 1:6; Romans 8:29; 1 Corinthians 15:49; 2 Corinthians 3:18; Ephesians 4:13; Philippians 3:21 ↩
0 Comments