Statement of Faith Article Eleven – God the Father

Dads or fathers often gets projected onto what we think of. And we think of God, especially as we think of God as father. If our dad was loving, supportive, kind, caring, compassionate, patient, it's really easy for us to see and understand that to be true about how God could be as father, or if our God or if our dad was absent and then and flaky, unkind withholding affection, then that too gets projected on to God as well. And it's just kind of something that's inherently built in us to look for God as father. But we can tangibly just see our earthly fathers right in front of us.

This is something we'll be exploring more this morning as we continue our Communion Sunday series. So normally this summer we're going through First Thessalonians on Communion Sunday. On Communion Sundays, we're going through our statement of faith article by article this morning, looking at this is what we believe the Bible to plainly teach about God as Father. So, brothers and sisters, would you read this statement? What we believe to be true about God as Father with me?

We believe there is only one God and Father of all who reigns with providential care over the universe and all creation according to the purposes of his grace. The Father is revealed through his Son, Jesus Christ. God is father to those who by faith in Jesus Christ become children of God. God is love. We believe that the Father concerns himself mercifully in the affairs of all people.

He is a father to the fatherless and protector of widows. He hears and answers prayer. He has blessed us in Jesus Christ with every spiritual blessing in heavenly place. So normally on a Sunday morning, we take a passage of Scripture and we try to expose its meaning. That's what expository preaching is.

But this morning and on our Communion Sundays lately, we're just going through each portion of our statement of faith. This statement of faith does not supersede the Bible's authority, but rather we believe it gets its authority from God's word. So we believe that this statement and all of our statement of faith just basically what the Bible teaches plainly about a subject that it speaks to. And so this morning we're looking at God as Father. And so we'll kind of go through line by line what we believe to be true about God as Father.

So the first thing we believe, as we just read and said together, we believe there is only one God and Father of all who reigns with providential care over the universe and creation. We've covered elsewhere that we believe that there's only one God who rules and reigns. But it's worth noting too here that we believe God is the most high God. There's no other God like Him. He's without rival, without equal.

To even try to compare how far he is from the next closest competitor would to be a disjustice because or an injustice because there's just nothing that can even compare. He is without rival. He's without equal. And within the Trinity, there's three persons. There's the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

And we're happily part of the efca. I'm happily ordained in the efca. But it is strange that there's not a specific article in the statement of faith just about God the Father. There's a specific article about God the Son and God the Spirit, but not one about God the Father. So we have our own.

So our church has added this. And so there's plenty of scriptural supports for every line that we're looking at this morning. But we'll just for the sake of time, highlight one or two. So this morning when we look at what we believe, the first thing we believe that God there's only one God, and He's Father of all. We're looking at Romans 8:28, 28:30, and then first Corinthians 8:6, Romans 8:28:30.

There we read, we know that all things work together for the good of those who love God, who are called according to his purpose. For those he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, so that he would be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. And those he predestined he also called. And those he called, he also justified. And, and those he justified he also glorified in First Corinthians 8:6.

For us, there is one God, the Father. All things are from him, and we exist for Him. And there is one Lord, Jesus Christ. All things are through him, and we exist through Him. Friends, from front to back, the Scriptures declare that God is Father, and he rules and reigns over everything.

There's not one small inch. There's not one inch of creation which he does not declare. That's mine. He declares it all belongs to Me. There's nothing that exists in creation that doesn't have to report to God.

He's over everything. Theologians would use the term that say that he's sovereign. And so maybe we're familiar with that term, sovereign. And we have sovereign nations that exist within the state of Wisconsin. Basically, that just means no one tells God what to do.

He Exists over and above everything. He's the most sovereign sovereign. And so how does he do this or how does he. What does this function, play out? Well, we believe that he carries it out with his providential care.

And at the root word of that is the word provide. God provides for every single one of our needs. And this is kind of a tension that we walk in because does God provide for us? Absolutely. Do we make the food ourselves?

Yes. But did God provide for it at the same time? Of course. Does God order our steps? Yes.

Do we walk in those steps? Yes. And so we have this kind of tension of is it one or the other? Well, it's both. It's a both, and it's not mutually exclusive.

I think sometimes we have this idea that we have total free agency. But I would say that the Bible teaches we have the ability to make meaningful choices. Right. Because Acts 2 is a prime example where God's word there says Peter says he's like, hey, as part of God's plan that Jesus was to be killed. But then he says, but you killed him.

And so is it one or the other? Well, it's both. And so how does God provide? Well, he. We don't necessarily know how he does, but he does.

It's not one, it's not the other. God's providence is not at odds with our responsibilities. He really does provide for us, and we really do play a role in that too. Maybe it's helpful to think about it like this. Charles Spurgeon would say that if you think of it like train tracks, on one side is God's providence or God's sovereignty.

They're not the same term, but they're close enough. And his man on the other side is man's responsibility. They're running parallel. They're not at odds with each other. But the further and further we look along the train tracks, they look like they're becoming one of the same.

Maybe it's helpful to think about it like this, that God provides using our choices. God knew the choices we make, and then he works out his plan through our choices. So how does it all work? I don't know. And if you are very certain how it does work, please let me know.

But we do know that both things can be and are true. Regardless though, he does take care of us. And Jesus tells his disciples not to worry. In Matthew 6, he uses two specific examples. He talks about the sparrows.

He talks about the wildflowers, two things that exist and grow and thrive and flourish apart from human interaction. God takes care of those things. And he writes what does he also say? Matthew 6 We're worth even more than the sparrows. Can we trust God to provide Absolutely everything that God reigns over is cared for, including even you and me.

Because in his providing care, he not only gets us what we need, but he gets us everything we would ask for if we knew everything that he knew. He gives us everything we'd ask for if we knew everything that he knew. And since He's a father of all fathers, we know he can be trusted. And he does provide. He does care.

We can come to him with concerns and he'll provide the exact right thing at the exact right time, the exact right way. We can trust that God will come through for us. And he does it for you and I, along with all of creation. But how does he do it though? Or.

Or why does he do it? He does it according to the purposes of his grace. We believe there is only one God and Father of all who reigns with providential care over the universe and creation according to the purpose of his grace. This line touches on something incredibly important, right? He rules and reigns over everything.

He provides care. Absolutely. Why does he do it or how does he do it? Well, he does it according to his purposes. In other words, we don't know inside the mind of God, but we know that he does it and he's doing it according to his purposes that he can be trusted with.

We see this taught throughout the Scriptures, but we'll just look at Psalm 47 here briefly.

Clap your hands all you peoples. Shout to God with a jubilant try or with a jubilant cry for the Lord the Most High is awe inspiring. A great king over the whole earth. He subdues peoples under us and nations under our feet. He chooses for us our inheritance, the pride of Jacob whom He loves.

Selam God ascends among shouts of joy the Lord with the sound of a trumpet Sing praise to God. Sing praise. Sing praise to our King. Sing praise. And so we've seen here he subdues them, but also he's giving commands that we're supposed to do Sing his song of wisdom For God is king of the whole earth.

God reigns over the nations. God is seated on his holy throne. The nobles of the peoples have assembled with the people of the God of Abraham for the leaders of the earth belong to God. He is greatly exalted. Why does God do what he does?

Well, we can't save for absolute certainty. We see there in different portions of Scripture that He does things for certain Purposes and certain reasons. But other times we don't fully know he does something. Some things we know all the aspects. Some things we know part of the aspects.

It's been said that God's often doing about 10,000 things in our lives, or maybe aware of three of them. I once heard a pastor put it like this. If we're looking about trusting God's sovereignty, trusting in God's providence for us. If you could see. If you and I could see, like the whole script of our life verbatim, what's going to happen at this time, this place, and so on and so forth, I think a lot of us would be tempted to scribble things out, wouldn't we?

Like at age 9, you lose the league championship. Cross that out. They cheated anyways. And write in that we won. We didn't.

We won when I was 10, by the way. And then at age 14, let's say you get rejected by your crush in front of the whole school. Well, scribble that out. Age 18, maybe you're looking back and like, ah, that's actually. That wasn't.

That's not a great choice about college or a career path. I'm not doing that. Age 30, start to have trouble. Like, well, you feel aimless. Okay, well, okay.

This feels like a crisis situation. 43 Months, starts to go longer than our money does. And so, okay, well, that's a hard situation. Cross that out, erase it. Age 61, you hear the words you never want to hear a doctor say right after retirement.

That word cancer, that certainly sounds unpleasant. I'll get rid of that. Age 82, you're forced to move from a home that's the only home you've ever known as an adult. Get rid of that. My point is, I think that a lot of us, self included, would be tempted to try to control or get rid of these things that are really unpleasant things we would never ask for, things that if we're being really honest, we would like to and maybe have shaken our fist at God, said why.

Maybe we've said things that we wouldn't repeat.

But if God is good, if He's a trustworthy father, we can know that he uses and plans everything according to the purpose of his grace, even the scenarios that we would have never asked for. And mit, I can start talking up and down about the scenarios that I never would have asked for, that he's turned around and used for good. But at the same time, it doesn't mean they don't hurt. We can trust him. He's faithful Even still worthy to be trusted even when we cannot see Him.

There's some things we maybe won't see this side of Heaven, how they work out. Again, Spurgeon puts it this way. There's a quote I have up in my office. He says, God is too good to be unkind and too wise to be mistaken. When we cannot trace his hand, we must trust his heart.

God offers us the chance to do that. And we believe there's only one God and Father of all who reigns with providential care over the universe and creation according to the purpose of his grace. We also believe that God the Father is revealed through His Son, Jesus Christ. God the Father is revealed through His Son, Jesus Christ. Our scriptural support we're going to use Here is John 14, 9, 11.

Jesus said to him, have I been among you all this time and you do not know me? Philip, the one who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, show us the Father? Don't you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words I speak to you, I do not speak on my own.

The Father who lives in Me does His works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me. Otherwise, believe because of the works themselves. And so there's a. There's some really important theological implications here, and also some really important practical, like boots on the ground implications.

First, we can. We can only know the Father through the Son. You can't know what the Father's like if you don't know Jesus. And that's a really important thing because Jesus is making a divinity claim here. Sometimes people say, well, Jesus never claimed to be God.

Well, he does. It's just not in the Western way that we're used to saying, like, oh, I'm God. No, he makes it. I and the Father are one. You can't know the Father if you don't know me.

He's talking about here. He's giving a peek behind. How does the Trinity work if somebody's seen Jesus and they know what the Father's like? In everyday language, the Father is only knowable if you first know the Son. It's impossible to know just one person of the Trinity practically.

This tells us that our God is knowable. The God of the universe is knowable. I think sometimes we just say a truth statement in church and then we're just like, yeah, that's great. That's cool. No, God wants to be known.

He's noble and he wants to be known. Throughout the Old Testament, there's this refrain of, and you will know that I am your God. God is noble and he wants to be known by us. Who are we that he would want to know us? We need to have an accurate idea of who we are.

If that doesn't blow our minds, we need to reorient ourselves. Our God is high, holy, lifted up. He's the most high God, but He not only can't he be known, he wants to be known by you and me. That's incredibly good news, friends. God can be known and he wants to be known.

Paul writes this in Philippians 3:10. My goal is to know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to his death. And we can know God. How do we do that? Well, we know him by spending time with Him.

That's how we get to know anybody, isn't it? We know God by spending time with Him. We know God by hearing from him in his word. We know God by talking with him in prayer. We know God by talking about him and with him and to him with his people.

We can see what he's like. We believe that God the Father is revealed through His Son, Jesus Christ. We also believe that God is the Father to those who by faith in Jesus Christ become children of God. We believe that God is the Father to those who by faith in Jesus Christ become children of God.

Friends, one reason the Bible is written is to push back what we think God is like with what he's actually like. That's one reason the Bible is written, to push back what we think God is like with what he's actually like. Left to our own devices, we can get some stuff right. Romans 1 says we should look and know, see the created world, know that there's a Creator. But we're going to get a lot wrong left to our own devices.

So that's why God's Word exists. There's a few. Just two popular phrases I'm going to pick on if you've used them, don't feel bad. They're wrong, but don't feel bad. One is, some people will say, wow, you know, when they die, we become angels.

No, we don't. We don't. Scripture says we'll judge angels, be above the angels. We don't get wings. That's too small of a view.

And it's just faintly. It's just frankly, unbiblical. We don't become angels. That's a small view of. Well, we will have resurrection bodies someday and it'll be Even better, the angels.

Scripture says angels long to see God is like to understand the salvation. But also too another really popular one is everybody says, well, we're all children of God. Is everybody made in God's image? Absolutely. Is everybody made by God?

100%. But is everyone a child of God? No.

John 1:12 13 teaches, but to all who did receive him, he gave them the right to be children of God. To those who believe in his name, who are born not of natural descent or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. Only those who put their faith in Christ become children of God. This serves as a good reminder to keep coming back to our Bibles. Our Bibles are the standard.

God's Word is a standard that sets all other standards. The Bible is our ultimate authority because it's the very words of God. We should look to the Bible to speak to something. Can things be true and not be in the Bible? Yes, the Pythagorean theorem is not in the Bible.

But can something contradict the Bible and still be true? Absolutely not. This is a good reminder to come back to our Bible that tests what's true not only about God, but about everything. I like country music and as good as it can be sometimes there's a lot of poor theology. There's.

But also it should not be. That shouldn't be where we base. Neither should nursery rhymes or tiktoks or popular Christmas movies. Because if we're looking at these things, then we'd be missing out on what's most deeply true, like this wonderful truth. We can know God as Father by faith in Christ.

Maybe our earthly dads were great and maybe they weren't. Maybe they were so. So maybe they treated you in a way you didn't want to be treated. Or in the perfect way. And they got a lot of things right, but they still fall short.

This picture, though, that we have in Scripture of God as Father, he does the exact right thing at the exact right time in the exact right way. Every single time, without fail, he loves us far more than we could ever possibly fathom. This should shape how we act. Right? If you belong to a family, that should shape how you act.

Should shape how I act. Should shape how we all act. If we know our Heavenly Father has the cattle on a thousand hills. That's just scripture's way of saying he owns everything. It all belongs to Him.

Should we then struggle to believe that he will take care of us? Absolutely not. At the same time, too, if our Father is holy we're called to look and be holy. But another thing that's really, really cool, really special, just awe, right? We use that word awesome a lot.

But this is truly awesome because we have access to our father. Tim Keller describes it like this. He says, the only person who dare wakes up a king at 3am for a glass of water is a child. We have that kind of access to God anytime, anywhere, for anything.

Brothers and sisters, let's enjoy that. Because we believe that God is the father to those who by faith in Jesus Christ become children of God. We also believe that God is love. We believe that God is love. First John 4, 8 says, the one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.

There's not much expounding to do here. There's not. The meaning is plain, right? We understand what love is, but it's maybe helpful to kind of talk about how does this work out then? So God is love.

He's the standard of love. God can't do something unloving any more than I can do something that's not. Hunter Newton like, everything that God has and does, he does 100% all the time, always. God is all of his attributes all the time. He's incapable of doing something that's unloving.

And maybe some of us are like, well, but what about this? But what about this? And that's not to say there's going to be things that we don't understand or frankly don't like, or frankly just makes us really upset, want to run far away from God. And he gets those and he cares and he does understand and he knows. But I think just let me just offer.

God doesn't need me to defend Him. But I think just two things might make it more clear to us or more helpful to understand. Why does God do what he do? Well, one, if our God is truly infinitely wise, like if he's infinitely wise, his wisdom knows no limit and we are confined to space and time, however many years we get on Earth, does it not make sense that there's going to be things he does that far exceed what we can grasp? In fact, we should expect not to understand everything that he does.

And two, if I was able to understand everything God did, if I could fully master, fully grasp everything that God is and God does, he wouldn't be a God worth worshiping. He wouldn't be much of a God at all. Instead, we should know it to be true that God is love and everything he does is love. And when we can't understand what he's doing, we can trust his character.

We also believe that the Father concerns Himself mercifully in the affairs of all people. We believe that the Father concerns Himself mercifully in the affairs of all people. He is the Father of mercies and all comfort. In 2 Corinthians 13:4, the support there says, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort. He comforts us in all our afflictions, so we may be able to comfort those who are in any kind of affliction through the comfort we ourselves receive from God.

He looks out for everyone, everywhere, all times, all places. Sometimes modern critics will say, well, he's only the God of like his white man's religion. And that just couldn't be more false. Because if you were like to find the most average, average in terms of just like pure numbers, what a Christian would quote unquote look like. And it's fairly difficult to do it, but just modern polling data like that be the most average Christian would be a teenage girl in the Southeast Asia.

And so God cares about her. He also cares about kids in Lodi and He cares about elderly folks in Europe. And you get the picture. He cares about everyone, always at all times. He's not the God of just the people who have money or the people who don't, or the people who look like this, or the people who speak like this.

He is concerned with and loves all people.

We believe that the Father concerns Himself mercifully in the affairs of all people. We also believe that he's father to the fatherless and protector of widows. Psalm 68:5 says, God in his holy dwelling is a Father of the fatherless and a champion of widows. God cares for those that the world has forgotten about, or maybe those who can't take care of themselves, or those who have no way of. Maybe they just feel forgotten or ignored or worse.

And I love how the CSB translates is that He's a champion of widows. Nobody's more for them than he is. Nobody's more for them than God the Father.

What a wonderful truth to believe, O God, knowing that when it seems that no one else cares, he does. When no one else fights for those who can't fight for themselves, he does because he's the ultimate Father. Who knows, cares, sees, fights for them. We believe that God is a father to the fatherless and he's protector of widows. We also believe too that he hears and answers prayer.

We believe that God the Father hears and answers prayer and Again, I just want to pause on this. Is it not incredible that the architect of creation not only knows our name but wants to hear from us?

That should blow our minds in humble amazement. He's willing to hear from me.

He wants to hear from you. He wants to hear from me. Wow. My goodness. That is incredible.

Prayers throughout the Bible, but we'll highlight just One passage here. Matthew 6. 6. But when you pray, go into your private room, shut your door, and pray to your Father who's in secret, and your Father who sees in secret will reward you. We can pray directly to God, and we don't have to go to anyone to do it for us.

Can we ask others to pray for us? Sure, it's fine. It's biblical. We see that throughout the scriptures. But we can go directly to God.

Whenever, however we talk about, we have this access to God as children of God. First, Timothy 2. 5 Says, for there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man, Jesus Christ. We can approach God the Father anytime, anywhere. Not just when we're in church, not just when we're in our prayer closet, not just when, around the dinner table or before bed, anytime, anywhere, always.

We have access to God. Not just on a day when we've gotten our acts together or when we've quote unquote sinned less, or when we've done things that we're supposed to. Whenever that brings us to just this idea. I think it's important to remind myself, but also remind all of us to if we believe that God put the stars and the sun guy, is there anything we believe he can't do? I know there's probably people in the room that have prayed for one thing for 25 years.

And God keeps saying no or wait, no or wait. But if we believe he can do that, why would we ever stop praying for it? Sometimes people will be quick to say, self included, wow, I don't know if that's really possible or if they can change. Friends, our God wants to hear from us, and our God wants to do what brings him glory and our good. And so the answer, if you've been praying for a certain thing for weeks, days, months, years, and it just keeps being weight or no, don't stop praying.

Sometimes I think we feel we might feel annoying to God. Well, he doesn't want to hear me pray for this thing again or that thing again. He's already heard from me on that. Because we think about this in terms of maybe our earthly Father or earthly relationships, and we think, yeah, but he's got to be. His patience got to be wearing thin.

Oh, they're bringing up that again. But he delights in hearing from us. His patience won't run thin. In fact, it can't.

But how do the mechanics of prayer work? I'm sure a lot of you were wondering that on the way in. How does it actually work? So can we pray to God the Son and pray to God the Spirit? It seems Scripture allows it.

It seems that that's allowed for in God's word there are three persons of the Godhead. But also seems the Scriptures seem to teach that all prayer ultimately ends up before God the Father. And so when we pray directly to the Father by the power of this, by the access we've gained through the Son, by the power of the Spirit, we're praying with the grain of Scripture. Ultimately, it all ends up before the father anyways. Ephesians 2:18 outlines this for through him, through Jesus, we have both have access in one Spirit to the Father.

And I want to share with you this quote from Dr. Fred Sanders. He is a Trinity expert, if that's if it's possible to be such a thing. But I will warn you, the first couple of lines are very dense, but the last two or three are worth it. But you need the first, first few lines to understand the last three. So I warned you.

Here he says, what difference does it make to begin cultivating an alertness to the Trinity in our prayer? Well, here's the difference it makes, he says. It builds on what is already actually going on in prayer. We have an opportunity to bring our experience and our awareness into alignment with the structure of the economy of salvation. In case that's not familiar to you, what he's basically meaning is how do we understand how salvation is carried out, how it works?

It might be wise to restrain ourselves from saying much more than that. But it is possible to say one more thing. Since the economy of salvation as we have seen is the one sure revelation of God's tri unity, then our alignment with it is also in alignment with what has been revealed about the eternal being of God. Not only are we coming to God the Father in a way that echoes the salvation historical unfolding, that just means God's fulfilling of his salvation promises of the Gentiles and the promises to Abraham. But we are coming to God the Father in a way that retraces the path of his sending the Son the Spirit to reveal Himself and redeem us.

And if you've totally zoned out, zone in for this. If you're like he lost me. Come back for this prayer thus opens us up to an eternal trinitarian vista. There's open always already a conversation going on among Father, Son and Holy Spirit. When we pray, we are joining that conversation.

We've been invited to call on God as Father, invited by a spirit of sonship. So Spirit invites us to this that cries out abba Father. That's just like the most intimate, endearing term, Abba Father, how do we do it? As the Eternal Son does.

Friends, our heavenly Father hears prayer. And like Pastor Robert always says, prayer is the most we can do. Should we move our feet and do things? Absolutely. But if we believe that God hears and answers prayer, we should be praying as we do those things.

We believe that he hears and answers prayer. We also believe that he has blessed us, Jesus Christ, with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places. We believe that God the Father has blessed us in Jesus Christ with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places. Ephesians 1:3 says, Blessed is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavens. In Christ, he's given us blessings that we can't even fully understand or fathom or totally comprehend.

So where are these blessings located in heaven and how do they who are they given to us by the Father and why are they ours? Because we're in Christ and so our blessings are far, far longer than we have time for this morning. Let me just. Let's just consider six. Let's just highlight a few of these blessings that are located in the heavens for those who are in Christ.

1. Salvation from sin. 2. Adoption as sons and daughters of God. 3.

Being transformed to become more and more like God. 4. Friends, we are deeply loved by our Maker, the Maker of the universe. 5. Hope in a future with no pain, no suffering.

6. We can have intimacy with God right now. And the list goes on. The blessings we have in the heavens because we're found in Christ are so deep, so wide, and they're given to us by the Father. This is all ours to get, to rejoice in because they've been given to us.

I want to real quickly read again our statement of faith, what we believe about God the Father, and we'll get to some practical what does this mean for us? Let's read this together. We believe there is only one God and Father of all who reigns with providential care over the universe and all creation according to the purposes of his grace. The Father is revealed through His Son, Jesus Christ. God is Father to those who by Faith in Jesus Christ become children of God.

God is love. We believe that the Father concerns Himself mercifully in the affairs of all people. He is a father to the fatherless and protector of widows. He hears and answers prayer. He has blessed us and Jesus Christ with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places.

So this is what we believe to be true about God the Father. But you've heard us saying, we'll keep saying again until kingdom come. Theology should never sit as an out there 30,000 foot idea. Can it be that? Sometimes, yes, but should never sit there because every decision we make is based on a belief, every single decision.

And there's no more important belief about us than what we believe about God. That's why it's so not. Yeah, I can say it's frustrating or just mind boggling when people say, well, I'm not sure what I think about that. What else is there to consider? There's nothing more important to consider than who is God that shapes everything about us.

And especially our view of God as Father is going to plainly affect how we then live. Today we've considered what our church understands the Bible to teach about God the Father. This can surely will have real implications for our lives. And let's just highlight a couple here. That's a preacher's way of saying 5 so 1.

Since we know that God provides for our needs, we should trust him to provide. He said he will, so we should trust that he will. He's proven Himself to us time and time again. We should trust him to provide. And I know this is a lot easier said than done.

It's a lot easier to see things from hindsight, but what's true in the light is still true in the darkness. And even when his provision is different than what we would want or what we think we need, we know he's still giving us everything. Exactly. We need the exact right time in the exact right way. He's shown his provision for sin in the person of Jesus.

He provides for our material needs as well, because we are worth more than even the sparrows. 2. Since we know that God works according to the purposes of his grace, we can be okay with whatever is to come. Doesn't mean we need to be excited about it, but we know that. Okay, well, he's working out to the purpose.

And I've trusted His heart, I've seen Him provide. I can be okay with whatever comes. He does for us what we would have asked for if we knew everything that he knew. 3. Since we know that by faith in Christ we are Children of God.

We should live like we're part of the family. We belong to Him. We've talked about a couple of those implications. We should know that he has the cattle on a thousand hills and they belong to Him. He can provide.

He's holy, so we should be holy. But also we have access to Him. We should act like children of God. 4. Since we know that God hears and answers prayer, we should bring everything to him, both big and small and everything in between.

And he loves to hear it all the time, in all places.

5. Since we know that God is knowable, we should seek to know him above all else. If we can know God, that's the most important thing about us. If we know God or not, what greater good could there be for us than to know Him? There isn't any.

There's no greater good than Him.

There'd be nothing better for us than to know God more and more. And why? Why is that true? Only in him can we be made complete. St. Augustine said that our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you, O Lord.

Only in God can we find the actual deep sigh of the soul where you know something's going to actually be okay. Find real rest for a restless soul. There's nothing greater for us than the greater. There's no greater good for us than to know and enjoy God. Let me call you a word.

It's a good one, but beloved. That's what the Father calls us. He calls us his beloved. Beloved. That is who we are.

That's who we profoundly are. If we are in Christ, we are beloved. So beloved, what we believe about God matters, and it should affect how we live. Should help us go from a scarcity mindset to knowing that God will take care of our needs. We should go from feeling unwanted or unvalued to knowing no, he does see me.

He does bring value. He does care about me. Well, no. It feels like no one listens and no one understands. Our Heavenly Father sure does.

Let's consider this good news and how we should respond if you'd like to talk to someone more about this or you'd like to find someone to pray with. You came in with a burden that's just so heavy that you could not possibly carry it. This morning, we invite you to. You can either talk to me or someone in the back who'll have a name tag on. You can go to this final song right after service.

But friends, our Heavenly Father cares, and he wants to help you be relieved of burdens. And he wants to help you consider more of who he is. And so, as we get ready for our final song, it's a great opportunity to consider how should we respond to God's word, both sung and proclaimed? This morning, I'm going to pray. We'll give you the chance to do just that.

God, you are good, patient, faithful and kind. You're better to us than we could ask or imagine or deserve. And we pray for those who came in with a burden that was heavy. Or as soon as I said the word Father, images of their dad came up that they really didn't want to think about. But God, we pray that you would replace those feelings, those thoughts with.

With who you are. God who knows, God who cares, God who sees, God who understands. We pray that we would enjoy you more as father and we would act like children of the most high. God, we thank you for this morning. The chance to gather under your word is sung, but also sharing and the bread and the cup this morning and your word proclaimed.

God is a gift to know you and be known by you.