Which Side of the Cross - Lesson 18 Week 3
Mike Doyle · Oct 15, 2017
Which Side of the Cross, No. 39
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/492667436904

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

How far did we get? Did we get to immutable? We're a class and a half now talking about the attributes of God. I think I'm at immutable, but I'm not sure. How about truth and faithful and spirit? Immutable is real simple. It just means God never changes. He's the same. I find it interesting with believers how they try to get God to change based on their circumstances. And that's not going to happen. Because He just doesn't change who He is. He's truth.

In John 14, 6, Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father except through Me. Hebrews 13.8 says that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

In John 14.6, I think it's one of those verses that you begin to realize as you spend time, that the truth is more than just an objective doctrine or a list of facts. The truth really is a person. And like everything else we discover as we go forward in growing in the knowledge and grace of the Lord Jesus, this really has everything to do with a person.

The Lord Jesus is truth. He is life. He is way. He is a specific truth which is all truth. And I think sometimes we don't teach enough of the personal side of Christianity which is knowing Christ. And that everything that we study and read is really designed by the Father to reveal the person of Christ to us. That's really what he's doing. He's faithful. 1 Corinthians 10. No temptation has overtaken you but such as common to man. And God is faithful. He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able. But with the temptation will provide a way of escape also so that you will be able to endure it.

So let's talk about that for a minute. When you read that verse, doesn't the thought in your mind is, well here comes the avalanche, right? And I'm at the bottom of the hill. And somehow God is going to preserve me in the avalanche. Isn't that the mindset you get? Yeah. You think that's the way it is? Yes, no, or I don't know.

I'm particularly interested in the avalanche itself. Because this verse a lot of times is interpreted along the lines of, well, we're going to find ourselves in all really tough circumstances and God will put us in some, but he's going to rescue us. Is that what he means here?

How about our boy Peter says, count it all joy when you encounter certain trials. Yeah? I don't know if this fits or not, but isn't in James where it says that he doesn't attempt to fail anybody? And that when there's a testing by God, it's to prove what you believe, to verify to you that that's real. You know, what do you think about this thought? that God puts us in circumstances so that he can prove to us that he's faithful. I don't think he stands there and waits to see how you do in a circumstance and see, you can say, oh yeah, I passed this time. Or I didn't pass this time.

Because then it would be a legal based system where I find myself in circumstances and he's sort of folding his arms, you know he's going to help me through it, but he's got his eye on me. As opposed to the other idea that he's the author of your trials, he specifically ordained you to them and brings you in them to grow you up. And it's not so much a matter of rescue as it is a matter of maturity.

I think that's why I always tie it's, Lord's impressed upon me the last several years, sovereignty and his eternal love for us. If you put those together, he's allowing, he's the one in control, so he's allowed it. But he's doing it in love, which means it isn't a big test. It takes that test part out of it. He loves you, so whatever he's doing, it's to conform you, to transform you. It's all to bring you to Him. And it's done in love. He loves you. So it isn't about rescue or testing or anything like that. It's using Him.

That's why I say in a trial, that's how I think you can do that. Consider it all joy. It's because you know He's allowed it and He loves you. Let's talk about allow it. Is it allowed or just ordained? What do you think? That this is specific, specific for you? Yeah, Philippians says that that's what we're... See, I think that's right.

I would lean more towards the fact that no matter what the circumstances are, he's, yeah, in a sense he's allotted, but he's ordained it. For me. For my growth and my benefit. Maybe not just me, maybe the whole sphere of influence of people around me. You know, I don't think he works so much just on one person without somebody else being affected by what he's doing.

See? He's got all things in play at all times. All the time. That's why I always say, you know, the pointing of the finger, I always use you as an example of saying the right thing at the wrong time or the wrong thing at the right time or whatever. Yeah. That may be your thinking that, but he's working on you at that time. That's exactly right. And he's working on a thousand other things at that same time. So we look at myopically, it's me. It's all about me. But he could be using it in a thousand different ways. And you have to look at it that way. It's not only for you.

And back to the loud and ordained, I think a loud and ordained is maybe Because we look at it in time, I say it's allowed, but when you look at it from God's perspective, He's ordained it. Sure He has. Irrespective of time, it's ordained. Yeah, it's like He didn't allow the cross, He ordained it. So I think that no son of God is going to get by without being trained by his father.

That would make Satan sovereign. Yeah, we do. So it's interesting. I think a perspective change there, it takes a while to learn. I take it back. It takes a while to settle down by faith in the fact that God is a sovereign God and He's doing everything. And it's for good, even though it may not look that way initially.

I was wondering, as far as the Las Vegas shootings, Dane seems a little down for that. Because I don't think he had that guy go to bed and start shooting people. Yeah, did he allow him to do it? Yeah, like allow seems to work better for that situation.

You know, I was thinking about that the other day and I just flipped through some issues in the Old Testament with Israel. There were days when the Israeli army went out and slaughtered thousands of people. Just went out because God said go do it. We have a sense that life on earth is the most precious thing there is. We know better. It's not. Would God allow something like Las Vegas to happen to save one soul? Would he do that? I think he would.

Because the precious There are a thousand, a million different things that were going on at that time. We look at it myopically as a horrible, tragic event. Thousands of people who see that and now wonder about life, death, have those questions. There can be a billion different things that were going on that he used that for. And how many believers were taken home, that actually is a joyous for them. But I think, again, we tend to look at it very myopically, very focused on one thing, where he's accomplishing a million different things. life or had the bullet hit right beside them and start thinking about life and what after life or anything like that.

Or any type of a combat situation where you're in harm's way. You don't know if you're out there whether you're next. so to speak. I listened to several of the tapes of the shooting and you'd hear a lot of, oh my God. Oh my God. You hear that in foxholes too, oh my God.

The last thing in the attributes of God is that he's a spirit. I'm sorry, the second to last thing, that he's a spirit. And he says in John 24, God is spirit and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth. So, does that mean music? We talked about that last week and Nick's leaving the Dorys to go places. What did you say? I'm going to go get spiritual now? What does it mean to worship God in spirit? Boy, that's a hard question, isn't it? It's a really hard question.

Yeah. In spirit and in truth. Well, he said that he was a truth. He is truth. So there's connected with him and all that what truth is regarding him. I think it's fairly easy, but in spirit. Why spirit? God is a spirit. That's why. Now think about it. The Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Father is a spirit, is he not? and so is the Holy Spirit. Only the Son is incarnate God and we would not know anything about God without Him, other than He's powerful and Romans 1 talks about it.

But other than those things, you wouldn't know anything about Him, would you? Would you know that God was love without Christ? No, you wouldn't. You wouldn't know that He's gracious. You wouldn't know almost all of these characteristics that we have just gone through without the Lord Jesus Christ.

We're a three-part being and one of our parts is spiritual. A non-believer isn't spiritually alive, so it's impossible for them to worship God in spirit, right? Do you agree with that? It's totally impossible for them to do that. But we're spiritually alive, so how does worshiping God in spirit What does that mean? It seems to be, you know, when you say that God is spirit and those who worship him must, must, worship him spirit and in truth.

One of the things you taught us is that I think so. I think that we have this resurrected life of Christ. Eternal life. And it's a spiritual life. And that, I think, is where the crucible of worshiping God spiritually is. It has to do with the truth, as God has revealed it to us, and we'll talk more about Revelation. But if I make a decision that I'm going to go worship God in spirit, and I have decided to my own self what spiritual is, When I'm jumping around and running off at the mouth in a language I don't understand, yeah, that must be spiritual. Not necessarily. I better find out what is spiritual.

And I think the truth, one of the attributes of God, and the fact that he's spiritual, the truth has to be tied to that. Because he requires both of these things, spirit and truth. You see that? So then the next question in my mind would be, well, who's the only one capable of worshipping God in spirit and in truth? I think it's the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the only one that I know of.

And so what does God do? He's so judicious in his plan He puts us in Christ, right? He identifies us with the resurrected, glorified Christ. He gives us His resurrected life. And as that life is manifested through us vis-a-vis the work of the Holy Spirit, guess what we do? We do worship Him in spirit and in truth.

What does the word worship mean? I mean, I've had guys come tell me, oh, I just worship this girl. And I say, well, what does that mean? Well, I like her a lot. I say, well, that's not worship. What does the word worship mean? Huh? That's a good question. Honor, respect. Honor, respect.

I look at it this way, that I have found God worthy. of my attention, of my praise, of my whatever I can give him, and I do worship him. Because he's proven to me he's worthy of it. I can't go to him, I don't think, and say, well, I'm going to worship you, but I don't know if you're worthy of it or not. These attributes of God that we've just gone through, I think it's interesting that we When we started through this, I talked about the fact that most believers have God in a little box that they can deal with. But you go through the attributes of God and you find out, wow, not only is He not in a box, He's way bigger than I ever thought He was, which should increase my confidence and my dependability on Him. And as I learn the truth about Him, I'm much more ready to trust Him because of who He is. these attributes and they don't ever change.

I was wondering if worship was under that grace umbrella, that it's a response mechanism. That's a great point. When the Holy Spirit shows you something, it's a thankful, it's a gracious response. Yeah, that's really good. I don't know if you remember at the beginning when we were talking about the grace class, the grace segment of this class, that the word grace is the... what's the Greek word? Charis. Charis. Charis, right? And so, if God showers His grace on me, I respond with a thank you. And the Greek word for thank you is charis. It's interesting that the action and the reaction are both the same word.

Add in the elements you just brought up, I can't worship God unless he shows me his grace. Isn't worship a response to him? If I think that I'm going to drum something up, I'm going to tell people I'm worshiping him, and you don't have any evidence that he has showered his grace on you, then what is it? It's just your own self-effort to try to get him to find more favor in you, which is impossible because he finds you in Christ and you can't add to that.

Do you see that? Well, I was also thinking, you know, you talked about, oh Lord, won't you find me mercy? Rather than it coming down to me, you know, you worship in spirit. I think it lifts us up. I think early on in your Christian life you think that God gracing you is something material, like a country and western song.

Oh Lord will you, this one, two, three, four, and I've got my list. And so he doesn't respond. When, in fact, what he has in mind for us is so far beyond that. The things that are really, really beneficial to us and we really appreciate are the spiritual things. Sometimes they're backwards, like, I was crucified with Christ. Is that a blessing? Yeah. It didn't seem that way when I first looked at it, but yeah, it sure is. It's huge. I've been buried and now resurrected and seated in Christ in the heavenlies? Well, I can't ask for that because I already have it. So what can I ask for? What would I ask Him for? And I might enter fully into what that means. Last thing is sovereignty. We'll catch up, will ya?

Yeah, we put God in a box, he said. I was thinking about that. Who's in a box? I'm in a box. Yeah, I'm in a box. And I'm trying to get God in that box so I can deal with it. Yeah, it's not God that's in a box, it's me. Oh no, he's not in a box, although I'm trying to squeeze him in there so then I can, you know, if I can get him inside my computer then I'm in charge of the keyboard. And when you think of philosophy and stuff, it's like you have God inside this, everything that's material is all that there is. And that's the box. You can't envision that God is bigger than what we can observe or whatever. We're the ones in this box.

I absolutely agree with that. I was having breakfast with Vern the other day, and he said, we've got to get rid of the isms. I said, what do you mean? He said, we tie all of our Christianity to dispensationalism, reformism, and ism, ism, ism, rather than just the Word of God. I was pretty profound. I thought that's a great idea. No more isms.

The other thing, think about it. I'm a little behind too, Roy. I think we talked about this early on in the faith one, that we try and use faith to change God. We pray for it. I think about it. I go back to it a lot of times. Nobody wants to go for prayer when you ask for a prayer request, because why are you praying? And that still comes up, but you look at Paul. He prayed for the elders here. He prayed without ceasing. And yet, you know, I go back to why this goes to ordained, allowed, all these different things we talked about. We just prayed before the class.

Sure. And I go He just wants the intimate fellowship with us. Yes, he does. And we may be asking things, but I think he just wants the fellowship, the union, that we are coming to him. Right. That's right. That's what he wants. We're asking for these things. He's already got it figured out. We're asking for these things and we try and change God's mind or this or that. But I guess I go back to that. I think he wants us to pray just to be in fellowship with him, that we are spending time focused on him rather than everything else. He's already got the answers figured out.

Well in Romans 8 it talks about we don't know how to pray as we ought to. but the spirit who searches the mind of God and knows the things of God? Who's the ignorant one in that equation? Is it me or is it God? Do I need to pray so the Holy Spirit can translate it so God can understand it? I don't think so. I'm the one who doesn't know what's going on. And it's encouraging to me to know that one of the members of the Godhead, the Holy Spirit, is translating God's will so that I get it. I get it.

This is my thing, kind of backwards, but I remember when the not going to church thing started, my wife's mom was dying of cancer, and she'd been dying of cancer for about a year, and the doctor said, And my wife, your mom's not going to make it through the night.

So we tell them, the doctor says, Grandma's not going to make it through the night. She says, she sure is. What are you talking about? The doctor says that she's not going to make it. She says, I'm praying she's going to make it. Did she make it? She didn't. She died.

And it was kind of like, That corroborates what you're saying, that if I pray hard enough, or here's the other one, get the prayer chain going, right? The more people that pray, the more God's going to listen. Or it's like the louder the band is, the greater the worship. Like Jack said, that band in Spokane thought God was deaf.

But again, looking at 1, I think of 2 in Philippians 4, 6, be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. So he's telling us to come before us, asking He always wants us to come and I think that's just the fellowship aspect. Not to bend it, but the result and the peace of God which surpasses all comprehension will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Trusting in the person who is sovereignly in control of this, you can ask for anything. Yes you can. Whether it's right or wrong. Like your wife. You can ask for anything. It's not that you're going to bend him. You can come in the fellowship that you have with him. Again, I think it's this multifaceted. He's working on you. He's doing a thousand different things. But I think the key is the fellowship. We're asking him not to bend everything and change everything and change his mind.

But come, trust me, and I have the peace knowing I'm listening at any time, any place, anywhere. Have you ever gone to God with a request and then in the process you changed your mind? Oh yeah. I've had that happen to me a lot. Or over time, or you pray for something and then... It doesn't happen, but when it doesn't, it's okay. But he changes, yeah, your whole attitude, heart, everything. And that's, I think, the purpose in the process. This growth, the intimacy, the union, all that. Yeah, I agree.

And through all that process, what do you learn? You learn the ways of God. He was always telling the Jews, you know, the problem I have with you guys is you didn't know my ways. And you could say the same thing about most of Christendom today. They don't know God's ways. You don't know how He does things.

And it's important that we do. Alright, last issue is that he's sovereign. What does that mean, you Americans? I think you can say it in one simple question. He does what he wants. And whatever he does, he can do it. He doesn't rely on anybody. He's absolutely sovereign. Now, add all the rest of his characteristics in there. We Americans don't like the word sovereignty because we think we have free will and we have a constitution.

How's that working out for you? So we find, and we won't go through the verses, a great set of verses that have to do with God's sovereignty is Romans 9, 14-24. where he talks about whether God is unjust or not. And he says, God says, I'm going to have mercy on whom I'm going to have mercy and I'll have compassion on whom I have compassion. I'm going to do it. I get to decide. You don't. And so it doesn't depend on man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who shows mercy.

The scripture says to Pharaoh, for this very purpose I raised you up to demonstrate my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth. Gee, would God raise up our boy Pharaoh just so he could proclaim his power in all the earth? Yeah. And does he have a right to do it? Sure, he's God.

You know, he doesn't do it arbitrarily though, it isn't that that Pharaoh got screwed in this deal. Because if you look at that, Pharaoh hardened his heart towards God three or four times before God said, OK. I like that. And it's written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated. Yeah. And does that mean our definition that he hated Esau? No, it meant that he chose Jacob.

J. Bernard McGee says that Esau was a man, Jacob was a sissy. But he chose Jacob.

It's interesting how God does things in that way. We were talking a couple of weeks ago about why do certain people like our friend Joanna, somebody in her family in Mexico City, when the earthquake hit, During that process they were down, the grandmother who's 94 was down at the doctor's office in a building with her granddaughter who was 31. And the earthquake hits and the building came down around the grandmother and never touched her. But it took the life of the 31-year-old and she said, well, wouldn't you think that the older one would go? Well, no, God decides. He decides. But see, I think that's when you say, you know, Americans bristle and sovereignty and all that. You know, it's just the opposite.

If you know, I mean, and this is knowing and trusting in the person of Christ and God, it really frees you up the sovereignty that you know he's in control of that and that he's using it for his purposes. And so even if that happens, I mean, I don't understand. those two, but I rest in the fact that he does, and that he allowed that. And that's where I think, instead of bristling, that peace that surpasses all understanding, is that when the tragedy, when the hurricanes hit, when the earthquakes hit, when the fires hit, he's in control. It isn't that it's unbeknownst to him. And even though it's tragic from a worldly perspective, he's using it for his purposes. And you can have a peace, even though there, you know, and it may be for you to comfort somebody who lost somebody or to, I mean, there's so many things that, like I said, the immensity of his workings with us.

I mean, he goes back to Colossians. He holds from the molecular to the universe. He holds it together. And so, you know, you rest in that fact. I think it's important as we grow spiritually, we come to the realization and we're excited about the fact that God is sovereign. You know, it's a good thing He is. Took my advice. That's speeches to Job. That's why I go back to Job. Like, where were you when I created you? Yeah, when I set the stars. Where were you? Did I need your counsel? Where were you? You got it all figured out, Job?

No. So, you know, just to sum up this whole thing on the attributes of God, to just spend a little time in who he is, I think takes him out of the box, expands him to where he is. And then in the middle of all of that, I get a call Tuesday morning from a guy. And he said, I had to share this with somebody.

I'm out working. He said, I've been kind of lonely today. And I was praying. I said, God, you know, I'm kind of lonely today. He said in the Spirit of God showed me the kind of love it took for Christ to die just for me. He said, I had to call somebody and tell him. I said, yeah, I understand that. He's done that with me and others that I know where just you, I loved you, and my son died just for you.

He said, OK, bye. But what did he learn from that? He learned sovereignty. He learned love. He learned trust. He learned a whole bunch of things just from that one little thing. And he went to the Lord with this request. He said, I'm lonely. Can you help me with this? And God said, OK. I'll help you. I'll show you. All right. I'm going to try to finish up in five minutes.

Just as an aside, as you go through those things, It's fascinating that they all go together. If he was just sovereign and not love, we would be in huge trouble. If he was just holy, you know what I mean? It's who he is in all of his aspects that make him God. And we talk about the glory of God. That's what it is, right there. All of those together radiating out of him is his glory.

So would you say that God's thoughts and ways are beyond our grasp? Isaiah 55, 8 and 9 says, My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are my ways your ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts higher than your thoughts. So how would you answer the question? God's thoughts and ways are beyond our grasp. Yeah, that's question six. But question seven says, how does God let us know what his ways and thoughts are? And does he? I mean, the fact is, will he do that? And if he will, how does he do it? That's right, through his word. How do you tie in the verse that says we have the mind of Christ?

I just pulled it up, 1 Corinthians 2.16. It's interesting if you, and that's where, in 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians?

1 Corinthians 2.16. Yeah, read the verse for me, because there's something else in there. Well, I'll read it from 14.

But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, will instruct him, but we have the mind of Christ. So is that tied to the fact that he who is spiritual? Does that mean just that I'm not spiritually alive or I'm mature?

What do you think? I don't understand the question. and we have the mind of Christ, doesn't that tie together that we have the capacity of thinking of Christ now? To think God's thoughts after Him? Yeah, we do have the capacity. We're in the spiritual realm. I think you're right about that. I don't think the light goes on all at once.

Or you can say, well, this guy's been a Christian for 60 years. He must know God's thoughts after him better than somebody who's only known the Lord for 20 years. My experience is that sometimes a 20-year-old is way beyond a 60-year-old. It has to do with knowing Christ. Again, I think it goes to intimacy with Him. There's a beholding of His glory and there's a transformation that goes on that transforms us into His very image from glory to glory. That's where I learn I have the mind of Christ. Now positionally I have it, but it may not be functioning in the way I live my Christian life. So the answer to that question is I guess using the word spiritual, can know. Yes, yes we can. And you know what's interesting about all this? God is eager for us to know. We're the ones that are fighting against that, not Him. He wants us to know.

And that's why it's tied into talking about faith. Because the object of our faith has to be the things of God. And those things of God are the things that are the mind that we have of Christ that we know and that we believe and we trust. So last question, what event represents the wisdom of God?

1 Corinthians 1.18-21. For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing. No kidding. But to us who are being saved, it is the power of God.

For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the cleverness of the clever I will set aside. Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe." The cross is the wisdom of God.

It seems like the greatest tragedy ever, doesn't it to you? I mean, if you look at it from an empirical standpoint or put it in a test tube standpoint, it just doesn't make any sense. But without it, we're no hopers. We really are. The cross is the central event in all of history.

I think what they did was talking about how all these fat cats are just doing great and it's so horrible that they're just blessed beyond the palmation and they went into God's sanctuary and they saw how God thought of those people and it's like we see people flourishing who are making a million dollars a year selling drugs But God sees that in a different light.

He doesn't like to drive with headlights and all that. Notice when you enter into that conversation that the value of that conversation from a worldly standpoint are physical things like cars and money. Yet the value of the things that are the foolishness of God, the most valuable thing ever is the cross of Christ and the blood of Christ. The greatest, the most, the highest value commodity ever is the blood of Christ. Yet it seems foolish to those in the world. Can you think of anything that's more valuable to God than the blood of Christ?

I can't. Yeah, it's interesting how a lot of times the foolishness of the cross will sort of cause you to take a step back because you've been heading down a road thinking that God is going to bless my endeavors. We were talking about in James where it says, you know, we've decided we're going to go to this other city and we're going to make a whole bunch of money and in a year's time we're going to come back.

We forgot to ask God about that. We just forgot about that part of it. So, yeah, I would much rather be schooled in God's foolishness than in the assets of the world system. Okay, so that finishes that lesson. It took us about three times longer than I thought it was going to take.

So the next one has to do with We talk about the message of the cross, the message of the cross, and the power of God. And it's lesson 19. So we'll pick up on that next week. I think everybody had a 19? I sent out 20 yesterday too. Did you get 20? You were at the football game. Twenty's back there if you wanted to.

So we'll try to pick up the speed. You realize that as of today, there are ten classes left. After today, there's nine. Because at Christmas time, we don't have them on Christmas Sunday and New Year's Sunday. So we've got nine to go. And I'm wondering if we're going to get it all in. I'll let J.D. teach, because Courtney and I have a tendency to draw things out. Get J.D. down here and get it done.

Let's close. Dear Father, how we thank you for your grace. We thank you for The fact that you would really have us know and understand your attributes and who you are, that it really is all about having fellowship with you and all that you are, and that you have decided that that's what you want from us. We look forward to growing in the knowledge and grace of your dear son, the Lord Jesus, and we pray in his name. Amen.