Tag: Doctrine of God

Learning to Enjoy God – An Alcoholic meets the good God

When we came to Methuselah, the alcoholic, we intuitively went to Ephesians 5:18: “Don’t be drunk with wine, because that will ruin your life. Instead, be filled with the Holy Spirit.” Here we see that being filled with the Spirit is contrasted – not compared – with being drunk on wine.  I think that one… Continue reading Learning to Enjoy God – An Alcoholic meets the good God

The doctrine of God and a marriage on the rocks

Now we return to Tom, Gladys and Ethel. Tom had been giving Ethel lifts to home group whilst his wife Gladys stayed at home.  When we first met their situation, we talked about a gut instinct that things were wrong and that we weren’t getting to hear the whole story. Tom had admitted that his… Continue reading The doctrine of God and a marriage on the rocks

Love, holiness, relationships and rivalry

Remember Juliet? We met her at the coffee shop where she was looking longingly into the eyes of Romeo, her work colleague. In conversation, it comes out that When you talk with Juliet, she defends her relationship as follows. By the way, I’m not suggesting that she presents the following points in a neat, structured,… Continue reading Love, holiness, relationships and rivalry

Why does what we call God matter?

Throughout our look at who God is, we’ve kept coming back to the point that what we believe affects how we live. This means that when we talk about The Doctrine of the Trinity, belief that God is Sovereign or the question of Predestination, we’ve not just been engaging in an intellectual exercise. These beliefs… Continue reading Why does what we call God matter?

What is God called?

What’s in a name? Different names have different meanings.  My name means “loved.” My wife’s name, Sarah, means “princess.”  Generally speaking, though, we don’t tend to pick names primarily for a specific meaning associated with the child. Names are given based on how they sound or because there is a family tradition. For example, I… Continue reading What is God called?

God creates, sustains, judges and redeems

We follow on from saying that God wills and decrees to look at some of the specific things he wills and decrees.  We are going to look at these in far more detail later on when we come to look at Creation, Humanity and New Creation. However, I want to just highlight those three things… Continue reading God creates, sustains, judges and redeems

The goodness and greatness of God: Implications for spiritual warfare

If God is completely sovereign and knows all things, past present and future, then is spiritual warfare real?  Or to put it the other way round, given that the Bible talks about spiritual warfare and given our experience in life of an ongoing struggle between good and evil, doesn’t this challenge our understanding of God’s… Continue reading The goodness and greatness of God: Implications for spiritual warfare

God’s Goodness and Greatness: Implications for prayer

Another response to God’s character should be a lively prayer life. In fact, this is part of worship. Prayer is an obvious response to God’s goodness. God is love and so prayer is about a relationship with him, knowing God and knowing that he loves to hear us. We can be confident that a good… Continue reading God’s Goodness and Greatness: Implications for prayer

God’s goodness and greatness: Implications for worship

Our first response to God’s goodness and greatness is worship. In fact, Calvin says that our first priority in life is to seek to be worshippers: “We should consider it the great end of our existence to be found numbered among the worshippers of God.”[1] We exist in a Christian culture where worship is often… Continue reading God’s goodness and greatness: Implications for worship