INTRODUCTION

Throughout the ages — since the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ — the lives of many people have been changed by hearing and responding to “the gospel” (meaning “good news”) of Jesus Christ.

This same gospel still changes lives when God’s Holy Spirit (called the “Holy Ghost” in the King James Version) opens the heart of the one who hears it, causing them to respond to it the way God commands.

This study has been prepared to aid you in sharing the true, biblical gospel with others. When you complete this course, you should get others to take the course so they may also hear this age-old message from God.

This series of studies assumes that you believe in God and respect the Holy Bible as His written Word given to mankind so that you may know what He wants you to know.

In order for you to understand God’s GOOD NEWS (gospel), you need to know a few basic things about WHO GOD IS and WHAT HE IS LIKE. People from around the world believe there is some kind of God — One Who is Lord of all things. They often wonder who God is and would like to know many things about Him.

Before starting, take just a moment to pray to the only True God and ask Him to help you understand the things this Bible study can teach you about Him.

A. GOD IS THE CREATOR

When a man looks at a house, he knows another man built that house. When a man looks at another man, at the stars, at the earth, or trees and animals, he sees something about their Maker. These things tell him that Whoever made these things must be very, very great.

When God created everything, He did not start with things (such as wood, stone, chemicals) like man does when he makes some-thing. God does not start with anything.

Read Psalm 148:2-5 (especially verse 5).
2 Praise Him, all His angels; Praise Him, all His hosts!|
3 Praise Him, sun and moon; Praise Him, all you stars of light!
4 Praise Him, you heavens of heavens, And you waters above the heavens!
5 Let them praise the name of the Lord, For He commanded and they were created.

Hebrews 11:3
By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible.

When God created everything, He did not need to take a long time like man does when he makes something.

Exodus 20:11
For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.

When God finished everything, it was perfect and good. He made no mistakes.

Genesis 1:31
Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good. So the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

Revelation 4:11
“You are worthy, O Lord, To receive glory and honor and power; For You created all things, And by Your will they exist and were created.”

B. GOD IS IN CONTROL – HE IS SOVEREIGN

The God who created the whole world, the universe, all animals and man is a very great God. The Bible tells us repeatedly that God is on the throne of the world. He is all powerful. He directs all things. He makes no mistakes. He has everything under control.

Not only did He create all things, but He is ruling over them as Lord and governing them as their King. This must be so or He would not be God. Either God is their ruler or He is ruled; He either does His will or He is angered because He cannot do what He would like to do.

1 Chronicles 29:11
Yours, O Lord, is the greatness, The power and the glory, The victory and the majesty; For all that is in heaven and in earth is Yours; Yours is the kingdom, O Lord, And You are exalted as head over all.

Daniel 4:34-35.
34 And at the end of the time I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted my eyes to heaven, and my understanding returned to me; and I blessed the Most High and praised and honored Him who lives forever: For His dominion is an everlasting dominion, And His kingdom is from generation to generation.  35 All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing; He does according to His will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth.  No one can restrain His hand or say to Him, “What have You done?” 35 And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?

Today many people speak of God as someone who is like a big grandfather in the sky who is at the command of His creatures. They speak and He does it. Others think of Him as very upset and angry about what is happening in the world. They agree that God started the world right, but somehow everything got out of control. They think of God as running here and there begging people to let Him be their God.

Psalm 22:28.
For the kingdom is the Lord’s, And He rules over the nations.

He sets up kingdoms, overthrows empires, and controls all governments so that they do as He pleases. Even governments that are oppressive serve His will. He uses them to judge a wicked nation for its sinfulness.

Romans 9:14-15
14 What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. 15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.

When it comes to being saved from sin and its punishment, the Bible also tells us that God is in control.

C. GOD IS ETERNAL

This means God always was and always will be. Because everything else we know about has a beginning and an end, it is hard to understand how God has no beginning. He has always existed and always will.

Revelation 1:8 (“Alpha” = the first letter of the Greek alphabet; “Omega” = the last.)
“I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End,” says the Lord, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”

Psalm 90:2.
Before the mountains were brought forth, Or ever You had formed the earth and the world, Even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God.

There was no one before God because He has no beginning or end, He is the first and the last. Because we are created beings, we cannot fully comprehend that God was not made, but has always been and can never die. Meditate on this concept and pray over it because to fully understand God, we have to understand that we cannot truly know Him without His assistance and revealing Himself to us.

D. GOD NEVER CHANGES

Any time something or someone is changed, it is either for better or for worse. If God changed and became better, that would mean He was not perfect before, and therefore, He was not really God. If God changed and became worse, then He could not be God because He would not be perfect. If He changed His mind about something, it was because He made a mistake or found new information. But this cannot be, because God knows all things and never makes a mistake.

Malachi 3:6
For I am the Lord, I do not change; Therefore, you are not consumed, O sons of Jacob.

James 1:17 – variation means “apt or liable to vary or change; changeable” so if God has no variation, then He does not change.
Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.

E. GOD KNOWS ALL THINGS

God knows what a man is thinking about.

1 Chronicles 28:9
As for you, my son Solomon, know the God of your father, and serve Him with a loyal heart and with a willing mind; for the Lord searches all hearts and understands all the intent of the thoughts. If you seek Him, He will be found by you; but if you forsake Him, He will cast you off forever.

Psalm 139:2
You know my sitting down and my rising up; You understand my thought afar off.

No thought can be kept from God. He even knows what you are thinking now. What are you thinking right now? (STOP AND THINK.) God knows it even before you do. Therefore, He knows what you are thinking every minute of the day and night. He knows your good thoughts and your evil thoughts, and He does not forget one of them. God knows every word you say.

Psalm 139:4
For there is not a word on my tongue, but behold, O Lord, You know it altogether.

Matthew 10:29-31
29 Are not two sparrows sold for a copper coin? And not one of them falls to the ground apart from your Father’s will. 30 But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. 31 Do not fear therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows.

Proverbs 15:3
The eyes of the Lord are in every place, keeping watch on the evil and the good.

F. GOD IS ALL WISDOM

God not only knows everything, but He knows the best way to do things.

Proverbs 3:19
The Lord by wisdom founded the earth; by understanding He established the heavens;

Romans 11:33
Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out!

G. GOD IS ALL-POWERFUL

God can do everything He wants to do. (Of course, He can never sin because He can never want to sin.) His power has no end. Nothing can change or stop God’s power — not Satan, not man.

Numbers 23:19
“God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?”

Study some amazing, powerful things God has done by reading the Scripture verses below. Match the verses with the correct event by putting the letter from the event (from the right column) on the blank line before the correct Scripture verse (in the left column). (You will need to use your Bible to look these verses up)

H. GOD IS EVERYWHERE

Psalm 139:7-12
7 Where can I go from Your Spirit?
Or where can I flee from Your presence?
8 If I ascend into heaven, You are there;
If I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there.
9 If I take the wings of the morning,
And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
10 Even there Your hand shall lead me,
And Your right hand shall hold me.
11 If I say, “Surely the darkness shall fall on me,”
Even the night shall be light about me;
12 Indeed, the darkness shall not hide from You,
But the night shines as the day;
The darkness and the light are both alike to You.

There is no place where God is not. God is Spirit and has no body like man. He is always present everywhere.

Though God is everywhere, He IS NOT in everything as many Hindus believe. If God were the same as everything He created, then He would have created Himself — an impossibility. God is separate from His creation. Furthermore, if God were the same as His creation, then that would mean God could be sinful since much of His creation is now evil. But God cannot be both holy and perfect AND sinful at the same time.

I. GOD IS HOLY AND PERFECT

Leviticus 11:44
For I am the Lord your God. You shall therefore consecrate yourselves, and you shall be holy; for I am holy. Neither shall you defile yourselves with any creeping thing that creeps on the earth.

For God to be holy, He must be free from all sin. God cannot sin and cannot cause sin. God is completely pure. He cannot do evil and has no evil in Himself.

Romans 3:23
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God

Since all men have sinned and are evil AND since God is a holy God, MAN HAS A REAL PROBLEM: a holy God cannot have fellowship with sinful men. The gospel tells us how God solved this problem.

Acts 17:25
Nor is He worshiped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything, since He gives to all life, breath, and all things.

This verse tells us that God depends upon no one and needs nothing. Only God is COMPLETE and INDEPENDENT. Therefore, He is perfect because ONLY SOMEONE WHO DOES NOT NEED ANYTHING NOR ANYONE could be perfect. This means God does not need us, nor our love. But, in many other places in the Bible God does say He wants our love and obedience. Never think that God needs our love and obedience. Also, never think that He does not want them. He has commanded us to love and obey Him. Therefore, we must love Him and obey Him because He has commanded us to do so. Furthermore, we should want to love Him because of the love and goodness He has shown to all men. (Look at these additional verses – Matthew 5:44-45 – 48 But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the tax collectors do so? 48 Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.; Psalm 145:9 – 9 The Lord is good to all, And His tender mercies are over all His works.).

J. GOD IS ALWAYS FAITHFUL AND TRUE

God will always do what He says He will do. He keeps His promises.

1 Thessalonians 5:24
He who calls you is faithful, who also will do it.

In Exodus 34:7 (“keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.”) the Bible says that God will by no means clear the guilty. In many other verses in the Bible God says that He must punish sin with death. Now if God is faithful and true in things we like to hear about, He also must be faithful and true in things we do not like to hear about. Therefore, when God promises us something, He means it. He must keep His Word. When God promises us eternal life if we believe in His Son and repent (turn away from) our sins, He means it. He also means it when He says He will punish us with everlasting fire if we do not believe in His Son and repent of our sins. Do not forget. God keeps His promises.

K. GOD IS LOVE

Many gods that people worship are gods full of hatred. The God of the Bible is the God of Love. He gives His love to His chosen people and then He shows this love to the world through His people and in various other ways. In the Old Testament times His people were the Israelites. Today, His covenant people are Christians. Though many people claim they love, only God can give true love since He alone IS love.

1 John 4:8-16
8 He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. 9 In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us. 13 By this we know that we abide in Him, and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit. 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son as Savior of the world. 15 Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. 16 And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.

L. GOD IS TRUTH

Romans 3:4
Certainly not! Indeed, let God be true but every man a liar. As it is written: “That You may be justified in Your words and may overcome when You are judged.”

John 15:26
But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me.

God is Truth, and the Spirit of Truth comes from Him. He caused the Bible to be written (2 Timothy 3:16). The Bible is God’s Word and is truth (John 17:17). Jesus Christ also came from God and said He is “the truth” — there is no truth apart from God (John 14:6). God is revealed by His Spirit in the Bible and in Jesus Christ — both are “the truth.”

M. GOD IS A JUDGE

Genesis 18:25
Far be it from You to do such a thing as this, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous should be as the wicked; far be it from You! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?

Psalm 19:9
The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever: the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.

God is a perfect Judge, and He is never wrong in His decisions. He is the Judge before whom you will stand one day and explain about all your words, thoughts and against whom you are sinning and rebelling. Can you imagine throwing a rock through someone s window, being taken to court, and then finding out that the window you broke was in the judge’s house? Well, that is how it is with God. You have broken His laws, and He is going to be the Judge who makes a decision about you.

HAVE YOU EVER THOUGHT ABOUT THAT?

Revelation 11:18
The nations were angry, and Your wrath has come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that You should reward Your servants the prophets and the saints, and those who fear Your name, small and great, and should destroy those who destroy the earth.

N. GOD IS SPIRIT

God does not have a body and yet He exists. Because He is God, He does not need a body. God is Spirit and has no limits on His power and abilities. A body would limit God.

John 4:24
God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.

O. GOD IS A PERSON

The three things that make a person are:

• MIND (the power of knowing things);
• EMOTIONS (the power of feeling); and
• WILL (the power of choosing)

God has these three things and because of this He is a Person. He does not have a body because He is Spirit and needs no body. A person does not have to have a body to be a person. God is both Spirit and Person.

1.  God has the power of KNOWING. God knows Himself when He called Moses from the burning bush, He said, “I Am that I Am.” God could not say He is like anyone else because He is not. He could not say this any stronger. God is sure of Himself. And remember, He knows all things. (Psalm 147:5 – Great is our Lord, and mighty in power; His understanding is infinite.)

2.  God has the power of FEELING. He feels love, anger, hatred, and pity. (Psalm 5:4, 5 – 4 For You are not a God who takes pleasure in wickedness, Nor shall evil dwell with You. 5 The boastful shall not stand in Your sight; You hate all workers of iniquity; l John 3:16 – By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren)

3.  God has the power of CHOOSING. Ephesians 1:4 says God chose some people for eternal salvation (just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love). Psalm 115:3 says that God does everything He wishes. (Psalm 115: 3 But our God is in heaven; He does whatever He pleases.) (See also Isaiah 46:10 – Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done, Saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, And I will do all My pleasure,’.)

P. GOD IS ONE GOD, BUT THREE PERSONS

Read this verse very carefully.

I Corinthian 8:4
Therefore, concerning the eating of things offered to idols, we know that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is no other God but one.

1 Corinthians 8:4 shows that the Bible teaches there is only One God. But the same Bible that teaches this also teaches that this One God is made up of three Persons. This is hard to understand, but because God teaches us this in the Bible, Christians must believe it.

The illustrations below may help you understand the ONE and the MANY:

Yet each one of these has more than one thing in it. It is more than one. It is many, yet it is also one. Remember, these are illustrations and are only meant to help you understand a little about how God can be One, but Three (Many). Yet, not one of these illustrations is exactly like God is.

Matthew 3:16-17 shows the three different Persons.
6 When He had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon Him. 17 And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”

In the following questions choose the correct answer to the person described from the passage in Matthew.

Matthew 28:19 also speaks of three different Persons.
Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,

Romans 1:7
To all who are in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Hebrews 1:8
But to the Son He says: “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your kingdom.”

Acts 5:3-4
3 But Peter said, “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and keep back part of the price of the land for yourself? 4 While it remained, was it not your own? And after it was sold, was it not in your own control? Why have you conceived this thing in your heart? You have not lied to men but to God.”

There is much more that can be said about this subject. But, even if it were all said, God is God and we are not (we are men) — we will never be able to understand Him completely. MAN MUST ACCEPT THIS FACT.

Let us close our study ABOUT GOD by looking at one last verse.

Romans 11:33-36 answer the following questions from verse 36:
33 Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out! 34 “For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has become His counselor?” 35 “Or who has first given to Him And it shall be repaid to him?” 36 For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen.

Conclusion

What a great, great God this God is! He truly deserves your worship, praise, and devotion. He is worthy of your complete attention. Such a marvelous God He is! If you really studied about the different gods of the different religions, you would find no other god in all the religions of the world as great as this God. All other gods are not real gods because man has made them up in his mind to suit his religion, and then passed on these beliefs to his children.

There is some truth about God in many of these religions, but they all fall far short of the total truth about Him that He has revealed to man in His Holy Word, the Bible. He is the ONE and ONLY TRUE GOD!

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