This week's Bible Study - July 5, 2009
Getting to Know the Father
 Background Scripture:
Exodus 33:18-23; 34:5-8; Micah 6:6-8; John 4:21-24
Quote of the Week:
"It is a wise father that knows his own child."
-- William Shakespeare
The next few lessons explore the concept of the Trinity. The Trinity is a uniquely Christian concept, and can be difficult for many to comprehend. However, it has many implications for how we, as Christians, live our life. Each member of the Trinity has a role that we need to understand and deal with accordingly.
This lesson is about getting to know the Father. Many people have different views of who God is, and it is largely based upon their own earthly father, unfortunately. All earthly fathers make mistakes. Some fathers are very authoritative, leading to a household that is very rigid and legal. Some fathers are very permissive, leading to a household that allows almost anything. Most fathers are inconsistent in dealing with situations. Some fathers are close, while others are distant. Just from your own experience and the experience of those you know, you can see a problem if one's view of God is based solely on their own earthly father.
Many people tend to concentrate on one characteristic of God, while disregarding the others. If you choose to focus on God's love, it may open the door to doing anything that you want to do, because God is love and he would never get angry. If you choose to focus on the wrath of God, it may restrict your life to a set of rules, do's and don'ts, that govern your ever move. There are many characteristics of God, and while humans are prone to exhibit a few of these characteristics imperfectly, God has them all completely and perfectly (all at once). It is important that we understand who the Father is, so that we can relate to him as intended.
You've heard the prayer that many children say "God is great, God is good…" Our understanding of good is relative. When we think of food we like, there are things that we like a little and other things that we like a lot. Recently, I was on a trip to China and I saw some food that looked very good and other food that was unappealing. Others on the trip had differing ideas of what looked good. My pastor said last week that his children have supernatural abilities. Just by looking at food, they can determine if they will like it. (Unfortunately, I still have this ability, too). These and other relative ideas we have about good do not describe the Father. He is perfectly good.
In this passage, Moses asked to see God's glory. God agreed to allow all of his goodness to pass in front of Moses, and the name of the Lord would be proclaimed in his presence. In this statement from God, we see that he has mercy on those whom he has mercy and compassion on whom he has compassion. Part of our problem is that we tend to put God in some sort of box. We don't truly appreciate his goodness and his sovereignty. We believe in that, but we get more caught up in what we consider to be fair or unfair. We need to realize that God holds it all in his hands.
The Father told Moses that he would appear before Moses, but that his face could not be seen. No one could see the face of God and live. In many places in Scripture, we can see the awesome nature of God. At times, he is able to hold us and comfort us, and at other times, he is able to strike terror in the hearts of people. The Lord told Moses to go stand on a rock, and then go into the cleft of the rock as the Lord passed by. The Lord would cover Moses with his hand as he passed by and when he removed his hand; Moses would be able to see his back.
We see that God is not a force to be reckoned with. I remember when one of my daughters was in preschool, and I was a daddy helper on a Monday. There was another boy, Nathan; whose family also went to my church, and the teacher was asking the kids what they did over the weekend. At church on the day before, there was a man dressed as King Herod that came up and yelled, as a promotion for a play that was going to take place. Our church used to do that type of thing more in the past. I remember seeing 'Big Mike' playing that role and I understood what it was about. Nathan didn't. I saw Nathan raise his hand and the teacher called on him. He said, "At my church, we're going to have a scary play about God". That's what he got out of that. To be honest, when I read this passage about the glory of God passing before Moses, there is a sense of awesomeness and perhaps even some amount of fear that I feel. We see that God is good, sovereign and mighty.
As the Israelites spent many years in the wilderness, they experienced the presence of God on a regular basis. He led them by a pillar of cloud in the day and by a pillar of fire at night. You would think that he was leading them out of the wilderness, but in essence, he was really leading them in circles, so that they would learn what they needed to learn. Isn't this true of us? We so want God to step into our situations and fix things for us (as we think they need to be fixed). And, in those times in our lives, we can surely feel the presence of God as we go forward. But, he doesn't seem to just solve the problems. He is surely with us, but he is helping us to learn the lessons that are intended. We can't think of God, the Father, who is there for a quick fix. I know, as earthly fathers (or parents), sometimes we want to give the quick fix to our kids. If they need help, we are often quick to respond and provide what they need. We want them to learn the lessons, but we'd rather them test out rather than take the class. God is not into quick fixes - but he is there for you as you need him.
The Lord appeared in the cloud and proclaimed his name. He passed in front of Moses and proclaimed many of the qualities of the Father. The Lord is compassionate and gracious. God has compassion on those in need and provides for his children in a gracious manner. The Lord is slow to anger. If this wasn't true, I can't imagine many of us still being able to walk on this planet. The Lord abounds in love and faithfulness. You may see examples of parents that abound in love and faithfulness, but it is at an incomplete level. The Lord maintains love to thousands (I would suggest this is truly billions). As I've traveled to China recently, we went to a small town of a little over 12 million people. God cares about all of them - and that is just one town. God forgives wickedness, rebellion and sin. Who is wicked, rebellious and sinful? Each of us that are reading (or writing) this lesson can relate. God does not allow the guilty to go unpunished; he punishes multiple generations for guilt. We've all seen how people that have lied and cheated and treated others badly have found some amount of success. Sometimes, we wonder why God doesn't just 'take care' of them. Their day is coming.
When Moses heard all of this about God; he just bowed to the ground and worshiped. What is our response to these attributes of God? Many of them impact us directly. Are we thankful and do we truly worship God? When we worship, are we worshipping the God who is, as opposed to the God who we make him out to be?
The prophet Micah wrote about something that we experience, albeit in a different context. As he wrote, he mentioned things that a person might bring before the Lord - whether it was burnt offerings or calves or thousands of rams or ten thousand rivers of oil. He asked if the Lord would be pleased with the offering of his firstborn for his own sins. We tend to want to bring something before God. For some of us, it is because we love him so much and just want to do something for him. For others of us, it may be in an effort to buy him off in some manner. I work in a technical field and many people tend to want to track things in a spreadsheet. Sometimes, I believe that people believe that God has a spreadsheet that he uses. He tracks every time you attend church on Sunday (or maybe every time you DON'T attend). He tracks every dollar you give to the church or every time you say a prayer or so on and so forth. When we start to think like this, we tend to look for the things we can do; the things we can give to the Lord.
Micah writes that the Lord has shown us what is good and what he requires from us. For some people, they would like to see a dollar amount to be given to the church, or the number of Sundays that they should show up at church. However, what is specified is more difficult, because it impacts how you live your life each and every day.
We are to act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God. There are times when each of these is easy to come by. But, there are other times when it is very difficult to act justly. There are people that have mistreated us and to do the right thing can be hard. Loving mercy can be easy, when it is mercy that we need. However, I've seen that we, as Christians, can be very unmerciful and judgmental on others who have made mistakes. In fact, it often seems that the worst place to go after you've messed up is to church, because of the judgment that you are likely to face. Are you showing mercy to those who need to have mercy shown to them?
Walking humbly with our God can be very easy when we are around other believers. Much of what we end up doing is often determined by the type of people we spend our time with. There is the desire for many to boast about their accomplishments in their career, athletics, academics or any other pursuit. However, God wants us to be in a place that he can use us as he sees fit. It may line up with your abilities, but even so, God wants to receive the glory, and that can only happen when we are humbly walking before God.
In John 4, Jesus met up with a Samaritan woman. He and his disciples were traveling back to Galilee, through Samaria. His disciples went into the town to buy food, but Jesus sat down by Jacob's well. The woman came up to draw water, and Jesus asked for a drink. She knew that there were issues between the Jews and the Samaritans, so she asked why he would ask her for a drink. Jesus responded that, in fact, he was the one with the living water. She was perplexed, but Jesus spoke to her and it became apparent that he knew of her life situation and she assumed he must be a prophet. She then went to a theological question about where to worship. The Samaritans worshipped on a mountain and the Jews said that you must worship in Jerusalem.
Jesus replied that a time was coming where worship of the Father would not be on a mountain or in Jerusalem. The revelation of the Father came from the Jews, while the Samaritans worshiped the one they didn't know. Jesus said that a time was coming (and was already there) where the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. God is spirit and the true worshipers are those who worship in spirit and in truth.
Jesus was saying that to worship God did not really imply that one had to be on a mountain or in the temple. There are places that you can go in our world where you feel the presence of God in a meaningful way. It may be a manmade cathedral, church building or the beauty of creation. In those places, it may seem easier to worship the Father. However, our relationship with the Father implies that we can worship him in any location, at any time, in spirit and in truth.
Closing
I don't believe we can get a complete and accurate description of God in one lesson and likely not in one lifetime. However, in this lesson, we have seen that God is good. He is not good as we know good to be, but to a point beyond our comprehension. There are people that think that they just need to be good to be accepted by God. God's standards of goodness and holiness are perfect and complete. Can you handle that?
The Father is with us, as we go through circumstances of life. He is helping us to learn how to live along the way. He shows compassion and love to us as we find our way in this life. While we may think the way he would do that would be to remove us from a circumstance or situation, God really operates by helping us in the midst.
We need to remember that there is nothing that we can give God - any form of sacrifice or service - that he needs. It would seem the easy way to show our devotion, but what God has called us to do is to act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God. How has your relationship with the Father impacted how you live day to day? Does it impact the way you deal with neighbors, co-workers, friends and family? Does it impact the way you deal with those who have made mistakes? Does it impact the way you deal with your own successes and failures? God has called us to worship him - not so much by our deeds, but in spirit and in truth. You will find that as you worship God in spirit and in truth that you will see your life being impacted in many tangible ways.
|