HEBREWS 9:27 warns all by saying
“…its appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment,”
No one who stands before God at the final judgment will be able to honestly say “I could not know that You existed.” Or “It was impossible for me to know for sure that You existed and that I was supposed to humble myself in Your presence.” Those lame words will carry no weight on judgment day. And these five great lights will prove that to be true. Again, no excuses on judgment day.
The five great lights are as follows (for each one of these LIGHTS, we will include a hyperlink to the corresponding teaching that pastor Sonny gave at SHINE BRIGHT Church):
1. THE LIGHT OF CREATION.
2. THE LIGHT OF CONSCIENCE.
3. THE LIGHT OF CONDEMNATION.
4. THE LIGHT OF COMMANDMENTS.
5. THE LIGHT OF CHRIST.
1. THE LIGHT OF CREATION (the General Revelation) This first light will be our focus today.
ROMANS 1:20 says
“20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse,”
God has revealed Himself or has made Himself knowable through creation. Through creation God has revealed His existence, His infinite power and His matchless wisdom.
Listen, man hasn’t created anything without using God’s pre existing materials! Man always uses borrowed materials, like God’s trees, God’s plants, God’s animals, God’s stones, God’s metals, God’s jewels, sunlight, water, wind, fire, oils, energies etc. And all while borrowing God’s oxygen – God’s gift of breath and life.
Here’s a joke to better illustrate what I just said:
A brilliant scientist decides to defy God by saying “Look God, humanity doesn’t need You anymore, because there is nothing that we cannot do without You!” So God says, “Oh really? How about we both create a man in the same way that I created Adam in Genesis 2 by using dirt.” And the scientist proudly says, “Consider it done!” So when the scientist brings in a wheelbarrow full of dirt, God smiles and says, “Wait a minute, you have to use your own dirt.”You see, many people are like a meme I’ve seen where - a crowd of ticks on a dog are protesting against the dog’s existence, they hold up banners that say, “There is no dog!” all while living on the dog and living off the dog.
In the same way, we live on God’s Earth and off of God’s Earth and yet we deny the Earth’s Maker.
GENESIS 1:1 says,
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the Earth (the universe).” This is how the Bible starts to reveal God, as Creator. This is God’s way of saying, “it all starts with Me.” While it’s true that humanity didn’t witness the awesome and miraculous moment of creation (Angels did – JOB 38:4-7), this doesn’t mean that God didn’t create all things.
For example, I wasn’t there to see Henry Ford create his first car in June of 1896 – but his line of cars/his creations point to Henry Ford’s existence and geniuses. In other words, creation points to a Creator and that Creator is Yahweh God.
Concerning creation, here is a quote from Alister Begg:
“To deny what we clearly see is intellectual and moral suicide.” In other words, to deny the existence of God after seeing His breathtaking design all around us, starting with ourselves, is to kill logic and reason. It’s to murder what makes perfect sense – that creation points to a Creator. That God is the cause, and His creation is the effect. The law of causality is a sure and unchanging reality.
What we have to understand is this, humanity doesn’t have an eye problem, or a brain problem if you will, humanity has a heart problem – Jesus puts it this way:
What we have to understand is this, humanity doesn’t have an eye problem, or a brain problem if you will, humanity has a heart problem – Jesus puts it this way:
“…men loved (heart/affections) darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil (JOHN 3:19; in other words, there evil deeds prove what they love).” Paul says, in ROMANS 1:18 “…who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.”
They "hold down, hide, ignore, deny, refuse the truth" because they want to keep on living a sinful lifestyle. Creation tells them that there is a God but their desire for evil moves them to reject this holy Creator God.
Fallen man would much rather give credit to nothing than to God. This is what Darwin and evolution teaches – that everything came from NOTHING (proudly giving credit for everything we see and enjoy to nothing – which is a scientific impossibility). We believe that everything came from SOMEONE/God!
Fallen man even gives credit to an imaginary mother called Mother Earth (the Greeks named her Gaia) but there is no such thing as Mother Earth, there is only Father God, Creator of all things.
Fallen man is quick to give credit to man but never God. i.e. Man sees a robot and he gives the credit to Elon Musk. The same man sees a human being (looks in the mirror) and he gives the credit to random processes. Man sees a light bulb and he gives the credit to Thomas Edison. The same man sees the sun in our impressive solar system and gives the credit to random processes. How stupid can that be?
Paul says of people like this, (found in ROMANS 1:22) “…professing to be wise, they become fools (by choosing to deny God’s existence and trading God for idols and perversions instead).”
Research shows that about 37% of college professors are atheist which means 37% of them are fools even with all of their academic degrees.
Here’s another sad fact: Charles Darwin’s view of evolution dominates 99% of secular universities in America. And even Christian universities deny portions of the Book of Genesis (i.e. a literal 7-day creation, the inerrancy and sufficiency of Scripture, the miracles found in the OT and the NT etc.).
They "hold down, hide, ignore, deny, refuse the truth" because they want to keep on living a sinful lifestyle. Creation tells them that there is a God but their desire for evil moves them to reject this holy Creator God.
Fallen man would much rather give credit to nothing than to God. This is what Darwin and evolution teaches – that everything came from NOTHING (proudly giving credit for everything we see and enjoy to nothing – which is a scientific impossibility). We believe that everything came from SOMEONE/God!
Fallen man even gives credit to an imaginary mother called Mother Earth (the Greeks named her Gaia) but there is no such thing as Mother Earth, there is only Father God, Creator of all things.
Fallen man is quick to give credit to man but never God. i.e. Man sees a robot and he gives the credit to Elon Musk. The same man sees a human being (looks in the mirror) and he gives the credit to random processes. Man sees a light bulb and he gives the credit to Thomas Edison. The same man sees the sun in our impressive solar system and gives the credit to random processes. How stupid can that be?
Paul says of people like this, (found in ROMANS 1:22) “…professing to be wise, they become fools (by choosing to deny God’s existence and trading God for idols and perversions instead).”
Research shows that about 37% of college professors are atheist which means 37% of them are fools even with all of their academic degrees.
Here’s another sad fact: Charles Darwin’s view of evolution dominates 99% of secular universities in America. And even Christian universities deny portions of the Book of Genesis (i.e. a literal 7-day creation, the inerrancy and sufficiency of Scripture, the miracles found in the OT and the NT etc.).
Note from James Fire: Check out this TTUF interview with Russ Miller, ex-theistic evolutionist turned Christian apologist!
In PSALM 14:1 King David says,
“The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none who does good.”
In PSALM 14:1 King David says,
“The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none who does good.”
(watch the SHINE BRIGHT Teaching on the link provided at the beginning for the remaining commentary!)
ACTS 17:22-31
22 Then Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, "Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious; 23 "for as I was passing through and considering the objects of your worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO THE UNKNOWN GOD. Therefore, the One whom you worship without knowing, Him I proclaim to you: 24 "God, who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands. 25 "Nor is He worshiped with men's hands, as though He needed anything, since He gives to all life, breath, and all things. 26 "And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their pre-appointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings,
27 "so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; 28 "for in Him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have said, 'For we are also His offspring.' 29 "Therefore, since we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, something shaped by art and man's devising. 30 "Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, 31 "because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead."
ACTS 17:22-31
22 Then Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, "Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious; 23 "for as I was passing through and considering the objects of your worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO THE UNKNOWN GOD. Therefore, the One whom you worship without knowing, Him I proclaim to you: 24 "God, who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands. 25 "Nor is He worshiped with men's hands, as though He needed anything, since He gives to all life, breath, and all things. 26 "And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their pre-appointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings,
27 "so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; 28 "for in Him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have said, 'For we are also His offspring.' 29 "Therefore, since we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, something shaped by art and man's devising. 30 "Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, 31 "because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead."
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