Bible Studies
| Study Outline – Jude 1:3. The fundamentals of THE FAITH |
| “Beloved, while I was making every effort to write you about our common salvation, I felt the necessity to write to you appealing that you contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints.” |
| The primary theme of Jude’s letter is seen in this exhortation to fight for the faith. “The faith” refers to that which is believed – the sum total of revealed Biblical Truth. In other words it is a fight for the Word of God. In exhorting his readers to fight for the faith, Jude is calling for defending the Biblical doctrines of Christianity and preserving the integrity and purity of the faith. |
| WHAT THEN IS “THE FAITH”? |
| There are 7 key things – fundamentals (basics) - that consist of the core of our Biblical faith. Remove one of these seven and you do not have a faith to fight for. 7 FUNDAMENTALS OF THE FAITH 1. GOD- creator of all things 2. THE BIBLE – Inspiration and Inerrancy 3. DEITY OF JESUS CHRIST 4. VIRGIN BIRTH 5. HYPOSTATIC UNION 6. THE DEATH BURIAL AND RESURRECTION OF CHRIST 7. THE PHYSICAL BODILY RETURN OF CHRIST |
| Fundamental 1 – God WHO IS GOD? |
| God revealed Himself to Moses and His people as the God who is DISTINCT (separate/different) from creation - Isaiah 44:6-8 Definition of God (based on limited biblical passages): God is the invisible (Colossians 1:15), personal, eternal and living Spirit (John 4:24), distinguished from all other spirits by several kinds of attributes. The attributes of God are His essence, what makes God who He is. (qualities or characteristics). ATTRIBUTES OF GOD ARE: Sovereign (ultimate authority), Just, Eternal Life, Love, Veracity, Immutable Absolute Righteousness, Omnipotent, Omniscience, Omnipresent. We can also KNOW GOD by His Names. To a Jew/Hebrew a name says something about the character, the back ground, and attributes about someone/something. So the names of God tell us something about who He is, and what He can do. 1. EL “EL” This is a standard or generic (basic) name in Semitic languages for deity (Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic, and Ethiopic). The attributes of God are generally connected with this title “EL”, or God to express His character and action |
| a) EL ELYON |
| It means: The “LORD MOST HIGH” - Genesis 14:18-20,22 |
| This name emphasizes the exalted (high, glorious, dignified) status of God. It means that He has overwhelming power, emphasizing His supreme majesty. This name deals with HIS SOVEREIGNTY. Sovereignty means: possessing supreme power, highest authority, supreme volition. God is the boss! So this name “El Elyon” emphasizes God as the owner of the heavens and the earth and therefore the one who has the right to rule the heavens and the earth. KEY FACT: God does not exist for our benefit (advantage/profit/use): we exist to know and glorify Him as God, the only true God |
| b) EL – ROI |
| It means THE GOD WHO SEES – Genesis 16:13 |
| This is where God gave a prophesy that Ishmael will be a wild donkey of a man, and that his hands will be against everyone. So Hagar calls Him the God who sees, because He knows the future. He is omniscient. OMNISCIENCE describes God’s Complete, Simultaneous and eternal knowledge of all things. God’s knowledge is: Complete – He knows all the knowable. He does not increase in knowledge God is PERFECT in Knowledge – Job 37: 14-16 God’s knowledge is: Simultaneous – He knows everything at one time He knows all things – Psalms 139:1-6 / Jeremiah 17:9-10 / Acts 1:24 / Hebrews 4:13/Psalms 147:4 We can evaluate things of the past, see our failures and learn from them. We can speculate about the future and make accurate guesses, but none of us knows exactly what will happen tomorrow. But God knows the end from the beginning – Isaiah 46:8-11 / 42:9 / Acts 2:23 / 15:18. Because He is omniscience God knows everything about your life billions of years ago, and being perfect, He provided a perfect provision and perfect solution for every problem we would ever face. God has always known everything-- every thought, every motive, every event, every action of every person in the world billions of years before they ever came into existence. God is God because He is Omniscience – all knowing and has ALL- KNOWLEDGE. EL ROHI means the God who sees |
| c) El Olam |
| It means: The eternal and everlasting God - Genesis 21:33/Isaiah 40:28 This name of God emphasizes God’s attribute of eternal life, that God has neither beginning nor ending. He is the self-existing one. You cannot trace the beginning of His existence because it does not exist. (creator creature distinction). God exists endlessly! He is infinite (limitless) with no beginning or ending, and all of His attributes are infinite - Psalm 90:2/Isaiah 26:4;40:28;63:16/Jeremiah 10:10 What this means for us? That God is limitless in existence, and therefore knows everything about us, for He neither slumbers nor sleep - Isaiah 40:28 He is always there for us, never leaving us nor forsaking us, no matter what we are going through, even to the end of the age. Therefore let all fear seize! Isaiah 43 |
| d) EL BETHEL - This means the God of Bethel - Genesis 28:10-22; 31:13; 35 |
| This is where he sets up an alter at Bethel, and God reconfirmed His covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. God is a covenant making and keeping God. It emphasizes His faithfulness. Only in the bible do you have God entering into a legal contract with human kind. This has tremendous implications, that God sort of accommodate Himself to us, and enters into legal contractual arrangements with human beings, in order to spell out who He is and what He is going to provide for us, so that we can count on it. God is a covenant making and keeping God - Psalm 25:14. No matter where one stops to do a study in the Bible, whether it be Moses or Joshua, or Samuel, or David, or Jeremiah, or Ezekiel, or Isaiah, or even our Lord in His Incarnation in the New Testament, that they know something? It is almost as if they look across time and space and wink at each other. For the way that Elijah lived, prayed and depended on God has a parallel in Joshua's life. Abraham and Jeremiah seem to be almost identical in their 'faith-walk' with God. It is as if they know a secret. And the author maintains that this secret is an understanding of 'covenant.' God is a covenant making and keeping God. It emphasizes His faithfulness. Deuteronomy 7:9 - Faithfulness means: trustworthy, dependable, reliable. The faithfulness of God to the believer is expressed in many ways in the Bible. 1. The faithfulness of God to forgive sin - 1 John 1:9 2. The faithfulness of God in keeping us saved - Jude 24,1/ 2 Timothy 2:13 / 2 Thessalonians. 3:3 3. The faithfulness of God in times of pressure and testing - 1 Corinthians 10:13 / James 1:2-4 4. The faithfulness of God in providing for us under the partnership of Christ - 1 Corinthians 1:9 / 2 Peter 1:3-4 5. The faithfulness of God in keeping His promises to us - Hebrews 10:23 6. The faithfulness of God to us in times of suffering - 1 Peter 4:19 7. The faithfulness of God in providing for the believer's eternal future - 1 Thessalonians 2:12/5:24 |
| e) El GIBBOR - This is a name that speaks of God’s power and might - Jeremiah 32:16-18 |
| Affirming God’s power in creation (27:5) bolstered Jeremiah’s faith in God’s ability to deal with the siege of Jerusalem. Psalm 93:1 ; 96:6. El Gibbor is also used to describe the Messiah in Isaiah 9:6. El Gibbor DEALS WITH God’s omnipotence. Omnipotence means: God is all powerful, able to do all things, but doing all that which is compatible according to His Holy character or essence |
| f) EL ELOHE ISRAEL - It means: God the God of ISRAEL: Genesis 32:22-28 / 33:18-20 |
| Jacob (now Israel) is emphasizing that God is His God personally. He is the God who has reconfirmed the covenant He has with Abraham, Isaac and himself – JACOB. This also emphasizes that God is A PERSONAL GOD, not some impersonal force. Not some idol of wood or stone. He is a personal God. |
| g) EL SHADDAI - It means: God Almighty |
| This is one of the most popular names for God that is used in the OT. SHADDAI is used at least 48 times IN THE OT. It appears mostly in the book of Job 31 times. This indicates that it is a very ancient title for God. Exodus 6:3 / Ezekiel 10:5 THE SEPTUAGINT translated SHADDAI with the Greek word PANTOKRATOR. PANTO – MEANING “all” and KRATOR – MEANING “power”. So it means the all powerful one. In the New Testament the equivalent of this name is used about 10 times. Examples: 2 Corinthians 6:18 – Lord Almighty ; Revelation 1:8 – The Almighty ; Revelation 4:8 – Lord God Almighty ; Revelation 16:14 – God Almighty ; Revelation 19:6 – Lord God Almighty The Jews thinks that “El Shaddai” has to do with the power of God, HIS OMNIPOTENCE. Jerome translated the Hebrew OT into Latin and He used the Latin word “omnipotence” to translate EL SHADDAI, FROM THE RABBI IN BABYLONIAN TALMUD, many of the rabbis understood this to mean THE SELF SUFFICIENCY OF GOD. Therefore there is a connection here of the idea of the power of God and the sufficiency of God. Because God is “ALL POWERFUL”, He is “SUFFICIENT” (more than enough) for every situation and problem in life. This is nowhere better illustrated than in Genesis 17:1-8, where we have the first occurrence of the name. Abraham was 75 years old when God made a promise to him, and when he came into the land of Canaan - Genesis 12:1-4. At age 86 (11 years after the promise) he became the father of Ishmael- Genesis 16:16. Then 13 more years passed without a son being born to Sarah (Genesis 12:1-3; 15:3). When God was ready for Abraham He revealed Himself to him as THE ALMIGHTY God because what He was about to say again to Abram seems impossible with men but not with Him - Genesis 17:1-8. The fulfillment – Genesis 21:1-7. To a man 99 years old, and “as good as dead” (Hebrews 11:12), He said, “I am Almighty God [El Shaddai], ... I will make my covenant between me and thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly.” - Gen. 28:3,4. In the midst of the impossible, with God all things are possible because He is ALMIGHTY GOD! |
| h) YHWH - JEHOVAH - ADONAI |
| YHWH This is distinctly/clearly proper name of God. It is never used to refer to any pagan gods; neither is it used in regard to men – Exodus 6:3 / Psalm 83:18/ Jeremiah 16:2. It appears 6823 times in the OT, occurring first in Genesis 2:4, where it is joined with Elohim. Yahweh is used 164 times in Genesis, and it appears 1800 times in Exodus through Joshua. Exodus 20:7/Leviticus 24:16 - As a result for fear of God’s judgment, the Jews could not call this name. Based on Hebrew sacred Tetragrammaton – means four letters. This is because in early Hebrew especially there were no vowels points. All you have is consonants. Note that over the years you have a tremendous number of German scholars working on Hebrew, and you had a number of Jews living in the area of Germany who contributed to this. So, in German the “Y” is written with a “J” , and the “W” is pronounced like a “V”. So that’s where you pick up your letters “J” and “V”, and the you have “JH” and “VH”. Another word that is used in Hebrew, which is a generic term for “LORD” is the Hebrew word “ADONAY”. So if you took the vowels “E”,”O”, and “A”, and inserted them, you come up with the name “JEHOVAH”. JEHOVAH Jehovah is not a Hebrew name at all. It is a compound of Yahweh plus Adonai. Now the Jews treated the name of God with reverence. They would never pronounce the name Yahweh. When they added vowels point to it, they actually added vowel points so that the vowel point would remind the readers to read Adonai instead of Yahweh. So it was that compound of the consonants from one name, and the vowel point from another name that produced “Jehovah”. Yahweh is a personal name for God that is emphasize as a covenant name for God. So whenever they see that name, it is going to remind them that this is the God that has entered into a covenant relationship with Abraham, Moses, and that this is the God of Israel. Key verse for Yahweh - Exodus 3:14. This name is based on the Hebrew verb HAYAH which means: “to be”, or “to exist”. So it is generally understood that the name of God emphasizes His existence, referring to God as the self-existing one, and that He is the one that has no beginning or ending. As it takes many rays to make up the pure light of the sun, so it takes various descriptions to give us a true conception of the being and glory of God. No man is able to receive the whole revelation of His majesty at once. This is why it was the special purpose of God, who is one, to reveal Himself to saints of old in the development of their spiritual life in different names and titles of His nature and purpose. In God’s redemptive relation to man, various compound names of Jehovah are found which reveal Him as meeting every need of man, from his lost state to the end. These compound names are: |
| i) JEHOVAH-JIREH - Yahweh Yireh. This name means: “The Lord will provide” - Genesis 22:13-14. |
| In context this name means: the Lord will provide a sacrifice. God always provides, adequately when the times come. This is in the context of Abraham following God’s command to sacrifice Isaac. Mount Moriah is the same place as the temple mount, where the Dom of the rock is today, and it is at that same place where Abraham built an alter to sacrifice Isaac. The ram is a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ, who dies in our place just as that ram died in the place of Isaac. The message is at that time that God is the one who supplies. Actually it comes from the same root as the God who sees. He is the God who sees and supplies the needs. So the emphasis in this name is that God supplies all of our needs, especially the need for salvation. His pre-vision means His pro-visionj) |
| j) JEHOVAH - RAPHA - It means: “The Lord who heals” - Exodus 15:26 |
| This is when God assured Israel that He, their healer, will prevent the diseases of Egypt from affecting them if they will heed His voice, do what is right, listen and obey His word. The word Rapha itself means: “To mend (restore), as a garment is mended, to repair, as a building is reconstructed, to cure, as a diseased person is restored”. In Jeremiah 8:22 the Hebrew word “Rapha” is translated as “physician”. Therefore Jehovah Rapha is the GREAT PHYSICIAN! The term “heal” is used: 1. To express God’s grace in restoring healthy life – Psalm 103:3 2. To describe the healing of a broken heart - Psalm 147:3 ( A broken heart is a heart that is overcome by grief: (heartache, pain, unhappiness, sorrow) or despair: (hopelessness, depression, misery ) 3. To recover the backslider from backsliding – Jeremiah 3:22. This is used in the context of the spiritual life. God can therefore heal and restore the spiritual life of a believer 4. To indicate removal of bodily infirmity – Genesis 20:17 ; 2 Kings 20:5 CONCLUSION: God WHO IS JEHOVAH RAPHA heals body, soul and spirit; all levels of man's being ! Disease has four sources: (1) God (2) Satan – Job 1:12 (3) sins of ancestors – 2 Samuel 12:15 (4) breaking of physical, mental/emotional, or moral laws of nature -2 Chronicles 16:12 God as the source of disease All early peoples attributed events and miracles to the supernatural, either to various gods or to evil spirits. The Hebrews were different by being strong monotheists, attributing all wonders and miracles to the one true God who had revealed himself to them (Isaiah 45:21). Therefore their conclusion is God was responsible for everything, including disease and evil (Isaiah 45:7). This same God could also give material blessings, health, and heal all diseases (Psalm 103:3). To the Hebrews, God could give health or sickness, and in either case he had his purpose or reason. One purpose of disease from God was punishment for wrongdoing - (2 Samuel 24:1, 12–16; 1 Corinthians 10:8 ; 11:30). In the Hebrew mind, even when the immediate cause of the disease and death was obvious—as many poisonous snakes biting people in the camp—the response was not to kill all the snakes but to pray to God for forgiveness (Numbers 21:4–9). Leprosy, which literally means “a smiting,” was a devastating disease sent by God to punish individuals who sinned - (Numbers 12; 2 Kings 5:27). God also sent disease to demonstrate his power or to protect his people. The ten plagues in Egypt illustrate the former; the elimination of Sennacherib’s army the latter (2 Kings 19:34–36). |
| k) JEHOVAH-NISSI - It means: "The Lord my Banner." Exodus 17:8-16 |
| BANNER in Hebrew is the word: “deḡel” which means: ‘standard’ “Degel” also means: flag, that is, an ornamental piece of cloth on the end of a staff or pole as a leader’s signal. Another Hebrew word that carries the same meaning as “degel” is “NES”. It means: a signal pole, i.e., a wood pole tall enough to be prominently seen when raised - Numbers 21:8. Jesus is our “nes”-standard on the cross that delivers us from eternal death. “NES” also means: a signal, i.e., that which is a non-verbal communication Numbers 26:10; Jeremiah 4:6. Because banners, or flags have ever expresses the intangible loyalties of the soul, men have been prepared to defend a particular standard with their last breath. The surrender of their flag would have meant dishonor, for as it waved in the wind it seemed to say on behalf of the fighters, ‘HERE WE STAND, AND THIS IS THE POSITION WE ARE PREPARED TO DEFEND TO THE DEATH”. In the moral realm, valiant souls were prepared to die rather than lower the standard, because they knew the lower the standard, the lower the living. There is THE ABSOLUTE standard FOR LIVING that God has set for his own people, that standard is HIMSELF (absolute righteousness). In the wilderness each tribe was marked by its own banner - Numbers 1:52; 2:2–3, etc. In Psalm 20:5 the word is used for a flag of battle. Most often used by an army (see Song of Solomon 6:4, 10), banners are sometimes mentioned symbolically (Exodus 17:15; Song of Solomon 2:4). Exodus 17:8-15 - The presence and power of Jehovah were the banner under which they enlisted, by which they were animated and kept together. Jehovah was the cause of their victory! When the LORD Himself is our banner He will lead us always in triumph. The war He participates in and expects us to fight in beneath His banner is: that of light against darkness truth against error good against evil, holiness against sin, church against the world In the war with Amalek, Jehovah could have done without Israel, but Israel could not have done without JEHOVAH - John 15:5/ Galatians 5:16. In all our battles against the world, Flesh and the Devil, it is so necessary that God is before us, and with us as our Jehovah-Nissi. No matter how strong the enemy, or continuous his attacks, Jehovah Nissi is with us, girding us with strength, teaching our hands to war (Psalm 18:32,34), and His banner over us is love (Song of Solomon 2:4) |
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