(the picture in the video is from Tim Challies)
I.
Introduction
A. Phillips, Craig, and Dean, You
are God Alone (Not A God)
1. You are not a
god created by human hands. (uncreated) You are
not a god dependent on any mortal man. (self-existent) You
are not a god in need of anything we can give (self-sufficient)…You
are God alone from before time began (eternal)…You're
the only God whose power none can contend (omnipotent)…Unchangeable
(immutable), unshakable, unstoppable. That's
what You are.
B. Theology proper is the primary aim of our life
1. What were we made for? To know God. What aims
should we set ourselves in life? To know God. What is the eternal life that
Jesus gives? Knowledge of God. John 17:3, “This is life eternal that they might
know thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.” What is the
best thing in life, bringing more joy, delight, and contentment than anything
else? The knowledge of God. We have been brought to the point where we both can
and must get our life’s priorities straight. From current Christian
publications you might think that the most vital issue for any real or would-be
Christian in the world today is church union, or social witness, or dialogue
with other Christians and other faiths, or refuting this or that -ism, or
developing a Christian philosophy and culture, or what have you. But our line
of study makes the present-day concentration on these things look like a
gigantic conspiracy of misdirection. Of course, it is not that; the issues
themselves are real and must be dealt with in their place. But it is tragic
that, in paying attention to them, so many in our day seem to have been
distracted from what was, is, and always will be the true priority for every
human being—that is, learning to know God in Christ. (J. I. Packer, Knowing God, pg. 314)
C. God is an Infinite-Personal Being (the picture didn't show up, use this link and scroll downto see it)
1. In order to know Him,
we have to learn about His infinity and His personality
D. Attribute: a quality or feature regarded as a
characteristic or inherent part of someone or something
1.
example: Aristotle classifies human beings as rational animals
E. A common misunderstanding of God’s attributes
1. “The attributes are not parts of the essence, of
which the latter is composed. The whole essence is in each attribute, and the
attribute in the essence. We must not conceive of the essence as existing by
itself, and prior to the attributes, and of the attributes as an addition to
it. God is not essence and attributes, but in attributes. The attributes are
essential qualities of God.” (W. G. T. Shedd, Dogmatic Theology, 1:334 in Floyd H. Barackman, Practical Christian Theology, pg. 47)
II.
Incommunicable Attributes
A. Necessity
1. Definition
a. God is a necessarily existent being
i.
necessary: required to be present
ii.
existent: having reality or existence
iii.
God is a being that is required to have reality
2. Scriptural Data
a. Exodus 3:14a: God said to Moses, “I am who I am.”
i. This can also be translated “I am what I am” or “I
will be what I will be”.
b. Job 33:4: The Spirit of God has made me, and the
breath of the Almighty gives me life.
i.
gives in Hebrew: חיה,
tehayye
ii. Piel Imperfect: intensive verb sense, incomplete
action
c. Hebrews 1:3a: He 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.
d. Colossians 1:17: And he is before all things, and
in him all things hold together.
3. Consideration and
Reflection
a. God is
not merely a factual necessity, but a logical necessity.
i. factual necessity: if God exists, He cannot go into
or out of existence
ii. logical necessity: God must exist
-Revelation 4:11: “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to
receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will
they existed and were created.”
-Anselm’s ontological argument: God is the greatest
conceivable being in which necessary existence is greater than contingent
existence
-Leibniz’s cosmological argument: Why is there
something rather than nothing?
-Conceptualist argument: grounding of abstract objects
in God
-Axiological argument: grounding of moral values and
principles in God
-Possible worlds semantics: “To say that God is a
logically necessary being is to say that God exists in every possible world”
(William Lane Craig and J. P. Moreland, Philosophical
Foundations for a Christian Worldview, pg. 502)
4. Practical Application
a. God’s necessary existence means that we should rely
on Him for everything.
i. Psalm 18:2: The Lord is my rock and my fortress and
my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn
of my salvation, my stronghold.
ii. Psalm 37:5: Commit your way to the Lord; trust in
him, and he will act.
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