(All Scripture quotations are from the Berean Standard Bible [BSB])
Many of us are nervous to share our faith with others for a variety of reasons. Some have a fear of public speaking or confrontation; some don’t know how to answer questions or objections to their faith.
I heard a great, simple breakdown of questions believers should know how to answer:
Who is God?
Who is Jesus?
What is the gospel?
I’ll take each of these questions separately and answer them in a series of posts.
God tells us who He is in Scripture:
He is the creator – Genesis 1.1: ‘In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.’ Part of that creation was humanity. Genesis 1.26-27 says, ‘Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness…” …So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.’ King David writes in one of the Psalms: ‘I praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made’ (139.14a). In another: ‘The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands’ (Psalm 19.1).
He is holy – Isaiah 6.3: ‘Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of Hosts…’ What does it mean to be holy? God is pure. Habakkuk 1.13 says, ‘Your eyes are too pure to look upon evil, and You cannot tolerate wrongdoing…’ and 1 John 1.5: ‘…God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all.’ God is perfect and just. Deuteronomy 32.4 says, ‘…all His ways are just. A God of faithfulness without injustice, righteous and upright is He.’ God also calls his people to be holy in Leviticus 11.44 and 1 Peter 1.15-16.
He is merciful and patient – God calls us to be holy, but humans are really bad at it. Exodus 34.6-7 says, ‘…The LORD, the LORD God, is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in loving devotion and faithfulness, maintaining loving devotion to a thousand generations, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin. Yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished…’ Most of the Old Testament shows God’s extreme patience with the people of Israel as they broke covenant with him over and over again. He gave them chance after chance before disciplining them. I saved a quote from C.S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity about this that gives me a chuckle:
‘He selected one particular people and spent several centuries hammering into their heads the sort of God He was – that there was only one of Him and that He cared about right conduct. Those people were the Jews, and the Old Testament gives an account of the hammering process.’
Along with this goes an idea I heard from Melissa Dougherty in one of her videos or podcasts: God is the perfect father and wants to adopt you as his child. Isaiah 64.8: ‘But now, O LORD, You are our Father; we are the clay, and You are the potter; we are all the work of Your hand.’ Psalm 103.13: ‘As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear Him.’ Romans 8.15-17: ‘…you received the Spirit of adoption to sonship, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. And if we are children, then we are heirs: heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ…’ When we place our trust in Christ, we are adopted as co-heirs with him by God. (More on this later.)
He is sovereign – Finally, and perhaps most importantly, God is sovereign. ‘In Him we were also chosen as God’s own, having been predestined according to the plan of Him who works out everything by the counsel of His will…’ (Ephesians 1.11). As Paul declared to the people of Athens in Acts 17.24-25, 30-31, ‘The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples made by human hands. Nor is He served by human hands, as if He needed anything, because He Himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else… Although God overlooked the ignorance of earlier times, He now commands all people everywhere to repent. For He has set a day when He will judge the world with justice by the Man He has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising Him from the dead.’
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