There is a gap that exist between us and the Father. It is something that everyone feels and everyone knows is there. This gap didn’t always exist. In the garden man was in communion with God, he walked with God, and constantly worshiped God. This is what the Father designed us perfectly to do, this is what he pronounced as “very good” (Genesis 1:31).

Now because of the fall we are separated from this communion. Our rebellion has built a canyon that we can’t cross alone, although we try exhaustively. The gap is essentially our rebellion that keeps us from God and his glory.

Building a Bridge With OUR Hands

If we can see the gap as a canyon then we can see our attempts at crossing it as building bridges. Mankind has been trying to reach the supernatural since the fall.

In ancient times temples were built in attempt to converge the natural and the supernatural. It wasn’t just the Jews that did this. Everyone was trying to meet with their God(s) and they were trying to do so with temples. All cultures had felt such a strong void with the supernatural that their whole society encircled these places of worship.

The temple was a crossroads of the temporal and the eternal, the natural and the supernatural, and heaven and earth. Offerings would be brought to the temple as a payment to get to the eternal, the supernatural, to heaven. If the temple was the bridge, the offerings were the bridge toll.

Today, temples are seen as prehistoric. We no longer build societies around a PLACE that gets us to God but an ATTITUDE of MORALITY that gets us to God. So many truly believe that they are building a bridge to heaven with their works and that because others see them as a “good person” they will be acceptable to God.

The bloody knuckles that come from community service and ministry work are seen much like the blood shed from lambs and goats on the Jewish temple steps. Just like the blood of the animals though, our bloody knuckles of works righteousness are our sacrifices to God in order that you might obtain access to the impenetrable. We keep striving for more and more because it never feels like we are doing enough works. The temple is never big enough, the lamb is never fat enough, the church numbers are never growing enough, the technology in the youth room is never new enough, etc etc… A bridge built with these methods are made with toothpicks and glue.

Building a Bridge With HIS Hands

We can never build a bridge long enough or strong enough, but there is one who did.

It is not the temple nor the works that is the problem, it is the ideology behind them that is our failure. An attitude that a temple, an offering, or a work alone will make you acceptable to a holy God is absolutely false. For without Christ these things are worthless and unacceptable at the throne of God. Christ said that, “You can do nothing without me” (John 15:5).

A gospel that preaches that you should try harder to serve more, preach more, feed more, clothe more, etc. without faith in Christ alone is a FALSE GOSPEL. Christ did not come as just a moral example of what we should do on our OWN in order to obtain access to the Father. Christ came to DIE as an offering for sinners in order to DELIVER them as justified and acceptable to the Father (Titus 3:5), because in our own flesh even with works we are trash in the garbage shoot headed straight for hell (Isaiah 64:6). Christ lived the perfect life that we cannot not live. Christ did the works that we cannot do. Christ had the faith that we do not have. That is why his death is an acceptable sacrifice, because it’s the only death that was unmerited. He was the only man that lived who was perfectly pleasing to the Father and therefore the shedding of HIS blood from HIS hands is the ONLY acceptable offering.

This is why Christ said that He is the Temple.

Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?” But he was speaking about the temple of his body. When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken. -John 2:19-22

He is our only access to the supernatural. He bridges the gap. Without him we continue to strive and fail and strive and fail over and over again in our works. We are trying in our works righteousness to reach the throne so that we may worship God, but never get there because our works never feel quite good enough, and rightfully so, they are not.

Worship On The Other Side

If we have faith in Christ and the Gospel that justifies by grace alone, through faith alone, and lay prostrate at the throne that is of grace with Christ as our representative then and only then can we truly worship God. It is this reconciliation, the rejoining of creator and creation that causes us to worship. It is what we were created to do.

Christ lifts us up to the Father and says, “You can now walk again together in the Garden because I have paid the penalty for what originally separated you”, and we immediately worship Christ for his representation.

Without Christ we never reach the throne of grace, and if we never reach the throne of grace, Christ cannot deem us blameless and if we cannot be deemed blameless we can never truly worship God (John 14:6).

Don’t be lazy when it comes to your study of the scriptures…

Dig deep… KNOW GOD!

Visit me over @ Transformed By Grace

I form light and create darkness,
I make well-being and create calamity,
I am the Lord, who does all these things. (Isaiah 45:7)

One of the most common questions I am challenged with when debating with Atheists is the century old question “If your God is so good why does he allow evil and pain in the world”. This very question is what drove Charles Darwin to further his research in evolution after his daughter Annie died. I mean, surely, if there is a God who knows all things and loves all things he would not allow evil to exist in his world, let alone create it? It is a hard question, but one that of course, can be answered by the Gospel.

The Nature of God

God is love (1 John 4:8), but scripture also teaches that God is wrath (Romans 1:18). This is all very crystal clear in the Old Testament as God is shown having mercy on whom he wishes and bringing destruction on those who already have it coming because of their love for sin. The act of bringing justice through wrath does not make God evil nor a sinner. It is important to understand that God has never brought wrath upon anyone who didn’t deserve it besides Jesus (that will come later). Even though God desires that no man should perish (2 Peter 3:9) He above all things, desires to be glorified (Isaiah 48:8-11) and everything, good and evil, blessings and wrath, is being worked out according to his will (Ephesians 1:11) and therefore for his glory.

The Garden

In Genesis 1 God creates, and calls it all good. Since God is all good (1 John 1:5) and created everything good (Genesis 1:31) and evil is not good, he cannot be the author of evil. In the Garden God gives one rule and one rule only, and that is to not eat of a specific tree. Man has yet to know or understand what evil is, or experience the pain that it causes because Total Depravity is not yet present. In Genesis 3:5, the snake tells Eve that the tree of which God told her and Adam not to eat of will show here the difference between good and evil. Up until this point God and man fellowshipped together in bliss and God is merely glorified for breathing life into man and providing him a beautiful place to live. After eating of the tree, man sees all the blessings God was showering and all the pain he was withholding.

It is important to remember that man sinned against God and must be punished because that is what is just. God had made Adam good and holy with imputed capabilities of rebellion against holiness. Although God provided enough rope, man still decided to hang himself. God put the snake in the garden, but man listened to the snake. So it is not with God that evil originates, but with Adam in the Garden. God had put his stamp of approval on creation and Adam by his own evil intentions, corrupted the pure nature that God had given him. By doing this, Adam brought all of humanity down with him into destruction. This is why all mankind is born totally depraved, hating God, kicking and screaming against all that God thinks, feels, and wills. Adam’s rebellion against all that God proclaimed as good is at the core of our evil hearts.

This makes it easy to ask “Why put the snake in the garden at all, or why make objects to defy God?” First and foremost, understand that Adam did not do anything that we would not have done and therefore, we all deserve eternal punishment for our defiance against the holy God. He owes us nothing (Romans 9:14-18). More importantly though, God is absolutely sovereign over all things and is working in and through the evil that we commit (Romans 8:28). He, from eternity past, in his most wise and holy will, ordained all that has and will come to past, including our sin. This does not make him the doer or author of evil, nor does it make man any less guilty for his selfish desires and actions. God is ultimately, purposefully orchestrating the horrible things that we mean for rebellion, and reconciling them back to his holiness. We make the decision to do evil, and God, even though the sin is so vile, has meticulously purposed it to happen for good. This becomes more apparent as we continue…

Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever—” therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. He drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life. (Genesis 3:22-24)

The Law

Now that we are out of the Garden, Total Depravity exists and man is born wicked, hating God, and out of communion with him. Adam’s sin has cursed mankind and no longer is man set at a crossroads, but from his first heartbeat in the womb causes suffering on others and himself for the wicked choice he makes. When sin is committed, because God is a just God, the playing field must be leveled and for blood there is blood and there is a lot of it early on i.e. the flood. Then, God chooses Abraham out of great mercy to be the father of a new nation in which He has favor on (Genesis 17:5 & 9). God has mercy on the Hebrews, despite them being just as evil as any other people, and gives them the law (Exodus 24:12). Much like what took place in the garden, the law simply gives ground rules for the Hebrews. This proves to be insufficient for man, who is incapable of following the law and must be given a way to atone for the sins through sacrificing animals. This proves insufficient for paying for evil, and still God is not glorified to the fullest extent.

Therefore, as the tongue of fire devours the stubble, and as dry grass sinks down in the flame, so their root will be as rottenness, and their blossom go up like dust; for they have rejected the law of the Lord of hosts, and have despised the word of the Holy One of Israel. (Isaiah 5:24)

The earth lies defiled under its inhabitants; for they have transgressed the laws, violated the statutes, broken the everlasting covenant. (Isaiah 24:5)

The Cross

The temple steps run red with blood for years. Man is incapable of following the law and incapable of atoning for his own sins. Then the One who has always been becomes flesh and enters into the time line of man to fulfill the law for the first time and be murdered as if he hadn’t (Matthew 5:17); Jesus is alive. In order for the Cross to do anything at all Christ had to live a life of perfection, not once disagreeing with God’s law. This is because when Christ was nailed to the Cross it could not be for any sin of his own but for other men. If the wages of sin is death, than Christ is the only man to live who did not deserve death. Yet he died anyway, and his death, unjust, allowed for atonement. Him being the son of God makes it a sacrifice carried out by God himself for his creation helplessly caught in the snares of hatred toward him. This brings the MOST glory to God, that he would sacrifice himself for those wallowing in evil with smiles on their faces as they curse and spit at God. Christ is not some trial and error experiment gone right that God pondered over the drawing board about as the he gave the law of the Jews a try. Christ was a plan before creation, and the men atoned for on the cross are part of the plan.

…knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God. (1 Peter 1:18-21)

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, (Ephesians 1:3-7)

Death in Adam Life in Christ

The failure of the Garden and of the Law had to take place in order to show the need for the Cross and to show off ultimately God’s glory. As many reformist say, “The people atoned for by Jesus on the Cross show God’s glory to the fullest extent through his abounding Grace, and those not atoned for show God’s glory to the fullest extent through his abounding justice.” So good exist so man can see how holy God is and evil exist so man can see how holy God is. Evil exist so that God could lovingly sacrifice himself for people who love it and hate him, but because of such a sacrifice now praise His name forever and forever, AMEN!

12 Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned— 13 for sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law. 14 Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come.

15 But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many. 16 And the free gift is not like the result of that one man’s sin. For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brought justification. 17 For if, because of one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ.

18 Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. 19 For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous. 20 Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, 21 so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 5:12-21)

1) Scripture, or the Word (Jesus Christ) has authority over ALL things.

The bible teaches that scripture is the inspired “God-breathed” Word of God, and that it has final say in all faith and practice.

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness. (Ephesians 3:16)

Knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. (2 Peter 1:20-21)

2) The God of the bible is triune, three in one, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

The Bible teaches that within the one Being that is God, there eternally exists three coequal and coeternal persons; namely, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Jesus Christ was not created by the Father, neither the Spirit. Since forever, they have always been in perfect communion with one another existing equally as one from eternity past into eternity future.

One God:

Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.(Deuteronomy 6:4)

I am the Lord, and there is no other, besides me there is no God; I equip you, though you do not know me, that people may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the Lord, and there is no other. (Isaiah 45:5-6)

Since God is one—who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith. (Roman 3:30)

There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. (Ephesians 4:4-6)

For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, (1 Timothy 2:5)

You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder! (James 2:19)

Triune:

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, (Matthew 28:19)

Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit;  and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord;  and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. (1 Corinthians 12:4-6)

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. (2 Corinthians 13:14)

Father:

For you are our Father, though Abraham does not know us, and Israel does not acknowledge us; you, O Lord, are our Father, our Redeemer from of old is your name. (Isaiah 63:16)

…The only Father we have is God himself.” (John 8:41)

And I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty. (2 Corinthians 6:18)

One God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. (Ephesians 4:6)

With it (the tongue) we bless our Lord and Father, (James 3:9)

See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; (1 John 3:1)

Son:

All of the following verses define Jesus, (Iēsous) with God (Theos) in the original Greek manuscripts. This is one of the most apparent dividing lines between true biblical Christianity and other beliefs and is extremely important. Scripture is absolutely clear on this subject, Jesus is LORD, no argument!

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was in the beginning with God.  All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. (John 1:1-3)

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.  (John bore witness about him, and cried out, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me ranks before me, because he was before me.’”) (John 1:14-15)

Then he (Jesus) said to Thomas, “Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.” Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:27-28)

…care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood. (Acts 20:28)

waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, (Titus 2:13)

Simeon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ, (2 Peter 1:1)

For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily (Colossians 2:9)

Holy Spirit:

Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there! (Psalm 139:7-8)

Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ (John 3:5-7)

But Peter said, “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back for yourself part of the proceeds of the land? While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not at your disposal? Why is it that you have contrived this deed in your heart? You have not lied to men but to God.” (Acts 5:3-4)

These things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. For who knows a person’s thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.(1 Corinthians 2:10-11)

But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit. (2 Corinthians 3:16-18)

To be honest, this post took so long to do because I had to keep thinning the amount of scriptures to use. There was such an abundance of verses that supported the topic it  was extremely difficult to decide which  ones gave the most evidence, when all were very convincing. The scriptures front to back personify the one and only true God as triune. All of the verses I posted contain Theos (God), Iēsous (Jesus), or Agiou Pneumatos (Holy Spirit) in equality and union with each other. This should be a closed handed topic for all Christians. If someone does not believe the trinity to be true, than they believe in a false teaching.

If you have lived in any American suburb, chances are you have experienced a run in with a door to door “evangelist” associated with one of the many Christian Cults. You really do not want to listen to what any of them have to say, but you also do not want to be rude.  So you stand in the door way and hear them out. They have a compelling script about why what they believe is truly what the bible teaches and when they see your discomfort with such a claim, they tell you it’s not much different from what the general American Christian believes. You might have questions of validity and they will have quick rebuttals. So, they invite you to their place of worship so that all your questions can be answered and you are left with a colorful pamphlet and a lot of confusion.