Greatness Of The Godhead (part 2)

Father in heaven we thank you for this morning For your grace even as we see the the temperatures changing.

We're just reminded of your constant care for the planet for us how you transform

Things from season to season father. We would pray for your blessing this morning as we look to your word and look at how you have

Really revealed yourself to us that we might know you that we might trust you that we might grow in grace

Father I pray that you would bless this time and bless each one here in Christ's name. Amen And for those in the kitchen well

We You know, we often talk about Doctrine and some people kind of you know

They there's just there's just too much emphasis on doctrine and I was thinking about this morning really it is like It is like in my old line of work.

We used to talk about training a lot and I remember When a well, I mean, let's put it this way you ever watch a police show and you know

What happens the bad guys always run? What I really hate though, you know, I I'm just sitting there watching and I'm thinking myself would

I do it this way? You know like let's say I'll just back up a little bit, you know I'm the cop and we'll just make

Pat the suspect and they go.

Hey Pat We just have a couple questions for you and she knows she's guilty, right? So what does she do?

She takes off running and it's you know, I'm just like why do they do that? They're to go. I don't know why this is this thing is making so many funny noises

That's about but anyway, I always think you know, that's just loopy To do that and to give them like a heads up so they can take off running and then what

I really enjoy of course is like one of the partners is 300 pounds and You know,

I'll get the car, you know kind of thing But I just think back to when

I was doing that and I and I just thought what if I weighed 300 pounds You know and a guy took I did have a few people run on me in my day

I'll just tell you a little story. This is a fun story and I just feel like telling it The very first night

I was in a radio car We had a guy and I'll shorten it but we had a guy we were working the foothills above Los Angeles and we had a guy and we took him for possession of coke and marijuana and open container in his vehicle and He managed to escape out of our vehicle because we didn't have a cage or anything my training officer was showing me something and So he went running down this turnout of this hill and Instead of running down the turnout the road he went straight over the edge of the cliff well, well we caught him and So I'm really shortening the story, but we caught him and then like maybe about three or four weeks later

We had a guy different area but still the mountains and we were taking him because he had a $10 ,000 warrant

I think and the other people in the vehicle were heavily under the influence of marijuana, so they were going to jail too and This guy

I told him put a big guy. I mean he was much bigger than me. So you know he was a big guy I Said put your hands behind your back and as soon as I did that he turned around and took a swing on me

So I just kind of moved out of the way like this and he just kept going And he went straight over the side of the cliff so the next night the next night

We're having our briefing and this guy who I just saw got promoted a commander Which is pretty high up there in the sheriff's department.

He was just a deputy like me and he Name was buddy and buddy says so who you guys gonna throw over cliff tonight.

I Just want to share that so but training is important.

Let me give you another illustration Well, let's talk about why? It's important and why we need to get our minds to think, right?

there's a situation where a man who ironically was from Afghanistan went in to settle a

Child -custody dispute with his wife and he took the standard ar -15 into that's a assault weapon

Into the house to settle this and We Had a couple units respond and a sergeant went in the front window along with another deputy and I was like the third person there at the scene

Which really is immaterial except for the next part there was a standoff and the sergeant eventually shot the suspect

And I walked in and I just remember seeing the sergeant Just he was sweating and breathing heavily and I thought he was gonna like die right there

Because he just so much stress and everything like that and then I realized a Week before that he'd ridden around with me for an eight -hour shift and then gone to the hospital for stress and so I thought you know,

I might have contributed to that but I Just thought it hit, you know, he was a little bit older Not in good shape, and I just thought you know what you really have to It's a job that demands a lot, you know

Even if it's not physical it can take a physical toll on you and when we think about the Christian life

I think it demands a lot Because when we wake up in the morning, we might think

I mean, I hope our first thought is what a great God I have who would save me and I look around at all the blessings

He's given me and I don't just be filled with thankfulness But a lot of times I get out of bed and what's the first thing

I think? My heel hurts my back hurts my shoulder hurts my neck hurts

I Could hardly wait to get some coffee And just gonna get going here

We got to keep our minds right because we don't what happens the cares of the world the aches and pains just everyday life

Can just sign kind of consume us so as we turn here to look at this at the

Godhead I Think it's important for us to just think rightly about God because when we think rightly, what do we do when crisis comes?

We act rightly we respond rightly and you know what let me just say this if you don't respond rightly

Initially sometimes what happens is Is this tell me if this has ever happened to you? You don't respond rightly when something doesn't go your way and then you think about it for a minute and you go

In light of what I know was that a good response in light of All that the all that God has done on my behalf.

Is that the right thing? You know I had this thought in my head this morning that I saw or that I heard pastor

Dave in the hallway and now I see Deb hi, I thought I heard Dave and I'm going that's my imagination because anything could be you know

But it's so important that we train ourselves to think rightly and so we've come to this talking about the

Godhead and talking about different aspects of God and his

I guess we could call it attributes some of them And last week we talked about several and we began talking about three in particular on Omnipresence omnipotence and omniscience

I always want to say omni science Yeah but it just means all -knowing but And so we've talked we've been talking about that and let me just kind of back up and we'll just start with that the omnipresence of God Famous Baptist theologian once wrote in the totality of his essence without diffusion or expansion multiplication or diffusion penetrates the universe in all its parts

That's what God does in his omnipresence now, I'm sure that was a blessing to you What does that mean that means everywhere you go?

God is there and he's no less in one place than another and He says we've already met this idea under the eminence of God the nearness of God But this idea is hard for us to grasp.

Why is that hard to grasp? Because we can't do that.

We're not God and what else do we do? I mean, I don't know about you guys. Maybe you guys are just better than me probably are

I Tend to a lot of my thoughts tend to be about what? It's it's sad, but it is true.

A lot of my thoughts are about me and I don't

I don't think often enough God is here How am

I how am I thinking about God? What is my you know thought process? What am I even thinking about that junk for?

But he goes on to say even though God is pure spirit

I like this children and naive adults Almost necessarily think of God and corporeal images.

So we talked a little bit about paintings and stuff like that last week but if we think about God as having a local presence as having a body then we're thinking about him wrongly and So Now we're here something new here this morning theologians have always found

God's omnipresence in other words They've always believed it the widely witnessed to be in the

Bible. It's hard to formulate as doctrine, right? I mean we would say that I mean that is difficult

Karl Barth I Just kept this in here because I thought this part was funny

Karl Barth Atypically thinks everyone else has it wrong and that omnipresence does not belong to God's infinity

But the attribute of love and freedom now, why did I like that because he thinks everybody else is wrong That's Karl Barth for you dead

German He promises to give God's unity and omnipresence a more biblical and therefore

Christian basis than it had in the early church the Middle Ages and prophet anyway 50 pages later

He discussed God's simplicity faithfulness and so on but leaves omnipresence more mysterious than before listen to this

This is from a man named Ludwig Ott who says the first monograph on the substantial presence of God in the whole world and in all its parts thereof and on the indwelling of God in the just was written by Augustine So we're talking 1 ,600 years ago

Men were wrestling with this and we're still wrestling with it now Now what's the first if you think of a

Bible passage that talks about the omnipresence of God? What's the most obvious one? Psalm 139 okay, so why don't we turn there?

Psalm 139 and If somebody would read verses 7 through 10

Maybe is he is David bugged by that is he put off by this idea that there's no place

He can go to escape from the presence of God What's that? He's happy.

He's rejoicing now. What do you suppose? What's the significance of that comment about the sea?

from a Jewish mindset You know is he thinking hey, it's great to go hang out at the beach

We'll go out and go for a little ocean swim Notice what he says there read that again

Bob Just the part about the the sea Even there why because it's a place of fear trepidation one of the

Pictures of heaven is you know that there's a place where there's no sea

So David's saying look even in the worst place I can possibly be You're there,

I mean it reminds me of Psalm 22 right the shadow of the valley of death even there

There is no place that God is not and that should be a great comfort to us For the unbeliever, what is that?

It's horrible. There's no place. He can go no matter how much he'd like to pretend There's no place.

He can go and be away from the presence of God Let's look at Jeremiah 23 verses 23 and 24

Jeremiah 23 verses 23 and 24 And who would read that?

Mark go ahead. Those are questions that obviously demand well, they don't really demand any kind of answer, but I mean you would answer them in the

Can a man hide himself? No, is there a place where we can go? No, I mean, you know, we like to talk about locking ourselves in our prayer closet

Some of us like to talk about that. Well, you know the unbeliever like to lock himself in a sin closet But wherever he goes

God is there now again Culver notes this that Christians must be on guard to think to not think of God's omnipresence in a material tangible sense whatsoever

Now listen to this. I like this example a youthful hippie known to me converted to Christ at a charismatic retreat

Thought the rising mist of early morning must be the presence of the Holy Spirit Kind of wacky as To his essential being it is false and fatal to any true religious spirituality to think of God as materially

Sensible that is understandable in any manner whatsoever all sorts of crass forms of mysticism grow in the soil of material conceptions of God's omnipresence

So what's he saying there? You know, there was a heavy sense that the

Lord was in that place the anointing filled the building His spirit was exceptionally whatever

I Mean we hear people talk like that What what there should be is there was a heavy conviction of what the holiness of God?

There was a heavy conviction of our sinfulness. There was a heavy conviction of the wonderfulness of Christ Now, what are the practical benefits of just thinking about the omnipresence?

Well, obviously as we've been discussing it's beneficial for devotion We can never be in any place where God is not present

It is also beneficial for assurance We can never

Just scratch your head, okay Okay We can never be physically or geographically beyond God's help for he is present whether in a prison

With Joseph in a den of lions or in the Emperor's presence According to Psalm 107

God is a present help or he's present to help when lost in the desert when in prison When on a sickbed and when in storms at sea,

I was thinking You know talking about the geographical separation. I was thinking about a bogus email.

I received from Frank Rotolo one time it was one of those, you know, Frank got hacked and he was in London for a conference and And I thought well,

I'd like to help you Frank, but I'm geographically unable to do that but But God is never unable to help us

Bob. Yeah, that's what

Culver's saying. I tend to agree with that because I think we can almost walk ourselves into a

Soft form of idolatry. Well, you know what?

That's a good point because the the Hebrew word for glory, you know the kavod

Depicts weightiness, but does it mean physical weightiness No You know, it just means it like they used to say of Dick Cheney, you know, they use this word

Yeah all the time gravitas there's a certain Gravitas that he has that the president doesn't have you know, etc, etc.

There's just you know, there's just a weightiness like In a personal way when somebody walks in the room.

I mean, this is just true, right? I remember I used to say this of Lewis Brown When he walked in the room you just knew he was there because there was just kind of like a

You know a tilt in the room The the whole respect thing just kind of you know tilted.

I don't I don't know how that happens But and he wouldn't have to say anything and in a non -physical sense

There's just a weightiness and a gravity of the presence of God So, yeah,

I think it would be wrong to think of it in that kind of charismatic sense, right

Now he says there's a problem. How can an omnipresent God be said to dwell in heaven and Come to travel back and forth from earth to heaven in Genesis 11 5

Well What do you suppose the answer that is? How is it that God dwells in heaven

John, okay, well that's true, right

Second person in the Trinity. Yeah Brian, okay.

He doesn't have to travel. That's true. But why would the scriptures ever use that language? I think in some cases it does

You know comport to Christ it would be attributed to him but what are you supposed the

Bible uses language like that Maybe when it's not specifically referring to Jesus excellent

Anthropomorphic language to give us a sense of what's going on You know language that speaks as if God were a man so that we can understand what he's doing so that we get kind of a

Picture in our minds not of God but of his actions Yeah I mean there is a sense in which he's above it and then there's a sense that he's in it and so I think all these things are just helpful to kind of for us to sort of Understand the flow of thought rather than I mean, it would be difficult to write or even to read something where I just said

God this and God that and God without any any sort of transportation language or anything to where we understood that he was addressing a particular problem or whatnot, so But yeah,

I would say that he definitely true that he's outside of creation Bob Right Yeah, where it says in the

Psalms that he's in heaven and he does what he pleases that does give us a sense of his throne But that doesn't mean that he's not here or that he's not ruling and reigning here in some sense.

Yeah, Brian Well, okay.

Brian's question is, you know, if we're not to worship any kind of image now or even kind of Strive to have an image in our heads.

Well, then what about when Jesus was on the earth and people did Bow and worship to him in a few occasions and it's interesting that you know, like when they would fall at a man's feet

What would the you know, usually an apostle what would they say, you know get up? Don't don't work or an angel, you know, don't don't worship me, but Jesus didn't say that to people

But so what do we do with that? What do we do with that idea there that it was okay to worship

Jesus in the physical body? But not okay to you know

Have a picture in our head now Yeah, and and Peggy I think is exactly on the right track

I mean we have to think about why they would do that and I think you know often it was they were undone, you know

By their own sinfulness or or what have you and we certainly don't have that physical presence now

And I think that's the issue Any kind of picture whether it's in Spain I really should

I want to bring in a graphic that you know the before -and -after if you haven't seen it It's really worthwhile looking at because it's terrible.

But whatever Whatever picture we can conjure up. It doesn't it wouldn't match

Jesus and it wouldn't be him. So That would be the issue But he says here and I think this is right to think about in heaven he says he is perfect or he's permanently manifest in a special way in heaven and Hence is said to dwell there.

So there is a special presence of God there that is

Unrivaled anywhere else and so he said to dwell there But he also as he chooses especially manifests himself on earth at various times and places and hence is said to Come to those places even the tabernacle in the wilderness the first temple

And Certainly we have in the Old Testament his Shekinah his glory is there and it was visible they could see it

So the omni presence of God Now we come to the omniscience or the omni science the all -knowing aspects of God This term designates

God's cognitive awareness He has perfect immediate knowledge of all things and events whether actual or conditional upon the acts of free beings free being in quotation marks

Whether the events are or things are possible or only actual and whether they are past present or future

Now as we've said in many occasions, this doesn't mean that God has some kind of event chart flow chart

You know as it were where you know, gee there were Five possibilities of clothing that Steve could have worn this morning and based on a you know

This is gonna happen B C D and you know, and then kind of branches off of that.

God knows What's the difference? Well, let's let's just get off this for a minute and let's just think about this.

What's the difference between? What will happen and what has what God has commanded? Is there any difference at all?

What will happen and what God has commanded? Okay, he had already determined for anything that happened what the plan was.

Okay, is that the same as God's command? Anything let me say it again.

Is there any difference between what will happen and what God has commanded? Yes, I am

John Okay.

Okay. I see some other hands Erickson. That is an excellent point

Do people obey what God commands? He gave the Ten Commandments. How many of you broke those this week?

You're laughing so what will happen let's just differentiate here

You're gonna say who? Okay Bruce Bruce understands what

I'm getting at good.

So the the difference is here's what God Commands which you know, we could have the

Ten Commands We could even have the two commandments in the New Testament Which is just love the Lord God with all your heart soul mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself

How many of you broke that this week and then what he decrees is actually everything that comes to pass so, you know and and the

Church fathers those who wrote things like the Westminster Confession of Faith are very careful to say things like God ordains them or decrees events to come about in such a way that what?

he is not the author of sin and how does he do that by using

Secondary agents us And knowing what we will do and ordaining that but not

Causing us to do it we do we sin of our own will Now just a word and I know

Pastor Mike's gonna talk about election tonight. But what is Let's talk just a second about free will what is free will?

Brian, that's great.

That's perfect. Brian said whatever whatever nature you have you are free to choose within that nature and You know to illustrate that you can tell your

Dog to go to the refrigerator and get you a root beer all day long and guess what? That dog unless he's really smart like Kona won't

Won't be able it Kona's kind of vertically challenged. So I don't know if he can do it or not

He's not gonna get it. Why not because it's not in his nature. He doesn't understand English. First of all Doesn't understand

German doesn't understand anything But understand certain voice sounds or whatever, but He doesn't have the physical capacity to go to the refrigerator and open it up and get you

And he doesn't have opposing thumbs the poor little guy, you know, you can tell a butterfly to mop the floor

It's not gonna do it. Why because he's constrained by his physical nature Well, it's so hard for us to get that if things are

Constrained and restricted by their physical nature then why aren't people Constrained and restrained by their spiritual nature and the

Bible would teach that they are You know when Paul writes the church at Ephesus in Ephesians chapter 2 and he says you were dead in your sins and trespasses

He didn't he doesn't go on to say but you Because of that small little bit of life you still had chose to believe

He says even as pastor Mike was saying this morning, but God And we see that over and over again

It's God who's the actor God who goes first why because our will is not free and I think that's important when we just consider decree and What God has ordained and whatever comes to pass.

So with that said We we go into the omniscience of God what he knows and how he knows it and And he has perfect knowledge but In as much as the scriptural statements are overwhelming in detail

Let us give them full opportunity to speak God has perfect knowledge. Listen, listen to this language No creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed laid bare

To the eyes of him to whom we must give an account There's nothing that he doesn't see there's nothing that he doesn't know

You know and how does that come into play? Well a lot of times like, you know when we pray if we leave out something and we go

Oh, I forgot to tell you. Well, he knew that already prayers for us and we talked about that but Listen also the eyes of the

Lord run to and fro throughout the earth to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward him

God's immediate knowledge or immediate awareness is not based on experience deductions or inductions of fact or truth

He doesn't learn he doesn't grow he's not acquiring new knowledge This is good.

He says here for God's knowledge of all things is eternal present and always in his mind he knew as surely 10 ,000 years ago or however long ago the earth the earth was founded 6 ,000 years ago, whatever it was

He knew exactly then everything that he knows now he's learned nothing and he will learn nothing

He doesn't need to learn anything because he's the source of all knowledge In fact, let's go to Isaiah chapter 46 and I think

And I knew I had this. I think I wanted some specific verses

So I'm gonna I think it's 7 to 11, but I'm gonna read that. I don't know.

It's later than that. Okay Yes verses 8 through Well, it doesn't matter

I'll read until I'm done Starting at verse 8 remember this and stand firm recall to mind you transgressors stuck in Israel sinning

Remember the former things of old for I am God and there is no other I am God and there is none like me

Declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done now notice

I just want to stop there for a couple of reasons here first of all, he's talking to them because they were in idolatry and he says

There is no other I am God and there's none like me they were trying to create gods and he says you guys are wasting

Your time there's no one like me and he says you you want evidence declaring the end from the beginning in other words from the beginning of time,

I told you what the end was going to be like and And from ancient times things not yet done my prophecies come to pass

My counsel shall stand and I will accomplish all my purpose Calling a prey a bird of prey from the

East. He's talking about another country the man of my counsel from a far country I have spoken and I will bring it to pass.

I have purposed and I will do it Listen to me you stubborn of heart you who are far from righteousness.

I Bring my near my righteousness. It is not far off and my salvation will not delay

I will put salvation in Zion for Israel my glory. I Mean I read that and I'm going you know over and over again

We see God saying what he will do what we don't see is him making things contingent upon You know

Israel G You know what Israel if you'll just leave open the gate at midnight Then I'll send somebody in or we don't see anything like that.

God always brings his purposes to Pass that's what he does.

That's why he's God now. He says Does God know therefore conditional events of the future even events depending?

dependent on the future acts of free beings and again, the answer is yes, he knows and They're not actually free they choose according to their nature

There's no mystery to God when someone chooses to sin when someone chooses to repent when someone chooses what whatever it is

Because he knew from the beginning all these things that we're going to be Modern liberal writers of theology quite uniformly deny this.

Why do they deny this? Just a just a little sidelight about Liberalism what is it when we say liberal theologians?

What are we talking about? Okay, no absolute truth.

I mean that's certainly become true now. I Don't you know in the beginning? I don't think they would have said there's absolutely no truth

They the liberals would have said that the Bible isn't Yeah, it contains truth.

You know, that's kind of the neo -orthodoxy approach to it But liberals are those who primarily like Thomas Jefferson only maybe not with scissors want to cut out the supernatural

From the Bible. They're always looking for a physical explanation. Why is that? Why are they looking for physical explanations?

Well Peggy said because they don't want to be judged and I think that's true But I think it goes beyond that because they don't believe they're not believers

They don't want there to be a supernatural power to whom they are accountable for And so they like kind of the trappings of Christianity They like some of the goals and the ideas of Christianity Christianity is a fine social construct and If you know you just view religion as a social construct then

Christianity is as good as any But this whole idea of a personal God who invades the space of The earth of people who changes lives

They don't go for that They say what they were they would say something like this the knowledge of God must be limited if there is a

God But they would say he must be limited by his own nature and purpose If he has put a check on his power to give man freedom of will then he must have somewhat limit somewhat limited knowledge of the future

Which I Think is at least consistent if you believe that God gave man a free will well truly free will means what

I mean? I've even as I've read I've been reading Norman Geisler a lot for this class I finished reading his book, and I think

I can uniformly say speak for the students of the class it was horrible but Here's part of the issue because he says that God Knows all things and he knows all people and he knows who's going to believe he doesn't cite the quarters of time view

But the end result is the same But if God knows all things

Perfectly Let's let's just think about this for a minute if he knew for example that I was not going to believe and Therefore he didn't choose me

Well when that point comes where I hear the gospel do I have do I still have a free will? It's kind of dicey isn't it?

Because if I if it's set in stone from the beginning of time that I can't choose then do I have a free will and I?

Think we get right back to it to this We get back to right back to what Brian was saying that I can only choose according to my nature well if I can only

Choose according to my nature, then how does my nature change? Well the

Arminian says It's me. I choose to change my nature They say well, it's not works, and I'm going well.

How can it not be works in fact? he has a whole couple sections in his book about faith preceding regeneration and If faith precedes regeneration then that means the unsaved person has to Generate his own faith has to choose to believe

So you run into problems like I I'm I couldn't even make this up if I wanted to he comes to Ephesians Chapter 2 verse 1 dead and sins and trespasses and guess what do you mean what he says?

Doesn't mean that you're all the way dead And here's why it doesn't mean that because you still are an image bearer now

Just think about it Just think about Ephesians 2 1 and what's there and think if this sounds like it's there even anywhere in the context he says

Even though you're spiritually dead. You're still an image bearer and Because you're still an image bearer then you still have the ability to choose

Yes, but it is talking about death it is necrotic, and it does mean dead, but he says well wait a minute it can't be that word because in Revelation that word is used of annihilation and if it's an

It's also used and he says if it's annihilation in Spiritual annihilation in Ephesians 2 1 then it must be spiritual

Annihilation in Revelation 20 which would mean that you're annihilated forever, and there is no actual hell

Well the problem with that is you have to look at the context and explain it in the context and if you think of Ephesians 2 1 and you think this

Dead in your sins and trespasses, and then he goes on to say I'm gonna have to go over there. He he skips over verse 2

But I remember it like it was yesterday because it was one of these nightmares from which you can't wake up he says about he skips over verse 2 and Then he goes to verse 3 and he says this that Among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh

Carrying out the desires of the body in the mind and were by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind he says Well it can't mean that This was your permanent nature because obviously you had to choose and he starts going to Isaiah and talking about you know

How we have to be reasonable because in Isaiah 1 it says God says let us reason together, and he goes to all these different verses, and here's what you find out

That for somebody like dr. Geisler the Bible is Great and it's true, and it's right and he upholds the authenticity of it

But when he can't get the doctrines he wants out of a specific passage. What does he do? He starts doing what cults do sorry

Which is going from one verse to another to another to another to another and you know what's strange about his?

Treatment of Ephesians 2 is he never goes to Ephesians 2 verse 4 the very next verse and explains away

It doesn't mean that you know I mean here We have it I mean if you just read this you would never think well there must be human choice involved here listen to verse 3

And then I'll read verse 4 among whom we all once lived in the passion of our flesh Carrying out the desires of the body and the mind and were by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind but I being smarter than most wait

But God being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead in our trespasses made us alive together with Christ he skips over all verse 4 and 5 and Then conveniently later on he goes back to verses 8 and 9 and shows how

You have to generate the faith yourself It is just it it's not exegesis and the reason

I wanted to do that is just to show that We're going to be talking about the will of God and when we think about that we need to consider our own will

We have to consider all that God has done, and you know I was talking to some people the other day

People with difficulty in their lives, I mean you might say Tragedy you know why did this happen?

Why did that happen? How could God allow that? What do you say to somebody like that?

You don't look at what you look at who and you just here's what I say. You know what it's easy to say to yourself

God loves me because of all the blessings that he's given me. I mean I when I think of my grandkids I just can't

I kind of get Crazy because I just think about what God has blessed me with But when

God brings difficulty into your life. Do you just tell yourself? This is the same God and here's what

I said to those people. I said God works all things together for good all things and there's a

Puritan book that talks about all things and it talks about every manner of Event that could possibly happen in your life

God brings Or works all things together for good not just the things that we count as good, but even difficult tragic things and In times of trouble in times of stress

It's what we think about God is how much we trust him how much we love him and how much we understand him that controls our response

If we know that God loves us that God has set his affections on us that he has promised us heaven and That even if we have to go through temporary things right now that it's for our own good

Then we have a completely different picture of our lives and a completely different picture of God.

Let's pray Father in heaven. We just love you. We worship you. We're thankful for who you are we're thankful that you're in control and that we're not and Most of all father we're thankful that you set your affections on us for reasons that we cannot fathom other than to glorify yourself as We look around the room and even around the church this morning father.

We think we are not the great ones you are the great one who has taken the the the refuse of the world and made us

Pure and spotless before yourself because we couldn't do it on our own. We would never choose you

Father we praise you and just I would pray for each one here that we would think rightly of you That our thoughts would be glorifying and honoring of you in Jesus name.