Pastor Terry Coon

God's Holiness
​Isaiah 6:1-8

Intro:

As humans we believe we have some inherent value outside of God, and if anyone diminishes that value, we demand they see us for who we are. The issue is that we diminish the value of God as we go about our everyday lives. Very rarely do we consider God in our daily activities.


The Knowledge of the Holies by AW Hoser:
“What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.” We’ve been conditioned to think of God as this mean, old man who is waiting to catch us in our wrongdoing and He’s not to be trifled with. Or is God a pop-culture icon that is accepting of every lifestyle and every worship because He forgives everything. Our conceptions of God must be rooted in His holy word!!!

Main points:

1. God’s holiness reveals His elevated position above creation

• “I saw the Lord seated on the throne, HIGH and EXALTED.”
• Uzziah was strengthened by God, but he became prideful and was unfaithful to God, which lead to his destruction.
• As an earthly king faded into the dust and death, the true King revealed Himself to Isaiah, seated on a HEAVENLY throne!
• In a time of crisis, the God of the universe remains on the throne and remains in charge.
• God’s presence was so big, so lofty, so great that He himself consumed the temple. He is elevated above all creation.

    2. Reveals His unique and utterly distinct and majestic character

• The seraphs cry out Holy Holy Holy is the Lord Almighty
• Even these perfect and powerful seraphs cannot be exposed directly to God’s incomparable brightness and beauty
• God is still set apart from heaven’s inhabitants
• Seraphs could be prideful, but they speak about nothing but God’s holiness
• The whole earth is filled with His glory.
• God is simply “other than” and “indescribable”
• God is not like anything or anyone else. He is altogether different.
• Isaiah responded with true humility because he recognized he is nothing compared to God
• When perfection meets imperfection, the imperfect is reduced to nothing.
• Isaiah recognizes that he not only is unclean, but everyone he knows is also unclean
• Isaiah’s response reveals how we ought to view ourselves - in need of cleansing
• In the midst of Isaiah’s filthiness, God meets him
• A seraph descends and touches Isaiah’s unclean part to clean him
• The gospel: Jesus’s blood came to cleanse us of our unclean parts, our sinful selves
• God does not bid us to come when we have achieved perfection. He meets us in the middle of our sin.
• God comes seeking us and reaches us.
• We do all we do because God did it.
• God calls us out of our hiding “Let me fix you.”
• Our filthiness cannot stand in His presence, but He elevated us so we can be in His presence by the merit of Christ

    3. Reveals His supreme worth

• God is holy holy holy
• He is high and exalted
• He deserves our adoration and our praise
• Isaiah knows that God deserves all of him, his life, his service, his worship
• you can serve God with whatever your life pursuit’s are
• Could it be that you haven’t given yourself over to the Lord because you have a high view of yourself and a low view of Him?
• God is interested in filling not just some spaces, but ALL PLACES including you.
• That can only happen if we see God the way Isaiah sees Him.
• Until you see yourself as nothing and God as everything, and until you see your need for a saviour, you will miss out on God and the joy and salvation

God is absolutely and uniquely excellent above all creation and without sin.
He has invited us to come experience His grace.

Pastor Andrew Yang

"Attachment Theory and God the Father"
Attachment Theory
Attachment theory: the study of attachment bonds within a caregiving system and how it affects a child's Internal Working Model
Caregiving system: negotiation between child and parent; how the child expects to be comforted and how the parents expect to give comfort
Internal Working Model: child's mental representations of the attachment figure, self, and environment based on experiences
- Growing up, you feel like you have unlimited potential; you don't know your weaknesses yet. This changes as you age.

Ainsworth's Strange Situation Assessment explores attachment styles: secure, insecure-avoidant, and insecure-resistant. This is important to identify because how we react as a child in distress is how we react now when we're in distress.

Promise Keeping
Why is promise keeping important? We need to develop trust, credibility, reliability, and vulnerability. When someone breaks a promise, we lose all of that. With promises, there is an expectation to be cared for and for the promise to be followed through with.
God's promises throughout scripture are given for us to hold on to, to rely on, to trust. Promise keeping is a biblical mandate (See Mat 5:37 and 5:33, and Lev 5:4).
Words are an extension of the attachment caregiving system in humans. God's word is one way He takes care of us and demonstrates His commitment and love to us.
Understand that God is a perfect Father and is always with us through the Holy Spirit. We are by definition God's children, because we have been brought to Him through the blood of Christ.
Psalms 22: David feels a separation and abandonment from God. Yet, he responds by lifting God up in glory and praise, demonstrating a secure attachment to God. He reflects on moments when God saved him and fulfilled His promises. It's normal to feel and express moments of frustration and anguish. However, what do you do after? Do you reflect on the moments where God has taken care of you? Do you remember when God saved you? Remember God's goodness in our lives. Pray to Him, read His word and seek comfort through it. Rely on God - "Take care of me because I cannot do it on my own".

What can you do?
Be a witness for God. Demonstrate how God is our primary caretaker through your own actions. Facilitate and help your brothers and sisters in Christ to seek God. As images of God, we were created and designed to reflect God and His love and characteristics to the world. Be a compassionate listener. Don't try to fix people's problems when they come to you to share. Empathize with them. Live this out in discipleship, small groups, and pray for each other.

Pastor Kevin Hayashida
 
The Bigger Picture
1. God’s plan is bigger than my plan. Seek God’s plan in the world, and be a part of it.
2. People are more important than achievements. How you work with people, how you serve, love, and minister to people will lead to you success. Material things are temporary; the people around you are eternal. God works through the relationships around you! Refer to 2 Peter 3:10-11
3. Post-college life is longer than college life. Invest in the things that will last. Appreciate the time you have your entire life; this will allow you to make wiser decisions and have a clearer perspective. Psalm 90:12
 
Church versus Parachurch
  As a definition, the church is the divinely established institution that is the continuation of the Lord’s presence and ministry in the world. To live together as the church calls for the development of close personal relationship, for the ministry of memebrs to one another, for the experience of family love, and for maturing in holiness. The church is the visible presence of Jesus Christ in the world. It is an enduring body, a community, that will prevail over the gates of hell.
  Parachurch goes alongside the church, providing ministries that the church cannot do on it’s own. Whereas in the parachurch, you can choose who you want to be with (you tend to choose a parachurch ministry with similar people), you do not get to choose who God places in your church family (and real family!). However, the parachurch has great opportunity for reaching non-believing college students, providing a unified vision to a community, and offers opportunities to serve.
  Prepare for transition into your next season of life by developing health habits now. The benefits of starting things now are cumulative. Part of those habits should include how you relate to the church. People often feel out of place post-grad because they did not set up the habit of getting plugged into the church. Also, develop your spiritual gifts by serving. Finally, cultivate relationships beyond your comfort zone.