Ignite: Rekindling Passion for Who God Is?

Oh My Goodness!! Has it really been over a month since my last post? Wow! I have missed this time sharing my heart with you gals,  But some times life gets busy and in the way!!  So I am so excited to jump right back into sharing with you girls!!!! and continuing on this journey of Igniting you Heart! So today we are going to talk about who God is!!! so we can once again fall in love with Him!! God has so many characteristics, and I want to dig deeper into his beautiful character so we can understand and grow more like Him in our own lives. So lets hop into it!!!
So I have been hearing a lot lately from people saying If God is a loving God why does he allow, suffering, pain, and evil, to exist? I know I wrote a post regarding why does evil exist? but it is actually so much deeper. I also hear people say if God is a loving God why does he send people to Hell.....yup, I said the H word... this is an extremely sensitive subject to talk about. Do you believe in Hell? well guess what we aren't going to talk about hell yet..... if you want me to do a post on this subject comment below or email me. Okay back on topic... So God's Characteristics... where do I even start their are so many. lets dive into some scripture that talk about who He is. This will give us a fuller understanding about God, and as I discuss these things, please know that their are many things we may never know or understand about God. Isn't it kinda of exciting that God gives us my of his attributes in Scripture, but also left some mystery to who he is...because if  we knew everything about God we wouldn't need His salvation and grace. Okay, so what does Attributes mean? this means; we learn to understand who God truly is. I think sometimes we forget how powerful and amazing are God is, because He is watered down so much in our society. It is time as believer's once again to discover who He is and how he is different then other deities in different religions.  Really take your time as we go through many of his attributes. I am only going to go through ten of  his many attributes that really sum up who God is. this only is going to be a glimpse of who he is. Here  we go....

Omniscient- Okay your probably like Whoa!!! Natasha way to jump right in to a difficult word, it actually really isn't that difficult so what does it mean?  This means that God knows everything and His knowledge is complete. Check out these scriptures

• Psalm 147:5 

Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit.

Romans 11:33

 

Oh, how great are God’s riches and wisdom and knowledge! How impossible it is for us to understand his decisions and his ways!

• Isaiah 40:28

 Have you never heard? Have you never understood? 

The Lord is the everlasting God,

  the Creator of all the earth. 

He never grows weak or weary. 

No one can measure the depths of his understanding.

Omnipotent- God has no limitations, he is able to bring to pass everything he chooses, He is in control and he is outside of time.

• Genesis 17:1

 When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am El-Shaddai—‘God Almighty.’ Serve me faithfully and live a blameless life.

• Genesis 18:14a

  Is anything too hard for the Lord?...

• Job 42:2 

“I know that you can do anything, and no one can stop you.

Omnipresent- God is present everywhere at all times.

• Proverbs 15:3 

The Lord is watching everywhere, keeping his eye on both the evil and the good.

• Jeremiah 23:23-24

Am I a God who is only close at hand?” says the Lord.

 “No, I am far away at the same time.

 Can anyone hide from me in a secret place? 

Am I not everywhere in all the heavens and earth?”

says the Lord.

• Psalm 139:7-12

 I can never escape from your Spirit! I can never get away from your presence! If I go up to heaven, you are there; if I go down to the grave,[a] you are there. If I ride the wings of the morning, if I dwell by the farthest oceans, even there your hand will guide me, and your strength will support me. I could ask the darkness to hide me and the light around me to become night—  but even in darkness I cannot hide from you. To you the night shines as bright as day. Darkness and light are the same to you.

Immutable- God is absolutely unchanging, He will will always be the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow....

• Psalm 90:2

 Before the mountains were born, before you gave birth to the earth and the world, from beginning to end, you are God.

• Malachi 3:6

 “I am the Lord, and I do not change. That is why you descendants of Jacob are not already destroyed.

• Numbers 23:19

 God is not a man, so he does not lie. He is not human, so he does not change his mind. Has he ever spoken and failed to act? Has he ever promised and not carried it through? 

• Psalm 33:11

 But the Lord’s plans stand firm forever; his intentions can never be shaken.

Holy- I believe this attribute of God is of great importance, He emphasizes it so much in His Word. Holy means "...To be set apart.." through out scripture when God has revealed himself to Man he always mentions His Holiness.... so as believers we need to take to heart this meaning, because we are also called to be set apart....from the things of this world.

• Psalm 99:9b

... for the Lord our God is holy!

• Habakkuk 1:13a

 But you are pure and cannot stand the sight of evil...

• 2 Corinthians 5:21

 For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ

• 1 Samuel 2:2

There is no one holy like the LORD, Indeed, there is no one besides You, Nor is there any rock like our God.

Righteous- His attribute of righteousness is the way His holiness is expressed when
dealing with men.

Psalm 116:5

How kind the Lord is! How good he is! So merciful, this God of ours!

• Ezra 9:15

 O Lord, God of Israel, you are just. We come before you in our guilt as nothing but an escaped remnant, though in such a condition none of us can stand in your presence.”

• Exodus 9:23-27

So Moses lifted his staff toward the sky, and the Lord sent thunder and hail, and lightning flashed toward the earth. The Lord sent a tremendous hailstorm against all the land of Egypt.  Never in all the history of Egypt had there been a storm like that, with such devastating hail and continuous lightning.  It left all of Egypt in ruins. The hail struck down everything in the open field—people, animals, and plants alike. Even the trees were destroyed.  The only place without hail was the region of Goshen, where the people of Israel lived. Then Pharaoh quickly summoned Moses and Aaron. “This time I have sinned,” he confessed. “The Lord is the righteous one, and my people and I are wrong.

• Psalm 145:17

 The Lord is righteous in everything he does; he is filled with kindness.

• 1 John 1:9

 But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness.

Sovereign- God's sovereignty is how He rules His creation, This shows us that God is in complete control, but he also gives us free will to obey or reject Him.

• Genesis 1:1

 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

• Colossians 1:16-17

 For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together

• Psalm 90:2

 Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the whole world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God.

• Psalm 97:9
  

  For you, Lord, are the Most High over all the earth; you are exalted far above all gods.

Love- TheThis is the attribute that we as humans love to embrace, it is true that God IS love this represents, this is so different then many other gods of different religions who are thought of as angry and hateful.  One true God is so much more, He loves us so much that He wants a relationship with us.

• John 3:16

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

• Ephesians 2:4-5 

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ— by grace you have been saved ...

• 1 Peter 5:6-7

Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.

Merciful-  God's mercy is Him not giving us what we deserve, for example as sinners we all deserve eternal punishment and separation from God.  But in his mercy he offered us a choice, to except His salvation through His son Jesus death on the cross and resurrection, so we can share in eternity with Him in heaven.

• Psalm 103:8

The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love.

• Micah 7:18

 Who is a God like you, who pardons sin and forgives the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance? You do not stay angry forever but delight to show mercy.

• Isaiah 30:18

Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you; therefore he will rise up to show you compassion.
For the Lord is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for him

Trinity- So this one is always a hard one to explain, but again God is Incomprehensible (like how I threw in another attribute of  God :)....... we will never fully understand who He is). So God is one, but he reveals himself in three distinct persons. God The Father , God the Son (Jesus), and God the Holy Spirit. Here is a perfect example of the Trinity.

• Matthew 3:16-17

 As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. ¹⁷ And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”

• John 14:16-18

 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be^] in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.  This is talking about how the trinity works as one unit, in every believer. but still they are all God.

Well I hope you enjoyed this glimpse into the beauty of  who God is, and just how powerful He is, we as believers need to understand just how mighty God, and not be blinded by the the worlds watered down version of who He is. If you want a more in depth study on God's Characteristics(attributes). I would be happy to go more in depth I hope this reignited your curiosity of who God he is amazing,, powerful, majestic, holy, and pure...... Yup I just had to throw more of His attributes at you... I pray you will take to heart these attribute and pray asking God to instill these in you as well. Remember we are created after the image of God so we need to learn to apple these attributes to our own lives to continue grow more like Him!!!!! Until next time!!!!!

Keep it Real...Fiercely Real!!!!! Natasha