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CHAPTER ONE

THE DIVINE NAME

NOT A HANDLE FOR INTRUSION

BUT A GLORY TO HALLOW

Exodus 3:14

INTRODUCTION OF MOSES TO THE DIVINE NAME

It is near to 3500 years ago. There is a man called Moses, tending his herds.

He has just asked a question. It is always apt to ask when you lack knowledge, wisdom, guidance, grace.

Moses had a task, but he did not understand part of it. God confronted the former prince of Egypt, Hebrew-born, Egyptian raised, with His concern at, and involvement in the situation of Israel in Egypt. Step one. "I have heard their cry because of their task-masters, for I know their sorrows."

The Lord indicated that He had come down, was to be terrestrially active, to DELIVER them. Action was to hand, and Moses was to be the one sent! All this came in a lustrous revelation of divine knowledge, compassion and intent to act. It was spectacularly wondrous to be chosen to work so closely, indeed intimately with the God of creation and the Lord of life in such a redemptive enterprise as this. "Come now, therefore, and I will send you to Pharaoh," so that the children of Israel would end their time in Egypt and get out of it.

God was active, Egypt was active, Israel was suffering, Moses was questioning conditions of his appointment.

Moses, evidently already on close terms with the Lord at once goes to the practical. After all, he had been VERY practical when seeking, 40 years earlier to deliver a Hebrew man from an Egyptian assailant, for it resulted in the death of the latter. HOW at once came to mind, it appears. How would there be opportunity to start such a mission as this ? Who am I ? he asked, that I should go t o Pharaoh. Doubtless there would be a certain strain in view of his earlier action, as a young prince, guilty at least of manslaughter; but it was still true he had had a status like that of prince. The Lord's reply was simple: I WILL BE WITH YOU, and indeed, CERTAINLY He would be with Moses. If God be for you, who can be against you! WHEN, the Lord added, you have brought the children of Israel OUT of Egypt (with the then current status of slaves), you will serve God on this (same) mountain.

Moses pursued the practicalities. What then is the NAME to be given to the people when he,Moses presents himself to lead them out ? If the people are to act with Him on the basis of a mission, from whom then is this mission coming ? How can he identify the God who had called him, to the people ?

IF the WHOLE point is God's presence, they need to be assured that this is really the case. God provided confirmatory actions, with astonishing power, but Moses wanted to know - What name shall I give ? as if to a caller at the door, wanting to speak to the owner within!

THAT NAME is our concern in this Chapter. It is true that the word in Hebrew which is translated LORD, is a translator's composite of four famous letters and vowel points (for in Hebrew they put in vowels through points, underneath words of consonants) taken from another word, another for lord, and these are then a synthesis, the four consonants with the vowels taken from the other word, a composite! It is the case that there is question about the original four letters; but this is not here our concern. The statement of the name is the high-content jewel here, for it is explicit, not philological game, and its meaning is intended to be explanatory. Let us then follow it.

In reply to Moses' interrogation, about name, the Lord responds in this way. "I am who I am" is the name, and in speaking to the people of Israel, at such time as he returned to them from his voluntary exile, he was to say, "I AM has sent me to you."

That was clear, but what did it mean ? In Hebrew, there is the possibility of translating this, "I am" as "I will be"; but since God wishes to show the people who He is, it would be useless to say this, since just what He would be ten seconds later, or ten weeks, months or years, would make the contract, the agreement, the basis meaningless. He WILL BE what ? there would be no limit. If He changed, then who knows what effect this internal change would have on His commitments which were vital to the case. It was no play, but a going concern God who was in action, and His word is this: I AM WHO I AM.

This at once may be seen to include a number of elements, given the situation, the words and His past actions. As Creator of the universe, methodical, vast in plan, adequate in power (Genesis), with equivalent of word and deed without limit, insistent on communication and communing with man, giving tests to show reality to man, in his own self, bringing death to man as a result of failure, and promising deliverance through someone in human format Genesis 3:15), He was far from unknown. His impress was on all, and His provision was for voluntary breach, if this was the human desire, with just such a penalty. He was no trifler, space and time themselves, with the entire universe, all that belonged to it, entirely from Himself. Time assuredly would not wither Him: it was a mere current in the tide of events from His power, a place for patience in the creation of His unlimited dominion.

Thus the name I AM', means at once that He is NOT subject to His creation, such as by time or wearing out or changeable space or attenuation or alteration. Time itself is His, and He made it. He is, thus, eternal, dependent on nothing, subject to nothing, invulnerable to anything, in charge, even though He allowed for liberty on the part of man in particular, as part of the very essence of His creation, so that man could voluntarily follow Him, or allow his own seduction, which occurred, and hence death. It was that foretold result of man's sin and fall, that left for any continuance, the necessity of redemption or else permanence of his plight, in final totality.

God could, of course, if He so desired, actually take on Himself the format of a man, thus in a very lively way resembling an author making of himself a player in his own novel; and thus He could make Himself vulnerable to what would be done to Him; but having all time in His hand, and limited by nothing, He would know what would, and without breaching the liberty given to man, could control events, allowing this or that act or attitude in man to be used to the desired end, as if in chess; and in such ways He could still accomplish whatever He wanted when among mankind, thus fulfilling Genesis 3:15,and who else ? since the enemy of life was strong, and man was smitten with a spiritual disease and distemper, subject to the sin he had thought to advance his powers and position! Sin is often like that: ironic.

The divine desire was for His creation, for man, but not so that He would change and use force instead of ensure liberty for His human creation; so that man in response to His coming, might slay the format of mankind which He would adopt, and He, unlimited as always in power, could resurrect the same and so demonstrate His power, kindness, concern and the depth of His love of man, making a way from less than eternity to eternity itself, from debasement to delight, from shame to salvation. That would be the end of the beginning of the exhibition of redemption in the time of Adam, as in Genesis 3:15. How much was involved in so few words, but in such a maximal situation, to the very depths of mankind and his life, death, guilt and future.

This was the basic situation, as we rove over the realities and consider what faced Moses. THIS is the God of creation without limit to power, making man in His own likeness, having significant liberty therefore, with no less significant results for breaching those gifts as man did. Now there is a savour of redemption.

The time moves to Moses, this Hebrew babe appointed to die with the others in the Egyptian partial genocide, who is adopted secretly by an Egyptian royal lady. The babe has lived well, become a prince, had his zeal turned to a plight through the manslaughter in his efforts to deliver a Hebrew from Egyptian persecution, has lived in another land with his herds for 40 years, and now is divinely sent for the deliverance of the nation. Which nation ? that of Israel. Why so important in this setting ? It is because God appointed it from the time of Abraham as a source nation for the coming of one, doubtless the same one as in Genesis 3:15, through whom, firstly, ALL the nations of the earth would be blessed (Genesis 12). In order for this to happen, there had to be a locality for them to be, and God showed a way as extraordinary and majestic in leading Abraham to this, as He did later in having Moses lead the nation which went to Egypt in time of famine, out of that land when they had abused them as slaves, the rulers having changed in that time.

Moreover (Genesis 17:7-8), God determined that the land to which He sent Abraham would be theirs, and would be of uncancellable character for them, though (Leviticus 26), if they misused their divine relationship, they would know the meaning of forgiven sin presumed on, and mission abused themselves, losing their land for a long season. This was to occur, later, as in the book of Kings and that of Chronicles, but for the present, our time with Moses, it was a case of deliverance, redemption, a power paying a price to e extract them from the slave pen which, for them, Egypt had become. Thus we see the situation with Moses and the divine name.

Where have we reached ? It is here. We are now back some 3500 years. God is going to take action through a man, this time a prophet, Moses, to deliver one particular nation from another, guests in Egypt (invited in the day of Joseph), whose hosts had decided on the most treacherous step of turning them into slaves, just as in parallel, sin turns mankind into slaves of sin (John 8:30ff.). As to sin, God in due time would redeem those who followed HIM, from that special horror also, and once more, this in terms of the liberty given to man, as He Himself knew it, even when man would foul up even that deliverance through the Saviour to come! This too He foretold (Isaiah 49:7). Thus THIS is condemnation that light has come and man has preferred darkness, in the SETTING of a limitless love that the world might be saved, but LOVE (John 3:15ff.), and not martial arts is the name of the procedure. Hence some come, and some do not, known to God from the first, implemented to the last.

One God with several steps leading to a stated end, in the day of Moses, was showing a step in this redemption, the national one out of Egypt. Like any other work of faith, in which man must follow God, but need not, for the action, this one is accompanied by revelation and requirements. ONE of these is that they know His eternal name, one for ever to be applicable (Exodus 3:15), "My memorial to all generations." It is one God revealed by an eternal name, to all generations to be applicable, recognisable and applicable, the God who never changes, eternal, independent, able to speak and not to be withstood, but in love not merely dictating, but allowing to liberty its love and life, or its folly and results. It is well now as then, to know this name.

We need now to look to this name and find something of its revelatory force.

Who is this God ? We have already pondered together some of the immediate background and some things to come, in looking at the NAME of God, which is to show who He is, and communicate to the point, so making an introduction to what is knowable. It is not as if reference to such a name had certainly never been known before Moses; but it is now central, explained, applied, eternal. This, rather than GOD ALMIGHTY, is the core term for transactions at least. It is by this He may be known. It will perpetually be a kind of core signature of Himself. I AM WHO I AM.

THE DIVINE NAME,

AND JESUS CHRIST WHO BORE IT HIMSELF

Moreover, this God added to Moses, "Thus you will tell the children of Israel, 'I AM has sent me to you." As to this eternal signature, name, therefore, when Jesus Christ declared, "Before Abraham was, I AM," (John 8:58), there was an infinite significance in that it was significant of eternity and infinite power and majesty. It was He who had this name. It is as in Isaiah 48:16ff., HE is sent, as Deity, from Deity, for Deity is in three Persons, all God, in infinite intimacy, the One to Express, the One Expressive and the One applying these things, this true of the very nature of God. This is direct in Isaiah, as Christ was direct in assigning that NAME to Himself personally. But what of Christ's statement in John 8:58 ? There is more. It was in a special context. The Jews were querying Christ on His statement that "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day...", challenging that He was not yet 50 years old, and yet was stating that He had seen Abraham (thousands of years before!). Christ's reply is to use the signature name, the eternally significant name, that given to Moses to last through all generations, the identikit name, THE name above all names for God Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, namely l AM.

In doing so, He was saying not that I AM had sent Him, not that. It was not as with Moses. Instead, He was stating in terms of how He could know Abraham: that before even Abraham existed, there was He. Moreover, not only this, was His statement but this, that IN His existence it was above time, and again, it was as God exists, beyond chronological limits, in eternity. Time is His and He made it; things made have to be in time on this earth; but He, His mode is I AM, beyond the limitations of our system, as an author above His book, but more so in this, that books as such are all dependent on Him! He is absolute Creator, in the Trinity in unitary action.

With Him, then, the mode of living was as stated earlier to Moses, and through Moses, concerning his Sender. Now it is stated BY Christ of Himself. Nothing could be more fundamental in the equation of Christ to God (as in Philippians 2:1-10 with Isaiah 45:22-25), and nothing more thrilling, and WELL might Abraham rejoice to see the day of the one who, in one of the generations from him, would be a BLESSING TO ALL NATIONS. HERE at last, He was - He who IS: I AM. His time had come; to earth He went, to perform the overthrow of Satan as prescribed in Genesis 3:15, and bring the blessing of Genesis 12.

Consider this NAME further.

It is not an identity statement, not in the context. He is not saying, WHO I AM IS WHO I AM. No, it is more directive. In this, that it reveals Him as knowable in crucial respects, no mere mental idea. It is, then, asserting His eternity, infinity, limitless power and being, independence of all, but there is more. It is not that I AM because I was begotten, because such and such events produced me, am a species or genus or a type, for this is all swallowed up in unqualified being.

Let us consider what might be thought, without consideration of this name. It is conceivable to think of God, like a human body or tree, as having this and that, this more prominent than that, and so on. However God here shows that He is NOT a sum of characteristics, just as a jewel is not a sum of facets. Such qualities may be seen in it, but these facets do not constitute it. They are on it, show something of it; but do not equate to it.

God is what He is - this, not a statement of tautology, but one of emphasis to detach misconceptions. Infinite in power and wisdom, He is not anatomisable. Distinctive characteristics do not comprise Him, but are true to Him.

He is boundless in wisdom: that is why it is so comforting that when He delimits a situation or intention, He makes it relative to His word, so that it is fixed. As Psalm 138 shows, He has magnified His word above all His name.

He declines to decline. He is impregnable to insistent analysis, as you might make of the parts of a slain mosquito (and amazingly surgical and brilliant are those parts, as part of the curse as in Romans 5, to disturb man). He is not this and that, assembled, co-ordinated by the mind of man. To be sure as He declares it in Romans 1:17ff., His divine nature is obvious, together with His power, but while from what He has done, this is evident, what are the plans of His heart ? that is another thing. While this whole matter is expressed in its aspects in SMR and with the conclusion concerning His word, here we are concerned with a special feature in itself: His name.

This inner scope of the thoughts of His heart, His responses to all that is, His plan of action, it is available in one way only, by DIVULGEMENT. Even a man knows by his spirit what lies in heart, and if a man is thus private, how much more is God (I Corinthians 2:9ff.). It is this which comes by revelation, in this matter, the Bible as shown in SMR. The word of God is the determinative revelation. This is the consummation of the knowledge of God given to man, just as in Christ, the Saviour is the activation of this knowledge in the heart of man, as God and man live in accord. That, it is a heart to heart matter with a propositional background of depictions, diagnosis, prognosis, remedy, destiny and foci.

What then as to the name further, as shown in Exodus 3 ? It is this. God is not subjectible to probing scrutiny, though His sublime nature is clear, undimmed, undiminished, not subject to time, doing what He will, co-ordinate in power and principle, in will and result. You either know Him, to be found where and how He declares (cf. Isaiah 52-55), or you do not. Thus, He BY HIS OWN WILL has given to man, and if man uses this as if God is not there, then things desirable there are, that will not eventuate. These are desired by God for man, but if not preferred by man, then they become a leave of absence, without leave, that is, an action to desolate man, instead of redeem him. Yet this capacity given to man, is part of God's will, that will have some reality on the earth, and some resultants. Thus, though pathology has blighted the human will (John 1:12), so that man does not, as if autonomous simply choose God, yet the will of man, as before God before all time, and as in all love, is crucial: that is, man is accountable for His handling of the sublime divine offer of salvation, and ONLY man is to be blamed for its negation (John 3:19), being magnificently able to deny God in essence, principle and reality.

III

THE DIVINE LOVE

WHAT would be the Gospel could never be deduced, induced or found. It had to be stated. HOW He would respond to sin would not be known unless He had spoken (I Corinthians 2:9ff.). He could trash the disobedient, as one might crush a piece of paper where one had found a fault, or else correct it, for example. He chose to correct; but again, with due regard to the liberty which He Himself had created, and the love which is critical to all He does (Deuteronomy 6:5, Leviticus 19:18), matters amplified and applied by the Saviour, Jesus the Christ, when He came to this earth (Matthew 22:37ff.). This very correction, however, was given in the form of optional redemption, necessary for life, but capable of rejection (cf. Acts 7:49-53, Proverbs 1). True God knew His own beforehand and had ensured that the response that was true would not be lost or cancelled through universal sin, but it was this response, given in God's sovereign grace, which known to Him, would be crucial. This is what He wanted, and as He is love (I John 4:7ff.), clearly nothing fundamentally and finally contrary to it could be the method! Even the gift of love, this is something which the Lord did it Himself, not by some kind of subjection OF man. The truth is what He discovered, before time, and applied.

It is His word which is reliable, just as He is faithful to it and to those to whom it applies, as in Colossians 1:19ff.. There are no variant elements in Him (James 1:17ff.), as if different, difficult bits of Him were at variance; for nothing is given to Him, nothing can resist Him, there is neither limit without or without. He is what He is, not derivative, manipulable, with junctures and junctions in which His weakness through inconsistency is to be found; for there is no weakness, nothing is His inheritance, but He is what He is, always was, always will be, and time has no relevance to His composition, since He is not composed. HE IS. The CONDEMNATION principle is at the lip's of Jesus, not man in his sin: THIS is the condemnation, light has come, darkness is chosen rather than light, is preferred.

Man's will is currently devastating disabled towards the Lord by sin (I Cor. 2:14), but God's knowledge is gloriously triumphant over this current malady of man, and there lies the forekowledge, not of man's variable works (Romans 9), but of his heart. It is God who knows this past psychology; it is He who engenders new life in man, one by one, each who is His; and it is He who shows in the face of His passionate desire for the world, to save it, what is the exclusive function. It is not in Him, who gave all for this world; it is in man, who all or nothing, does not so prefer.

This lies as seen in revelation, in the Bible, in the heart of that God who would have ALL to be reconciled to Himself (Colossians 1:19ff.). This is not calculable, for the I AM WHO I AM, knows all, expresses His very depths (I Corinthians 2:9ff.), and so acts, desires, values and assesses. We know because He has said this.

Eternal in His divine nature, this NAME means that He is disposable by nothing (including the mind of man!), obvious in His majesty and divine nature and power, but for intimate understanding, your need is for Him to tell you, as in any heart to heart situation, and this telling He has accomplished. It is written in the word of God, the Bible, and shown in the incarnation of Christ, in history, in His works, ways, powers and declamations, declarations and intimations.

Thus He does not change (Psalm 102:25-28), giving certainty to His word. He does not deceive, for His words and actions do not disturb each other, as if He had competing components. Even in His love, where He may love and lose, it is His desire that thus it should be; for if it were otherwise, love would be otherwise, and He would change; but He does not change. It is Hi will for His love to be like that, and whatever He is, this is His desire, for there is nothing to disturb the reality, to condition or determine it. He is free, limitless and Himself, based on nothing because eternal with all that He is, beyond time.

He wills it that way, beyond all time, and being like that, and has no intention or need to change (Malachi 3:6, James 1:17). There is lustre in His love, magnificence indeed, but nothing dictatorial. To be sure He gives us plan for life, including life for plan, both intermeshing, as Creator and Counsellor; but what is best for man is not brought into being by tanks and machine guns, firing rubber or real bullets on those who do not respond to His love.

That in terms of what is and is known to be, would be a ridiculous contradiction in terms. Yet He does make it eminently clear what in love He would have us do, to make life as abundant as might be, and some of these things are available and clear from the Bible, and hence in Part II of this Chapter, before we complete the finding on His name, there is as now to come, a taste provided from His word of what IS for the greatest abundance of godliness and grace, goodness and fulness in human life. Freely in love, what is the scope for man, when liberated to be what he ought to be, but often is not.

CONSIDERATION OF THE DIVINE DIRECTIONS

CONCERNING ABUNDANCE OF LIFE

IN THIS NAME, THAT OF THE LORD

I Peter 1:22-23, 3:8-9 with 2:2, Philippians 2:1-4

OF LATERAL RELATIONSHIPS

AND THE DIVINE HEAD

3 Biblical Foci

Here, for a swift realisation of our purpose,
the desire is to flood you with such a torrent of graces to enfold and evils to avoid, that it will
like a trip into space, not costing millions, but attention,
like a walk through an arboretum, leaving you footsore,
but suffused with perfumes and sights of splendour,
to encourage growth, prudence and discretion, love in grace and goodness in Christ.

In particular, it is to show something clearly concerning the ways of the Lord for man, freely given like a manual in the Bible, for his value and blessing. It is THIS that, in kind, is the free provision of a free way for man, instead of the freeway to hell which is broad and easy, as Christ declared (Matthew 7:15-222).

Items are listed for impact, and clarity.

3 Biblical Foci

I

POSITIVE PROGRAM - I Peter 1:22-23

Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth
through the Spirit in sincere love of the brethren,
love one another fervently with a pure heart,
having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible,
through the word of God which live and abides forever.

Being purified

Obeying the truth through the Spirit

love one another fervently with a pure heart

having been born again

of incorruptible seed

the eternal word of God

2

NEGATIVE PURSUITS - I Peter 3:8-9 with 2:1-2

with Positive Introduction and Conclusion

Finally, all of you be of one mind, having compassion for one another,
love as brothers, be tender-hearted, be courteous,
not returning evil for evil or reviling for reviling,
but on the contrary blessing,
knowing that you were called to this,
that you may inherit a blessing.

Indeed, while

being of one mind,

have compassion for each other, loving as brothers, being

tender-hearted, courteous,

NOT engaging in tit-for-tat evil blows or

reviling for reviling detestations,

BUT blessing, knowing this for a calling.

With this, let malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy (I Peter 2:1) get lost,

keeping desire for the pure milk of the word of God,
voracious as a growling suckling (I Peter 2:2),
and not disdaining spiritual meat (Hebrews 5:13-14).
I Peter 2:20 counsels further, even if in doing good you suffer for it, take that patiently.
What more ?

I Peter 2:8 tells us to avoid walking with those who stumble,
3:15 to give a reason for the faith for those who ask,
4:11 to speak when preaching as the oracles of God,
4:11-12, to endure trial,
4:14 to be wiling to suffer reproach for Christ,
4:17 to realise that if judgment must begin in the house of God,
what will it do outside it!

5:8 is counselling to be sober and vigilant,
resisting with vigour the wiles of the devil (5:8).

II Peter 2 deals with false brethren, II Peter 3 of a failing world at length,
3:2 of the need for zealous care to keep to the word of God as criterion, not straying.

  3

The GAUNTLET OF GRACE - Philippians 2:1-4

If there be therefore any consolation in Christ,
if any comfort of love,
if any fellowship of the Spirit,
if any bowels and mercies (tender mercies, kindness, affection and mercy),
fulfil my joy, that you be likeminded,
having the same love,
being of one accord, joined in soul, minding the same thing,
Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit;
but in lowliness of mind
all esteeming one another above themselves.
Look not every man on his own things,
but every man also on the things of others.

It is, but in a positive sense, like passing through, running the gauntlet of soldiers with raised gauntlets, ready to harass, smite, but it is positive one, ready to encourage, lift. These positive assailants, benignant warriors include, the first three as underlying conditions, the rest as divine overlay.

1.       consolation (encouragement) of Christ
     comfort of love

2.       fellowship of the Spirit

3.       tender kindness and mercy

4.       likemindedness

5.       being of the same love

6.       being of one accord

7.       being of one mind

8.       lowliness of mind, with hopeful esteeming of others

               This done, you put on work clothes of

9.       Coat - no selfish ambition

10.   T-shirts - No conceit, while studying
not just one own spiritual clothes, but those of others.

Ponder that James 5:11 tells us that
we count those blessed who endure,
like Job,
for then the desired result is reached,
the Lord being very pitiful and compassionate.
As He is, so we should endeavour to be.

This can and does work

is pleasant and profitable

is peaceable and pitiful

harnesses thrust to truth

accompanies truth with love

maximises reality

minimises mutual flack

leaves more aeroplanes flying.

but does nothing to prevent grace from the Lord (I Peter 2:3).

RUN then this gauntlet of grace, each attacker, doing so with good,
to stir righteousness, godliness, and growth;
for GROWING in grace and the knowledge of God,
is a work of liberty, love and vigour (II Peter 3:18).
No-growth plants are stunted, miserable.

It is in parallel that I Peter 3:18 undergirds all this with the solemn reality for all,
applied effectually for all Christians, that Christ died the just for the unjust, to bring us to God. When you get there, this is the way.

He, Jesus the Christ, is the Head, the Redeemer, the Resurrection exemplar, the Counsellor, who came that we, careened and cleansed, renewed and regenerated, should go where He is: eternal from God, that we should have everlasting life with Him. That is the way of life abundant, life with God, in His presence, for His purpose, in accord and concord with Him.

Naturally, when the Head is decapitated, a monster results. Until it is replaced (as in Ezekiel 21:27), the world withers and self-destructs. Then, pagan and autonomous, self-involved and self-limited, it is like a headless monster, even at times like a fowl decapitated, running wildly, as if crazed (John 14:30, Revelation 6 give light on this!).

Lift up your hearts, then, and live with, in and for this same Saviour, Head and Lord Jesus Christ. He is the truth, but also the life and the way (John 14:6). His way is exclusive. There isn't any other (Acts 4:11-12): NO WAY! If then you are on another, GO BACK! get back on the highway of holiness, and follow Him. There IS an entrance fee, but HE pays it. How glorious to be repentant and receive such grace as that, to be lost and find such a way as this, to be found and received to be adopted as a child of God (Ephesians 1:5-6,11-14, I John 3:1), for ever...

There is likewise an avoidance fee, called death. In the formal, physical functions of life this appears as dis-coordination, as if there were no depth of knowledge, but an eccentric deviousness, hiding from the Lord. Afterwards, it appears as endless shame (Daniel 12).

It is a question of who pays, the Lord for you, or you for you. You unlike Him, are incapable of meeting the cost. Hence loss of life is the result, and it is no mere event.

The beauty of it lies not least in this, that He has paid ENOUGH to cover ALL (I John 2:1-2), to that you cause no new expense if you come to Him; and in this, that no transfer of funds, of vitality, of eternal life is made to those who do not receive it. It is potential as before man, though known to God; and until consummated in love through man, it has no effect, and sins remain where they were, with the person himself or herself (John 8:24). When however a person does act and so come to the Lord in repentance for wandering on without Him, then from the ample funds of His ransom, the payment goes out, the debt is obliterated, the evil is atoned for, and the day is won. The divine love is without limit in itself, and it is a limited attainment of that love, limited by its own purity that it is not dispensed contrary to its own nature, and in that, there is a cover from what was sufficient for all, many of whom never realise it, receive it, being pre-occupied with other things.

An oral exposition of these things may be reached by this LINK.

V

BIBLICALLY CONSTRAINED

FURTHER CONSIDERATION OF THE DIVINE NAME

We return now to Exodus 3:14.

God provides rulings on what is for the best, and this is not alterable. It is the case for the life as He has made it (John 10), and in section 2, above we have been exposed to a substantial amount of biblical revelation, as to the kind of thing that is involved, in life lived as He would have it, that fulfils it as created. If man elects otherwise, in the end, he pays for his extraordinary im-pertinence, instructing his own limitless Maker on how to live! But he can, he can... Costly are two things: ignoring the truth from God and the redemption in Christ, at infinite cost provided freely (Isaiah 55, Ephesians 2), a vast cost for man to be seared in shame by sham; and accomplishing the free path back home on the part of God, a vast cost for God, in that He gave His only begotten Son, His word before all time, the Creator through whom He wrought, to be despised and rejected, neglected and used, to be magnificent in enterprise, glorious in holiness, amazing and love, and then crushed by mere power and poisonous words, nailed with the other prongs of iron, into Him in furious tumult by man; arising only after 3 days as repeatedly stated, showing His power and love jointly, all to the precision of innumerable forecasts and identification measures in the prophets, not one unfulfilled. Not the utmost zeal of His hates could show one flaw. It was superb; but very costly for God. Love pays costs repeatedly. It does not pretend relationship however, when it is not there.

All this God elected to do, unpredictable, amazing, infinitely personal and intimately private, but made universally public and potent.

Thus the name of God is what it is. He is what He is. He is not summable as this and that, though this and that may be mentioned as true of Him. He is His own Personal Being, possessable by none, as if a viewable machine, subjectible to none, clear in His grandeur, revelatory in His plans and promises, pursuits and remedial actions for man, together with their outcomes.

Thus man should not try to put Him, like an egg within an egg-shell of his making. His divine qualities are supervenable by nothing, by no shell, and are due to nothing as their controller, qualifier or conditioner, His power and nature being eternal as the beginning of all nature, the criterion and cause not only of space and time, but of our model of causation as well, where patience may be required for causative events to be concluded. As the ground of all things constituted, including liberty and knowledge such as man may have in the abstract, God provides all the conditions. Man uses, or misuses, or abuses them.

Thus delimited through Him (Colossians 1:15, Revelation 4:11), are the things man likes to imagine coming from nowhere. This includes the pressures, forces and the like, with all their allied laws and constraints, as with the ludicrous, pressurised point of the Big Bangers, who have not only force, but its applicative intensity towards a point, in mind for the start, and a provision for expansion in a total overall, contrived system of correlatives parts of complex character - imparting intensity despite their infinite compression before become so accomplished. Indeed, on this misaligned model, all this to come OUT of the given point and to exist in logically conceivable complex systems, so that they might evidence from their former shroud, their crowd of implicit precisions in due course. Never was such an explosion that brought constituent parts into cohesion, laws into delicate interaction, forms and formats into increasing wonder, order and sequence of the most minute and exacting, out of a compression infinite, so that there was no room or scope for anything; for however little its need, far less, infinitely less would be accorded to it.

Not in some splendour of ignorance, to get everything from nothing and nowhere, except by making up ideas about all you need from nowhere, but in splendour of majesty is the God whose name is before us to be found. He has what it took; that is why it came. If we are going to use reason in argument, then we must entail it in the formats for which we argue: otherwise antinomy looks scathingly at our nonsense. Argue WITH reason for what LACKS it, as though this could interpret it! As well use a hammer for a brain anuresis. What fits for presentation must fit the field, lest it merely mar it, being irrelevant to its ways. Reason is fine to address what is reasonable, but an ill-match to the irrational, where it has no purchase. Yet if you abandon it, as here in the POINT MODEL, then you have no power to argue. What is abandoned, cannot be then made valid without antilogy. It is a matter of self-contradiction, not finding of anything, but what does not work, either logically or empirically.

Conclusions without causes are logically an impossibility, for to get rid of causation, you have to invent a program for its removal, to show how it could be done, and so provide causes (cf. SMR Ch. 5). To be rid of it, then, you have to use it, and so both beg the question and deny your own hypothesis, thus indulging in antinomy. It stays. Your contrary ideas go (cf. Predestination and Freewill ).

But what of this compressed point, smaller and smaller, endlessly reduced till merely a mathematical point with no bearing on reality, a conception alone, orphaned ? what of this Big Bang type of model ? Less still. Who compacted it all, whatever it is thought to be before it suffered to infinity, this fate ? whence the force ? whence its application in the form of pressure, a distinctive concept of application to surface ? whence the introduction into the system, which grows in wonder and law, as it comes, in total opposition to explosion, of all required ? whence the arrival of any of these things, all of them, and in such an array; and for what reason, the composition which undergoes such constructive decomposition, and any of the results in quality and type? Nullity is the only known source for such a program, and to be sure, it does very well for what it is: everything from nothing, explicit or implied, wonderful! but not glorious or rational. What is found in any such model is a mere smuggling in of what is needed for what we now have, by additives constantly brought from the hidden but fertile source, nothing, the basis of all question-begging, a mode as unscientific in properly seeking a cause to relate closely to the effects, as it would be possible even to imagine. Yet they call it science, divorced from reason itself!

Scientistic, not scientific, it clings to its position, like a real estate dealer, whose land has just been subjected to an erosive tsunami, and wishes to sell it.

To get back, however, from such models, to reality and reason, and its relevance as in any and all argumentation, God is logically apt to be sought in entire rationality, in contrast against this creative question-begging ineptitude of man's merest and anti-verified imaginations, with their unbased forces and butts for force. Not nothing, but One eternal and eternally competent for every variety of quality and power, mind, matter and spirit, with all the derivative features in morality and aesthetics, in logic and love, He causes what He will, including our minds, so that their logic is accountable with good reason. Nothing lacks reason, this applying with glorious consistency by those who, knowing God, use it and find its confirmation on all sides.

This is the biblical work of the LOGOS by whom all things were created; and because of this we can understand His creation as we toil, in terms of it, using it as method, finding it as measure in law and legislation, composure and synthesis, relationships and brilliance of method.

As to our minds, just as these He has made, so He has made these so that they can follow His, and at times some of His steps in creation, as in Genesis 1, and so that if so disposed, as recipients, we may follow some of the movements of His mind, active and intelligent, made perception in logic, of His divine logic. Matter becomes in its massive complexity, with attendant simplicities as is the frequent nature of design, , a lower exhibit of His performance, a strut and site for action of more significance, purpose and performance. Matter, then, it is in mind here as exposition of His divine mind, in impersonal form, a structure for action, from the mind which made man's mind, so that he could be mindful of why he is here, and in what, and as what! The will, mind and Spirit of God is equally the causal basis of our morals and mentality, spirituality and liberty^*1. This is especially prominent in Ch. 7of The Divine Sublimity in the Ardour of Christ and His Salvation, as in SMR Ch. 4, and Repent or Perish Ch. 7.

In all this, He is unfathomable, but by revelation, tells us the way He works in terms including principles, which themselves mirrror, but does not determine Him. He determines them, and does not change Himself or them. They stay.

Thus we move form using logic to survey uncaused system, in antinomic antics, from folly^*1to faith, to a causal base for all systems in Him, who has invented with time for change and growth, and our type of causation. In this, you must wait for eventuation, and expect divine intervention at His will, but in accord with His stated principles, and finding it, enquire.

As then to knowing the I AM WHO I AM, it is not a question of complacency, or code. It is inter-personal, but with propositional principles clearly stated, unalterable features distinctly cited, impervious promises categorically expressed, immutable progression of events and destiny as announced, and with this, the very personal BEING, God Himself, to be explored in His majesty, known in His immensity of intensity, delighted in for His magnificence, humility, illimitability and love, declarative certainties and mercy, ever expanding sheer splendour from the perspective of the eyes which behold Him, shown to be unfathomable, but declaring from the depths what the truth is, that man may know it, and through it, the Christ Jesus the Lord.

Here is the ultimate declaration, the total and utter expression, that in Him one may know God (John 14:1-9); for this IS eternal life, said Jesus, that you may know God and Jesus whom He has sent (John 17:1-3). He is not simply the alphabet for reading, nor is He a series of propositions for imbibing; He IS the utter revelation, the express image of His Person who sent Him, and in Him is life, from Him judgment. Its principles ? deliciously simple. IF you prefer darkness, it is yours. Those who receive Him, are His. In that lies all the difference both in this world and in the next. Repentance is the prelude (Luke 13:1-3, Matthew 4:17). Reception of Him, this is the procedure (John 5:39ff.); believing is the activator, regeneration is the result (Titus 3:4-7, Hebrews 11:1-3), eternity is its inheritance in, and because of Him, freely (Ephesians 1:11, 2:1-10, Romans 3, Galatians 3); and this will not change (Galatians 1).

That is the name I AM WHO I AM, and there is no name like it, ever has been or will be. Praise God for that! Thank God that Jesus Christ has shone forth with the glory of God in His face (II Corinthians 4:6):

"For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness

who has shone in our hearts

to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."

NOTES

Thus in Chs. 6 and 7 in The Divine Sublimity in the Ardour of Christ and His Salvation, as elsewhere in the Six Volumes of The gods of naturalism have no go! we find features of dissolution in this human construction which seeks to avoid the divine name. As the resource for everything on the Big Bang model is ultimately and logically nothing, so its explanatory power is nothing in the multiplied special features of human power and operation.

These include in their nihilism, or naturalism or atheism, determinism (cf. Repent or Perish Ch. 7, Christ Incomparable, Lord Indomitable Ch. 2)or evolutionism, such furrowing features as:

Failure in verification, validation, scientific method, the beginning (nothing there except what amounts to nothing, causative considerations without a cause, temporary constraints without a basis), and the end (what does not relate to such a start), antinomy, antilogy, and thus provides a complete failure in logical method, including the scientific aspect of it. Indeed, the failure is most notable in causation, outcome, model collapse, scientific method, reductionism, in a sort of consistent inconsistency, ignoring what is to be explained in castles of imagination, defensible by nothing.

See further in LIGHT DWELLS WITH THE LORD'S CHRIST

for actual, persistent and consistent verification and validation, and on this topic, in Deity and Design, Designation and Destiny, section 8 in particular on the logical illiteracy of such imaginations.