Our Triune God Part III August 24, 2014

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1 1 Our Triune God Part III August 24, 2014 God the Father God God the Son God the Holy Spirit A Triune God in RELATIONSHIP with Himself Tim Chester We cannot know the infinite God because we are finite and because we are sinful. But God graciously makes Himself known to us. We can know Him through a personal relationship. And God can be known personally because He is a trinity of persons in relationship. When you accept the truth of the Word of God you are much wiser than the world. Postmodernism is suspicious of all claims to know absolute truth. Most post moderns doubt anyone can confidently know absolute truth. Christians boldly declare God s Word is truth. Truth can be known. It is not vague. It reveals what we could never know without it being given by God Himself. A wonderful truth God is a PERSONAL God. But don t miss this! Christians are not those who have searched for and found God. They are those who have been FOUND by God. We don t put our thinking caps on and contemplate God, do our best to reason about His existence to then believe in Him. No! God came to earth in the Person of Jesus Christ to make Himself known. This is important!

2 2 Because God is a personal God He can enter into a personal RELATIONSHIP with people God is not a distant God. He is a very present God. Because He is a personal being we can have a personal relationship with Him. It is on the premise of relationship that we begin to know about Him. God exists eternally in a relationship within the God-head. Three Persons in complete union, unity, love and purpose have a relationship that requires no other relationship outside of itself. In other words God was not lonely when He created other beings. God did not create us because He needed more friends more followers for He was completely sufficient and satisfied WITHIN the God-head Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Carl Barth The starting point of theology is the fact of revelation. God reveals Himself. He reveals Himself through Himself. If God were not a triune-god, He would not be KNOWABLE as a person. This may seem deep but do your best to get this The Trinity is the three Persons of the Trinity working so that: God the Father is the REVEALER (He alone can cause us to know Him personally) Romans 1:18-23 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, 1:19 because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. 1:20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. Watch this

3 General revelation - that everyone has been given information and knowledge that there is a God with eternal power, a divine nature. That is undeniable according to God s Word. This is absolutely clear. But this is insufficient revelation that God is a personal God. That requires the special revelation of God through His Word by the Person of the Holy Spirit through the knowledge of Jesus Christ working individually in hearts We can know God exists but we cannot know that He is a personal God without Him also being THE REVEALER God the Son is the REVELATION of God God cannot be known without the self-unveiling of God. God the Holy Spirit is the REVEALER of God to man The One who enables us to see that Jesus Christ is the revelation of the Father Jesus is THE truth. At the same time He is the truth ABOUT God the Father And Jesus is the truth revealed THROUGH the Holy Spirit to us personally or individually We need a Triune God to know God. God is invisible, unknowable through our reasoning even through general revelation. Simply giving non-believers information will not suffice. Salvation requires a personal relationship with God. We can know God because in God the Son, God the Father is revealed. And because God the Son has reconciled us to Himself we can at once know Him personally, be cleansed of our sin and understand truths otherwise unknowable. The relationship of Father and Son John 17:1 3

4 4 Jesus spoke these things; and lifting up His eyes to heaven, He said, Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son, that the Son may glorify You, The glory of God was a MUTUAL glory Jesus is asking to receive back the VISIBLE glory He had before He came to earth John 17:3 This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. Familiarity with God the Father is what Jesus desired for us. Knowledge that God sent Him to us to make the Father known. John 17:4 I glorified You on the earth, having accomplished the work which You have given Me to do. Christ s purpose on earth was to bring glory to His Father But in the finished work of Christ the glory is to return to a mutual glory shared between Father and Son before the incarnation. John 17:5 Now, Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was. I am only beginning to understand these truths but notice Christ s revelation to us of the relationship He has had with His Father John 17:7-9 Now they have come to know that everything You have given Me is from You; 17:8 for the words which You gave Me I have given to them; and they received them and truly understood that I came forth from You, and they believed that You sent Me.

5 5 17:10 and all things that are Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine; and I have been glorified in them. Everything Jesus gave on earth was a gift from the Father. This includes even the words Jesus spoke. It was given so believers would truly understand the Jesus was sent by the Father. Notice in verse 11 of the unity of relationship between Father and Son John 17:11... keep them in Your name, the name which You have given Me, that they may be one even as We are. A hint of the glory of a Triune God John 17:21-22 that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me. 17:22 The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; The relationship of God in three Persons is a relationship of ONENESS The relationship of God in three Persons is a relationship of LOVE Three times Jesus speaks of the Father s love for Him (vs 23, 24, 26) John 17:23 I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.

6 6 John 17:24 Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am, so that they may see My glory which You have given Me, for You loved Me before the foundation of the world. John 17:26 and I have made Your name known to them, and will make it known, so that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them. The relationship of God in three Persons is one of intimate KNOWLEDGE of each other. John 17:25 O righteous Father, although the world has not known You, yet I have known You; and these have known that You sent Me; The Trinity has a mutual love within the Persons of the Trinity from eternity past. Tim Chester God is not a solitary individual, but a divine community. God is personsin-relationship.