Balanced In Belief

The Transcendent Creator in Isaiah 40

This evening, we're going to do something a little bit different. And it's not just because Pastor Pryor's not here. But our study this evening, I really don't know how it's going to go. But I hope it's a blessing to you.

It's probably going to be a little more challenging than what we're accustomed to on a Wednesday evening. Turn with me please to Isaiah chapter 40. We'll actually look at two texts of scripture. And then think together, if we're willing.

Isaiah chapter 40. We have these words beginning in verse 12. Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand and marked off the heavens by the span and calculated the dust of the earth by the measure and weighed the mountains in a balance and the hills in a pair of scales?

Who has directed the spirit of Yahweh or as his counselor has informed him? With whom did he consult and who gave him understanding? And who taught him in the path of justice and taught him knowledge and informed him of the way of understanding?

Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket and are regarded as a speck of dust on the scales. Behold, he lifts up the islands like fine dust. Even Lebanon is not enough to burn, nor its beasts enough for a burnt offering.

All the nations are as nothing before him. They are regarded by him as less than nothing and meaningless. To whom then will you liken God or what likeness will you compare with him? Here you have some words and they strike us with the fact that God is not only unique, but God as the creator is in need of nothing.

The nations, all the peoples are regarded as a speck of dust on the scales. All the beasts of Lebanon are not enough for a burnt offering. All the nations are as nothing before him. They are regarded by him as less than nothing and meaningless.

Thus, here you have a great and sovereign creator God and he is transcendent. He is not dependent upon anything that he has created. The Bible definitely presents that view. Keep that in mind. Keep that view of God in mind and turn with me to John chapter 11.

Jesus Weeps at Lazarus's Tomb

John chapter 11, you know the story. Lazarus has died. Jesus has now come and beginning in verse 32. We read, therefore when, John chapter 11, verse 32,. Therefore when Mary came where Jesus was, she saw him and fell at his feet saying to him, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.

When Jesus therefore saw her weeping and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit. He was troubled and said, where have you laid him? They said to him, Lord, come and see.

And Jesus wept. What I wish to do this evening as we look at these words is to ask you, how can you put these two together? Do we even try? Or do we give up? Do we just simply say, too big for me? I mean, there's no question that in John 11, Jesus, who we believe to be God incarnate, God in human flesh, he's deeply moved in spirit and troubled.

And normally those terms would be, there's anger involved, but there's deep emotion involved at what he sees, at people crying, at grief, at loss. He weeps himself. And yet, we read in Isaiah chapter 40, we read in Isaiah chapter 40 about a transcendent God and all the nations, dust on a scale, nothing meaningless.

Well, those nations were made up of people like Lazarus and Mary and Martha. Those nations would be filled with people who wept and people who had joy and people who experienced grief. How do we put all this together?

Or do we even make an attempt to do so? My concern is primarily for those who would self-identify with the reformed label, which if you're here, I'm assuming that's everybody. We speak often of the sovereignty of God, and I think one of the reasons that we feel the necessity to do so is that we don't hear it very often around us.

We see so much presentation that is sub-biblical, that doesn't take into consideration so many clear teachings of the scriptures, and so we're ready to take out our sword and defend for the sovereignty of God, and we know our verses and we can go there and we can, I think, accurately handle them and present them.

When I was in seminary, I remember very clearly that the seminary I went to was not reformed and not nearly as conservative as I was. And as a result, I had to read and interact with a lot of theology that, let's just say Pastor Fry wouldn't waste his time reading it, okay?

That would be the fairest way of putting it. And some of it was about the suffering God. Certain German theologians had developed the idea of the suffering God, not in the sense of Christ suffering, no, but in the sense that God had decreed to make a world where he risked.

And, you know, there's theologies out there where people don't think God knows the future, and so he's taking this big risk and this big gamble and it might not turn out real well, and he may end up suffering himself for all time.

And I just, I remember, you know, reading this stuff and going, which Bible are you reading again? Did you lose the book of Revelation? I bet you it fell out. It's one of those last books, sometimes, you know, the spine breaks.

I was just, you know, blown away because people would take such an imbalanced view of things. But at the same time, there are those, there's, you know, sure there's that danger over there. We've seen the danger of avoiding the truth by the sovereignty of God and the incoherence that comes when you have a God that, you know, I mean, there are certain people who think that God on September 10th was sitting around going, I see these men are planning this and I know it could happen, but I don't know.

I don't know what's going to happen because he doesn't know what free creatures are going to do. And I don't know about you. I'm not sure why you'd bother praying to such a God. We see all of that over there, but on the other side, there's a danger for reformed folks to have a God that's so transcendent that he really doesn't, he's got his decree.

This is what's going to happen in time, but he's not actually involved. I mean, we think of Islam and we think of the transcendent God of Islam. And he certainly has a decree and, you know, it's called Qadr in Arabic.

And he has predestined who's going to go to heaven, who's going to go to hell, and what's going to happen in time, when you're going to die. And it's all there, but he's so transcended that it's just, it's something he's done out there.

It doesn't affect him. And what I want to try to encourage us to do this evening is to recognize that both of these texts are true. Both of them speak to us and what we should be doing as we seek to understand the Scriptures is to not fit God into a box of our own creation.

Holding Sovereignty and Divine Nearness Together

We should be constantly building our box out to try to fit the God who has revealed himself in his word. And what that means is we need to understand, we need to recognize, that if we talk about God's sovereignty and God's decree, you will never really understand the beauty of that.

For a lot of people that's not beautiful. For a lot of people that's not only reprehensible, it's scary and it brings them despair. There's nothing we can do. It's all fixed, it's all determined. I don't want to worship a God like that.

Because they don't see that God's decree is what makes our freedom what it really is. If it weren't for God's decree, we could be inflamed by all sorts of powers and things outside of ourselves. We're small little creatures.

We may think very highly of ourselves, but face it, folks. Remember, I don't know, two months ago I brought in my little projector on a Wednesday night and I showed you the little video about how small we are in comparison with God's decree.

We're little things. And there would be so many forces that could control us. But you see, it's the decree of God that determines the very nature of our lives and that what we do actually matters because that's a part of God's decree.

It's not just some random thing. And what people don't understand, people always ask me, well, what's the difference between the Islamic view of God and what you Calvinists believe? In fact, Norman Geisser and others love to attack how it's just, they believe like the Muslims believe and if the Muslims are wrong, they must be too.

Genetic fallacy. But anyways, what's the difference? And what I've always said is, the Islamic God may be sovereign over his creation, but he is not personally involved in his creation in the sense that his creation exists to glorify him by his personal involvement in accomplishing his will in creation.

It's impersonal in Islam. It is very personal in the Christian faith. And if you want the biggest example of that, if you want the biggest way to avoid slipping into Calvinistic fatalism where you go, well, it's all determined, so man's irrelevant and I can't see how God can judge anybody and I can't see how there can be any real justice or truth or love.

You want the greatest reputation of that? We just read it. God in human flesh was deeply troubled. He was moved in spirit when he encountered, yes, our little minds, we go, what do you mean? How can that be because he's just encountering what he himself decreed?

He did not make you and I to function on a knowledge of what his eternal decree is or he would have told us what it was. That's one of the biggest errors that Calvinists fall into, is that we know there is this eternal decree and we know a little bit about what it is.

I mean, God's going to be glorified and there's going to be specific people that are going to be saved. We've got some basic outlines, but we don't know one ten billionth of the detail or the glory or the beauty of how all that works out.

And that decree involves God's actual interaction with his creation. That's what's amazing. And that's what the Muslims reject. God incarnate? God interacting with his creatures? Never do it. Only sends angels down to transcend it.

Would never dirty himself that way. God's decree included the second person of the Trinity entering into this creation as a man and giving himself and having a people united to him in his death, his burial, and his resurrection.

That's an intimate union. See, what troubles us is because we look at Jesus and we go, but did he really weep? What was he weeping about? I mean, does God weep? Jesus knew what he was going to do. He had perfect confidence that he was going to be able to raise Lazarus from the dead.

So why would he weep? Why would he be troubled? How could God ever be troubled? And you see, what's in the back of our mind there is we really don't believe what the Bible has said about the fact that God truly loves justice and God truly hates unrighteousness.

Well, yeah, sort of. Yeah, the wrath thing. But, you know, hey, since it's a part of his decree, what does it really matter? I mean, he can't really honestly, you know. And you see, we try to live outside of the realm that God has created us to live in.

He has not created us to have access to eternity and have that perspective and be able to see the eternal decree. He created us and he judges us only in the realm he's created us to be in. And in that realm, he holds us accountable for his revealed will, not for the decree that we do not have access to.

And so you see, the danger is that we will shrink back from the lifelong task of holding together the rich fullness of God's revelation and we'll take the apathetic route. We'll take the easy route. We'll take the route where we just take what makes us comfortable with ourselves rather than the constant challenge to be recognizing God uses means, he's ordained the means, and the means are real.

It's not just some fake dame. And in fact, it is that decree that gives the very form, the warp and the woof, if you're familiar with that terminology, of the world that he has created and that he has placed us in.

And that makes our decisions real. The devil that makes us real. The danger is there are many people. Hyper-Calvinism and things like that. Well, God's sovereign and man has nothing to do. It's just a puppet.

But the Bible doesn't treat man as a puppet. And so if you're going to go there, you're going to have to say, yeah, I'll accept what the Bible says about this and this, but I'll reject what it says over there.

No, you have to hold both of them together. And you know what? It may be a real challenge for you for the rest of your life to work that out. But do you really want a God that you can figure out in one class?

I mean, really. When you graduate from seminary and finish your systematic theology class, do you sort of go, ah, glad I got that figured out. Never have to worry about that again. Unfortunately, a lot of people do exactly that.

And so we need to recognize the danger that we need to avoid as reformed people is we understand and affirm what the Bible says. The nations are as but a speck. And yet, in light of that awesome sovereignty, that same God who said that entered into his own creation, walked dusty roads, was constantly followed around by little men trying to trip him up, and he didn't turn around and turn them into pillars of salt, all for a purpose.

And what that means is his interaction in creation, his interaction in time is real, and that means our decisions and actions are just as real. And when God says he loves righteousness and hates lawlessness, he means it.

And when someone who has the revelation of God all around them, the fingerprints of God is on everything around them and on their own conscience, and yet that person chooses to sin against that light because they love their own sin, they love their own lust, they love their own power over others, whatever the situation might be, that action is condemnable.

You might say, yeah, but God decreed it from eternity past. He decreed everything from eternity past, and that's what makes it real. You have to hold it all together. You have to allow all of it. There's no reason to quote a part of it and say, well, the Bible clearly does teach the sovereignty of God and the decree, and so therefore, you've got to believe all of it.

Everything that is said. Halfway and go, well, if this, then, all that stuff over there just can't possibly be true. We can't really believe that. It does happen to people. And so you see, what I'm saying is, don't become comfortable with where you've come to in your understanding of God and his ways.

Because I can guarantee you, there's nobody in here that has it all figured out, including the guy standing up here. And sometimes we back away from opportunities to grow in our understanding, to grow in our depth of wonderment at God, simply from our own apathy.

We become comfortable. I like my theology. Well, yeah, I like my theology too. But that doesn't mean I don't need to continue to grow in it. And it should be part and parcel of my theology to have a constant wonder at learning more and more about my God.

If that's not your experience, it needs to become your experience, because that is consistent with what we really believe. I mean, we confess. We know this much about what God has actually revealed about himself.

And there's going to be so much more that we will someday discover when we are in his presence. This should be, for us, the greatest adventure. For a lot of Christians, it's not. It's a straight jacket, or it's dry, or it's boring.

I've said many times, I've never ever understood how anybody can teach theology and bore their students in the process. Just can't figure it out. I mean, if you're not passionate about it, you've missed the boat.

But for all of us, we've all got to ask ourselves the question, have we become complacent? Have we become apathetic? Ah, I've got it all figured out. There's nothing more I can learn. There's always much more that we can learn about our magnificent God, but we must look to all of the Word of God and we must hold it all together, accept all of it.

The Diamond of God's Truth and the Call to Ongoing Wonder

It's sort of like, and I'll close this, it's sort of like, you know, the displays that we're getting on our devices these days are getting amazing. I was watching a video yesterday about how a company in Australia has found a way in gaming things to get away from polygons and go to individual atoms in rendering stuff.

And the basically unlimited resolution. I mean, they've created this island and they zoom in on it and they can go all the way down to the grains of sand on the beach. I mean, it's just incredible. And what's going to be right around the corner?

And I remember what our devices used to look like and now, you know, I've got this iPad in front of me and I bring up pictures on it. It's just incredible. But if I had a picture of a diamond on my iPad, it might look just beautiful.

It was a video that allowed me to look at all of it from all the different perspectives and in different lighting. It could never, ever come close to the real thing. And unfortunately, we get too accustomed to a two-dimensional view of God.

We've got our theology down. And we're afraid to look at the backside or look from above or bring a different light to it. Because it might force us to think about some new things. It might force us to examine some aspects of our own lives that we're sort of comfortable not examining.

God's truth is like that beautiful diamond that should be observed from every angle and every light source. And the fact of the matter is, folks, our lives aren't long enough to actually allow us to do that.

It should be something that we enjoy doing. We look forward to. It should help us to avoid being trapped in worldly desires. Because our desire to know God would be so strong that it would constantly be driving us to do that rather than the things the world would entrap us with.

And so just some thoughts, hopefully, to challenge you to hold it all together, to believe all of it, not just a part of it. And that in the process, you will not become apathetic in the worship and indeed the study of God's truth, the worship of God and the study of His truth.