Simply Christian

A now infamous preacher recently said, "...if we don’t have signs, then all we have is a bunch of theology..." Needless to say, neither signs, wonders or this individual's (heck, who doesn't know it's Todd Bentley) "theology" seemed to be of much help to him at all (or his wife and children). I'm sure that many in the crowd the night he said that gleefully bobble-headed and amened in approval, not even stopping to consider that theology means the knowledge or study of God and His nature.


One day as I was driving through our town, I noticed a church that had the following familiar verse displayed:

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. So do not be attracted by strange, new ideas... ~Hebrews 13:8-9a

It hit me as I read this simple little church sign the magnitude of the importance of our Theology. The verse above is far more than merely a collection of words; together they reveal to us a specific aspect of the nature and character of God, a little but extremely important part of who He is. The fact that He is eternal and unchanging in His nature is revealed and can be confirmed by many other scriptures. For example:

I am the Lord, and I do not change. ~Malachi 3:6

But You are always the same; You will never grow old

If we lose sight of the study of the nature and character of God, we run the very real risk of creating a god of our own imagination, and the consequences can be spiritually, morally, physically and consequently, eternally devastating:

Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship him as God or even give him thanks. And they began to think up foolish ideas of what God was like. AS A RESULT, their minds became dark and confused. Claiming to be wise, they instead became utter fools. And instead of worshiping the glorious, ever-living God, they worshiped idols made to look like mere people and birds and animals and reptiles. So God abandoned them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desired. As a result, they did vile and degrading things with each other’s bodies. They traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshiped and served the things God created instead of the Creator himself, who is worthy of eternal praise! Amen. That is why God abandoned them to their shameful desires. Even the women turned against the natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex with each other. And the men, instead of having normal sexual relations with women, burned with lust for each other. Men did shameful things with other men, and as a result of this sin, they suffered within themselves the penalty they deserved. Since they thought it foolish to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done. Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder, quarreling, deception, malicious behavior, and gossip. They are backstabbers, haters of God, insolent, proud, and boastful. They invent new ways of sinning, and they disobey their parents. They refuse to understand, break their promises, are heartless, and have no mercy. They know God’s justice requires that those who do these things deserve to die, yet they do them anyway. Worse yet, they encourage others to do them, too.~Romans 1:21-23

The Bible says that as mankind abandons the truth about the nature of who God is, we become abandoned to our own sinful desires. Then, sadly, mankind reaps the full wages of the consequences of their "theology." When we exchange the knowledge of the Holy One for another false god, darkness and confusion quickly ensue. This "original sin" is repeated over and over again as mankind questions, "did God really say that?" or, "Is that really what God is like?" We have examples in abundance in the form of books such as "The Shack", so-called emerging churches, with their Universalistic philosophies, and traditional denominations that have abandoned the teaching of the Scriptures for "strange, new ideas."


Anything less than truth is confusion for knowing who God is helps us to know who we are. Because He is unchanging and eternal, His words are therefore eternal and they expressly reveal His nature to us and our role in His unchanging plan:

The grass withers and the flowers fade, but the Word of our God stands forever. ~Isaiah 40:8

Even the smallest detail of God's law will remain until it's purpose is established. ~Matthew 5:18

Forever, O Lord, Your word stands firm in heaven. Psalm 119:89

Through God's word, The Bible, we understand that God's person, plan, purpose, and words are eternally unchanging. As a reflection of His nature, His words are called eternal and are forever settled in the heavens, remaining until every last detail of their purpose is established. Therefore, His words are an unchanging standard. Knowing this, it stands to reason that his words are authoritative, in fact, the final and highest authority for our lives and the filter through which we should form our world view and definition for all things. This clear theology, or understanding of God and who He is, clears away the darkness and confusion of sin, false doctrines and cultural misconceptions.


For example, if I am to know what true love is, I must conform my knowledge of love to the definition of love as revealed in God's Word, for, ...God is love. ~I John 4:8. Anything less than the truth of the Bible brings about darkness and confusion, and this is clearly evident in the many distorted definitions of "love" in our corrupt world. I can only know true love if I know the one true God in all His fullness as revealed to mankind through His word, the Bible. He does not nor will He ever conform to us or our misguided ideas of Him, for He is eternally who HE IS. We are to conform our knowledge of Him to the truth He has revealed to us in the Bible.


Your theology is of the utmost, eternal importance...

And this is the way to have eternal life—to know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, the one you sent to earth. ~John 17:3

...everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord... ~Phillipians 3:7-11