(Continued-Chapter III-The God of Revelation)

Let us now look at holiness in its positive aspect. Holiness might be called the purity of God's substance. Of course there are two elements involved: first, His being in this condition; second, His acting in accordance with His pure nature. The first is passive; the second is active. Purity is more of a negative idea; hence the positive element must be added to fill out the picture, which is that of righteousness. Again I wish to quote Dr. Strong who declares that "holiness is that attribute in virtue of which God's being and God's will eternally conform to each other. ... We must maintain that, as truth of being logically precedes truth of knowing, and as a loving nature precedes loving emotion, so purity of substance precedes purity of will."

In analyzing holiness, we might say that it is the energy of the will of God. Purity, being largely a negative concept that connotes the absence of evil, is a passible idea. It is a personal quality that is undergirded by will. But the holiness of God is the free moral activity of the Almighty. Again, holiness is self-affirmation. It is God's self-willing. His holiness is the supreme object of His concern. As in the case of truth and love, the doctrine of God's holiness can be understood fully and adequately only in the light of the doctrine of the triune nature of the Godhead. Upon this point I herewith shall quote Thomasius as given by Dr. Strong: "Holiness is the perfect agreement of the divine willing with the divine being; for as the personal creature is holy when it wills and determines itself as God wills, so is God the Holy One because He wills Himself as what He is (or, to be what He is). In virtue of this attribute, God excludes from Himself everything that contradicts His nature, and affirms Himself in His absolutely good being--His being like Himself."

As a final quotation in this section I wish again to express myself in the form of another statement from Dr. Strong: "The object of God's willing in eternity past can be nothing outside of Himself. It must be the highest of all things. We see what it must be, only when we remember that the right is the unconditional imperative of our moral nature. Since we are made in His image we must conclude that God eternally wills righteousness. Not all God's acts are acts of love, but all are acts of holiness. The self-respect, self-preservation, self-affirmation, self-assertion, self-vindication, which we call God's holiness, is only faintly reflected in such utterances as Job 27:5,6 --'till I die I will not put away mine integrity from me. My righteousness I hold fast, and will not let it go'; 31:37--"I would declare unto him the number of my steps; As a prince would I go near unto him." The fact that the Spirit of God is denominated the Holy Spirit should teach us what is God's essential nature, and the requisition that we should be holy as He is holy should teach us what is the true standard of human duty and object of human ambition. God's holiness moreover, since it is self-affirmation, furnishes the guarantee that God's love will not fail to secure its end and that all things will serve His purpose. Romans 11:36--'For of him, and through him, and unto him, are all things. To him be the glory for ever. Amen.'"

B. Relative Or Transitive Attributes

Let us remember that in the foregoing section we have been studying the immanent or absolute attributes of the Almighty--the very nature of His being--before and independent of creation. In the present section we are to examine the outworking of these absolute attributes in relation to the universe and all things therein.

1. Attributes Related to Time and Space

Concerning God's eternal existence I may quote the following passage: "For I lift up my hand to heaven, And say, As I live for ever" (Deut. 32:40). This passage speaks of God's eternal existence--past, present, future. Nevertheless it is spoken with reference to time and timely things. In Psalm 90:2 God spoke of Himself in relation to the world; "Before the mountains were brought forth, Or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, Even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God." Since Moses was speaking of God and His existence prior to the creation of the world, a better translation of the last phrase of this passage would be "Even from age to age thou wast God." In one's thinking, one may go back throughout the eternity of the past as far as his mind can conceive and there He will find God. Such is the significance of this passage. The Lord chose the elect in Christ "before the foundation of the world" (Eph. 1:4). God is the King of the ages (I Tim. 1:17). In Psalm 102:23-28 the eternity of God is contrasted with the transitory nature of the universe. These and many other passages speak of His eternity in relation to time and earthly things. Eternity is infinite, whereas time has limitations. Since God created the universe, He is related to all things.

God, inhabits eternity (Isa. 57:15). There is no past, present, or future with Him. But, as one has said, eternity is "one eternal now." Of God, Isaiah declared that He is the one who declared "the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done ..." (Isa. 46:10). According to this statement God sees all things--everything throughout time (From beginning to end) and saw it from the very beginning. There is nothing hid from His eyes.

In speaking of God's immensity, we are thinking of Him in relation to space as we know it in the physical realm. In discussing the immanent attributes of God, we saw that He is omnipresent, that is, He is everywhere. There is no place to which anyone may go where God is not to be found. Should one travel to a star farthest from the earth, there he would find God. We speak of illimitable space. It would be better for us to think of God's not being limited and of space, though vast it is, as being limited by His great immensity. When creation began, space began. But God existed prior to that event. Since God is truth, He recognizes space and space-relations in His creation.

2. Attributes Related to Creation

a. Omnipresence

In our thinking of creation, immediately our attention is called to the omnipresence of God. He, being what He is, is everywhere, and penetrates the entire universe. We have seen that He is transcendent above the universe and at the same time is immanent in it. In holding this position, let us remember that His immanency in nature is far from the crass, pantheistic conception of nature as God. God, as we have seen, is a personal, rational being, whereas the universe, as such, is impersonal, inanimate. There is life in the universe only as the Almighty creates and sustains it.

According to Psalm 139, God is everywhere. To Jeremiah the Lord put this question: "Am I a God at hand, saith Jehovah, and not a God afar off?... Do not I fill heaven and earth?" At Mars Hill Paul declared that God is "not far from each one of us; for in him we live, and move, and have our being" (Acts 17:27,28).

There are various statements in the Scriptures which speak of a place that might be properly called the immediate presence of God. For instance, in Psalm 123:1 the Lord is spoken of as "thou that sittest in the heavens." In Psalm 113:5 He is said to have "his seat on high." Again, heaven is called His throne and the earth His footstool. Since God is everywhere, one may ask, how can He be in heaven more than in any other place. The probable answer is that it is in this special place called the heaven of heavens where He manifests, in a special manner, His glory and appears to His created beings. That there is a place which we call heaven is quite manifest from the Scriptures. After His resurrection the Lord Jesus ascended to heaven, to the right hand of the throne of God. There is a locality somewhere in the universe which is in His immediate presence. The Lord Jesus is there at this moment. At the same time He is everywhere, being omnipresent. In the eternal order, concerning which we shall study in the last chapter of this volume, we shall see that the eternal Jerusalem will descend out of the eternal heavens and rest upon the eternal earth. In this place God will be, although being a Spirit He will be everywhere. He will be there in the plentitude of His power.

b. Omniscience

God knows everything. He knows the number of the stars (Ps. 147:4). He knows every sparrow that falls to the ground (Matt. 10:29). He knows the thoughts of men (Acts 15:8). He understands our thoughts afar off (Ps. 139:2). He realizes our need (Matt. 6:8). Nothing is too small for His attention--even the hairs of one's head which are numbered (Matt. 10:30). He knows the past, having a book of remembrance (Mal. 3:16); and the future (Isa. 46:9,10). He foresees the free acts of men in the future (Isa. 44:28). He foresaw the evil acts of the executors of the Messiah (Acts 2:23). Our Lord's statement in Matthew 11:23, "... for if the mighty works had been done in Sodom which were done in thee, it would have remained until this day," shows that He knew what would have been had circumstances been otherwise. Knowledge incomprehensible to man is thoroughly known to God (Ps 104:24). There is no creature that is not manifest in God's sight (Heb. 4:13). Let every man know assuredly that there is nothing he can do which escapes the Almighty's eye. In this connection let him remember that the Almighty is a God of absolute holiness and righteousness and that He deals with each man according to his works, taking, of course, any mitigating circumstances into consideration.

c. Omnipotence

Omnipotence means all-powerful. By it we are to understand that God has all the power necessary to accomplish the things which He purposes and to reach the objectives toward which He is working. The Lord declared, "I am God Almighty." He upholds all things by the word of His power (Heb. 1:3). He does according to what He pleases (Ps. 115:3). He works all things after the counsel of His will (Eph. 1:11). Nothing is impossible to Him (Gen 18:14). "With God all things are possible" (Matt. 19:26). Many and numerous are the passages which show God's ability to do that which He in His infinite love, mercy, righteousness, and holiness purposes to accomplish.

Let us not infer from the doctrine of His omnipotence that He will accomplish that which is self-contradictory or contrary to His nature: for example, the cancellation of an event that has already transpired, or the making of a line between two points which would be shorter than a straight one. These are ridiculous and absurd things and do not come within the providence of a wise, righteous, purposeful God. To do things contrary to His nature is not implied in the doctrine of His omnipotence, such as lying, sinning and doing wrong. To do these things would not be evidence of power but impotence. He has all power to do what is consistent with His will and holiness. The fact that God has all power does not imply that He uses all of it. To assert such a thing would be to make God subservient to His power, whereas the facts are that His holiness and will determine the exercise of His power.

The omnipotence of God likewise implies His own self-imposed limitations. He has power to limit or to direct His energy as His truth, love, and holiness desire.

3. Attributes Related to Moral Beings

a. God's Veracity and Faithfulness or Transitive Truth

God is truth as we have learned. He speaks to His creatures for their good. By veracity and faithfulness we mean the truth or the revelation which God has made known to His creatures in general and to His redeemed people in particular.

The Word of God is True. It can be relied upon absolutely. The psalmist spoke thus of it: "The words of Jehovah are pure words; As silver tried in a furnace on the earth, Purified seven times" (Ps. 12:6). David declared, "More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold; Sweeter also than honey and the droppings of the honeycomb" (Ps. 19:10). "He that hath received his witness hath set his seal to this, that God is true" (John 3:33). Let every man be recognized or considered a liar, but let God be true, declared the Apostle Paul in Romans 3:4. The Word of God is called "the truth of God" by the same apostle in Romans 1:25. The Holy Spirit who inspired the men of God to write the Scriptures is called "the Spirit of truth" (I John 4:6). The Apostle John, in speaking of the testimony of God, said that the Holy Spirit bore witness "because the Spirit is the truth" (I John 5:7). God is called a "faithful Creator" in I Peter 4:19. He is not a man, that He should lie, nor the son of man, that He should repent (Num. 23:19). He is truthful and cannot lie (Titus 1:2; Heb. 6:18). His character guarantees the truthfulness and accuracy of the message which He has given us.

All the biblical writers assumed the reality of the world and the correct and proper adjustment between our senses and this world external to us, when they are functioning normally. When all facts of a given matter are brought to our attention, we can under normal conditions arrive at accurate interpretations of said phenomena. The Lord therefore gave His Word--His infallibly inspired and inerrant Word--to us for our salvation and profit.

The Word of God shall stand fast forever (Isa. 40:8). Not one jot or one tittle shall in anywise pass away from the law until all things are fulfilled (Matt. 5:18). The Lord Jesus declared that the heavens and the earth shall pass away but that His word shall not (Matt. 24:34).

God watches over His word to perform it (Jer. 1:11,12). No word of God is without power (Luke 1:37). The word of God shall not return unto Him void but shall accomplish that whereunto He has sent it (Isa. 55:11). Such promises and statements regarding God's fulfilling His word could be multiplied indefinitely but these suffice. Let us always bear in mind that the Scriptures are absolutely true and accurate, that God will fulfill every promise He has made in His Word, and that He will carry out every threat of punishment to the wicked.

b. Mercy and Goodness, or Transitive Love

God has commended His love toward us (Titus 3:4). To Israel the Lord said that He had loved her with an everlasting love (Jer. 31:3). "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have eternal life" (John 3:16). The Lord has granted unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness (II Pet. 1:3). "He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not also with him freely give us all things?" (Rom. 8:32). God's heart of love causes Him to seek that which will bring blessing to His creatures in time, and their eternal salvation--even at the infinite cost of the sacrifice of His only Begotten Son, as we shall learn later. His goodness, love, and mercy have led Him to provide everything for our welfare during our pilgrimage in this life and to provide a place of Blessedness with Himself forever and ever throughout all eternity. To those who had accepted the love, mercy, and grace of God, the Apostle John exclaimed: "Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called children of God; and such we are " (I John 3:1).

c. Justice and Righteousness, or Transitive Holiness

In pleading for the deliverance of Lot from the doomed city of Sodom, Abraham insisted to the Lord that to slay the righteous with the wicked would be unjust and concluded his argument by asking this question: "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" (Gen. 18:25). This rhetorical question demands an affirmative answer. Moses declared that all the ways of the Lord are justice (Deut. 32:4). Though God loves every man, woman, and child because they are His creatures, He declared that He hates the workers of iniquity. "The arrogant shall not stand in thy sight: Thou hatest all workers of iniquity" (Ps. 5:5). "Jehovah trieth the righteous; But the wicked and him that loveth violence his soul hateth" (Ps. 11:5). We have been incorrectly told that God loves the sinner but hates his sin. This statement contains so very much error that it is misleading. The truth, as just stated, is that He loves every one of His creatures, "For God so loved the world, [every individual in it], that he gave his only begotten Son" to die that every one might have life (John 3:16). But those who will not receive the life, but choose wickedness instead, His soul hateth. His holiness will not permit His condoning sin. He does, however, take everything into consideration and "With the merciful thou wilt show thyself merciful; With the perfect man thou wilt show thyself perfect; With the pure thou wilt show thyself pure; And with the perverse thou wilt show thyself froward" (Ps. 18:25,26).

The Lord charged His disciples, saying, "Ye therefore shall be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matt. 5:48 ). Peter urged his brethren, saying, "... it is written, Ye shall be holy; for I am holy" (I Per. 1:16).

God's justice and righteousness are expressions of His holiness. Justice looks at the punitive side of holiness, whereas righteousness is a mandatory expression of it. In His righteousness God reveals His love for holiness, whereas in His justice He shows His hatred for sin. Justice and righteousness are not arbitrary attitudes. They are expressions of the divine nature and will. God's justice compels Him to punish the sinner. He cannot act otherwise. This sense of justice will cause Him to deal with each one according to the merits of the case. The psalmist declared, "Thou hast dealt well with thy servant, O Jehovah, according unto thy word" (Ps. 119:65). This same note is struck throughout the Scriptures.

Throughout the Bible, emphasis, as has already been stated, is laid upon the holiness of God. According to Isaiah, chapter 6, the seraphim are constantly singing, "Holy, holy, holy, is Jehovah of hosts." From Revelation 4:8 we see that the living creatures are proclaiming the same message of God's holiness and purity. Righteousness and justice are said to be the foundation of His throne (Ps. 97:2). The King who sits upon this throne loves justice and demands to be exalted as God, who is holy and just (Ps. 99:4,5,9). The emphasis that is laid in the Scriptures upon this characteristic of God shows that it is the dominant trait of His nature or being. This position is confirmed by our own nature. Conscience is the dominant force above all of our feelings and desires. According to Dr. Strong, "as we may be kind, but must be righteous, so God, in whose image we are made, may be merciful, but must be holy."

There is and has been much discussion in regard to the basis of morals and ethics. We realize that we are in a changing world. Standards of yesterday are gone today; those of today will pass away tomorrow. Thus goes the world and the things of the world. But what is the standard or what is the basis of the moral and ethical codes of those who desire to please God? The answer is to be found in Daniel 9:24: "Seventy weeks are decreed upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy." In this verse we read of "everlasting righteousness" or, literally rendered, "the righteousness of the ages." Here is the one infallible standard of conduct among men, which is the righteousness that does not abide for one decade and then cease to function. On the contrary, it is the righteousness of the ages. What is this righteousness of the ages? It is God's character. This righteousness is found in the Word of the living God--the Scriptures. "To the law and to the testimony! if they speak not according to this word, surely there is no morning for them" (Isa. 8:20).

V. THE PLAN OF GOD UNFOLDING THROUGH THE CENTURIES

God loves man, His creature. He wants him to be happy and blessed throughout his life and be saved eternally. As we shall learn, Christ tasted death for every man (Heb. 2:9). God wishes that all men should be saved and come unto the knowledge of the truth (I Tim. 2:3,4). God does not will that any should perish, but that all should come unto repentance (II Pet. 3:9). "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up; that whosoever believeth may in him have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God sent not the Son into the world to judge the world; but that the world should be saved through him" (John 3:14-17).

From these and other passages we see that God loves His creatures and desires their blessedness both in time and eternity. His holiness demanded their banishment from His presence and the glory of His power. His love desired their redemption. His holiness and love therefore planned a means of escape and a scheme of redemption whereby "whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have eternal life." This plan of redemption was devised even before the foundation of the world. "Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, of the seed of David, according to my gospel: wherein I suffered hardship unto bonds, as a malefactor; but the word of God is not bound. Therefore I endure all things for the elect's sake, that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. Faithful is the saying: For if we died with him, we shall also live with him: if we endure, we shall also reign with him: if we shall deny him, he also will deny us; if we are faithless, he abideth faithful; for he cannot deny himself" (II Tim. 2:8-13).

As we have already seen, the Lord saw the end from the beginning. He is therefore working all things toward a grand consummation according to His will (Eph. 1:10,11). In order to carry out His plan or purpose of the ages, which is mentioned by the apostle Paul in Ephesians 3:11, the Lord selected Palestine as the home of His people Israel through whom He purposed to bless all the world. His plan began to come into the limelight when He dispersed the people of the Tower of Babel (Gen., chap. 11). His providential hand sent each group to that portion of the world which was to be its future home. In allotting the territory to each of these peoples, the Almighty did so according to the number of the children of Israel:

When the most High gave to the nations their inheritance,
When he separated the children of men,
He set the bounds of the peoples
According to the number of the children of Israel.
For Jehovah's portion is his people;
Jacob is the lot of his inheritance (Deut. 32:8,9).

From these verse we see that the nations of the world were placed in their respective localities with reference to Israel and to her land, which is the center of the earth (Ezek. 38:12)--centuries before there was any Hebrew race.

The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to show Himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward Him (II Chron. 16:9). The Lord, in the days of Hammurabi, found just such a man in the person of Abram, who lived in Ur of the Chaldees. But as he was surrounded by an idolatrous, corrupt environment, the Lord called him to leave his people and the land of his nativity for a country He would show him--Palestine. In faith Abraham obeyed, went out, not knowing whither he was going. Finally he reached Palestine and resided there, dwelling in tents as if in a strange land, though it had been given him by promise.

When Abraham was ninety-nine years of age and his wife eighty-nine, the Lord, in fulfillment of a promise, performed a biological miracle upon the bodies of this elderly couple, who had passed the age of parenthood, as formerly stated, and made possible the birth of Isaac. In so doing, the Lord injected into the bloodstream of the Hebrew race new potentialities powers, and capabilities, both spiritual and intellectual. The result of this miracle was the birth of Isaac, who became the seed of Abraham and through whom God had promised to bless the world.

Jacob, the grandson of Abraham and son of Isaac, with his immediate family, went down into Egypt, a company of seventy souls, and there developed into a nation. At the appointed time, God sent Moses to be their deliverer. With miraculous power, He led them out to Mount Sinai where He entered into a covenant with them, delivered His law to them, and entrusted to them the stewardship of the divine worship.

During the period of the Judges, every man did that which was right in his own eyes. Finally Israel clamored for a king, and Saul was selected. He started out well at first but soon failed the Lord, who then rejected him and chose David, entering into a covenant with him. In this He promised that there should come of the Davidic house the Messiah of Israel and the Redeemer of the world (II Sam. chap. 7). This theme is discussed in Chapter XI.

From this time onward the prophets and the psalmists of Israel sang of the Messiah and of His marvelous work for Israel and for the world.

In foretelling Messiah's redemptive work, the prophets approached their subject in different manners and dealt with various phases of it, at times giving more attention or emphasis to one special feature of it than on other occasions. This fact gave rise to four different types of messianic prophecy, which are as follows: (1) Those that deal only with Messiah's first coming and His sufferings in behalf of Israel and the world; (2) those that focus attention exclusively on the second coming of Messiah and His glorious reign; (3) those that blend descriptions of the two comings into a single picture as if there were but one event; (4) those that give the entire outline of Messiah's redemptive career, which consists of His first coming, His rejection, His death, His burial, His resurrection, His ascension to the right hand of the throne of God, His session there during the present dispensation (at the end of which God will pour out His wrath upon the world during the Tribulation), His return to this earth, and His reign of righteousness in Jerusalem for a thousand years. There are a number of passages which give the entire redemptive work of Messiah. This doubtless is what was referred to by the apostle as "the purpose of the ages."

As an illustration of the fact that the prophets at times did give us, figuratively speaking, the blueprint of the ages from their time and forward, look at Isaiah 65. A casual glance at verses 1-7 shows that the prophet was speaking of the present Christian Dispensation, during which the Gentiles are seeking God and finding Him (vs. 1). That this verse refers to the present era is evident from its being quoted by Paul in Romans 10:20 and its being applied to Christians today. It is a mistake, therefore, to say that the Christian Dispensation was not known in the Old Testament. Even Moses foretold the present age in Deuteronomy 32:21 which is quoted in Romans 10:19 and is applied to our present era. While the Gentiles are coming to God and finding Him, Israel is in rejection, as set forth in Isaiah 65:2-7. Though she is set aside during this age, God has not cast her off, but is providentially preserving her in order that He might bring forth from that people, as set forth in Isaiah 65:8-10, a seed to inherit His mountains.

Isaiah then spoke of the Tribulation and contrasted the condition of the faithful remnant of Israel at that time with the deplorable, wretched state of those in Israel who reject God. Verses 11-14 inclusive therefore constitute a prediction of the Tribulation, which we know will follow the present era.

At the end of the Tribulation a new order will be introduced, both social and spiritual. This is shown in Isaiah 65:15,16. In order that his readers might understand how such an era can be possible, the prophet foretold God's creating the heavens and earth anew and His making Jerusalem the center of interest and the Jewish people a joy and rejoicing. In verse 19 he gives them reassurance that the days of trouble will never recur. Weeping, crying, and mourning will be at that time a thing of the past, the reason being that God will have, at the beginning of this new era, the Millennial Age, created the heavens above anew and the earth beneath anew. In the rest of this chapter Isaiah speaks of this great Kingdom Age and the blessedness of that period when the glory of God shall encircle the earth as the waters cover the sea. Thus from a careful study of this chapter one can see the plan of the ages beginning with Messiah's first coming and the introduction of the Christian Age to be followed by the Tribulation which will precede the Millennial Era. The Kingdom Age will continue for one thousand years as we learn in the Book of Revelation, chapter 20. Following this period, as we see in Revelation 21 and 22, there will be new heavens and a new earth. The reason for this new order is that at the end of the millennium the present heavens and earth will pass away (Rev. 20:11).

(Continued on next page)