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THE FOUR WRITINGS OF GOD

 

PLEASE READ IN THE BIBLE (Exodus 31:18, 32:16) (Deuteronomy 10:1-4)

(Daniel 5:5, 23, 24, 27)(John 8:1-11)(2 Timothy 3:15, 16)(2 Peter 1:20, 21)

 

Many people today question the existence of God.  They refuse to believe the Bible and reject it as the Word of God.  They will not acknowledge the possibility that God could or would actually write something to man whom He created.  Other’s, believe that God is the creator and sustainer of the universe. They believe that God has created man and they have no problem in believing that God, through writing, would communicate His mind and will for man whom He created.   In this message we want to consider “The Four Writings of God” by way of the following outline:

 

  1. GOD WROTE ON TABLES OF STONE - REVEALING THE STANDARD OF GOD (Exodus 31:18, 32:16)(Deuteronomy 10:1-4)
  2. GOD WROTE ON THE PLASTER OF THE WALL – REVEALING THE JUDGMENT OF GOD (Daniel 5:5, 23,24)
  3. GOD WROTE ON THE GROUND – BRINGING CONVICTION AND GRACE TO SINNERS (John 8:1-11)
  4. GOD WROTE IN A BOOK (THE BIBLE) – REVEALING HIS MIND AND WILL FOR MAN (2 Timothy 3:15, 16; 2 Peter 1:20,21)

 

Let’s notice first of all;

 

  1. GOD WROTE ON TABLES OF STONE – REVEALING THE STANDARD OF GOD (Exodus 31:18, 32:16) (Deuteronomy 10:1-4)

 

It says in (Exodus 31:18) “He (the Lord God) gave unto Moses, when He had made an end of communing with him upon Mount Sinai, two tables of stone, WRITTEN WITH THE FINGER OF GOD”.  (32:16) “And THE TABLES WERE THE WORK OF GOD, and THE WRITING WAS THE WRITING OF GOD, GRAVEN UPON THE TABLES”.  (Deuteronomy 10:4) “He (the Lord God) WROTE ON THE TABLES, according to the first writing, THE TEN COMMANDMENTS”.  It has been said concerning God’s law, the Ten Commandments, that “like the granite rocks of the mountain on which they were given, these precepts form the immovable basis of the moral life of men and nations, the enduring groundwork of every lofty and stable civilization”.  The Ten Commandments were the standard of righteousness which God required from Israel.  They had voluntarily undertaken obedience to God.  They said they would keep His covenant as a condition of God’s blessing upon them.  It might be asked, why did God gave them a standard of righteousness so high and lofty that they could never reach it?  The answer is, God is holy and man is sinful.  God gave them His standard of righteousness to prove what was in their hearts, to bring out fully to view what was lurking there.  The purpose of God’s Law was to expose the corruption of their nature and teach them their ruined and guilty condition.

 

 Many people today also believe they can earn God’s favor and blessing by attempting to practice obedience to the law as the way of life.  Dear reader, are you doing this?  Listen to what God says in His Word, to any who would seek to earn God’s salvation by their own self righteousness,  (Romans 3:20) “By the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in His sight”.  (Galatians 2:16) “A man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ”.  Since man cannot be saved by keeping the Law, why then did God give it?  The answer is found in (Galatians 3:24) “The Law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith”.  The Law, as a schoolmaster, is a guide or tutor, and teaches the lesson that God is holy and man is sinful and unable to earn salvation by his own efforts.  Justification (the judicial act of God, whereby He justly declares and treats the sinner as righteous) comes by faith in Christ and on the basis of the shedding of His precious blood and His finished work on the cross. 

 

Dear reader, are you still trying to gain heaven by your own self righteous efforts?  The apostle Paul, speaking of his own Jewish brethren, said,  (Romans 10:3) “For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God”.  Are you like this, trying to establish your own righteousness by attempting to keep the Ten Commandments?  This will never save you for God’s heaven.  You need the “righteousness of God” in order to be saved.  You need the “righteousness which is of faith”.  (See Romans 9:30 and 10:6).  The way you can have the “righteousness which is of faith” is found in (Romans 10:9, 10, 13)”That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, (i.e. confess Jesus as Lord) and shalt believe in thy heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.  For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation”.  Dear reader, you must understand this very important teaching in the Word of God.  You can never be saved for God’s heaven by your own self righteous efforts.  You can not work your way to heaven by joining a church, being confirmed or baptized as a child.  Your Pastor, Pope or Rabbi can not save you.  Your self efforts to earn God’s favor may be religious, righteous and remarkable but they will not save you.  Nothing less than the “righteousness of God” imputed to you will save you.  (Romans 3:22) “The righteousness of God is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all that believe”.  The righteousness of God will be imputed to you when you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and put your faith and trust in Him to be your Savior.  Have YOU ever done this?

 

  1. GOD WROTE ON THE PLASTER OF THE WALL – REVEALING THE JUDGMENT OF GOD (DANIEL 5:5, 6, 23, 24, 27)

 

It says in these verses, (Daniel 5:5, 6, 23, 24, and 27) “In the same hour came forth fingers of a mans hand, and wrote over against the candlestick upon the plaster of the wall of the king’s palace: and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote.  Then the king’s countenance was changed and his thoughts troubled him, so that the joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one against another.  The God in whose hand thy breath is, and whose are all thy ways, hast thou not glorified: Then was the part of the hand sent from Him; and this writing was written.  Thou art weighed in the balances and art found wanting”.   This incident occurred when Belshazzar, king of the Babylonian Empire and grandson of Nebuchadnezzar, was keeping an idolatrous feast.  In the feast he was using the sacred gold and silver vessels which Nebuchadnezzar had stolen from the temple in Jerusalem.  They drank themselves drunk on wine and committed idolatry by praising the gods of gold and silver, bronze and iron, wood and stone.  The writing that appeared on the plaster of the wall was a rebuke of Belshazzar and his Empire for desecrating the vessels of the temple by using them in a drunken, idolatrous feast.  That same night, the Medo-Persian armies marched into Babylon and slew Belshazzar and overthrew the Babylonian Empire.  The writing of God, on the plaster of the wall, is by application, a message for every person.  Note the following;

 

·        “The God in whose hand thy breath is”.  Dear reader, this is true of you as well.  Your breath, your life, is in His hands.  The Bible says in (Ecclesiastes 3:2) “There is a time to be born, and a time to die”.  God knows you.  He knew when you would be born.  By His grace you have been given a certain amount of time.  He knows your time of death.  The question is, are you using your time wisely?  Are you prepared for eternity?  Your breath, your life is in His hands. It says in (James 4:14) “Ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life?  It is even a vapor (a puff of smoke), that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away”.  (1 Peter 1:24) “All flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass.  The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away”.  The message is, “life is brief and we do not know when the end shall be”. There is urgency about being saved and getting right with God.  It says in (2 Corinthians 6:2) “Behold, NOW is the accepted time; behold NOW is the day of salvation”.   Are YOU saved yet?

·        “Thou art weighed in the balances and art found wanting”.  This was God’s written message to Belshazzar.  He had sinned against God.  God’s judgment was pronounced upon him.  Judgment was swift.  It says in (Daniel 5:30) “IN THAT NIGHT was Belshazzar, the king of the Chaldean’s slain”.  Dear reader, it’s important for you understand that God’s written message to Belshazzar is also God’s written message to you.  YOU are weighed in the balances and found wanting.  God’s word, the Bible, plainly says we are all born into this world with a sinful nature which soon manifests itself by sinful deeds.  It says in (Romans 3:9, 10-12, 22, 23) “Jews and Gentiles, they are all under sin”. “There is none righteous, no, not one.”  “There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God.”  “There is none that doeth good, no not one”.  “There is no difference: for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God”.  “All” means all and “None” means none.  This includes YOU dear reader.  God’s Word says what it means and means what it says. 

 

Sin has its consequences.  It says in (Romans 6:23) “The wages of sin is death”.  (James 1:15) “Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death”.  Death is not only physical (the separation of the spirit from the body), but it is also spiritual and eternal (for the unsaved person, the separation of the spirit from God).  After death is the judgment of God.  It says in (Hebrews 9:27) “It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment”.  Unless you get saved, YOU will stand before God and give an account for your sinful, Christ rejecting life.  The outcome is certain.  It is recorded in (Revelation 20:11-15).  It says in (Revelation 21:8) “The unbelieving shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death”.  Dear reader, these things are not pleasant to hear but you must hear them.  These are not my words but God’s Word.  In love for your soul, I must warn you and tell you what God says in His Word.  God’s judgment, as we noticed above, was executed on Belshazzar “in that night”.  By God’s grace, if you’re reading this message, you still have time to be saved.  This leads us to the next writing of God. 

 

  1. GOD WROTE ON THE GROUND – BRINGING CONVICTION AND GRACE TO SINNERS (JOHN 8:1-11)

 

In this portion of scripture we have the account of the Lord Jesus sitting in the temple and teaching the people.  While He was doing this the Scribes and Pharisees brought unto Him a woman caught in the very act of adultery.  The self righteous Pharisees said to the Lord, “Moses, in the law, commanded that such should be stoned”.  “What do you say should be done”?  It says in (John 8:6 - 8) “This they said, tempting Him that they might have to accuse Him”.  But Jesus stooped down, and with His finger wrote on the ground, as though He heard them not”.   (vs.7) “So when they continued asking Him, He lifted up Himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her”.  (vs. 8) “And again He stooped down, and wrote on the ground”.  The One who WROTE ON STONE and WROTE ON PLASTER also WROTE ON THE GROUND.  In this account, He wrote twice but we are not told what He wrote.  At least two important things occurred as a result of the Lord’s words and the Lord’s writing;

 

·        It brought conviction to the woman’s accusers.  It says in (verse 9) “And they (the Pharisees) which heard it being convicted by their own conscience went out one by one”.  Their conscience was stricken with guilt.  They were convicted by their conscience.  They were brought to a realization of their sin and guilt before the Lord.  Have YOU ever been convicted and convinced of your sinful condition before God?  Have you repented of your sins?  “Repentance” in scripture means a complete change of mind involving turning from sin to God, which results in a change of life.  It happens when God supernaturally reveals to the sinner a deep consciousness of what he is in His sight, causing him to take sides with God against himself.  It is defined in (Isaiah 55:7) “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him”.  “Repentance” is a prerequisite and an absolute necessity for a person to be saved.  The Lord Jesus said in, (Luke 13:5) “Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish”.  It says also in, (Acts 17:30) “God now commandeth all men everywhere to repent”.  Have YOU repented of your sins? 

·        It brought words of grace to the sinful woman.  It says in (John 8:10, 11) “Woman where are those thine accusers?  Hath no man condemned thee?  She said, No man, Lord.  And Jesus said unto her, neither do I condemn thee: go and sin no more”.  O how gracious the Lord was to the woman.  He did not condemn her.  This was in keeping with His purpose for coming into the world.  It says in, (John 3:16, 17) “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life”.  “For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved”.  When He came the first time, it was not to condemn.  He came to save sinners by dying for their sins on the cross.  When He comes the second time it will be to bring condemnation and wrath.  Dear reader, these are the days of God’s grace and your opportunity to be saved.  Are YOU saved yet?

 

 

  1. GOD WROTE IN A BOOK (THE BIBLE) – REVEALING HIS MIND & WILL FOR MAN (2 TIMOTHY 3:15, 16; 2 PETER 1:20, 21)

 

The Bible is the Word of God.  The scriptures are God’s own written utterances.  The Bible is both divine and human.  It is divine, in that it came from God.  It is human, in that it was given through fallible men who, for the time necessary, became the penmen of the Holy Spirit to write infallible words. God is the source of Scripture.  The writers were the channels used by God to convey His mind and will.  We have in the Bible a complete compendium of all the writings of God and in every part of it, it is God’s voice to man. It says in (2 Peter 1:20, 21) “No prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.  For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit”.  No prophecy ever came by the will of man, but men spoke or wrote from God, being moved (or borne along) by the Holy Spirit.  It is not the writers only, who were inspired of God, but the writings themselves.  It says in (2 Timothy 3:15, 16) “The holy scriptures which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus”.  “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness”.  The scriptures are “God breathed”, therefore they are divine in origin and authority.  The scriptures are true because they come from God who cannot lie.  (Hebrews 6:18) “It is impossible for God to lie”.  The Lord Jesus Christ said in, (John 5:39) “Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me”.   The scriptures are first and foremost the story of Jesus.  Woven throughout the Old Testament is the story of One who would come down from Heaven to die and rise again.  His birth is found in (Isaiah 7:14) and (Micah 5:2).  His mission is found in (Isaiah 61:1, 2).  The Lord’s betrayal is disclosed in (Zechariah 11:12).   His crucifixion is spoken of in (Psalm 22:1, 16; 69:21) and (Isaiah 53).  The ascension of Christ is found in (Psalm 68:18; 110:1).

 

Since the Bible is God’s written Word to YOU, there are a few important things YOU should know;

 

·        It says in (Matthew 4:4) “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God”.  We need bread for our physical well being.  Our life, however, is more than just physical.  We need to read and obey the Word of God for our soul’s well being as well.  This sets before us the importance we should give the Word of God in our life.  How important is the Word of God in YOUR life? 

·        It says in (John 3:3, 7) “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”  “YOU MUST be born again”.  Have YOU experienced the new birth?  Are YOU “born again”?  You will never see or be in God’s kingdom unless you have.  The Word of God, along with the Spirit of God, are the instruments of the new birth.  It says in (1 Peter 1:23) “Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, BY THE WORD OF GOD, which liveth and abideth forever”.  Our physical birth is of “corruptible seed” since we are all born in sin that ultimately results in decay and death.  The “seed” of the new birth is the incorruptible Word of God because all who are born again have eternal life. 

·        It says in (the words of the Lord Jesus Christ), (John 12:48)”He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day”.  The Word of God that you have heard or read and refused to obey, are the words that will judge you in the last day.  We are told in (Hebrews 1:1, 2) “God hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son”.  Have YOU heard His word?  He said in (John 5:24) “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word , and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life”.  To hear His Word is to believe on Him.  Salvation comes from believing on Him.  (Acts 16:30, 31) “What must I do to be saved?”  “BELIEVE on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved”. 

 

Dear reader, in conclusion I want to say to you, on the authority of the Word of God, God loves you.  He is not willing that any should perish.  He wants you to be saved.  This is why He sent His Beloved Son to die on the cross for your sins.  You are traveling the “highway of life”.  Now that you have read this message, you have come to “the crossroads”.  Which way will you go?  Will you continue to reject the Savior and God’s offer of salvation?  Or, will you believe on Him and receive Him as your personal Lord and Savior?  It is your decision and your responsibility.

 

Please give this matter your most serious attention.  Will you be a believer or a non-believer?  Your eternal destiny depends on your decision.

 

Christian Messenger