Behold No.11 The Living God

The first book of Kings and chapter 18, here you have Elijah who has been used by the Lord to warn Israel that they need to turn to God. Because they didn't listen, there has been a famine in the land because of lack of rain for three and a half years. But the Lord wants to bring that to an end.

And so he sends Elijah to have a contact with the king and then through the king with all those who worship false idols. And there is to be a demonstration of the power of God. The people, when they are confronted, they don't want to say anything.

They don't know which way to turn. But then in verse 22, 1 Kings 18 verse 22, there we read, Then Elijah said to them, I am only one of the prophets left, but Baal has 450 prophets. Get two bulls for us.

Let them choose one for themselves, and let them cut it into pieces, and put it on the wood, but not set fire to it. I will prepare the other bull, and put it on the wood, but not set fire to it. Then you call on the name of your God, and I will call on the name of the Lord.

God answers by fire. He is God. Then all the people said, What you say is good.

Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, Choose one of the bulls, prepare it first, since there are so many of you. Call on the name of your God, but not light the fire. They took the bull given them, and prepared it.

Then they called on the name of Baal from morning to noon. Oh Baal answer us, they shouted. But there was no response.

No one answered. And they danced around the altar they had made. At noon, Elijah began to taunt them.

Sheikh Laodida, he said, Surely he is a God. Perhaps he is deep in thought, or busy, or travelling. Maybe he is sleeping, and must be awakened.

So they shouted louder, and slashed themselves with swords and spears, as was their custom, until their blood flowed. Midday passed, and they continued their frantic prophesying until the time for the evening sacrifice. But there was no response.

No one answered. No one paid attention. Then Elijah said to all the people, Come here to me.

They came to him, and he prepared the altar of the Lord, which was in ruins. Elijah took twelve stones, one for each of the tribes that descended from Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord had come, saying, Your name shall be Israel. With the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord.

And he dug a trench round it large enough to hold two pieces of seed. He arranged the wood, cut the bull into pieces, and laid it on the wood. Then he said to them, Fill four large jars with water, and pour it on the offering, and on the wood.

Do it again, he said. And they did it again. Do it a third time, he ordered.

And they did it the third time. The water ran down around the altar, and even filled the trench. At the time of the sacrifice, the prophet Elijah stepped forward and prayed, O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac of Israel, let it be known to the day that you are God of Israel, and that I am your servant, and have done all these things in your command.

Answer me, O Lord, answer me, so that these people will know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again. Then the fire of the Lord fell, and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones, and the soil, and also lit up the water in the trench. When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried, The Lord, he is God, the Lord, he is God.

Then Elijah commanded them, Seize the prophets of Baal, and don't let anyone get away. They seized them, and Elijah had them brought down to the Kishon Valley, and slaughtered there. From the 26th verse of Hebrews 10, If we deliberately keep on sinning, after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of anyone who rejects the law.

Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much more severely do you think a man deserves to be punished? Who has trampled the Son of God on the cross? Who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified him? And who has insulted the Bride of Grace? For we know him who said, It is mine to avenge, I will pay. And again the Lord will judge his people.

Now we'll read this 31st verse. It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. If we come to the conclusion of the series, which I think Tim would agree with me, it has been a real privilege and delight to speak on week by week.

As we try to show you something, believe me, the half has not been told of the daughter of God. I can reflect over so many years here at the tab. I hardly recall a time when I appreciated preaching and listening to the scripture.

As we've been on the subject of our God, what is our God like? Well, behold, this is your God. Jehovah, Jah, Jah, the Lord to who provides El Shaddai, the Lord Almighty, and so forth. Well, somebody came to a fairly uninhibited preacher in the country, some ten years ago.

And they said to him, Don't you know that God is dead? And with feigned astonishment, he said, Oh, you do surprise me. I didn't even know he'd been sick. We are thinking of the concept of the living God.

And in one sense that's tautology. That means to say that the word living is hardly required to describe God. Because if God is God, then logically he must be the living God.

Does God live in your own experience? Do I acknowledge that God is? The Bible says the fool declares his heart there is no God. Then how great foolery there is within the minds sometimes of men and women. Some of us theologians of the so-called death of God theological school, school of the absurd, who dare suggest that this God could ever stop being what he is, the living God.

The Hebrews were told, Thou shalt worship the Lord God and him that thou shalt serve. I don't think the Old Testament Hebrews would have come around to the modern Pope. Now I had some respect for the present Pope because I think he is a man with many virtues and a man who has gone through a great deal of suffering in the country.

But it wasn't that number of years ago when he drew together the leaders of the various faiths and they met at a place called Assisi. You got the ravenry of the Indians of America. You got witch doctors from the hub of Africa.

You got leaders of Hindu women and so forth. All came together, an agglomeration of faiths and they prayed. As I mentioned once before from the Pope here, the Pope went to the person who wrote a letter to the editor of the Times, dear sir.

All the leaders of various faiths in the world were there to which God was addressing prayers. The Hebrews were gone. The Duke of Edinburgh, now he told me when I picked up the information, some years later, informed the previous Archbishop of Canterbury to quote, crack a few heads together and get men from different faiths to come into Canterbury and we'll have an interfaith service especially as we emphasise the needs of the world and its environment.

The Hebrews would have felt most uncomfortable at either of those services. Why? Well, there is only one God. Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him only shalt thou serve.

There is an exclusivism in the Old Testament which is carried through into the New Testament which brooks no rivals. There is only one God, the God of Edinburgh, the God and Father of our Lord, Jesus Christ, and he is the Living God. So listen to this rather sombre verse which you read with me a few moments ago.

Listen to it again. It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the Living God. I have four propositions to read out from that particular text, four logical deductions.

Here is number one. A bad vote is frequently made. Deuteronomy chapter 5 and verse 26 helps to cleanse the sexual record in terms of claiming the exclusive nature of the God of the Hebrews.

It's there implicitly in earlier chapters and books. But he's set down for us so that even he who runs cannot but read it and know it. For what mortal man, Hebrews, Deuteronomy 5, 26, for what mortal man has ever heard the voice of the Living God speaking out of fire as we have and survived? The context is the Hebrews pleading Moses to go back to Sinai and to intercede on behalf of them before this God who is reckoned to be the Living God.

And when you go to Joshua 3.10, 1 Samuel 17.26, again there is this exclusion. You move through to Amos and you discover this old test of prophets saying, speaking on behalf of God to the Hebrews, You only have known of all the peoples of the earth. In other words, in a very special fashion, God discloses himself, his nature, his character, and what his requirements are to the ancient Hebrews in a way that he did to no other surrounding nation at all.

And so, yet, what modern commentators on Scripture find to be somewhat embarrassing that they can't withstand the claims that Scripture makes. And that is that no other God exists apart from the God of the Hebrews. And he is alone the Living God.

So go to the Psalms. Psalms 115. The psalmist is asking a rhetorical and somewhat cynical question.

Verse 2. Wide nations say, Where is their God? Our God is in heaven. He responds, He does whatever pleases Him. But their gods, their idols, are silver and gold, made by the hands of men.

They have mouths but cannot speak, eyes but they can see, they have ears but they cannot hear, noses but they cannot smell, they have hands but they cannot feel, feet but they cannot walk, or can they utter a sound with their throats? Well, he's putting it on a bit thick, isn't he? But he's making a point quite clear. These are utterly no gods. When you say, Are you in effect a god? No God.

Let's go to Isaiah chapter 46. He gets his inspiration from the psalmist. He makes exactly the same point, but we'll repeat it because it's necessary for us to latch onto this ourselves.

Isaiah chapter 46. Where again, we find the prophet in the fifth verse. Speaking on behalf of Jehovah, To whom will you compare me, or count me equal? To whom will you liken me, that we may be compared? Some pour out gold from their bags and weigh out silver on the scales.

Hire a goldsmith and make it into a god. They lay down and worship. They lift it to their shoulders and carry it.

They set it up in its place. And there it stands. That spot it cannot move.

Though one cries out to it, it does not answer. It cannot save him from his troubles. And we might be laughing.

How absurd that people should construct their own gods. But when you move through into the New Testament and you come to one of the epistles of John, you find he concludes with a letter that he dashes off. And in addressing his readers, he says, Little children, keep yourself from idols.

There are more contestants for a place or a pantheon. The place where gods are kept. In the modern world than ever there were.

In the ancient world. People who make their own gods. People who make their own idols.

People who live for certain things that can't really help them eternally. And anything that substitutes for God is an idol. And of that, you have to say, it is so grossly inferior to this.

To this God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who alone is the living God, who has eyes and sees and ears and hears. A heart that feels, and I ask you, my friend, do you know this God? Yourself. The living.

The true. God. Hebrews 3, 12, 9, 14, 10, 31, 12, 22.

Four examples of the use of that seeking Old Testament expression in the New Testament. Our Lord who is the living God. Here's Peter.

For Peter, and another example which will strike you rather extraordinary, actually, are best witnesses in the New Testament to the Old Testament books of the Hebrew roots. Here is Peter. He's at Caesarea Philippi.

Our Lord is with him, and the rest of the disciples It's a Roman place, a Roman town. It's also got Greek history. There is the center of worship of Pan, one of the gods of the Greeks.

Jesus is just a foot of a mountain where there's a stream, and then there's this little temple that's been erected in honor of Pan, and other Greek deities there are also represented. And Jesus spins around, and he says to the disciples, Who do you say I am? And Peter, full mark, says, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. Matthew is the only one who quotes Peter with that description of God.

Not just the Christ, the Son of God. You are the Christ, the Son of the living God. Second example.

Here's Annas. Both these examples are in Matthew Gospel. Here's Annas, and our Lord Jesus is in front of him.

Our Lord is on trial for his life, or so it seems as far as Annas is concerned. And the Lord will not respond to Annas' questions. You remember the story.

We looked at it last Sunday. And so, high priest, use us all as authority. I urge you in the name of the living God that you answer me and tell me whether you are the Christ or not.

You see, the Hebrews, they used this expression to qualify their belief in God because it made it stand out uniquely. Ours is the living God. A boast that's simply made.

Number two. It's the truth that's consistently taught. And I can be a little more quickly in nailing this conviction in your mind.

You see, what I'm referring to is not only do you get the concept in the Old Testament. This is a God who is alive. This is a God who responds to prayer.

But when you move to the New Testament, there's development in our understanding of the doctrine of God. We know that the God of Abraham is the living God. But this Lord Jesus Christ is also part of the Elevated Trinity, who is part of the God Himself.

We're told of Him. That He is alive. That He is the way, the truth, and the life.

And that when they did their damnation to Him, when they pinned Him to the cross, when He offered up His life as a sacrifice for the sins of the world, He was brought back from the grave in the power of an endless life. Behold, I am He that liveth and was dead, but I am alive forevermore. The eternity of God postulated in the Old Testament is taken out in all the splendor of its doctrine, and it's attributed to our Lord Jesus Christ.

And you can read other examples of that. There isn't time at the moment, but I would take you to 1 Timothy 4, 10, 11, 12, 13. Listen to this address by my tape because it's at the perfect point.

And check it out for the most. We are our hope set on the living God who is the Savior of all men. God is eternal.

Our Lord Jesus Christ is eternal. I, St. Peter, write to the Hebrews, speaking of the Holy Spirit, that our Lord Jesus Christ offers His blood before the Father in the power of the eternal Holy Spirit. The Apostle Paul writing to the Corinthians tells them about the eternal Spirit in 1 Corinthians chapter 3 in verse 16.

They know what it is to have the Spirit of God living in their heart. Don't you know you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you? God the Father is the living God. Jesus Christ is the living God.

The Holy Spirit is the living God. The one in three, the three in one, our God eternally the same causes a concern for you and me. It could be that the youngest child in Pathfinders can come and offer his prayer.

God the Father, the power of the Spirit, acted in the name of Jesus. He, she may not understand formula, but nonetheless has become simplicity without theological acumen. Here you are, some of you.

You're fairly dull in your understanding of Scripture too. You don't understand all these minute details. My friend, that's not important.

What important is this? That you recognize that there is a God who pervades, whose presence, whose Spirit is everywhere in this world and that this God has an ear that's attentive to the cries that you offer. This is the living God. A boast that seems to be made.

A truth that is consistently taught. Moreover, here is the fate that inevitably waits. Listen again.

I don't like to preach this, but you see, as a preacher, I'm controlled by the text. This is one of the fundamental differences between the evangelical pulpit and any other pulpit. I don't say that my own ministry is particularly exceptional.

In fact, sometimes when I listen to my sermons, I'm disgusted at the inarticulate way in which I put things and the utter lack of clarity. I say that not with false humility in respect to the burdens of my life. But here I tell you that at least the objective of this pulpit and the objective of the evangelical pulpit is to teach Scripture as it is, not as you think it ought to be.

I take you back to my verse. You see, this is a verse that will never be carried in any sense. It's a verse that you'll probably never find on a Christian calendar which has lovely verses and practices from the Old and the New Testament displayed upon it.

I'm not critical of this. I'm making this as a saint. Here is a verse of Scripture which is somber and profound and frightening.

It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of a living God. And I say, that's a fate that inevitably awaits each one of us. I pray for Salvation Army.

I thank God for the philanthropic and the benevolent work of Salvation Army. And they've got this remarkable missing persons register. They try to find people who've gone missing from families, parents, children, and every member of a family.

It's tragic when somebody goes missing. But you know, one of the things I bring to your attention is this. That in me, a pulpit, there is missing from the proclamation of the truth of Scripture this somber thought that it is an awesome thing to fall into the hands of God.

We have got our God into a sort of benevolent Santa Claus character in skies who really is there just for the benefit of people who perchance will dash off a little lele or a little request. He will come running to them. It doesn't matter how they live.

It doesn't matter how they exploit the opportunities that they give him. They can depend on this God who is ever the forgiving God. Now I'll be the last to argue against the forgiveness of God.

I need his forgiveness today. But I tell you that in the character of God there is something that is so holy that I know what favor means when he gets us to sing at him Oh, how I fear the living God with reverential fear. And I tell you that sometimes there is a lot of emphasis on the fear that ordinary people ought to have as they come into the presence of this God.

Here I say the fate if you prefer better word a circumstance that inevitably waits. Each man or each woman it doesn't matter where you come from. It doesn't matter how you yourself in the service this morning.

Here is something from God that the Word declares and there is no exception whatsoever. It is a dread thing to fall into the hands of the living God. You will either walk into his presence as prepared as Amelia Kilby the lady in memorial service with privilege take last week was or you'll fall into her presence.

It's a mode that differs that is important. But this is the inevitability whoever you are you will go into the presence the immediate presence of God. You will walk in joy in your heart and with a lightness of step with gladness in your eyes that of the just as the shining light which shines more and more until the perfect day.

Some of you know what Amelia knew of looking forward to the time when death would take your body if your body no longer did stay in life in a satisfactory body and you can be released from the prison house of your body and be freed in his presence. It's a wonderful thing to walk in the presence of God with anticipation of his nearness and an ability to praise him in a way that you never had before. But still fall.

And a fall generally bespeaks something that's either accidental or as a result of a lack of care. It's in a level of sense that this scripture speaks. It is a beautiful thing to fall.

To fall unprepared. To fall unexpectedly into the presence of this God. A beautiful thing.

Says the apostle Paul when he's writing to the heavens Do you know what stimulates me to be serious today? Do you think I wanted to leave the cloistered university of Jerusalem or Tarsus, my own city? Paul is a natural academic. He's one of the great geniuses of all time. He's a man.

He could absorb all time and innate talents by just perusing the philosophy of the geeks and relating to Old Testament theology and so on and so forth. We could have had many, many a book that poured from the mind and from the hands of the apostle Paul on top of the apostles that he gave us. But he doesn't spend his life in the cloistered clines of the university.

He's out and about somewhat set like a bling rabbit who can trace his footprints in the snow. He's there in Turkey taking minors into Greece longing to go to Rome. He wants to go to Spain.

Why? Why Paul? Well, he says, it's the love that I have for God. I want to tell men and women about Him. He says, Knowing the terror of the Lord.

The NIE gets a bit anemic when it points that out. Knowing the fear of the Lord. But I believe it's a more powerful word.

Knowing the terror of the Lord. What does it mean? It's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of this God. Are you listening to me? Oh may God that the spirit just rivet what I'm saying at this moment upon your mind.

It's a terrible thing to fall into the hands of an unprepared head. Knowing the terror of the Lord. This is the Apostle Paul.

Man abandons God as his saviour. Says an Anglican theologian who recently died. Philip Hughes.

Man abandons God as his saviour only to meet God as his judge. John Calvin. Mortal man.

However hoss may be. Cannot carry his enmity beyond death. But power of God is not confined to such narrow limits.

We often escape from there. We cannot escape from the presence of God. Here are two men.

They've got a dilemma. Within hours one will be in the presence of God. Within years another will be.

They're both kings. One is Shazza. The other is David.

Shazza sees the hand of God as it strikes in a disembodied fright fashion on the wall of a palace in Babylon. Remember, meenie meenie teetee call you father. Indicating the fact that he's weighed in the balances.

Before the night is through Sir Daniel will stand before this God. And Belshazz trembles. And then like so many moderns he lives out the rest of the night as though it will go on forever.

And the warning of judgement is really colourless and without meaning. Here is David. He's sinned against God.

You can read the context. No time to take you into it. You can read it in 2 Samuel chapter 24 and verse 14.

He has the option of certain punishments which God will give him as a result of his sin. And instead of this he opts to place himself in the hands of God in mercy. In other words, David will fall down before this God now.

Rather than fall down before this God eternity. And that's the option that faces you or me. Going forth to my last proposition.

I've talked to you about a boast that's frequently made and a truth that's consistently taught a faith that inevitably waits. Here we have a cross that is mercifully borne. Care to examine the passage back to we're still in Hebrews 10 now.

And verse 19 I want to take you into the context before you get to the 30th verse. It's necessary to do this because here is a contradictory statement. You see, look at verse 19.

Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the most holy place by the blood of Jesus by a new and a living way. Here the writer is talking about the confidence to go into God's presence. He's talking about a way that's opened.

He's talking in verse 21 about a great high priest. And then in 22 he underlines what he said Let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance having our hearts unculled and so forth. You see, the cross in Hebrews 30, 31 is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

In verse 19 or 20 it's a wonderful thing to come into his presence. How do you reconcile this? Well, you do it quite easily by staying your concentration on what Jesus Christ has done. How can you enter the presence of God and feel comfortable? Well, by the blood of Jesus in the Old Testament.

They went into the temple those Hebrew worshippers and they felt comfortable because the priest had slain an animal on their behalf. After the blood of the animal was applied to the altar. Now this is what our Lord Jesus has done.

He sheds his blood on the cross for you. You know the rest of your sin. The things that you have done that you are wrong.

There is not a man or a woman who would stay here if I invited them all into ministry to evacuate you who has felt uncomfortable about what they have been through in life. We've all sinned. We've all come short of the glory of God.

To stand before him as we naturally are would be a most unpleasant experience. But what has Jesus done? On March the 28th this year in Moscow 500,000 people were expected to come on a demonstration asking for the freedom in Moscow the Lithuanians had asked for in Lithuania. Mikhail Gorbachev who has gone through a number of conversions during these last few months as far as his political philosophy is concerned put 50,000 troops into Moscow to put down this rebellion.

And actually not a life was lost. There were no problems. But listen to the BBC describing Gorbachev's show of force a display of strength that showed considerable weakness.

That was March the 28th. March the 29th was Good Friday. And people were remembering the death of our Lord Jesus.

A show of weakness that contained immeasurable strength. How can you enter into the presence of God? I tell you you do it through him through the blood that he shed on the cross. He makes you comfortable to be with his father.

That was the reason why he came into the world. He is a living Christ though dying on the cross raised in the parlor in an endless life. So, so, so, so, I have forgiveness.

So you see there is no real contradiction between verse 19 and its immediate context and verse 31. It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of a living God. It is a dreadful thing to stumble without having in any due care paid no attention in your life at all.

It's an awful thing to consider being unprepared in the presence of God. But in the earlier verses the ref here me are to those people who have made preparation who have taken the way that the Lord God has made possible this living God who has through our Lord Jesus Christ opened an avenue down which you can come into his prep and feel comfortable in his immediate presence. Listen, and with this I wind up my address.

Here is a letter written by one of the translators of the Authorized Version a man called Miles Smith who could be Bishop of Gloucester. It was part of the preface not much any longer as far as I know incorporated in the Authorized Version. It is a fearful thing says Miles Smith it is a fearful thing to fall in the hands of the living God but a blessed thing it is and will bring us to everlasting blessedness in the end when God speaketh unto us to hearken when he hath his word before us to read it when he stretches out his hand and calleth to answer here am I here we are to do thy will, God.

May the Lord give care and a conscience in us to know him and serve him that we may be acknowledged of him at the appearing of our Lord Jesus to whom with the Holy Ghost we all praise and thanksgiving. Amen. He's a living God and that should I describe awe and wonder and thanksgiving in your heart or terror because one day you will stand before him it is utterly inevitable then may you respond to the message of the gospel as I've tried to declare it this morning let us pray.