It is my privilege to fill in for both Pastor Dennis and John Thaler-Sanborn, who is away this weekend.

We are going through a time of turmoil and uncertainty in our country unlike anything we have seen before. We began the year with the impeachment trial of President Trump, followed soon after by the first, detected case of coronavirus in America, here in Snohomish County. Then we had the shutdown of businesses and our economy by the governor’s order, as a pandemic exploded across our state and across the earth. In one month, the United States, sadly, became the world leader of COVID-related deaths.

More recently, we had a nationwide outbreak in protest and street conflict in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd unlike anything seen since the 1960’s. All this in the midst of a presidential election year. Sometimes, it has seemed like a portent of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse in Revelation chapter 6.

I’ve been pondering how God might respond to these cataclysmic events in our country. It is my prayer that He will show Himself strong and turn many back to the Lord in sincere repentance and faith. Yet there is a quieter and more pressing crisis that is occurring within the American Church. It is a crisis of faith, of doubting the timeless truths for which the Church has borne witness for two thousand years. The brother of our Lord, Jude or Judah, wrote in v.3 of his short epistle: “Beloved, while I was making every effort to write you about our common salvation, I felt the necessity to write to you appealing that you contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints.”

Ours is, sadly, the most biblically illiterate generation of Americans since our nation’s founding. The Bible is untaught and unread in public schools the way it once was a century ago. Consequently, Americans not only lack a shared language of meaning and morality that the Bible gave previous generations. Even American Christians are often wholly ignorant of some of the most important teachings of the faith. A survey of self-declared evangelical Christians found that one-third doubted the divinity of Christ – one of the most essential doctrines of our faith. These are matters of grave consequence; for ignorance of vital tenets of the faith have caused many to fall away into serious errors that warp their understanding of our Savior Jesus Christ, and His salvation.

To make matters worse, Western Civilization has been seduced by polluted streams of thinking that deny even the existence of God. How tragic it will be on the Day of Judgment when unbelievers hear from the Lord: “I never knew you. Depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.”

Ignorance of sacred truths is easily overcome by patient reading of Scripture and listening to accurate teachers of the Word. But serious error, or heresy, is always rooted in the pride of knowledge: believing one has a deeper and newer truth about God, Christ, or scripture than the Church has taught over the millennia. It is always supported by proof-texts of scripture, but unsupported by the teaching of the whole Bible. The Church has always taught that only through understanding the whole counsel of God in both Old and New Testaments can one properly discern God’s self-revelation and His purpose for our lives.

So today I want to speak on one of the foundations of our faith. My message was by one of the last books by the legendary Charles Colson, founder of Prison Fellowship. It’s entitled The Faith Given Once for All: What Christians Believe, Why They Believe it, and Why it Matters. The second chapter of that book is the title of my sermon: “God Is.”

It is noteworthy that God’s covenant name to the people of Israel was Yahweh, which means, simply, “He Is.” In the Bible, God revealed His covenant name to Moses from a burning bush in Exodus 3:13-14. Moses asked: “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”.

Yahweh comes from the Hebrew first person, singular for “I AM”, ehyeh, when God told Mosses, “Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” In English Bibles, Yahweh is usually translated as “the LORD” – with LORD in capital letters. In the King James you may also read an incorrect transliteration, Jehovah. Throughout the Old Testament, the four Hebrew letters that spell Yahweh are the personal name for God. They’re often accompanied by the word Elohim, which means God as in “the LORD God”. Elohim is a plural of the ancient word for God, El. So within the ancient Hebrew name for God is a plausible reference to God’s Triune nature. Jews would reply Elohim is the plural of majesty. He is the God of gods, which is also certainly true.

So when God gave His covenant name for the people of Israel to use, He emphasized His existence: He is! In ancient times, the existence of great gods or even a supreme God and Creator was assumed; but not today. He is affirmed that the God who made His covenant with the Hebrew patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is the one, faithful God who made a people for Himself out of Israel. And this God was and is, in fact, the one Creator of everything that exists. In ancient times, only a fool would deny that a God or gods had brought the heavens and earth into existence; for their very existence demonstrated a greater power and wisdom than mere humans could conjure forth.

Today, empirical science has burnished the hubris of modern man to deny the infinite genius that underlies all of creation. Somehow secularists believe that our greater knowledge of what exists and its nature gives us authority to posit a mindless, materialist Source for our universe. Theoretical physicists like the late Stephen Hawking posited a multiverse, (quote) “a place in cyberspace and in quantum physics where all possibilities and all outcomes are equally obtainable and where all possible universes are available.” So, they reason, if an infinite number of universes are coming into and out of existence for all eternity, it is mathematically possible for one that is as perfect as ours to come into existence. Ours is merely the result of a mindless, cosmic belch.

I would reply that hoping that one of an infinite number of mindlessly burped universes turned out right is a poor reason to reject the obvious intelligibility of our universe. Intelligibility presupposes intelligence, and a universe like ours demands an omniscient Designer. It’s also a very dangerous premise, now that we have in the Bible a trustworthy revelation of a personal God who promises to judge the living and the dead. Presuming a mindless multiverse without supporting evidence is a terrible reason to spurn eternal life and risk eternal damnation.

Over a billion believers today are living proof that through faith one can truly know God in an intimate way. True, God doesn’t love us the way other humans do. God is transcendent to us; He is utterly other to the creation. But the God who reveals Himself in the Bible is a God who loves, who loves us and wants us to love Him in return.

Chuck Colson explains that there are only three widespread beliefs concerning our origins in the world today. All three are based on unproven assumptions: #1: a mindless, material universe. #2: a Universal Mind that is the Source of all existence but is impersonal to us and lacks a particular interest in us. #3: A personal God who has revealed Himself to be personal in ways that are intelligible to us.

I’ve already briefly dealt with mindless materialism. It is philosophically impossible to disprove the existence of God; therefore, atheism or agnosticism can never claim the high ground of being more rational than faith in God. By contrast, the manifold perfections that are found at every level of existence: from the sub-atomic, to our living planet to galactic superclusters declare the glory of God.

Ironically, the same theoretical physicist, the late Stephen Hawking, who posited the possibility of a mindless multiverse spewing out universes endlessly wrote this about our universe:

“Why did the universe start out with so nearly the critical rate of expansion that separates models that recollapse from those that go on expanding forever, that even now, 10 thousand million years later, it is still expanding at nearly the critical rate? If the rate of expansion one second after the Big Bang had been smaller by even one part in a thousand million million, the universe would have recollapsed before it reached its present size.” (A Brief History of Time, 138).

Dr. James Collins, Director of the Human Genome Project that successfully mapped out human DNA, and a believer in God, wrote:

“On the other hand, if the rate of expansion had been greater by even one part in a million, stars and planets could not have been able to form…. The existence of a universe as we know it rests upon a knife edge of improbability….  The same remarkable circumstance applies to the formation of heavier elements. If the strong nuclear force that holds protons and neutrons together had been even slightly weaker, then only hydrogen could have formed in the universe. If, on the other hand, the strong nuclear force had been slightly stronger, all the hydrogen would have converted to helium, instead of the 25 percent that occurred early in the Big Bang, and thus the fusion furnaces of stars and their ability to generate heavier elements would never have been born.

“Adding to this remarkable observation, the nuclear force appears to be tuned just sufficiently for carbon to form, which is critical for life forms on Earth. Had that force been just slightly more attractive, all the carbon would have been converted to oxygen.

“Altogether, there are fifteen physical constants whose values current theory is unable to predict. They are givens: they simply have the value that they have. This list includes the speed of light, the strength of the weak and strong nuclear forces, various parameters associated with electromagnetism, and the force of gravity. The chance that all of these constants would take on the values necessary to result in a stable universe capable of sustaining complex life forms is infinitesimal. And yet those are exactly the parameters that we observe. In sum, our universe is wildly improbable.” (The Language of God: a Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief, 73) [emphasis added]

All life on earth has a biochemical code called DNA that is far more intricate and complex than any computer software ever written. And DNA doesn’t just run algorithms: it both codes and engineers within living cells the proteins that build and support life. That is a vastly more complex challenge than running a computer program.

But what about a Universal Mind, such as modern Hinduism or Eastern apologists like Deepak Chopra posit? Integrating such a universal mind with creation is logically consistent; but this mind must transcend the creation, because nothing can imagine and invent itself. Secondly, an impersonal, universal Mind doesn’t explain why relationships, love, or justice, are of such exceeding importance to the only race on earth that can appreciate them: the human race. If the Universal Mind lacks personal love, but we possess it, then in that one attribute we surpass the divine in goodness. For indifference to other living things, especially humans, is manifestly inferior to caring and empathy for the living.

An impersonal Mind can also never truly be moral, or mediate what is right and wrong, what we call ethics. If ethics and morality are merely a human construct, without the prior wisdom of God to instruct us, then why would Jews and Christians strongly affirm God’s justice? A universal, but impersonal, mind renders such beliefs meaningless, and leaves the human race without any transcendent hope of establishing justice and social peace. Yet for over 5,000 years societies have been built on laws of moral conduct which ancient peoples believed were handed down or enforced by the gods or God. Where did we get this profound moral and religious impulse if no God exists to instill that within us?

That leaves us, then, with only one, best option in understanding our existence. The truth, so to speak, backs us into a corner. This option gives us answers to the most profound questions of life: our origins, meaning, morality and destiny. God is! and God is a personal, relational Being who made us to share aspects of His Personhood. The foundations of human understanding of who this personal God is were written in the first chapter of the Bible, Genesis One. The very first verse, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” affirms two essential beliefs which empirical science has shown must be true. There was a beginning to creation, but before that there had to be a greater, self-existent Creator.

Greek philosophers, like Aristotle, understood this. Aristotle affirmed from laws of motion that since nothing can move without something moving it, there must originally have been an Unmoved or Prime Mover. This became the famed Catholic theologian, Thomas Aquinas’, first argument for God from reason apart from theology. Aristotle, however, believed the universe was eternal, as did most astronomers until Edwin Hubble proved the universe is steadily expanding and thus must have originated from a single point.

This leads to Thomas Aquinas’ second argument for God, the Uncaused First Cause. This is known as the cosmological argument for God. Every effect must have a cause, including the universe, a logical refutation of Aristotle’s eternal universe. Such a Cause must be self-existent, for no effect can logically be the means of its own cause.

The Greek philosopher Xenophon, understanding the unity and harmony of creation, declared there must be one, supreme Creator as the Source of all things, called Theos in Greek. Anthropologists have also confirmed that nearly all primitive peoples held a belief in a Sky God who was the Source of Creation. Our Native American peoples believed this long before Christian settlers came; though they also believed in lesser, ancestral, or animist spirits who governed their tribes or lives.

John 1:1 recapitulates this glorious theme of origins: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” God was, God is, and God will always be!

All ancient creation myths describe God or the gods bringing order out of chaos. So does Genesis 1:2, “The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.” Vv.3-4 continue, “Then God said, ‘Let there be light; and there was light. God saw the light was good.” God not only formed the earth out of the water, but also created light. Metaphorically, the goodness of light in the creation mirrors the goodness of enlightenment from divine revelation in the Scripture. Light and truth are synonymous with God, since light reveals what is real materially, and God is ultimate reality spiritually. These verses affirm the infinite nature of God in creation, but also His personality. The Creator spoke light into existence, and also called it good. Speaking and making value judgments are functions of personality.

Genesis One also made another extraordinary claim about God’s creation in vv. 26-31 that confirms God’s personal nature. ‘Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule” … God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. ²⁸ God blessed them; and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule … God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good.’ God not only created everything but made human beings male and female in His likeness to rule, or have dominion, over the earth. Filling the earth with the human race and subduing it are what we call the Creation Mandate; and when God was finished making man, he now declared His creation to be “very good.”

God refers to Himself as “us” – consistent with God’s Triune nature. And God made man in God’s likeness, male and female, which are intimately personal features of humanity. This suggests that God possesses all the unique personal qualities that distinguish male and female within Himself. God also blessed the human race, an intimate, personal act.

To the ancients, declaring God’s existence wasn’t shocking at all; it was presumed. What was contrary to ancient beliefs was that such a God not only cared about humanity, but fashioned us in His likeness, imprinting us with qualities of His own nature. But above all, what shocked the ancient mind was that this God would bind Himself into an alliance with a particular people through the most sacred of contracts: a covenant. What set apart the God of Israel, Yahweh, from every other deity is that this God declared an enduring commitment to one man, Abraham, and his descendants, to make of him a mighty nation.

Genesis 12:1-3 give us the redemptive purpose of God for the human race, beginning with the descendants of Abraham: “Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go forth from your country, and from your relatives and from your father’s house, to the land which I will show you; and I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great; and so you shall be a blessing; and I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse. and in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.”

Nowhere in any ancient culture will you find any other god making a pact with a human being or nation. Gods in ancient times were remote, capricious beings, capable of bestowing or withholding favor without justification. Sacrifices were made to the gods to placate them and avert disaster, not to affirm a covenantal friendship as God had with Abraham.

Why, then, would a man of the late third millennium BC like Abram have believed that such a God was worth obeying? Why would he leave his home country and kindred, to migrate to an unknown land? First, God spoke to Abram in an unequivocal way, and with such authority, that Abram could not deny that God was speaking to him. God’s words must have struck Abram’s ears or soul with such intensity that he couldn’t ascribe them to mere imagination or impression. Abram knew this voice was God’s, not his own; and he was willing to stake everything to attain the promises that were now etched in his soul forever. Secondly, God made unequivocal promises to Abram that motivated him to obey God.

God revealed two profound truths about the God who is: God is almighty: El Shaddai in the ancient, Semitic languages. And God is personal: He spoke to Abram in a very personal way. Our God is, uniquely, an infinite-personal Being.

God spoke to Abram in covenantal language, which He later sealed through the covenant of circumcision for Abraham’s descendants. In return for Abram’s obedience in migrating to Canaan land, God made a series of unconditional promises to him, preceded by the strong words “I will.” God promised to make a great nation through his descendants; to bless him, that is, to preserve and greatly enrich him; to give him a name of renown and to make him a blessing to others; to bless those who blessed him and curse those cursed him; and to bless all the families of the earth through his seed. Such promises had never been made by any deity to anyone before.

This passage declared God’s redemptive purpose for mankind, and revealed something new in man’s understanding of deity. God has a purpose for the human race, and that purpose is secure because God is a promise-keeping Agent. Abraham indeed fathered a great nation, Israel, as well as becoming the father of the Arabs, the Edomites and the Midianites of the Sinai.

More importantly, Abraham and Sarah were the ancestors of Jesus the Messiah who fulfilled God’s promise to bless all the families of the earth through his seed. Revelation 5:9-10 and 7:9-10 clearly describe the fulfillment of that promise, as a multitude of people from every nation, people, tribe, and tongue gathered before God’s throne to worship Him. Today, we see the near fulfillment of that promise in the spread of the gospel of Jesus Christ to virtually every ethno-linguistic group on earth.

I have briefly alluded to all five powerful arguments for God’s existence that were described by one of the great minds of the Church: Thomas Aquinas. Each of these arguments, he stated, stands to reason without theology; and they combine to make an irrefutable case for God’s existence. Let me restate them to help cement in your minds a confident assurance that the living God is real and worth knowing. These arguments are not concrete proofs; but they are logically reasonable and irrefutable. “God is” stands as the best argument for our own existence and nature.

The first two – the Prime Mover and Uncaused First Cause fall under the Cosmological Argument. The third one, or argument from Necessity, states that there must be a necessary Being to bring other possible beings – animals or humans – into existence. God alone is that necessary Being.

Aquinas’ fourth argument is from degrees of perfection. Since humans can perceive degrees of perfection and judge and evaluate things as more or less perfect presupposes that there must be a standard of perfection which is unsurpassable in every category. God alone possesses such perfection in every attribute He possesses. As St. Anselm succinctly stated, God is “a Being than which no greater can be conceived.” This is also called the ontological argument: “onto” being Greek for being. God’s being is perfect. The manifold perfections at every level of creation, including our DNA, affirm the perfections of God.

This leads to Aquinas’ fifth argument, also known as the teleological argument, or the argument from design. As one writer explained, “Humans and most natural beings in the world have been ‘designed’ to have a purpose and we behave or act according to that purpose. For instance, the bird’s wings behave in accordance with its design which allows it to fly. Humans talk using their mouths because this is in accordance with their body’s design which allows them to utilize air and various muscles in their body to create sounds.”

That all things clearly give evidence of a purpose or function, this presupposes a Designer who assigns to all things their purpose or design. The intelligibility of the creation presumes intelligence. That only divine intelligence could have brought an intensely information-laden thing as life into existence is an argument from design or teleology.

Beloved, God is, and God has a purpose for your life that extends beyond all creation into eternity. His purpose is the highest and best that He will ever offer any race of creatures. This is why you should make the pursuit of God your highest and most enduring pursuit. There is no other pursuit that will yield a higher, greater, or more enduring reward than what God has planned for you in eternity. Remember, what you believe about God and how you live will impact not merely this life, but all eternity. Will you give Jesus Christ His proper place in your life – the first and highest place?

Let Him dwell in your hearts through faith, and He will be the Unmoved Mover who moves you on the path to eternal life. He is the necessary and sufficient Redeemer who will ensure that you will be raised from the dead to everlasting life with God in heaven. He is the Holy One who perfects His nature within you. And He will be the Designer who works all things together for your ultimate good, that you may partake of Christ’s life and love forever.

Let us pray.

Benediction: Now the God of peace, who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant, even Jesus our Lord, equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.