Knowing the True God
Published by Stanley Pouw in 2017 · 28 May 2017
We are progressing through Acts 17 in our study and we find Paul al alone in Athens. He is overwhelmed by the idolatry of the city. They worshipped thousands of gods. And their gods are the great masterpieces of art and so, this city is tremendously cultured, but at the same time, greatly idolatrous.
Now, when we think about idolatry, we might think about a statue in a Hindu temple. Or maybe dances by the priests of Baal around the altar of Elijah. But Greek idolatry in Athens at this time was sophisticated and cultured. They were the philosophical and the intellectual class of the world. It was a sophisticated and complicated kind of thing.
And we have to recognize today that in America, as in all parts of the world, we are also victims of idolatry. In the truest sense, you only choose which god you are going to worship. Everybody bows down somewhere. Even the atheist bows down to himself, which is the most extreme kind of idolatry. Everything apart from God is idolatry.
Billy Graham asked a student at the University of North Carolina if he believed in God, and he said "yes, I have my own private god." And we see this all the time around us. We still bow down to those deities. Let me name a few. One is humanism. That mankind can solve their own problems. You know, this is the time when science was exploding and we thought we were really able to conquer all of these worldly problems.
The second deity that everybody worships is materialism. The panic of the energy crisis is that somebody is whittling away our materialism. And we're not going to be able to get all the extras we want. And life may reduce itself down to the dull, boring basics. And we won't be able to entertain ourselves. And so, little by little somebody is whacking away at, our little gods of humanism and materialism.
The third god that our society worships is sex. Everything from advertising to zoos is propagated through sex. Whether it is cars or deodorant or toothpaste or films and books now use that same language. Like Billy Graham said, “they rival the drippings of a broken sewer." People now are beginning to go back to old things, they are actually worshipping the occult. And some people even have physical idols that they worship now.
Western man with all of his culture, with all of his information, with all of his scientific knowledge is in the same satanic trap that governs the life of an individual somewhere in the middle of nowhere who's bowing down to a rock. Everybody bows at something. Idolatry is worshipping anything but God Himself. And it comes in all kinds of packages.
And the reason is that God created every human being to know Him. That's clear in Scripture. Not to know God means that you are totally disconnected from the purpose and significance of your life. And you may bow down to your little deities but you will never experience any ultimate satisfaction. As Augustine said "you've got a God-shaped vacuum that only He can fill.”
And so it's a tremendously frustrated world. And of course people are addicted to drugs and alcohol and they are killing themselves at a rate like never in history. And the reason is because they cannot cope with the fact that they have a multiple of things they bow down to that give no satisfaction.
Now, this was the same problem in Athens as we study Acts 17. With all their gods they had no satisfaction so they were open to a god they did not know, yet who could satisfy them. Because until mankind knows the true God, he knows no peace. He knows no satisfaction in the truest sense. Adam and Eve in the beginning were in the Garden of Eden together with and they were satisfied.
But once they fell, God separated Himself from them. And they lost the knowledge of God. And since that time men come into this world without knowing God. But even in a world where there is no true knowledge of God, there is still a little knowledge in our conscience and creation. In other words, God has planted within us the knowledge of Himself in our conscience and in the world that He has made.
Jeremiah 9:23-24 says, “Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, let not the mighty man glory in his might, nor let the rich man glory in his riches; 24 But let him who glories glory in this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the Lord, exercising lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth.” Now, in this life you might be smart, strong and rich, but you are nothing unless you know God.
In Exodus 20:3 God said, “You shall have no other gods before Me.” Is that just because God is selfish? No. The main point is that it is a violation of His creation. Verse 4-5, “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; 5 you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God.”
God does not tolerate rivals. You were made to know Me. Jealousy is not always evil. God said in Exodus 34:14, “You shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.” You say, God, why are You so concerned about that? There aren't any rivals. Oh, yes, there are. God in effect says that every person was formed by God in the womb. It was not an evolutionary process. So God has a right to be jealous.
But there are two kinds of jealousy. One kind of jealousy is, “I want what you have and because you have an idol, I hate you.” That is covetousness gone wild. But there's another kind of jealousy that says you are mine and I love you and I don't want anybody to take you from me. Now, that is pure virtue. Married persons who feel no jealousy at the intrusion of another lover into their home would surely be lacking in moral perception. For the exclusiveness of marriage is the essence of marriage.
1 Corinthians 10:22 says, “Are you going to provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than He?" That implies if you provoke the Lord to jealousy, He's going to do something. He has created man in His own image. And man cannot know his meaning until he knows God. And God will move to protect His own and He will punish an intruder.
2 Thessalonians 1:7-8 says, “The Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, 8 in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God.” So ultimately it's disastrous not to know God. It's a matter of spending eternity in hell. Can everybody know God? Yes, Romans 1:20 says that there is enough knowledge of God available in you and around you so that you are without excuse.
Paul would like to declare God to the people of Athens. Circumstances may come and go, but the knowledge of God remains. Think of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego who answered the king, "O Nebuchadnezzar, if we're going in that furnace, our God may deliver us, but if not, we still won't bow. Why? They knew they had the right God. They feared nothing. Now, that confidence and satisfaction comes to the life of one who knows the Lord. And no substitute can bring that.
Paul says there are three things necessary. One, recognize that there is a God. Two, recognize who God is. Three, understand what God is saying. They didn't know who He is and they didn't know what He was saying, but they at least believed He was there. Hebrews 11:6 says, “Without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”
The fool is the guy who denies God is. Some of them are atheists. Atheism is like a cactus sitting in the desert telling another cactus that there is no ocean. But there are those who like to do what they want to do and they don't want any judgment, so they get rid of God, so they can live easier. Then there is the agnostic who doesn't believe there is a God. Then, there is evolution which says, there may be a cosmic intelligence, but God has never manifested Himself. Everything is an accident.
Then, there is the polytheist who believes there are many gods. That is what is being propagated in America today. There are books about the spirit world written by demons, which tell us about all the hierarchy of the many gods and the prince of Venus and this ruler over here and this ruler over here. Many people believe there are many spirit beings, but those are not gods, they are only demons.
And then there are many people that are being dominated by this Eastern meditation. They are trying to get everybody to get to a higher level of consciousness. Transcendental meditation. They want the whole world to believe that meditation is what you need and that Christians are the problem. And so after the rapture, they are going to rule during the tribulation period. And everybody now is a god.
And then there is pantheism, which is a different kind of atheism. This says everything is God and if everything is God, then God isn't anything. Another view is deism. That says that there is a God somewhere and He made the universe. But after He created it, He went away and let it run down and He is totally uninvolved. All those are forms of the denial of the true God.
The greatest testimony to God is right here in the Bible. Deuteronomy 6:4 says, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one!” Deuteronomy 4:35 says, “To you it was shown, that you might know that the Lord Himself is God; there is none other besides Him.” Isaiah 42:8 says, “I am the Lord, that is My name; and My glory I will not give to another, nor My praise to carved images.”
Back to Acts 17, in knowing the unknown God we must believe that there is a God. Secondly, we must believe who God is. Paul tells them who God is in verse 24, "God who made the world and everything in it.” Think about God's creative power. Look at Job 26:6-7, “Sheol is naked before Him, and Destruction has no covering. 7 He stretches out the north over empty space; He hangs the earth on nothing.”
First of all, He created everything out of nothing. Isaiah 44:24 says, “Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, and He who formed you from the womb: “I am the Lord, who makes all things, who stretches out the heavens all alone, who spreads abroad the earth by Myself.” He created the universe by projecting His own thought into existence. Psalm 148:5 says "for He commanded and they were created".
And God never gets tired. Isaiah 40:28, “The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable.” And He is just as active now upholding what He made. That's the second point. He's not only Creator; God is the ruler. He holds it all together. Remember Hebrews 1:3, “He upholds all things by the word of His power.”
We launch men in these rockets and fly them around in space for many days and then they come back and they land where we expect. Why? Because the universe and the physical laws are constant. Imagine if all the laws were diminishing, and the world was decaying and God wasn't holding it together. We couldn't calculate anything.
Third thing, God is the giver. Look at 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.” Job 22:2 says, "Can a man be profitable unto God?" God is as good as He could possibly be. The pagans didn't understand this. They were always bringing food and were thinking that gods needed it. The Hindus still do that today.
Psalm 50:10-11 states, “For every beast of the forest is Mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills. 11 I know all the birds of the mountains, and the wild beasts of the field are Mine.” Do you think God needs you to bring an offering of food and put it before some altar? God does not need our food. We all need God, because it is God, who gives to all life and breath and all things.
Romans 11:36, “For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever.” James 1:17 says, “Every good 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.” 1 Timothy 6:17, “Command those who are rich in this present age not to be haughty, nor to trust in uncertain riches but in the living God, who gives us richly all things to enjoy.” Whatever we have comes from God.
Fourthly, God is the controller. Acts 17:26, “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.” Every nation is ordained by God. And God even determined the times and the boundaries of their habitation. That means that God is controlling history and destiny of men and nation.
You couldn't see what is happening in the USA, Israel, Russia and Syria without believing God is controlling history. History is His story. God has appointed the historical times when certain nations exist. History is on schedule and God is running it and it's going to culminate in the coming of Jesus Christ.
The fifth thing, God reveals all. I think about God and then I stop somewhere but the thing that amazes me most is that He lives in me. How do you get to know God? John 14:6 says, "No one comes to the Father except through Me." Christ is the one who introduces you to God. Let us pray.