Belief in a Creator God

God created by His “rhema,” meaning “word,” His divine utterance. What did He create? Worlds, “aion,” plural, indicating the physical universe and the order which controls it, and its administration. The word also conveys the concept of ages. It includes time/space/matter/purpose.

There is no science that can disprove Hebrews 11: 3, “By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible.”  (Hebrews 11:3).

The things seen, everything there is, are composed of things which we cannot see, atoms. This statement was made long before scientists knew there were atoms.

Those who believe in evolution do so by faith. For a thing to be a science it must pass two tests: it must be observable and demonstrable. Evolution is neither. Therefore, it is not a science and those who believe it believe it by faith.

Likewise those who believe in creation believe it by faith and the fact Christ said, “from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female.”

We live by faith.  We drink water from a faucet, eat in a deli, place our pay in a bank, fly in a plane, drive in the rain, undergo surgery, and take medicine by faith.

Evidence means proof.  Our faith is in the unseen but not the unknown.  A photon illustrates this. Scientists believe in photons. Yet, they have never seen one. They only exist when traveling at the speed of light, 185,000 miles per second. At that speed they have never been photographed. Though unseen scientists still believe in photons.

There is no science that can disprove, “By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible”  (Hebrews 11:3).

“Belief” and “trust,” two words used frequently in Scripture to identify how we should respond to the Lord.

The Hebrew word for believe is “amen.” It means “to use God as a foundation; to lean on Him.”

Another word translated “trust” is BATAK. It was originally a wrestling term meaning to “body-slam” or in modern parlance “suplex.” Applied to our faith-life, it means to pick up your problems and body-slam them before the Lord.

“Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ.”  (Col. 2:8)

Running On Empty

Jesus Christ left His lodging in heaven because of His longing for fellowship with you. Look at Him hanging on a blood-soaked Calvary, there you can see Him just dying for fellowship with you. 

He so earnestly wants this to be a lasting fellowship that He has prepared a permanent place in heaven for you. He said, “In My Father’s house are many mansions. I go to prepare a place for you…”

You have even been given a heavenly summons to enjoy fellowship with Him: “God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” (I Corinthians 1:9).

This fellowship is intended to provide for the greatest longing the human heart can experience. It is to enable persons to avoid an empty longing feeling. It is intended to make yours a gratified and satisfied life.

He said, “I have come that you might have life, and that you might have it more abundantly.”  He wants you to experience abundant life; life with supernatural additives. This is what everyone wants and needs. 

The drama of life turns to a tragedy or at best a comedy of errors at this point. We have been deceived to think there are ways of having a full and meaningful life apart from fellowship with God.  It doesn’t work and God has given us a case study to prove it. It is the life of Solomon. For a glimpse of life out of sync with all that is right turn to the most pessimistic writing every penned. It is the Book of Ecclesiastes.

The book opens with the expression, “The words of the Preacher…” It is literally “The man with a message…” That is what the preacher should be. In a technical sense he is not a preacher and his income is but one indication of that. He had an annual income from one source of $20,000,000. Keep that in mind as the story progresses.

Solomon was a king, not a preacher. He was a believer, but he was out of fellowship. In his life, as in every life, this caused an emptiness; a sense something was missing. Being out of fellowship with the Lord, he had a yearning for this fulfilling feeling. Unfortunately, he unwisely began to search for a substitute for fellowship. 

The reason the book is so pessimistic is that most of it was written while out of fellowship. Being out of fellowship he writes to tell of seven experiments he tried as pseudo substitutes for fellowship with God. The opening verses depict the void in the life of one out of fellowship.

“Vanity of vanities” (1:2), means “emptiness of emptiness.” Being out of fellowship with the Lord and trying to find a substitute for fellowship is like trying to fill a vacuum with a vacuum. Life without Christ is empty. Five times he uses this expression. A sense of futility results.

Life without the Lord is a merry-go-round of nothings (Vs.4).

Nature is used as an illustration of life’s emptiness out of fellowship (Vs. 5).

The water cycle is used as an illustration of just going around in cycles. Rain comes down, runs into the streams that run into the oceans. The oceans evaporate and moisture is taken inland as clouds and descends as rain and the cycle is repeated.

Incidentally, this was penned thousands of years before scientists understood the hydrological system in nature.

This man had everything physically one could ask for in order to complete experiments for substitutes for fellowship with God and describes this in verse 12.  He exhausts himself, as many still do, in trying to find a substitute for fellowship with the Lord that will be as fulfilling; something that will give life meaning.

Crossing Jordan

Does Joshua’s experience in crossing the Jordan ever typify your situation. For years the church sang the old hymn (remember them), with these words:

“Often times I’m forsaken, and weary and sad,

When it seems that my friends have all gone;

There is one tho’t that cheers me and makes my heart glad,

I won’t have to cross Jordan alone.”

My concept of the crossing of the Jordan was formidable. At flood time it was. However, I have stood on its banks many times and have always marveled at how small it. Many places it is less that 25 feet. It posed a major obstacle when Joshua and the Israelites got there. It was flood time when it is sometimes a mile wide, shallow, but wide. However. the crossing wasn’t the main issue. It was an issue, but it wan’t the major issue. The big issue was facing the unknown on the other side.

Joshua, along with Caleb, had spied out the land and reported it was populated by giants. The real story is that in our dealing with the unknowns we face, we don’t have to face them alone, giants and all. We have an invisible, but invincible guide, our Lord Jesus. He scouts it out in advance.

Arriving there at flood time may have looked like God scheduled it at a most inappropriate time. Do you ever have an experience causing you to question God’s timing? That is time you can put real meaning to the little chorus:

“God’s been in time, on time, every time for me.”

Reflect on some of your bad timing that has resulted in God acting on time.

They may have questioned why God took so long to get them there. Why had God waited forty years while Joshua had aged until he was 80? There is no indication that on the evening preceding the crossing they complained. We must emulate their faith when facing seemingly insurmountable obstacles. God made a way for them and He will make a way for you. You won’t have to cross your Jordan alone.

Do as Joshua charged the people: “Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you” (Joshua 3:5) 

Now the reason for the untimely and impossible challenge of crossing the Jordan. God set them up so that after the crossing they can look back and realize what had happened could not have been achieved without God enabling it. It was to bring them to the point they were willing to consecrate themselves.

Now, do some of your life experience come into focus? Consecrate yourself.

“Consecrate” is the Hebrew qadash and it means, “be hallowed, set apart, consecrated” or “consecrate, set apart, prepare, or dedicate.” Do it!

Count Your Blessings

Jesus Christ wants to give you a “Faith Life.” The starting point is found in the will of God. When doing God’s will, one is most happy. The explicit will of God is that “In everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” (I Thessalonians 5:18) It is the will of God that you have a thankful disposition. Do those around you consider you to have one? 

Your disposition can be changed by your resolve to begin being a person who is expressive of appreciation; a person who expresses thanks to God and people. Our predecessors realized this and set aside a day of Thanksgiving.

It is good that we have such a day. However, Charles Dickens had an alternate idea. He proposed that we reverse the practice and have a day for griping and use the rest of the year for daily expressing thanks to God and people.

If you resolve that your disposition and mental attitude will be of a thankful nature it will amaze you, refresh your friends, and please God. That is —- 

When we start to count flowers, 
we cease to count weeds.

When we start to count blessings,
we cease to count needs,

When we start to count laughter,
we cease to count tears.

When we count happy memories,
we cease to count fears.

William Law lost his position at Emmanuel College, Cambridge when his conscience would not allow him to take the required oath of allegiance to the first Hanoverian monarch, King George I. He later asked, “Who is the greatest saint? It is not the one who prays most or who does most, it is the one who is most thankful.”

Thankfulness and happiness go together like a hand and glove. It is not happy people who are thankful, it is thankful people who are happy.

Wouldn’t it be good if at the end of life your epitaph could be like that of Oliver Goldsmith: “He touched nothing he didn’t adorn.” Thankfulness does that.

Scripture exhorts us to give thanks in all things. All things? Yes, all things. We may not feel good in all things. To consistently give thanks acknowledges not all things are good, but God is always good. Therefore our focus must be on God, not things. The great drama of the Bible is that God is at work on behalf of His people at all times, no matter what happens. Remember that.

We might well pray, “Along with your many gifts, give me one thing more, a thankful heart.”

Contentment

“Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you. I rejoiced in the Lord greatly that now at length you have revived your concern for me. You were indeed concerned for me, but you had no opportunity. Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me. Yet it was kind of you to share my trouble.” (Philippians 4:8-14)

Are you known as being a content person? You can learn to be. This encouragement was written while Paul was in prison.

Believers are in a war for their minds, the world system continually bombarding them. The world system seeks to seduce our mind into an anti-God way of thinking.

The secular world rarely asks if a thing is true, which we are instructed to do. Instead, they asks, “Does it work?” or “How will it make me feel?” Based on their answer to these two questions the secular mind determines what for them is true. Truth arrived in this way is not true truth.

The Bible leaves no doubt that people’s lives are the product of their thoughts. Proverbs 23:7 declares, “For as he thinks within himself, so he is.”

“Sow a thought, reap an action. Sow an action, reap a habit. Sow a habit, reap a character. Sow a character reap a destiny!”

Twice in this passage, Paul says that he has “learned” to be content. You can, too. Contentment does not come naturally to the sinful human heart. We need God’s grace to strengthen us and to change our hearts. But we also have the responsibility to learn contentment. It requires effort. We must “keep seeking the things above”  (a present imperative command), meaning you have to do it if you desire the result, contentment. To do this we must lean on the Holy Spirit to enable us to keep setting a guard at the door of our heart.

Obedience to two commands is essential to have contentment. They are both  present imperatives meaning to “keep seeking the things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God, and keep setting on the things above, not on the things that are on earth.” This is how you learn contentment.

Christ-like character is shaped by thinking Christ-honoring thoughts. About what do think most often? Even more important is how you think about them.

Meditate on what is positive and praiseworthy. Train your mind. Remember that is what the secular world is trying to do. Without being sensitive to it, that it is happening all around us.

Now the formula for contentment summarized: “And do not be conformed (present imperative with a negative) to this world, but be (continually) transformed (present imperative) by the renewing of your mind.” (Romans 12: 2)