Sermon Central
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Self-Sufficiency Series
Contributed by Dan Cormie on Aug 20, 2011 (message contributor)
Summary: Men require community of each other, beyond that we need the provision of God - air to breath, organs (over which we have no control) to function, water, land, food and so much more. Our God is completely unlike us in this - living eternally without need
Dakota Community Church
August 21, 2011
Self-Sufficiency
This is what the LORD says: “Let not the wise man boast of his wisdom or the strong man boast of his strength or the rich man boast of his riches, but let him who boasts boast about this: that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight,” declares the LORD.
This morning we continue: “God’s Incommunicable Attributes” with a look at His self-sufficiency.
The $10 theological word that describes God’s self-sufficiency is aseity.
From the Latin ‘a se’ which means ‘from or by himself’
Big theological words can be discouraging even turn-offs that leave a foul taste in our mouths. Who are we trying to impress anyway?
Most of us use technical words in our various lines of work so why do we get turned off by difficult theological words?
Why even bother with this kind of teaching? It doesn’t help me with my financial struggles? It has no effect on my parenting skills? It isn’t helping me to determine the date of Jesus’ return!
In theology mistakes happen when we project the conditions and limits of our finite existence onto God. These doctrinal lessons stand against that. We impoverish ourselves by embracing an idea of God that is too small.
It is vital for spiritual health to believe and know that God is great!
Come, let us sing for joy to the LORD; let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation. Let us come before him with thanksgiving and extol him with music and song. For the LORD is the great God, the great King above all gods. In his hand are the depths of the earth, and the mountain peaks belong to him. The sea is his, for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land.
Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the LORD our Maker; for he is our God and we are the people of his pasture, the flock under his care.
Grasping the truth of God’s aseity; His self-sufficiency, is a huge part of doing this.
We have already stated that it is our desire to boast only in knowledge and understanding of God so why do we distain this kind of education?
We need to develop an appetite for understanding these things!
God’s aseity or self sufficiency means that He does not need any part of creation in order to exist. God is absolutely independent and self-sufficient in and of his own existence.
24 “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. 25 And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else.
God is self-existent, God has always been...Our Maker exists in an eternal, self-sustaining, necessary way, necessary, that is, in the sense that God does not have it in Him to go out of existence, just as we do not have it in us to live forever. We necessarily age and die, because it is our present nature to do that; God necessarily continues forever unchanged, because it is His eternal nature to do that. - J.I. Packer Concise Theology
Self-sufficiency means that:
1. God is Self-Existent
In the beginning God…
There was a time, though "time" is not the right word, when God, in the unity of His nature “One” subsisting equally in three Divine Persons, dwelt all alone.
There was as yet no heaven, where His glory is now manifested; He had not created it yet.
There was no earth to engage His attention.
There were no angels singing His praise; no universe to be upheld “by the power of His word.
There was nothing and no one, but God; not for a day, a year, or an age, but "from everlasting."
During eternity past, God was alone: self-contained, self-sufficient, self-satisfied; in need of nothing.
If a universe, angels, or human beings had been needed by Him in any way, they also would have been called into existence from all eternity.
The creating of them added nothing to God.
2. God is Self-Attesting
God’s knowledge is complete in Himself and He presents truth that comes only from Himself.
What He knows is real and true. He looks to no one else to inform His understanding or to guide Him in what is true or false.
God has no need of others to provide him with knowledge.
As men we search for ultimate truth. We probe religious and secular authority.
We examine and analyze our experiences and circumstances diving to the depths of our ability to reason; however, truth is found only in God.
