Declaring Doctrine (Part 8) | The Attributes of God
Alright well we’re there and we’re doing a systematic study of the doctrines we believe in the Bible. The goal is for you to be able to teach others also and that you would know what we believe and why we believe it and be able to prove it from the bible. We took a break from this series but we were dealing with the word of God. The 1st week of this year I preached a sermon called “The Importance of Doctrine” that kind of laid the foundation for the series. And then in the 2nd week I did a sermon called “The Doctrine of Revelation”. In the 3rd week, I did a sermon called “The Doctrine of the Word of God”. And we spent several weeks talking about the word of God. Week four, What is the Bible”. Week five, “Is the Bible Reliable?”. Week six, “The Doctrine of the King James Bible”. Week seven, “Comparing the King James Version to other Bible Versions”. That was the last sermon in the series and that was fine because we kind of finished that section on the word of God.
Tonight we’re going to begin a different section that we’re going to spend several weeks in. We’re going to spend the next several weeks studying the Godhead. So we’re going to be learning about the theology of God. And tonight I’m preaching a sermon called “The Attributes of God”. So, it’s going to be very teachy. We’re going to turn to a lot of passages. I hope you brought something to take notes with. When we talk about the attributes of God, what are we talking about? These are the things about God that make him God. This is the difference between God and us. I know today people think that we are God and that we are Gods and they think that we are evolving into these superior beings and one day we’re going to be mutants that are flying around and have superpowers or whatever. But the Bible does not teach that. The bible teaches that there is one being who exists in three persons and he is God. And there are some attributes about God that make him God. Next week we’ll talk about moral attributes that belong to God.
Tonight, I’m going to give you 4 thoughts in regards to the attributes of God. Point number 1, the omnipotence of God. The omnipotence of God. Now let me just kind of define this for you so that you can have it. The prefix “omni” or that word “omni” means all or of all things. It comes from the “Latin” and it means everything, including everything, all things, of all things. And then the word “potence” is the word power. It means power. When we talk about the omnipotence of God, we’re talking about the fact that God is all powerful, that God has all power. Now, sometimes when you use these terms and I believe when we preach that, we should use plain words and we should try to not confuse people. In this series, obviously we’re trying to teach you doctrine. So, I’m going to give you some theological terms. But sometimes you use these words and people criticize you like “I don’t think you should use those terms”. But the interesting thing is that this is actually a word found in scripture.
Revelation 19:5 This is a famous passage where Jesus is coming down on a white horse. And we’re not going to develop all that but look at verse 5. “5 And a voice came out of the throne, saying, Praise our God, all ye his servants, and ye that fear him, both small and great.”. Notice verse 6 “6 And I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Alleluia: for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.”. I want you to notice that this is actually a Bible word, a biblical concept. The bible says that the Lord God is omnipotent. He says “the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.”. What does that mean? That means that God is all powerful. That means that God has all power. When we’re talking about the omnipotence of God, we’re referring to the fact that God has all power.
When I preach things like this, I wonder if I really need to say these things. But the truth is this, it’s always good of course to review and to be reminded of certain things. Also, a lot of you may be newer in the faith or newer in church and this might just be something you’ve never been taught. As a Pastor, I have to remind myself that if I don’t teach these things, then who is going to teach you these things? It’s my job to teach you these things. So, sometimes we look at these things and you might think “Oh they’re kind of basic.”. But not everybody knows it. And to prove the fact that not everybody knows it, realize that there are some religions out there that teach that we will one day be Gods. The Mormon Church teaches that we will one day be Gods and we’ll become Gods. And if we’re good Mormons, we’ll be Gods of our own little world or our own little universe and God’s going to give us our own world and we’re going to be the God of that world. Look, this is not true. You say “Why?”. Because of the fact that God has all power. Now here’s the thing about God having all power. When someone has all power, that means that he’s the only one that can have all power. If two or three or five or a thousand Mormons all have all power then God doesn’t have all power. Do you understand that? So, this is something that makes God unique. And this is why you and I will never be God.
1 Timothy 6:15. The bible says this “15 Which in his times he shall shew,”. And this is of course referring to the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I don’t have to develop the context there. But if you want to look at verse 14 and study the passage, this is talking about when Jesus appears. It says “15 Which in his times he shall shew, who is the blessed and only Potentate,”. And again, that word “potentate” means powerful. And by the way, this passage proves the deity of Christ. It is Jesus who is “only powerful”. Why? Because Jesus is God. But here’s the point, God is the only one that is all powerful, that is omnipotent, the king of kings and Lord of lords.
By the way, let me just say this, we’re a family integrated church. What means is that we don’t run off our little kids out to some Sunday School or Children’s Church. We keep them in the congregation like it is patterned in scripture. I’m not going to quiz your kids after the Sunday night service but maybe you should quiz your kids after Sunday night service. You might be sitting there thinking like “I already know this.”. Okay. But does your nine-year-old know this? Does your eight-year-old know all this? Does your 12-year-old know this? So, it’s good for us to learn these things. And maybe mom and dad should talk to their kids about this afterwards and make sure they understand and grasp these doctrines that are the foundations of the things that we believe.
Job 42:1 “Then Job answered the Lord, and said,” Notice what Job says to God. “2 I know that thou canst do every thing, and that no thought can be withholden from thee.”. So, notice the Bible says that God can do everything. You don’t have to turn to these but I’ll just read a couple of these for you just to prove the point. Jeremiah 32:27 says this “27 Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh: is there any thing too hard for me?”. God asked this question, he says “is there any thing too hard for me?”. And of course it’s a rhetorical question and the answer is no. There is nothing too hard for the Lord. God can do everything. Matthew 19:26 “26 But Jesus beheld them, and said unto them, With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible.”. And you know sometimes we read those verses and we think “Oh, that’s just a nice little verse, a little nice thing that Jesus said and we can put that on a hallmark card and send it to somebody.”. But the truth is this, it’s not just encouraging. The truth is that with God all things are possible. Because God is omnipotent. He is the only potent. He is the omnipotent God. Like Job said, “thou canst do everything”.
So, the first thing we need to understand when it comes to the attributes of God is that of the omnipotence of God. God is all powerful. But there’s a 2nd thing that I’d like you to be aware of. Not only the omnipotence of God but the omniscience of God. The omniscience of God. And the way you spell that is omni-science. So, the same way you spell the word science is omniscience of God. Now again, the word omni coming from the Latin means all or of all things. And the word science, when we think of the word science today in English, we think of a type of study or learning where you are observing and testing and predicting certain things. But the word science comes originally from a Latin word which means “knowledge” or “knowing”. The word science means to know or to have knowledge. That’s why when you study science, you’re observing nature, observing things in our universe, testing it, predicting it.
When you talk about the omniscience of God or the omni science of God, what are we referring to? We’re referring to the fact that God knows all things. So, not only does God have all power but God has all knowledge. God knows everything. He has all knowledge. Job 42:2 “2 I know that thou canst do every thing,” That’s the omnipotence of God. Then he says “and that no thought can be withholden from thee.”. That’s the omniscience of God. He says I know that you can do everything and I know that you know everything. No thought can be withholden from thee. So, please understand this. When we talk about the omniscience of God, there are kind of two categories to the omniscience of God. The first category is the fact that God knows everything. Meaning he knows everything about everything. There’s no question. There’s no answer that God doesn’t have. God knows the answer to every question in relation to science, nature and all things. God also knows everything about you. God knows everything you think, every thought you have, everything you’ve ever done. God is aware of it. That’s why Job says “no thought can be withholden from thee”. There is no thought that crosses your mind that God is not aware of because he’s an omniscient God.
Let’s run a couple of verses just to show it to you. Go to Psalm 147:5 “5 Great is our Lord,” And notice this “and of great power:”. That’s the omnipotence of God. Then it says “his understanding is infinite.”. That’s the omniscience of God, the fact that God is omniscient. His understanding according to the Bible is infinite. What does the word infinite mean? It means that it’s limitless. It’s without end. God’s understanding has no end. Psalm 139:1 “O lord, thou hast searched me, and known me.”. And he’s referring to the omniscience of God, the fact that God knows everything. Look at verse 2. “2 Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising,” What he’s saying is that God knows when he sits down and stands up. “thou understandest my thought afar off.”. When he says “far off”, the idea is that “when my thoughts are afar”. Here’s what he’s saying. He’s saying you know my thoughts before I know my thoughts. You know what I’m going to think. You know what I’m going to say. You know how I’m going to respond before I even know what I’m going to think or what I’m going to say or how I’m going to respond. Because you are the omniscient God. “2 Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off.”.
And please understand. You say “Is this really a big deal? Is this a big doctrine?”. Look, these basic fundamental doctrines are important because this is where we lay the foundation for greater understandings that we have. For example, there’s a whole lot of so-called Christians out there called Calvinists who preach a false gospel, who believe incorrectly about the word of God. And a lot of them just have a misunderstanding or they don’t acknowledge the omniscience of God. Because they look at verses that say that God has elected, that God has chosen, that God has predestinated, and they say “Therefore God forced those people. God made it so those people would get saved.”. But wait a minute. God says whosoever will may come. God says that he has given us free will. The theological term is “individual soul liberty”. We’ll get to that eventually in this series as well. And you’ve got these contradictions. What they don’t understand is that those verses are referring to the omniscience of God. God chose you, he elected you, he predestinated you. That doesn’t mean he got you saved. He just knew you would get saved. He just knew how you would respond. He just knew that if when you got the gospel that you would believe it and accept it. And because he knew that, he predestinated you. He chose you. He elected you. How can that be? “because thou understandeth my thoughts afar off”. You know, my thoughts before I even know my thoughts. That’s not God forcing you. That’s not a Calvinist God. That’s an omniscient God who just knows you and knows what you’re going to say and how you’re going to say it and how you’re going to respond before you even do it.
Look at verse 3. “3 Thou compassest my path and my lying down,”. That word compass means to surround. He says you surround my path and my lying down, “and art acquainted with all my ways.”. The word acquaintance means to be aware of or be familiar. Notice “with all my ways”. He says you are acquainted with all my ways. You are familiar with all my ways. You are aware of all my ways. Notice verse 4. “4 For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether.”. He says I can’t say. You know what? You can’t say anything without God hearing. You know you can’t think something without God knowing what you thought. This is the omniscience of God.
1 Chronicles 28:9 “9 And thou, Solomon my son, know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind:”. Notice how David is telling Solomon that you need to know. He says “know thou the God of thy father”. That’s what we’re doing tonight. We’re getting to know God, how God operates, what God thinks. He says “know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind: for the Lord searcheth all hearts,”. He says look, the Lord searcheth all hearts. “and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts:”. He says God knows your thoughts and imaginations. He says “if thou seek him, he will be found of thee; but if thou forsake him, he will cast thee off for ever.”. So, here’s what the bible teaches. The bible says that God is omnipotent. What does that mean? That means that he’s all-powerful. There’s nothing too hard for the Lord. With men it may be impossible but with God all things are possible. Then the Bible says that God is omniscient. What does that mean? That means that he knows everything. No thought is hid from him. He understands everything. His understanding is infinite. He knows everything there is to know. And he knows everything about you. In fact, he knows everything about you. He knows you better than you know you because he knows how you will respond and what you will think and what you will say in different situations.
Go back to psalm 139. Let me give you the third theological term. The first one is the omnipotence of God. God is all-powerful. The second is the omniscience of God. God is all-knowing. The third is the omnipresence of God. The omnipresence of God. What does that mean? Well again, the word omni means all or of all things. And the word presence means the state of being present. What does that mean? It means that God is everywhere at once. So, God is not only all-powerful but God is all-knowing and God is everywhere. God is present everywhere. Psalm 139:5 “5 Thou hast beset me behind and before,”. The word beset means to surround. The Psalmist says you have beset me, you have surrounded me behind and before and laid thine hand upon me. “6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it.”. Notice verse seven. “7 Whither”. Now that word means to what place. I want you to notice what he said. He says wither or to what place. Notice what he says. “7 Whither shall I go”. Because he just got done saying God, thou beset me behind and before. You are everywhere around me. So, then he asks this question. He says “7 Whither shall I go from thy spirit?”. He said to what place shall I go from thy spirit. “or whither shall I flee from thy presence?”. He said where can I go to get away from the presence of God.
Notice, “8 If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. 9 If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;”. He says if I get in a ship and go out to just the middle of the ocean, just get lost in the middle of the ocean. Verse 10, he says “10 Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.”. What does this mean? This is the belief of the omnipresence of God. And look, you teach these things and people act like “Do we really need a whole sermon about this?”. But then you have the average evangelical Christian today like Billy Graham who says hell is separation from God. Wait a minute. I thought this was a basic thing. We all know the omnipresence of God. “7 Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? 8 If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.”.
Look, the point is this, you will never get away from God. And God is in hell because of the fact the Bible says that the people in hell are going to be tormented in the presence of the Lamb. You say “Well why is God in hell?”. Because God is everywhere. And by the way, God’s the one who created hell. People get this idea like “Oh the devil’s running hell.”. No, the Bible says that hell was created for the devil and his angels. It is God who is tormenting people in hell. It is God who is running hell. Hell is not separation from God. You say “What’s the worst part of hell? Separation from God?”. Well, if I make my bed in hell behold, thou art there. You say “Well then what’s the worst part of hell?”. I’m going to go with the answer Jesus gave. The fire. The torment. The fact that you’re tormented day and night forever and ever. But you have the omni presence of God. The fact that God is everywhere. You know you teach these things and people act like “Come on Pastor. We already know this.”. But then you’ve got Jonah who is a prophet of God. You would think that Jonah would know a basic thing like the omnipresence of God. But yet what does Jonah do? He gets on a boat and he tries to run away from God. I mean “9 If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; 10 Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.”.
And let me tell you something, there are Christians all day, every day trying to run away from God, getting backslidden, making bad decisions, chasing the wrong thing, and just running from God. And they go from this church to another church. They go from there to there. They run away when things get hard or things get difficult. Well let me tell you something. You can run away, you can try to run away, but you can’t run away from God. You can run from God but you can’t outrun God. Because wherever you go, God is there. And you say “Oh well I’m going to go to a different church”. Okay but you’re going to have to deal with the same God. “Well I’m just going to go do something else.”. Well that’s fine but if you’re a child of God, God’s going to be there with his spiritual belt ready to spank you because you can’t run away from God. People act like “Do you really need to be teaching these basic things?”. But obviously we’re not getting it. God’s everywhere. “whither shall I flee from thy presence?”. I can’t walk away from God. I can’t get away from God. He’s everywhere.
You teach about the omnipotence, omnipresence and omniscience of God and people are like rolling their eyes like “Oh brother. We already know this Pastor.”. Okay, well explain this to me. Because the last 10 years of ministry for my wife and I, we’ve seen people at the grocery store from our church not dressed right, or buying something they shouldn’t. We see them and then they are embarrassed or try to hide. But why don’t you worry about what God thinks because he is everywhere and sees everything. We need to understand that we serve a God that is omniscient and it’ll change the Christian life. Look, it’ll change your Christian life when you begin to live in the presence of God, when you begin to live your life with the understanding that it doesn’t matter if the Pastor sees me, it doesn’t matter if the Pastor’s wife sees me, it doesn’t matter if the staff guy sees me, it doesn’t matter if brothers and sisters from church see me because God sees everything. God knows everything. His eyes are everywhere going to and fro. So, before you roll your eyes and say “Pastor, this is really basic, we don’t really need this.”. Okay. Well let me ask you this. Are you living in the presence of God? Are you living in the understanding that God knows all things, hears all things, understands all things? It’ll change your life if you learn basic doctrine. The omnipotence of God. The omniscience of God. The omnipresence of God.
Let me give you a 4th one. The immutability of God. What does that word mean? It means unchanging or unable to change. You know what makes him God is that he is unable to change. He is unchanging. The immutability of God. Malachi 3:6 “6 For I am the Lord,” Notice the words “I change not;”. You can’t say that but God can say that. And look, please understand, if we run into you out and about and you’re not dressed in the way that we would preach, we don’t care. We love you, alright. We want to help you grow. But God sees you. Look, we teach and preach that women should dress like women and men should dress like men. The bible says that “a woman should not wear that which pertaineth unto a man neither shall a man put on a woman’s garment for all that do so are abomination.” And look, I realize that not every lady in our church agrees with that or believes that and they put on skirts just out of respect for our church and I appreciate that. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that. But please understand, I never really understood this idea “Well in church we dress this way and then at home we dress a certain way.”. It’s the same God that sees you at home and at church. He’s omniscient. He sees everything. He knows everything about you. So, what’s the point of acting a certain way around church people? We’re not God. God is God.
So, we have the omnipotence, the omniscience, the omnipresence and the immutability. “for I am the lord I change not”. Hebrews 6:17 “17 Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise”. Notice “the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath:”. I want you to notice that he talks about God’s counsel. He talks about the immutability of his counsel, that God doesn’t change and God doesn’t change his mind. “This is so basic.”. Oh really? Then why is the average Christian today saying “Well, God used to not like homosexuals but now he likes them.”. No, we serve the immutable God. His counsel has never changed. God feels the same way about divorce today as he did in the Old Testament when he says “I hate putting away”. You know that God feels the same way about sodomites today as he did in Genesis 19, Judges 19 and Leviticus 18? God still feels about fornication today the same as he felt in the Old Testament when he killed tens of thousands of people for the sin of fornication. “This is really basic.”. Well apparently, we’re missing it somewhere because God said “I am the Lord, I change not”. He says the immutability of his counsel. He says my counsel, my advice does not change.
So, why are Christians today changing what God says? “God says he used to but now he feels differently”. God doesn’t change. See, we believe in the immutability of God. The reprobate doctrine is based off the immutability of God. The anti-dispensational view we have is based from the immutability of God. Many of the things that we believe are founded and grounded upon these basic beliefs that the Lord does not change, that his counsel is immutable, that he does not change his mind.
Hebrews 13:8 “8 Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.”. What is the immutability of God? God does not change. God is the same yesterday and today and forever. James 1:17 “17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights,”. Notice this “with whom is no variableness,”. What is variableness? The word variable or variableness means subject to variation or change. “with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.”. There is nothing in him that changes. There’s nothing that’s subject to change. There’s nothing that might change. He doesn’t change. He is immutable. Other passages tell us “God is not a man that he should lie”. And “God is not a man that he should repent”. Now of course God does repent. But what that means is that God doesn’t have to repent if he doesn’t want to. And of course you need to understand that repenting in the bible is not always referring to repenting of your sins because God doesn’t sin. But it refers to changing your mind. And sometimes God changes his mind but if he changes his mind it is because he chose to. He doesn’t have to change anything. He could go ahead and just destroy Nineveh if he wants to. God doesn’t need to change anything. But look, you and I are not God. We make decisions that are wrong decisions, that head us in the wrong direction. And God is going to spiritually spank us when that happens and then we need to change. But God doesn’t have to change. The Bible even talks about the fact that sometimes God just kills people who choose to refuse to change. So, the immutability of God is that there’s only one being in this entire universe who doesn’t have to change and that being is God. “with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning”.
Now these are the major attributes of God. The omnipotence of God. He’s all-powerful. The omniscience of God. He’s all-knowing. The omnipresence of God. He’s everywhere present. The immutability of God. He is not changing. And people say “We don’t really need a sermon like this”. But yet I gave you application after application, example after example, of Christians today who are ignoring these basic fundamental beliefs that God knows everything, that God has all power, that God doesn’t change his mind, that God is everywhere at once. So, let me just end with giving you just kind of some applications just for our personal life. And I’m going to run through several verses and I want you to try to keep up with me. Just some encouraging thoughts regarding the attributes of God.
We learned tonight that God is omnipotent, right? Well here’s an encouraging thought. The all-powerful God wants to meet your needs. I mean the God who can do anything in this universe says call unto me and I will answer thee and shew thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not. James 1:17 “17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above,”. You say “Pastor, well I already know all about omnipotence. I don’t need a whole sermon on it.”. Well, how’s your prayer life? “Well I don’t pray very much.”. Why don’t you pray? Because if you really understood that there is a God that is all-powerful who wants you to pray and ask him, he says ask and ye shall receive, seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened. Maybe you don’t really have a thorough understanding or maybe you don’t have a real belief of the omnipotence of God. I mean if we really believe that we could speak to the God who created the universe, who has all power, maybe we’d start asking him for stuff. Because “17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.”. If we really believe in the omnipotence of God, here’s an encouraging thought, the all-powerful God wants to meet your needs. So, maybe you should ask him. You have not because you ask not. And it’s not that you have not because God can’t. You have not because you don’t ask. And of course we understand that we must pray according to the will of God and in the name of Jesus Christ and in all those things. But the point is this, that we have an omnipotent God who says ask me. The all-powerful God wants to supply your needs. Go to Jeremiah 29. Let me give you another encouraging thought. You say “Ah this doesn’t sound very encouraging.”. Well, you’re telling on yourself. Because if you had an active prayer life then you’d be encouraged regarding the omnipotence of God. Here’s an encouraging thought. The all-powerful God wants to supply your needs. Every good gift and every perfect gift cometh from above.
Let me give you an encouraging thought regarding the omniscience of God. The all-knowing God that is aware of everything, the God that is aware of everything in the universe, he knows all your thoughts and all of my thoughts. He knows all the thoughts of every person on earth. He’s omniscient. And you know that God thinks about you? Jeremiah 29:11. “11 For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.”. Here’s an interesting thought to me is. God who knows everything, who has every thought revealed to him. When the bible says “12 For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. 13 Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.”. God knows everything. Everything is naked and open to him. He sees everything. He knows everything. And that God chooses to think about you. That’s an amazing thought that God would say “I know the thoughts that I think toward you saith the lord”.
Go to Matthew 6. Let’s talk about prayer again for a second. You say “I know about the omniscience of God”. Okay, well Matthew 6:8 says “8 Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him.”. God knows what you need him before you ask him. Before you pray, God knows what you need. Why? Because God is omniscient. So think about this. The all-powerful God wants to supply your needs. The all-knowing God thinks about you and he knows what you need before you even ask it.
How about the omnipresence of God? Here’s an encouraging thought about the omnipresence of God. God is everywhere so he is always with you. Now that could be discouraging based on what we do and how we live our lives but it can be an encouraging thought that God is always with you. Isaiah 41:10 “10 Fear thou not;” You never need to be afraid. Why? “for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.”. Hebrews 13:5 “5 Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.”. People claim that you can lose your salvation but wait a minute. God says he’ll never leave you. And God can actually say that because he’s omnipresent.
Psalm 23:4 “4 Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,”. Referring to the fact that when we’re going through the process of death, when we find ourselves transitioning from physical life to physical death. That’s what he’s referring to. He’s using poetic language to describe someone dying. He says “4 Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,”. He says even on my deathbed, even as I’m dying, even as I’m giving up the ghost and in the process of dying. He says I will fear no evil. He says even as I die, I don’t need to fear anything. You say why? “for thou art with me”. That’s the omnipresence of God. God is always with you so you never need to be afraid. God is always with you so you never need to be fearful. Because even if I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I know that thou art with me.
An encouraging thought on the omnipotence of God is that the all-powerful God wants to meet your needs. An encouraging thought on the omnipresence of God is that the all-knowing God thinks about you and he knows what things ye have need of before ye ask him. An encouraging thought about the omnipresence of God is that the omnipresent God is always present with you. An encouraging thought on the immutability of God, the non-changing God, is that God will never change his mind. You say what’s encouraging about that? Well here’s what’s encouraging about the immutability of God. God who never changes his mind will never change his mind about you. Numbers 23:19 “19 God is not a man, that he should lie;”. What that’s saying is that God is not a man that he needs to lie. Now the bible says “in hope of eternal life which God that cannot lie promised before the world began”.
The bible says that God cannot lie. He’s not able to lie. We’ll talk about that next week when we talk about the moral attributes of God. But this verse is not saying that God cannot lie. This verse is saying that God doesn’t need to lie. There’s never a situation where God needs to lie. Because think about it. Why do we lie? Because there’s a situation that you know we’re afraid of, we’re scared of the consequences. We did something wrong and the authority is going to punish us. So, we lie to try to minimize that. God says I never have a need to lie. There’s no one I’m afraid of, that I ever need to lie about. There’s nothing wrong I ever do that I need to try to cover up. God says men lie. But he says I am not a man. “19 God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent:”. And again, God can repent but he doesn’t need to repent. He doesn’t have to repent. But here’s the immutability of God. The immutability of God is this “hath he said, and shall he not do it?”.
Here’s what he’s saying, when God says I’m going to do something, I’m going to do it. Now when men say they’re going to do something, the faithful fail from among the earth. When men say they’re going to do something, you’re like “I don’t know. Hopefully they do. They just committed to do x, y, and z. We’ll see what happens.”. But God says when I commit to do something, “hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?”. God never goes back on his promises. God never promises you something and then takes it away. I mean one of the greatest doctrines that we believe is the eternal security of the believer. It is based on the immutability of God. That when God decides to save you, to forgive you, to give you eternal life, he’ll never take that from you. “hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?”. When you enter into a covenant with God, God always makes his covenants good. His word is always good. He never changes his mind. And here’s the encouraging part, he’ll never change his mind about you. You’ll never change his mind about me because of the immutability of God, that we serve a God that does not change. So here are some really basic thoughts, the attributes of God. Omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, immutability. They’re all basic but on these basic thoughts we lay some heavy doctrines. They’re the foundation of some very important things that we believe about God; that he’s all powerful, he’s all knowing, he’s everywhere at once and he does not change.
Let’s pray.