Knowing God
Knowing God
Some say the greatest question in life is: Does God exist?
I say the greatest question is:
Do I know the God who does exist?
Do I know about Him, and do I know Him personally?
According to the Bible, our God is the Everlasting Father, the God of hosts, the Lord of heaven and earth, the Author and Finisher of our faith. He is the Comforter, the Counselor, the Creator. He is the Great Physician and the God of all grace. His Name is I AM, the Alpha and Omega, and the Holy One of Israel. We can call Him Jehovah, the Most High, and the Lord of the living and the dead. He is Maker, Mediator, and Man of sorrows. He is our Prophet, Priest, and King; our Redeemer, Refuge, and Rock. He is Ruler of heaven and earth. He is the Friend of sinners.
How we know about God
Knowledge of God comes from walking through life with God, thinking of him, talking to him, and worshipping him. Knowledge of God goes beyond merely understanding the truth about him, it applies that truth personally.
There is only one reason we know that God exists. It’s because He has revealed Himself to us.
But He has done it in such a way that we can choose whether or not to believe in Him. He gives more than enough evidence if we’re willing to believe, but keeps Himself sufficiently obscure so that people can deny His existence if they’re foolish enough to want to.
Here are some ways that God communicates with people:
HE HAS REVEALED HIS EXISTENCE IN THE CREATED UNIVERSE.
The universe is so complex and precise that it could not have appeared by accident. God was the great designer.
Rom. 1:20 - Since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities - His eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made.
HE HAS REVEALED HIMSELF BY PROVIDING EXACTLY WHAT WE NEED.
He gives us rain and sunshine, seasons and arable soil. This is referred to in Acts 14:17. He does these things in an orderly way, ensuring the survival of humanity.
HE HAS SPOKEN THROUGH CHOSEN INDIVIDUALS.
This is especially evident among the Old Testament prophets. A true prophet never delivered his own message. He always had to speak what God told him to. That’s why the prophets would preface their statements with “Thus saith the Lord.”
GOD HAS SPOKEN TO US THROUGH THE SCRIPTURES.
If you look at the various aspects of the formation of your Bible; when and where it was written over a vast period of time, the numbers of languages used, yet all harmonizing so perfectly, you will never again feel like saying, “The Bible is just another so-called sacred book - and other religions have their sacred books too.” Wrong!
The Bible is miraculous in itself not only in the way it came to be, but in the huge number of fulfilled prophecies.
GOD HAS SPOKEN TO US THROUGH HIS SON JESUS CHRIST.
Jesus is the best photograph of God that we have. We learn what the Father is like by studying the earthly life of His Son. Heb. 1:1-2 says that the Lord spoke to our ancestors through the prophets, but that in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son.
So, that’s how we know about God! As it says in I Corinthians 1:21, the world did not come to know God through its own wisdom.
He’s the One who initiates the relationship. He is the One who comes to us.
The Bible was written over a period of nearly 2,000 years by at least 40 different authors. Some of it was written in ancient languages that are no longer spoken. God delivered His message through men and women, but even though they may have been ordinary people, they were prepared people. He did not wait for them to go to seminary. He began preparing them from conception. Paul said in Gal. 1:15 that the Lord had set him apart even from his mother’s womb.
In the Old Testament, God formed Jeremiah in the womb. He appointed him as a prophet before he was born (Jer. 1:5). This is not to say that these people did not have a choice about whether to serve the Lord. But I believe God foreknew the ones He could count on, and He directed their birth, development, and temperament. After they were born, I think He led them into experiences that would enhance their ability to follow His calling.
A brilliant and well-trained scholar named Isaiah wrote in classical Hebrew style with a large vocabulary.
Luke was a highly-educated physician who wrote a Gospel that appeals especially to the Greek mind.
John and Peter were fishermen and they wrote in a simple, straightforward style that would draw common people (I am fairly sure that Mark was Peter’s scribe and that the Gospel of Mark is essentially Peter’s account).
Some critics use the above points to attack the integrity of the Bible. After all, there are slight variances in the Gospel stories. But this is actually more evidence of the authenticity of the Gospels. If the life and ministry of Christ were fictional, these writers would have collaborated together and produced one uniform account. The fact that the same events are told from different points of view and in different chronologies only proves that it was not a conspiracy. These are obviously individual eyewitness accounts.
A woman who said she had no use for the Bible because it is “just some old book written by a bunch of men.”
Men were the prominent leaders in the cultures we read about in the Bible. But women were hardly silent. This lady apparently was unaware of Deborah, a judge and military leader, who contributed about 30 verses of Scripture in the 5th Chapter of the Book of Judges.
She probably did not realize the sublime statements and bold deeds of Esther, a brave woman who trusted in the providence of God.
I wonder if she ever read about Miriam, a prophetess who had a role in Israel's deliverance from Egypt.
And what about Mary’s Magnificat in the Gospels? Would God have placed His divine anointing on Mary if women were “worthless” in the Bible?
The entire 31st Chapter of Proverbs is a pageant of praise to womanhood.
The daughters of Philip prophesied, it says in Acts 21:9. What they said isn’t recorded today, but they obviously had a prominent ministry or we wouldn’t be told about them. The Gospel of Luke often highlights the involvement of women. It was also women who made the first announcement of the empty tomb. And Paul commended so many women as co-workers in ministry.
This lady who said the Bible was just an old book written by a bunch of old men obviously knew very little about God’s Word. Her mind was shaped by modern feminist thought and skepticism.
And even if God had chosen only to use “old men” to convey His message, so what? Ultimately, it is still God’s message. In the Book of Numbers, He once even used a talking donkey to make a point.
How God Communicates With Us
God gave us the written word through prepared people. The writings were colored by the writers’ personalities, but they all conveyed the same message: God revealing Himself to His people and leading them to salvation.
God communicates in a variety of ways.
· The Ten Commandments were written on stone tablets directly by God Himself, Ex. 31
· God often spoke directly to His prophets. Ex. 33 says He would speak to Moses face to face.
· On other occasions, He used dreams to send a message, Genesis Ch. 40 & 41, Dan. Ch. 2.
· Sometimes His messages were given in visions - such as in Ezekiel 1, and the Book of Revelation.
· Sometimes a miracle conveyed God’s message. Jesus healed a man of paralysis in order to prove that He also had the authority to forgive sins, Mark 2.
· Rituals, sacrifices, and feasts were designed to prefigure Christ and His saving of mankind. The outward ritual always pictured a deeper reality.
And here are three things to consider:
1. God’s message is PLAIN. Even though there are many passages that are difficult to understand, there is more than enough for everyone to grasp the most basic truths about Who God is, and how we can be saved.
2. God’s message has been revealed PROGRESSIVELY. Abraham and Moses knew God in an intimate way, but there are things we know today that they did not. The principle is, “First the blade, then the ear, then the full grain shall appear.” We are incredibly blessed to have the New Testament, with the light and freedom that it gives.
3. God’s message is PERSONAL. He speaks to us directly. We’re all saved through the same plan of salvation, yet no two spiritual journeys are exactly the same. He is able to love us differently even as He loves us equally.
Our Priority
Peter’s final letter consists of only three chapters, yet he used the word knowledge seven times. He began 2 Peter by saying, “Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God” (2 Peter 1:2, emphasis added).
He went on to say, “His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us” (2 Peter 1:3, emphasis added). He told us to add to our virtue knowledge, and to knowledge self-control (2 Peter 1:5-6), “for if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord” (2 Peter 1:8, emphasis added). With his final words, peter told us to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord, to whom be the glory forever (2 Peter 3:18).
Peter wasn’t the only biblical writer who emphasized the priority of knowing God. They all did.
The psalmist, for example, put it this way, “One thing I have desired of the Lord, that will I seek; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in His temple” (Psalm 27:4).
In other words, for the psalmist, knowing God was his ultimate priority—his “one thing.”
He wanted to behold the Lord, to grow in his knowledge of God, and to learn more about Him all the days of his life.
