There is no more critical subject in existence for the Christian, for our Love for God is directly proportionate to our knowledge of Him! This is an absolute law of creation; "Knowledge begets Love". Ofcourse, it is assumed that there is the presence of worthiness, which is reavealed by our knowledge, and thus we come to love. I introduce this section, which focuses upon the charactaristics of God's person, with the reference to our love for God because the substance of our spiritual lives flows out from this Love. This is so, not only because the subject is God, but because this Love engenders impeccable integrity, and that status is greatly blessed by The Almighty. "We know that all things work together for good to those who love God and are the called according to His [predetermined plan.]" (Romans 5:8) Note: The "predetermined plan" in this verse, translated "His purpose" in most bibles, is a transliteration of the original Greek as written by the Apostle. This concept of love for God is explained more fully in Reciprocal Love, should you care to explore it. Therefore, because knowledge is precedent to love, and love for God determines the worth of our lives on this earth, and the worth of our lives, or the extent to which we accomplish God's eternal plan for us as individuals, in turn determines the scope of our lives in the eternal state, (whew) then knowledge is elevated to a principle of great importance, and I refer specifically to knowledge of God. Thus, the subject of His essence is the most direct means of learning about Him. God has 10 specific attributes, or charactaristics, which define everything He does. That is to say, all 10 of His attributes are involved in all His work. Some of these attributes are easier to understand for us, because they occur in mankind, but to a limited degree. Take God's Justice, for example. We can understand the function of His Justice (+J) because there is a human counterpart. Ofcourse, we must add to any thought in this vein, that God is infinitely superior to us, and we can never allow ourselves to slip into the habit of bringing God down to our level. This malpractice is common in Christianity today, which explains why most Christians never come to true +L for Him; They have reduced God in their thinking to no more than a super human. Thus, hewing to the natural law that "knowledge begets love", they love a specter of their own invention, and not the true God. The 10 attributes of God are: 1. Omniscience - All knowing 2. Omnipotent - All powerful 3. Omnipresent - Everywhere 4. Justice - Fairness, Equity 5. Righteousness - Intrinsic good, inviolate goodness 6. Eternal Life - From everlasting (past) to everlasting (future) 7. Immutable - Unchangeable, absolute 8. Veracity - Truth 9. Happiness 10. LOVE I hasten to add that Love (+L) is not an attribute only, but the term used for God's integrity, as a whole, consisting of the components; Justice, Righteousness and Grace. We would define "grace" as God's policy, which is the by-product of +J and +R, all under the umbrella of Love. Our initial contact with God is His Justice, for the dramatic event which made possible our redemption is this singular attribute, Justice. The event, ofcourse, was the crucifixsion, where all the sins of mankind were poured out on Christ and judged. This wonderful gift is based entirely upon upon that one monumental act of judgement. Thus, as unbelievers, the first attribute of divine essence we encounter is Justice. Please note; Justice is a component of Love, and therefore, God's Love for us is an everpresent theme that echoes across the spectrum of His vast creation. Even in judgement, God's Love is seeking us out, pursuing us. He is relentless in His efforts to reveal Himself to us for this purpose; that we will "be filled with all the fulness of God". Once we are Christians we have a new touchstone; Love. We are immediately faced with a distinction that we must clarify at this point, for there are two expressions of divine Love in scripture. The first is "agape" (ah 'gop ay), and refers to His unconditional love for all creatures. The primary feature of this Love is the unworthiness of the object, us. I call this "neutral love" because it remains active regardless of how horrible the object may be, and some of us are pretty lousy, even in the eyes of our fellow man! But to God our unworthiness is based upon our status of spiritual death, which was with us at birth. All babies are born spiritually dead because we all carry the "mark of Adam", the old sin nature, in every human cell. This is why we are said to be in a "body of corruption", because every cell is tainted with the "old sin nature". The unworthiness of the object highlights the integrity of the subject, or the one doing the loving. It requires divine Righteousness to love a creature who is riddled with the evil of sin, the anathema of God. Our reaction to sin is petty compared to God's revulsion, and He foreknew our every low thought, our most secret transgressions. But He didn't discard one soul, or refuse even one person the chance to be saved. The other love is "philos" in the Greek and amounts to "personal love", such as one might have for a friend or family member. Unlike agape love, philos requires that the object meet certain standards. In our case, the standard we rise to has nothing to do with us, it is a gift at salvation; Divine Righteousness. Many verses state that when we accept Christ as savior it is "credited to us for Righteousness". This alludes to the imputation of Righteousness that occurs at our salvation. Every Christian carries this +R around with them, although in most cases it is difficult, if not impossible, to recognize. Nonetheless, we have it, and when we are rid of this body of corruption we will be given a body without sin, a body with Eternal Life. Ofcourse, there is the issue of our continued life in this place, in a body of corruption, but God's answers for these complications are magnificently simple, once we come to know Him!. That's the key. As we come to know Him, by default, we come to know His works, His attitudes, His policies...and these dimensions of God hold the answers to every problem we will ever face. Anything in life that involves God's promises to us (which is about everything) brings to bear His +J, for He is always fair, in billions of circumsatnces every day, He has never once made a bad call, or let one simple gesture from any of us slip by unnoticed. It is this immensity of God, this unlimited concept, that we can't fully understand, so we lump it under the aforementioned thought of God's infinte capabilities, as opposed to our sever restrictions. At this point the attribute of Justice should be understood to some degree, we next come to Righteousness. You might say that His +R is the attribute which measures all things according to His perfect standard of good. Obviously, this appears to be a vast discouragement to Christians, for not the best of us can possibly live up to His standards. Well, there is good news, for God has provided us a fool proof system for residing in "good" and doing good, which I will explain presently. Righteousness sees evil and demands that Justice act upon it, to condemn and judge it, and He does. Righteousness sees good being done by Christians, and it demands blessing, so Justice provides it. Because man can also understand the concept of good, as well as justice, we can glean from this "back-and-forth" function of these "Dual attributes" how God manages the affairs of the universe, so far as His view toward all things, and how He arrives at a conclusion and acts upon it. The set of principles which emerge from this function of dual attributes; toward creatures...angelic and human, is called "Grace", and God has added some very desirable features of His own to grace, such as the passive role we, as men, play in His plan for us; God does all the work in grace, and we receive all the benefits...without lifting a finger. This is the epitome of the (+R and +J) function, emphasizing that they are encased in Love. You can't leave out the Love dimension and see God clearly. If you examine this arrangement you can't help but be in awe of God's supreme mentality, and just be thankful that He has loosed all this magnificent power to do something wonderful for US! We are the target of His Love, the heirs of His Kingdom...and He lays it at our feet, a free gift. Nuttin' has ever been this great, in terms of human well being and blessing! The final installment of the "Big Three" attributes is that; All God accomplishes is done in Love. When I say "all", I mean "ALL"! He judges in Love as well as blesses. It will take some serious contemplation and hours of meditation on this one principle before you begin to arrive at some measure of understanding, not to mention many hundreds of hours of sound bible teaching. As humans, and severely limited, it is unthinkable, for example, that someone could send His own creatures to hell, everlasting agony, while He continues to Love them! Can you fathom that? Ofcourse we can't! No human being can understand what goes on in God's mind to the fullest degree! But we do have a limited knowledge, enough to Love Him, and when we come to a dead end, when principles grow so huge or complicated that they boggle our tiny minds, we resort to the "The Great Default Thought" where we can deposit all our conclusions; It may appear that God has less than appealing charactaristics, judging from our opinions of some of His actions, but those appearances are borne of ignorance. We are shackled by human limitaion, and tend to see things that God does as we see what man does. But whereas greed, or hate, or envy, or lust may sponsor our conduct in part, God is free of those flaws. Even when He commands death, His reasoning and judgement are impeccable. So, the involvement of God's attributes of Love, which is comprised of Justice, Righteousness and Grace, should be fairly clear at this point. Now we need to jump in an examine how God's remaining attributes are similarly woven into His every thought and action. At the same any attribute of His essence is functioning, in any capacity, the other nine attributes are equally comitted. When we examine the other attributes, or remind ourselves of them, the fact of His supremacy is so obvious. Let's go down the list of attributes, applying each one to the divine act of judgement; I choose judgement because this is the subject of Satan's challenge, the outrageous claim that started the angelic conflict which continues to this moment; After God announced the verdict for Satan's revoltion, that he and his fallen angels be sent to the Lake of Fire forever, Satan accused God of being unloving, cruel, tyrannical. He claimed that no loving Sovereign could treat His creatures thus, regardless of their failings. Ofcourse, Satan's ranting is based upon his own extremely biased view of God, but The Almighty allowed the appeal, and all of human history is the result. We are the "new witnesses" in a second trial of Lucifer! So, judgement being such a major issue in our exsistence, let's look at God's individual attributes and relate them to His judgement of the damned; 1. Omniscience (all knowledge); God knows all the facts, every minute detail. He knows the thoughts and deeds of all creatures, billions and billions of them, every minute. His awareness of the guilty, those deserving of judgement, is eternal, was never unknown. In terms of judgement; The Righteous Judge must know all the true facts. 2. Omnipotence (all power); God has the ability to not only state His rules, but to enforce them, blessing or judgement. I will point out how very fortunate we are to have a God of such humility, kindness, compassion and Love...we could have as easily been in abject slavery to a tyrant! The sum of several of God's other attributes bear on His unlimited power in that they demand that any use of great power demands a senese of responsiblity. Thus, God only uses His power in compliance to His remaining attributes; notably; Rigteousness, Justice, Love, Truth. 3. Omnipresence; God is not limited by time and space, thus He can be local as He wills, but He may yet choose not to be local, or present at any one place. God is not local to any insidence of sin. God cannot contact sin (sort of the "Superman and kryptonite" principle!). He witnesses all things. This attribute plays a role in judgement similar to that of Omniscience; The Righteous Judge has been eyewitness to all transgressions. 4. Immutablility (unchanging, absolute); God is absolute existence, and cannot be otherwise. Because His essence is composed of 10 specific properties, each superimposed over the other, all His other charactaristics are equally impervious to change, static and eternal. God is the same yesterday, today and forever. This attribute is the key in what we call "faithfulness". God never fails us. 5. Happiness; God is never unhappy, and no human or angelic tragedy (as we define it) has ever made Him unhappy, or caused even a second of consternation. He doesn't HAVE Happiness, He IS Happiness! Please note that Christ "demonstrated happiness" at the cross, so obviously, happiness as God defines it is different from our concept. His happiness is a placid soul, unmoved by the forces arrayed against it and not hilarity. God will be happy when He judges the damned to hell, because that act will result from the function of His attributes of Justice and Righteousness. His +R must be sustained, and Justice serves that end. Happiness is the sum total of God's awareness of His perfection, and the impeccable nature of His involvement in all things...perfect, good, fair, etc. 6. Veracity; God is truth. He acts according to the truth, and always knows what is true, and what is not. He cannot Lie. He will not be fooled into acting upon a lie. His judgement is flawless because He knows all truth, and what He knows to be true of Himself is infinite, eternal. The importance of truth in judgement is obvious. 7. Eternal Life; All of the things God is have always existed, not being a result of an act of sovereign power (He did not cause Himself to exist), and no other Supreme Being caused Him to exist. He always was, and always will be. Eternal Life is not directly involved, as such, in Satan's judgement, except that it is an intrinsic property of The Judge's being, and adds the principle of timeless existence to His other attributes. 8, 9, 10; The Big Three; Justice, Righteousness, Love. He is fair, good, and Loves us all. If we add Grace to this short list, we have the Integrity of God, called Love. This word does not imply just the sphere of Love, but the several components which comprise Integrity. Each of these properties conforms to the "immensity attributes", thus they are eternal, infinite, unchanging. For the Christian who devotes his life to the study of God's Word, knowledge of His charactaristics comprises a formidable body of knowledge which adds direction to God's personal relationship with us. In His every action, no matter how minute, the whole of these attributes are at work. Understanding God, to some extent, is not understanding Him! That is to say, when we reach a cerain point, where God's Person exceeds human mentality, we must assign His motives to that sublime "catchall" that He is Supreme, without boundary. Although we cannot possibly fathom His every thought and dimension, we can know, beyond any doubt, that what He does is above reproach. Perhaps there will be times when things befall us that are unpleasant in the extreme, and we will be aware that it is God's will for us. At such moments we cannot allow ourselves to become bitter, or judgemental of God, for we can know that whatever the specific reason, it originates with God, and is therefore done in Love and utter fairness. No act of God is arbitrary, or based upon spite or any other mental flaw. He is above human foibles to an infinite degree. This principle is particularly helpful when we face suffering for blessing, and I like to reflect on Joseph as a prime example at such times. God exposed this man to extreme adversity, but all the while He knew, as Joseph did not, that the end result would be spectacular. Joseph, for his part, conducted himself with restraint and integrity, except once, when he asked his cellmate to remind the Pharoah of his plight. For this fauxpas he remained in prison for another entire year. But even in this he snapped back to the true faith way of thinking. He realized that he could only depend on God, and not his human solutions, to direct his life. That was precisely the lesson that God intended that he learn, and he learned it well. From the moment his brothers threw him in the pit, to the servitude to Potipher, and in prison, Joseph called upon the rationale that God exceeds our puny thoughts, our flawed motives, and His course of action always leads us to blessing. The problem is, with most of us, that long before we arrive at the blessing we have jumped overboard, lost our faith direction, and resorted to our own devices. In Joseph's case, God had reserved the Prime Ministership of the most powerful nation on earth at that time for him. This was the prize that He led Joseph to through all the apparent hardships and mishaps. They were, indeed, hardships, but designed to elevate Joseph, in his perception of God to a lofty pinnacle. Just so, we must keep the faith, hold fast to our confidence and trust in our Benefactor, for He leads us to a place of unbelievable blessing if we stay the course. Theime's Doctrinal Notes: Happiness Divine Essence [ HOME ] Order free tapes on this subject: Berachah Tapes & Pubs.