SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/8/2019 1:40 PM
My Worship Time Focus:
“The Unity of the Father”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Ephesians
4:6
Message of the
verses: “6
one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all.”
I have to say that this will be a
short SD as we look at the last member of the trinity’s role of unity, having
looked first at the Spirit’s role and then yesterday the Son’s role.
We want to first look at a number of
verses that speak of the basic doctrine of Judaism which are “The Lord is our
God, the Lord is one!” as seen in Deuteronomy 6:4. Let us look at a couple of more verses from
Deuteronomy 4:35 and 32:39 “35 “To you it was shown that you might know that
the LORD, He is God; there is no other besides Him.” “39 ’See now that I, I am He, And there is no god besides Me;
It is I who put to death and give life. I have wounded and it is I who heal,
And there is no one who can deliver from My hand.” Isaiah 45:14
and 46:9 “14 Thus says the LORD, "The products
of Egypt and the merchandise of Cush And the Sabeans, men of stature, Will come
over to you and will be yours; They will walk behind you, they will come over
in chains And will bow down to you; They will make supplication to you:
’Surely, God is with you, and
there is none else, No other God.’"” “9 “Remember the former things long past, For
I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me.”
Now
we want to look at some verses from the New Testament that show us of His oneness. 1 Cor. 8:4-6 “6 yet for us there is but one
God, the Father, from whom
are all things and we exist for Him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all
things, and we exist through Him.”
Eph. 4:3-6 “3 being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the
bond of peace. 4 There is one
body and one Spirit, just as also you were called in one hope of your calling;
5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism,
6 one God and Father of all who is over
all and through all and in all.” James
2:19 “You believe that God is one. You do well; the demons also believe, and
shudder.”
MacArthur
adds “Yet the New Testament also reveals the more complete truth that the ‘one
God’ is in three persons—‘Father, Son, and Holy Spirit’ (Matt. 28:19; John
6:27; 20:28; Acts 5:3-4).”
When
we look at the NT we see many times that God the Father is often used as the
most comprehensive and inclusive divine title, even though it is clear from
many texts in the NT that He is never separated in nature or power from the Son
or the Holy Spirit. Paul does not want
to separate the Persons of the Godhead, but he wants to note their unique roles
and also focus on their unity in their relationship to each other and also
their relation to the church—manifested in the several different aspects
mentioned in these three verses that we have been looking at.
John
MacArthur concludes this short sub-section and also his 10th
chapter, which by the way we began on the 18th of February, with the
following paragraph. “Our ‘one God and
Father,’ along with the Son and the Holy Spirit, ‘is over all and through all
and in all.’ That comprehensive
statement points to the glorious, divine, eternal unity that the Father gives
believers by His Spirit and through the Son.
We are God created, God loved, God saved, God Fathered, God controlled,
God sustained, God filled, and God blessed.
We are on people under on sovereign (‘over all’), omnipotent (‘through
all’), and omnipresent (‘in all’) God.”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I am thankful that the God that I worship is
one God in three Persons, for if that were not so then how could I have been
saved, and how could I have the third Person of the Godhead living in me. There is another thing I want to remember and
that is that because God is three in One He can have love, and demonstrate love
towards us because the trinity demonstrates love to each other.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Praise the Lord for His unity, and also for
Him teaching me more about humility as I have studied these verses in the
beginning of this 4th chapter of Ephesians.
Today’s verse that went along with
yesterday’s quotation: “But without
faith it is impossible to please Him, for He who comes to God must believe that
He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him” (Hebrews
11:6).”
3/8/2019 2:11 PM
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