The God Who Speaks Life: A Short Introduction to the Christian Faith

By Andrew Errington

Who is the God of the Bible, and what does it mean to have faith in him? This book aims to answer these questions in ten, short chapters, five of which introduce God, and five of which explain the core aspects of the Christian faith. It aims to go to the heart of the issues without taking too long about it. God, we learn, is the God who is Creat

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mountain Street Media
• Release date: Oct 25, 2017
• ISBN: 9780992559595

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For my mother

This book is © 2017 Andrew Errington.

Unless otherwise stated, Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture quotations marked NRSV are from New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Paperback ISBN 978-0-9925595-8-8

E-Book ISBN 978-0-9925595-9-5

Typesetting and Design: Beth Abbottsmith

Contents

Foreword

God the Creator

Creation, good and ordered

God the Judge

Sin and evil, a problem that goes very deep

God the Saviour

Salvation by grace

God the Life-Giver

New life in a new community

The one and only God

The gospel, the church, and the Bible

Afterword

Appendix: The Nicene Creed

Foreword

The aim of this book is to introduce the God of the Bible and what it means to have faith in him. By the Bible is meant the common Christian Bible, of the Old and New Testaments. Taken as one whole book, the Bible tells a story in which the God who creates the world and continues to rule it becomes its Saviour in the person of Jesus Christ, and promises to bring it to perfection. This, quite simply, is the central claim of the Christian faith: that the God who spoke life in the beginning has spoken it again, and speaks it today, in Jesus Christ. The aim of this book is to introduce this God, and what he means for life today.

My hope is that this book will be especially interesting to one type of reader: the person who wants to understand the Christian faith a bit better. This type of reader might or might not be a Christian themselves. Many Christians would like to understand their faith more deeply; many people who are not Christians would quite like to get their heads around this religion that has been of such importance and that lingers on so doggedly today. Hopefully, this book will be helpful to any such kind of sincere, enquiring reader.

The book has ten chapters. Five of these chapters (the odd-numbered ones) are about who God is: the Creator (chapter 1), the Judge (chapter 3), the Saviour (chapter 5), the Life-Giver (chapter 7), and finally, the one and only God, the Trinity (chapter 9). The other five chapters are about core elements of the Christian faith that relate to the aspect of God’s identity they come after. So after the introduction to God the Creator, we learn more about the Christian understanding of creation (chapter 2); after hearing about God the Judge, we consider the reality of sin and evil more deeply (chapter 4); after learning of God the Saviour, we think about what this means for the nature of salvation (chapter 6); after discussing the work of the Holy Spirit, we consider the Christian life (chapter 8); and after grappling with God as Trinity we think about the life of the church (chapter 10).

This arrangement has three aims. First, it aims to put God at the centre of the picture, emphasising that the Christian faith is most basically a claim about who God is. Secondly, it aims generally to follow the way the story of the Bible unfolds. Finally, it aims to cover the most important aspects of the Christian faith, so that at the end of the book, the reader is not left with a lopsided picture, or one with lots of bits missing. Although it is a short book, it aims to cover a lot of ground.

This ground includes not just the central themes of the Bible, but also the most important features of the Christian faith. Over the course of the book, the reader will find discussions of the Lord’s Prayer (in chapter 8), the creeds of the Christian church (in chapter 9), the sacraments (in chapter 10), and the ten commandments (in chapter 3). This means that this book introduces the central elements of what was traditionally called a catechism. This is a weird word today. However, a catechism is basically just a course of instruction in the core elements of the Christian faith. Catechisms were used when people had recently become Christians or were approaching confirmation. Without having any special commitment to the term catechism, it could be that this book is particularly useful for people at these kinds of stages.

Finally, this book is also driven by the conviction that the only way really to get to grips with the God of Christian faith is through direct engagement with the Bible itself. (We will talk about where this conviction comes from right at the end, in chapter 10.) To this end, in each section one or more Bible texts serve as a guide to the discussion. Two common English versions of the Bible have been used. Most texts are from the New International Version, and these are unmarked. Some other passages are from the New Revised Standard Version, and these are marked NRSV. The choice of the one or the other is not very significant. It has to do mainly with a preference for how things are expressed in that passage. Readers should feel very welcome to consult any available Bible. Along with these are given some questions for reflection. These questions are given to draw the reader more closely into the text of Scripture. The Bible is always more interesting and surprising than we imagine. The reader’s experience will be vastly enhanced if these questions are taken seriously. They could also serve as a basis for discussion with others.

The tone changes slightly at the end of the book (chapters 9 and 10), which moves to discussing not simply what the Bible says, but also how this has been understood and applied in the life of the Christian church. It will hopefully be obvious, though, that we have not simply moved on to something else, but that it is the Bible’s own story that remains the driving force.

Without further throat-clearing, then, let us begin this short introduction to God and the Christian faith.

CHAPTER ONE

God the Creator

Perhaps the most basic belief of the Christian faith is that there is a good God who created the world. This belief lies behind everything in the Bible, from its opening words, In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, to its final chapters, which paint a wonderful picture of the world healed of all its problems and brought back to its Maker.

For many people, the idea that there is a God who made the world might be totally unsurprising. For others, though, it is a bit strange, or at least unfamiliar. Furthermore, the Christian understanding of what it means for God to be Creator is quite different to many other ideas about what that means. So we need to take some time to get a feel for this enormously significant idea.

Creation by God’s word

There are many places in the Bible we could go to explore this central idea, not least the very first chapters. We will look at this famous opening in due course (see chapter 2). For now, however, it will be more useful to start somewhere else. One of the best places to begin is found in the book of Psalms, which is a collection of poems and hymns in the centre of the Old Testament. Psalm 33 provides a brilliantly clear window onto what it means to believe in God the Creator.

From the Bible: Psalm 33

¹ Sing joyfully to the Lord, you righteous;

it is fitting for the upright to praise him.

² Praise the Lord with the harp;

make music to him on the ten-stringed lyre.

³ Sing to him a new song;

play skilfully, and shout for joy.

⁴ For the word of the Lord is right and true;

he is faithful in all he does.

⁵ The Lord loves righteousness and justice;

the earth is full of his unfailing love.

⁶ By the word of the Lord the heavens were made,

their starry host by the breath of his mouth.

⁷ He gathers the waters of the sea into jars;

he puts the deep into storehouses.

⁸ Let all the earth fear the Lord;

let all the people of the world revere him.

⁹ For he spoke, and it came to be;

he commanded, and it stood firm.

¹⁰ The Lord foils the plans of the nations;

he thwarts the purposes of the peoples.

¹¹ But the plans of the Lord stand firm forever,

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