It was A.W. Tozer who so famously said, “What comes into our minds
when we think about God is the most important thing about us.”[1]$The
reality is that a well-formed doctrine of God will shape and inform nearly
every other theological view that a person might hold. Unfortunately, the
converse is also true; a poorly-formed doctrine of God will also (mis)shape
and (mis)inform every other theological view that a person might hold.
In the day and age in which we are living, there is no shortage of bad
information floating around on the internet about who God is. $This is part
of the problem with the internet, no one needs qualification anymore to
have as large of a platform as possible. The questions that I want to be
prepared to answer are those that stem from the promulgation of false
information about God. My desire is to know and understand this doctrine
so thoroughly that I can effectively refute bad teaching in this area.
Ultimately, however, my ambition is to study the person(s) of the triune
God as a means of truly knowing Him. Apart from knowing God, all of the
study of Him is an exercise in vanity. I heard, recently, of a legendary
theologian whose precise identity is escaping me (someone along the
lines of a DA Carson or a John Piper) who spoke at a seminary chapel
service with would-be pastors filling the auditorium and he challenged
them that in the midst of all of their theological, hermeneutical,
exegetical, and homiletical work, they had better pursue all of that with an
eye toward worship, that their study might inflame their hearts with love
toward God and empower them to pursue depth of relationship with Him. $
In my view, matters explicitly pertaining to the doctrine of God are better
served in a congregational setting if the pastor is to pepper the truths into
his teaching all throughout the year rather than have a concerted
emphasis on them for one particular series. However, if I were to develop
this content into a series, I would take the approach referenced above and
address the false teachings that are pervading the culture through social
media. Perhaps I would call it something along the lines of “The Lies We
Believe.”
For the Church, it is absolutely non-negotiable that she would be carefully
formed and shaped by a clear understanding of the person of God.
Beginning without that as a foundational premise would produce
misreadings and misunderstandings of the rest of the Bible. A misshaped
view of God would call into question His sovereignty, His omnipotence, His
omniscience, His omnibenevolence, or His divine authorship of scripture.
With those doctrines undermined, suddenly, what you are left with is no
longer the God of the Bible but a God of your own making, likely in the
image of the person who is imagining this God.
$
[1]$A.W. Tozer,$The Knowledge of the Holy.(San Francisco, California:
Harperone, 1978), p. 1.
