This is kind of a new experience
for me. I've never done the Sunday School before, so might have
to bear with me. I am going to take my coat off.
It is warm in here. OK, why do we believe in God
and Christ? It's something that we've never
seen. Has anybody in here ever seen Christ or God? It's something
that we believe in that we can't see, we can't touch or anything,
but we still believe it. And we seem to have an inherent
need to believe in something that's bigger than what we are.
And it's been true through all human history. The Greeks, Romans,
Egyptians, all civilizations throughout history have had gods
of some type. But were they actually gods? Could they do anything? Or were
they just carved stones, and that was just it, just a stone?
Could they do anything at all? Our god, we believe that he is
in control of everything, but their gods, They were just, like
I say, just a chunk of stone or something. They couldn't really
do anything. For believers, the Bible has been telling us about
God for thousands of years. But are we any different than
these other people that we believe in something that potentially
isn't real? So all these other people were
in the dark when it comes to our triune God. Have you ever
been in real darkness? I mean, I'm not talking about
when the power goes out, you can still see shadows and stuff,
you can see your hands and stuff like that. But I'm from West
Virginia and I used to work in the coal mines down there. When
you're six or eight hundred feet underground, you turn your light
off, you are in darkness. You can put your hands as close
as you want to your face, you will see nothing. I mean, it
is true darkness. And that's the way we are, or
that's the way we were before The Holy Spirit worked on us
and gave us the light to see Christ. He reveals it through his grace
and through the Holy Spirit. Only then can we see the light.
In Ephesians 5.8, for ye were sometimes in darkness, but now
are ye light in the Lord. Walk as children of light. The
Holy Spirit opens our eyes to that light. Otherwise, you're
in the dark. There's so many people in the
world that are in darkness because it hasn't been revealed to them.
In addition to that, we can see God's hand at work all around
us. The very first verse of the Bible,
Genesis 1-1, tells us, in the beginning, God created the heavens
and the earth. So it just, right from the very
start, tells us that God is in control. Genesis 1-11 goes on
and says, and God said, let the earth bring forth grass, the
herb yielding seed, and the fruit after his kind. whose seed is
in itself upon the earth, and it was so. First day of summer was just
a few days ago, and, you know, my strawberries are coming on
strong. You know, they're going crazy. I picked my first raspberry
just a couple days ago, and I may have planted those plants, but
it's God that gives the increase. I can't make those things grow.
It is only God. This is all God's hand yielding
the fruits of his creation. God gives the increase. You and
I can't do anything. We can go through the motions,
but we can't actually make anything grow. It's God's hand in all
that. In Genesis 125, and God made
the beast of the earth after his kind, and the cattle after
their kind, and everything that creepeth upon the earth after
his kind. God saw that it was good. And
after the animals, of the world were created, he created man,
in Genesis 127. So God created man in his own
image. In the image of God, created
he him, male and female, created he them. And all this goes against
the evolution theory. One of their theories is that
man developed from fish. Well, there's a hole in their
theory. You know, where'd that fish come from? You know, life
had to come from someplace. And they want to say, well, we
come out of the ocean and develop from there. But someplace along
the line, that fish had to be created. And that's part of God's
hand. The Bible tells us in Genesis
121, and God created great whales and every living thing that moveth,
that's all things, which the waters brought forth abundantly.
There's such a wide variety of life in this world, and it all
did not come from just a few cells like the evolutionists
want you to believe. You know, the evolution theory
that Darwin had, His study was about some birds
on some island. I forget exactly which island
it was, but he was talking about evolutionary changes that were
environmentally brought on. God allows evolution of creatures,
of animals and people and stuff like that. But the thing is,
a dog is still going to be a dog. They may change a little bit,
but it's not going to, change from a dog into a cat or into
a bird or anything else. Like I say, there are evolutionary
things. And in all of man's ability, they have never been able to
create life themselves. Five years ago, scientists created
a synthetic organism, but They had to create that from a simple
bacteria cell. So they did not really create
life. They claim that they created
life, but they didn't really do it because they took a living
thing and then just kind of added to it. So that's not really creating
life. Only God's been able to create
life. Going back to Genesis, and God made the beast of the
earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and everything
that creepeth upon the earth after his kind, God saw that
it was good. And it's all part of God's creation. It could not have become the
one big evolutionary puzzle that the evolutionists want you to
believe. They want you to believe that, you know, you know, like
I say, developed from just a few cells, but they can't explain
where that initial life come from. In Colossians 116, for
by him were all things created that are in heaven and that are
in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions,
principalities or powers. All things were created by him
and for him. Not only we can see the evidence
of God's creation here on Earth, but just go outside on a dark
night and look up at the sky. If you ever get a chance to,
there's a dark park up in west of Mackinac City. It's on the
Lake Michigan side and it's away from the city lights and you
go up there on a moonless night and you can see Thousands and
thousands of stars, the Milky Way, is what you're seeing. And
it makes you feel so small. And that's all God's creation.
I mean, how small are we in comparison to the whole universe? But God
still cares for us individually. You know, we're just a tiny speck
in that universe. And the Hubble Telescope is another
thing that if you ever get a chance to look at some of the images
from the Hubble Telescope and the billions of stars that are
out there well past the Milky Way, we can just see a little
bit with our naked eye, but the telescope sees a whole lot more,
but it's still all God's creation. Yet with all this great creation,
God and Christ still cares about us. Ephesians 1-4, according
as he hath chosen us before the foundation of the world, that
we should be holy and without blame before him in love. We're
just a tiny speck in this universe, and yet Christ died for us. Why
did Christ have to die for us? We're all sinners. We're born
sinners and we're sinners throughout our life. And that sin has a
price. And for believers, that price
was the very blood of Christ. Christ gave up his blood for
his chosen people that he shed on the cross. In John 15, verses
13 and 14, Christ tells us, greater love hath no man than this, that
a man lay down his life for his friends. Yea, ye are my friends. Christ laid down his life for
his friends. He laid it down for his chosen
people, for us. And that's just hard to believe,
you know, to understand sometimes. The life of Christ was not taken
by man, but Christ laid it down. John 10, 18. No man take it from
me, but I lay it down of myself. I have the power to lay it down
and I have the power to take it up again. We just talked about
A man laying down his life for his friends, but I think giving
the life of your son would be even a harder task. God did just
that with his son. He laid down the life of Christ
for us. As a father, I would find that
very, very difficult to do, you know, to sacrifice your own son. In John 3.16 it says, for God
so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever
believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. And in Matthew 17 5, this is
my beloved son in who I'm well pleased. Well, God is well pleased
with his son. And why is that? You know, he
knew that Christ was going to come to earth to lay down his
life for his people, for his chosen people. And he died for
that. He paid the price of sin for
for us. And that is definitely well-pleasing for Christ. If
God is well-pleased with Christ, then is he well-pleased with
us? When he sees Christ and we are in Christ, it stands to reason
that God is also well-pleased with us. And this is just hard
to understand sometimes or overwhelming that God can be pleased with
us. We're just sinners. And here it is, God, He created
the whole world, but He still cares about us. And we are just
sinners, and we can do nothing to please God on our own. But
through Christ, everything is possible. How is that possible,
that we are so well-pleased in Christ? Matthew 24, or 1924,
gives us the answer. With man, this is impossible.
With God, all things are possible. And Christ was talking about
a camel going through the needle of an eye, or the eye of a needle,
rather. But I think this could also plot
us that it's impossible for us to please God, and it's only
possible with God. It's not possible for us to please
God without being in Christ, that is. Christ went to the cross
for his chosen believers, not for everyone in the whole world,
like some people want to tell you that he saves the whole world,
but he was there to save believers. He shed his blood for the people
that he chose before the foundation of the world. Ephesians 1.4,
according as he has chosen us in him before the foundation
of the world. that we should be holy without blame before
him in love. He chose us, we can't choose
him. And we wouldn't have any desire
to choose him in our natural state, but with the Holy Spirit
works on us, we can believe in Christ. Ephesians 1.7, we have
redemption through his blood, forgiveness of sins according
to the riches of his grace. So going back to the original
question, why do we believe in God and Christ? God believes
in Christ, and Christ believes in us as his chosen people. John
6, 29, this is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he
hath sent. John 6, 37, all that the Father
giveth me shall come to me, and he that cometh to me I in no
ways will cast out. So God sends the Holy Spirit
to us to help us to believe, or to make us believe. And we
can't fight that. It is God's will that we believe,
so that we believe because we cannot resist the all-powerful
God. He has chosen people, and we
may try to resist or whatever, but He is gonna save every one
of His chosen people. There's not gonna be a single
person left. And when that last chosen person comes, then Christ
will be coming to, what is it? The last coming, I guess it is. I'm not sure if I'm saying that
quite right, but nobody will be left behind. So, okay. Any questions? I know it's fairly
short. Sorry, so short, but that's what
I've got there. So any questions or anything? all we have to do is look around
and, you know, the Earth is truly amazing, you know, when you think
about it, you know, how the world is positioned just perfect so
that we, you know, survive on this planet. If the Earth was
just a little bit out of orbit, we'd freeze to death or burn
up or something like that. And yet, the earth orbits around
the sun in a perfect orbit to give us the seasons. God created
the seasons so that we have the spring, summer, fall, and winter.
And that's all God's hand and it's all perfectly controlled
by him. So it's pretty much a miracle. And yet he still chose us, you
know, and it just it's just mind boggling to me. So that's all
I have. Dave, would you like to close this?