Higher Ways, Higher Thoughts

Isaiah 55 ESV

8 ...my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.
⁹ For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.

¹⁰ “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven
and do not return there but water the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
¹¹ so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,

and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

 

God is not some vague, feel-good, benevolent being defined only by a distorted emotion (unregenerate man's idea of "love").

 

God is a person; the original person, and the source of all that exists.

 

He has an hierarchy among the angelic creation as well as among mankind. He has a system of protocol. He has identified Himself to mankind and has provided logistical support to those who are positive to His plan of grace.

 

All humans are born condemned, as the result of Adam’s original sin. Salvation is free to all, but not all will receive it, because it requires faith in the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross, and some will not believe.

 

The Father raises the spiritually dead by giving eternal life to all who believe in His Son. The Son has this same power. He IS the atonement. He IS the propitiation. Therefore, He, like His Father, gives life to those who were formerly dead in their sins. The final judgment, however, belongs to the Son. As the unbelievers are gathered before Him at the great white throne, He will demonstrate to them that their human good can never measure up to His own perfect righteousness, which they have rejected. The Father will not judge them, because He judged their sins in His Son. This leaves them to face the One who paid for their sins on the cross.

 

People who say they believe in God but cannot accept the work of Christ for their salvation do not really believe in God. The Father and Son are one. If the Father is not honored, the Son is also not honored (“I believe in the love Jesus taught, but cannot accept that Old Testament God”) – this dishonors the Jesus they claim to love. He, Jesus Christ, IS that Old Testament God. He is Lord of the Armies. If the Son is rejected, the Father’s plan is rejected. Jesus is God, God is Jesus. If you reject the one, the other is dishonored. The unbeliever cannot win.

 

For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself. And he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man. John 5:26-27 ESV

God the Father and God the Son share the same eternal life, as well as nine other characteristics of divine essence. One of those is perfect Justice (judgment). The Son will be the final executor of God’s Justice, because He has the unique qualification of being the Perfect Man.

“I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me” John 5:30

Jesus was here in physical body to do the work the Father had planned for His creation and had authorized Him to do. This was all decreed in eternity past. Jesus’ one purpose in life was to fulfill the plan of the Father. Criticism of the Son was pointless, because He was following His Father’s protocol plan, and nothing would interfere with that.

In these comments, Jesus gave The Jews an introduction to the doctrine of the oneness of the persons of God.  We call it the doctrine of the Trinity. God is one in essence. Each person of the Trinity - Father, Son, Holy Spirit – has exactly the same essence: Sovereignty, Righteousness, Justice, Love, Eternal Life, Omniscience, Omnipresence, Omnipotence, Veracity, Immutability. Each manifests these characteristics in different forms. God the Father, the planner of all creation and history, is spirit and eternally invisible. God the Holy Spirit, a partner in creation, restoration and regeneration, is also spirit and cannot be seen, but can be experienced; convincing of sin, awakening the human spirit to faith in Christ, and nurturing the believer in growth to spiritual maturity. God the Son is the bodily person of God – seen, felt, heard – born into the human race as the Perfect Man and Perfect God in one person forever. We call that the Hypostatic Union – the unique person of the universe.

Jesus was speaking to people so blinded by religion they had no concept of grace or of the personalities of God. As He began His public ministry, Jesus kept His message simple, to accommodate the ignorance of His audience. We, too, must present simple, basic truths until we have the attention of those who want to know more. Hitting them with advanced doctrinal vocabulary is overwhelming to them and obscures our witness.

Jesus’ claim of equality with God was the final outrage to The Jews. From this point on, they earnestly plotted to destroy Him.