Core Series: Week 4 - Who is the Holy Spirit?
John 14:8-26; 16:5-15
Divinity
Purpose
Accessibility
A Mother’s Identity
Genesis 29:31-35
Leah’s Identity Traps
Reuben - trap of self-performance
Simeon - trap of reputation
Levi - trap of idolatry (not the little stone men; but people or things we put in the place of God)
The way out of all traps
Judah - praise
Judah, being the ancestral line from which Jesus would come, allowed Leah (and us) to enter His rest. To stop bearing, to stop laboring, to stop chasing identity from other things, and REST in His identity for us.
The Tree of Life: Dare to Dream
Proverbs 13:12-19
The Tree of Life
The Ban - Genesis 3
The Reinstitution - Revelation 22
The Placeholder - Proverbs 13:12
The Problem - Proverbs 13:12 & 19
How to Get Back - Mark 8:35
Core Series: Week 3 - Who is Jesus?
Who Jesus was born to be
Jesus was born to be…
Fully Man, Fully God
On Mission for God
Crushed
Resurrected
Author of the New Covenant
Core Series: Week 2 - Who is our God?
Pastor Jeremy’s Notes:
Trinitarian - One God, Three distinct persons - God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit
We will cover this in more depth later
Tonight we start with God the Father, and what better way to learn who He is than straight from Him:
GOD IS THE SOURCE
Exodus 3:1–15 (NASB95)
1 Now Moses was pasturing the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian; and he led the flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 2 The angel of the Lord appeared to him in a blazing fire from the midst of a bush; and he looked, and behold, the bush was burning with fire, yet the bush was not consumed. 3 So Moses said, “I must turn aside now and see this marvelous sight, why the bush is not burned up.” 4 When the Lord saw that he turned aside to look, God called to him from the midst of the bush and said, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” 5 Then He said, “Do not come near here; remove your sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” 6 He said also, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Then Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God. 7 The Lord said, “I have surely seen the affliction of My people who are in Egypt, and have given heed to their cry because of their taskmasters, for I am aware of their sufferings. 8 “So I have come down to deliver them from the power of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite. 9 “Now, behold, the cry of the sons of Israel has come to Me; furthermore, I have seen the oppression with which the Egyptians are oppressing them. 10 “Therefore, come now, and I will send you to Pharaoh, so that you may bring My people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt.” 11 But Moses said to God, “Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh, and that I should bring the sons of Israel out of Egypt?” 12 And He said, “Certainly I will be with you, and this shall be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall worship God at this mountain.” 13 Then Moses said to God, “Behold, I am going to the sons of Israel, and I will say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you.’ Now they may say to me, ‘What is His name?’ What shall I say to them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM”; and He said, “Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ ” 15 God, furthermore, said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’ This is My name forever, and this is My memorial-name to all generations.
I AM = to be = less “God will be whatever you need Him to be” and more “God is the source of all being”
YAHWEH = pronounced like breathing
“I am the God of your father…” = God of Covenant
Base Covenants:
Covenant with Noah - protection
Covenant with Abram - salvation
The root of all Covenants = GOD will fulfill…the war bow…the Suzeran-vassal covenant
GOD IS THE LAW - the perfect combination of justice and love
Exodus 20:1–17 (NASB95)
1 Then God spoke all these words, saying, 2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. 3 “You shall have no other gods before Me. 4 “You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. 5 “You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me, 6 but showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments. 7 “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not leave him unpunished who takes His name in vain. 8 “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a sabbath of the Lord your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you. 11 “For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and made it holy. 12 “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be prolonged in the land which the Lord your God gives you. 13 “You shall not murder. 14 “You shall not commit adultery. 15 “You shall not steal. 16 “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. 17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife or his male servant or his female servant or his ox or his donkey or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
Ten Commandments
God of Law
We learn something about God from each Law or Word
Worship no other gods - One True God
Do not make an idol - beyond us
Do not take Lord’s name in vain - holy
Obey the sabbath - our rest
Honor your father and mother - God of family & relationship
Do not murder - Author and Sustainer of life
Do not commit adultery - God of covenant
Do not steal - Provider
Do not lie - Our Truth
Do not covet - God is our all in all
GOD IS GLORY - His glory, our glory, all of creation’s glory
Exodus 33:18 (NASB95)
18 Then Moses said, “I pray You, show me Your glory!”
Exodus 34:5–9 (NASB95)
5 The Lord descended in the cloud and stood there with him as he called upon the name of the Lord. 6 Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; 7 who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin; yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished, visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth generations.” 8 Moses made haste to bow low toward the earth and worship. 9 He said, “If now I have found favor in Your sight, O Lord, I pray, let the Lord go along in our midst, even though the people are so obstinate, and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us as Your own possession.”
John 1:14 (NASB95)
14 And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.
Core Series: Week 1 - The Authority of Scripture
It all begins with an idea.
Pastor Jeremy’s Notes:
Before we start building out doctrine, we have to have a base from which we are building
For us, that base is in the Word of God
I debated starting where most normally start with their doctrine, with the existence of God
We’ll get into this later, but there are two ways in which we know about God
General Revelation
Divine Revelation
General Revelation can get us near God, but they can’t get us to the specifics
For that we need Divine Revelation - and for that, we need a foundational source
That source is the Bible
66 Books written over thousands of years - 35-40 writers - One Author
During the Protestant Reformation, one of the key issues ‘sola Scriptura’ - or only Scripture
The split here was that only the Bible is the infallible source of divine inspiration
The Catholic Church, Church of England, and others believed in ‘prima Scripture’, or that the Scriptures are the primary source of revelation. They believe that the key leaders of their church (or the King), angelic visitations, church traditions, etc, can carry divine inspiration in their decrees. The danger here is that their words can be placed on a level playing field with the Word of God…even if they contradict parts of scripture.
We have to be careful here, because modern charismatic movements are trending back in this direction. Anyone with a prophetic word can claim divine revelation and that word jumps up to a priority equivalent to the Word of God.
It’s one of the ways our individualistic, every one owns their own truth, culture has influenced our walk with God…and it needs checked.
We also see this in the other modern trend to buck the Bible as authoritative altogether.
I recently read one article written by an evangelical minister saying that too many Christians hold the Bible up as an idol.
The Catholic Church has believed this of the protestant and evangelical church for a long time and call it ‘Bibliolatry’
The question is, does the Bible leave this open?
John 1:1–5 (NASB95)
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. 4 In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. 5 The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.
John 1:14 (NASB95)
14 And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.
And then later in Revelation
Revelation 19:11–13 (NASB95)
11 And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war. 12 His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him which no one knows except Himself. 13 He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God.
We do have to point out a few key distinctives - the greek here is logos where the greek used in the New Testament for Scripture is graphe
So we can’t draw the conclusion that your Bible equals Jesus.
But we can draw the conclusion that the Bible, being the primary Word of God spoken to His creation, is all about Jesus and therefore is vital to holding our relationship with Him together.
Whether you’re in camp Prima or Sola, I think at their pure root, what they’re saying is right. We have to be careful of the extremes of both though and keep a healthy tension.
We believe a few fundamental things about scripture:
Scripture is inspired - from beginning to end, the Bible was planned and executed by the Holy Spirit
2 Timothy 3:16–17 (NASB95)
16 All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; 17 so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.
This is two-fold - Plenary Inspiration - that the Bible as a whole, it’s messages and themes, is inspired
and Verbal Inspiration - that every word, every letter, is used purposefully and is also inspired
Matthew 5:18 (NASB95)
18 “For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.
Scripture is infallible - the Bible is perfect in every way
Psalm 19:7 (NASB95)
7 The law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul; The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple.
Scripture is inerrant - the Bible is without error
John 10:35 (NASB95)
35 “If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken),
Because of these things, the Bible MUST be THE authoritative voice in the life of every Christ follower
The word cannon, when we talk about the Cannon of Scripture, the Old Testament Cannon and the New Testament Cannon, actually means ‘measuring rod’. I think because of it’s context we’ve come to assume that it means compilation or collection of books, but it doesn’t.
So the question is, as Christ followers, what are we using as the measuring rod in our lives?
Does the Word of God have that level of authority in our lives?
If we are going to LIVE as if the Word of God has the number one authoritative voice in our lives, this has some major implications:
It’s ALL about Jesus - it’s all about the Gospel
Since Jesus is the logos of God, the ultimate reason for existence, that means He has to be the reason for God’s chief communication with man...the Bible
Jesus is the only Teacher of all of the major religions who said “I AM the way” not “this is the way”
the Bible is not a to do list…it’s not a “this is the way”
It’s not good advice - it’s good news
This means these commands aren’t optional
It’s not our Sword
Sword OF the Spirit - not made of the Spirit…but HIS Sword
Ephesians 6:17 (NASB95)
17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
We can never use God’s Word on others if we won’t use it on ourselves first
Matthew 7:1–5 (NASB95)
1 “Do not judge so that you will not be judged. 2 “For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you. 3 “Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 4 “Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ and behold, the log is in your own eye? 5 “You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.
3. We can never use God’s Word as a weapon…we don’t cut to hurt, we cut to heal
Is the Gospel Enough?
Is the Gospel Enough?
The Power of the Gospel
The Position of the Gospel
The Point of the Gospel