This next Sunday I'll preach a sermon titled "Who is God?" I am fully aware of how futile it is to try and explain God in a 45 minute sermon when there are pastors and preachers who spend their entire adult lives preaching on that topic and never scratch the surface. God is an infinite person of love. Infinite means without beginning or end. If you travel in one direction long enough eventually you will leave our universe and there will be nothing but God. If you travel in the opposite direction the same will happen. That is why He is the Alpha and the Omega.

The answer to this is in the Bible. This should go without saying. The answer to everything is in the bible. God has laid it all out for us. The Bible is God revealing Himself to us through time. He give us His guidelines, His rules, His code of conduct. As Christians we are supposed to become more like Christ, and the best way to do that is to read the Bible and follow what it says, to learn from the mistakes made and stop time from repeating itself.

1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. - Gen 1:1. 

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. -John 1:1-4

In these two passages we see that God is so great He is three persons. We call this a triune God. The Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit. When I say God is a person I mean He is personable. He has a personality. There are things that anger the Lord, and He says He is a jealous God. We see His personality most through Jesus. We will talk more about Jesus in the future, but now I want to talk about God, the Father. 

We see in Acts 17:25 that God determines our every breath. He gave it to us in the beginning by breathing into man's nostrils and giving him life. God determined that I, and you, were going to exist and he decided that we stay alive. He will determine when I am finished in this world and get called home, I hope. God created everything that exists and therefore he gets to decide how I ought to live. The comparison we get is if a potter creates two bowls out of clay he gets to decide what the bowl is used for. One can be a chamber pot and the other can be a bowl for food. God has a plan, and he decides what part we will play in that plan.

It is up to us if we are going to listen to God and do what He wants of us. God has given all of us free will and the ability to tell Him no. However, why would you want to. When I get on a plane I am glad there is a pilot flying the plane who knows what is going on. He knows where the best place to land is, and he knows the best path to take is. I am glad God is in charge, that I can trust in Him and know that my final destination is Heaven, to be in His presence for all of eternity. God isn't just holy, He is holy holy holy.

We know from Exodus 33:18-22 that the glory of God is so great, that He is so Holy that we can't even look up on His face with our mortal bodies. Philippians 3:21 tells us that when we get to Heaven we are given new bodies. It says that "who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body." Lets look at the description of His glorious body, meaning Jesus. "13 and among the lampstands was someone like a son of man, dressed in a robe reaching down to his feet and with a golden sash around his chest. 14 The hair on his head was white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire. 15 His feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters." Revelation 1:13-15.

Read 1 Corinthians 15:35-54 for a better description of our heavenly bodies. Through all this God allows us to choice between having a relationship with Him our to turn away from Him, no matter if it breaks His heart, for God loves all of His creation. He wants people who love him to be with him. He wants those who are committed to Him to rule over His creation with Him.

This leads all of us to either repentance or judgement. Those who repent for their sins, to turn away from sin and towards God, will live forever. Those who do not will be judged by the creator, the one who wrote the rules. You will either be wearing a robe of righteousness or you will be cast into the one place where you will have no connection to God. A place like that can only be described as hell. There is a saying that goes "better to rule in hell than to serve in Heaven." Yet, the saying misses that everyone in Heaven will rule over creation with God, Rev 22:5.

God's name is pronounced (ehyeh) which is "I am". It means to exist, to simply be. That is who God is, existence. To be separated from God is to exist without being a part of existence. Too many take this for granted. The Jews called Him Adonai because even His name was holy and couldn't be spoken.

Think of life as learning how to rule. Like a young prince growing up to rule with his father the king. We are the children of God, learning how to rule with Him over creation. In Genesis 1:26 God says "so that they may rule over..." This promise will be fulfilled in the end times as said in Revelation 22:5. When God created everything in the beginning He intended Eden to provide everything the early humans needed. He made sure everything was good. In fact He is the one who notices that it is not good for man to be alone, so He immediately fixes it. He knows what is good and not good from us before we do. Before we even become aware of it.

It is God who decides what is good, what is not good. Evil is just the absence of goodness. The only evil in the garden was the serpent, and Adam and Eve only had to listen to God to stay in that goodness. The command was simple, don’t eat the fruit. 

God is everything, He is existence, and we need a relationship with Him.