ARTICLE I

[Picture of Garden of the Gods, Colorado Springs, Colorado, after a light snow, with clouds partially obscuring Pikes Peak.]



In article one of the London Baptist Confession it states that God cannot be comprehended of any but himself. This is an indication that no man can understand God unless God chooses to reveal himself.

Matthew 11:27 says...
"All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, or who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him."

This begs the question then; how can anyone know God. As the passage above indicates, we can only know him if he chooses to reveal himself. And he has chosen to reveal himself in three basic ways.

I. He reveals himself in his creation. The heavens declare the work of thy hands.
II. He declares himself in his written word, the bible, the holy scriptures.
III. He reveals himself in his only begotten Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

We may consider a fourth revealing of God and that personal and individual, which is the Holy Spirit revealing the Son in each of our individual hearts; his reality, his presence and his love for us. Without this fourth revealing and the subsequent gift of faith, we would have no hope of ever being reconciled to God. This is called election and regeneration and several other terms, but for a greater discussion on these stand by for article V in due course.

So it is a gracious act that God himself took upon himself even to reveal himself to us. Without his choice to reveal himself we would still be in darkness and we would know nothing of the divine.

As Matthew 11:27 reveals that the Son is in charge of that decision to reveal the Father we need not despair of being left out of that revealing. For if we keep reading in Matthew 11:28 and following, he goes on to say...

"Come unto me all you that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

And he says in another place; "All that come to me I will in no wise cast out."

The invitation is to come, if he has revealed himself to your heart then come. If he has not revealed himself to you, then pray to him and beg him to show you the wonder of who he is and how we can be reconciled to him.

In his grace.

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ARTICLE I

That God as He is in Himself, cannot be comprehended of any but himself,(1) dwelling in that inaccessible light, that no eye can attain unto, whom never man saw, nor can see; that there is but(2) one God, one Christ, one Spirit, one Faith, one Baptism;(3) one rule of holiness and obedience for all Saints, at all times, in all places to be observed.
1) 1 Tim. 6:16
2) 1 Tim. 2:5; Eph. 4:4-6; 1 Cor. 12: 4-6,13; John 14
3) 1 Tim. 6:3,13,14; Gal. 1:8-9; 2 Tim. 3:15