can we know about god without knowing god?

52

Upload: cuthbert-hodge

Post on 24-Dec-2015

232 views

Category:

Documents


0 download

TRANSCRIPT

JEREMIAH 31:31-34

Jeremiah 31:31-3431 “The days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah.32 It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them,” declares the LORD.

Jeremiah 31:31-3433 “This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time,” declares the LORD. I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.

Jeremiah 31:31-3434 No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the LORD,’because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,” declares the LORD. “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.”

KNOWING GOD

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO KNOW GOD?

CAN WE KNOW ABOUT GOD WITHOUT KNOWING GOD?

Yes - Titus 1:15-1615To the pure, all things are pure, but to the defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure; but both their minds and their consciences are defiled. 16They profess to know God, but they deny him by their works. They are detestable, disobedient, unfit for any good work.

• Many verses in Old Testament talk about knowing who God Is

• Nearly every other verse in Ezekiel has “they shall know that I am the LORD (YHWH) their God

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO KNOW GOD?

More than a matter of knowing something about God

CAN WE BELIEVE IN GOD WITHOUT KNOWING GOD?

Yes - James 2:19

You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder!

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO KNOW GOD?

Knowing can be a matter of relationship

• Hebrew: Yada' – know, comprehend - often implies sexual relations, sharing love, showing mercy

• Greek: Ginosko – know, recognize, understand - often implies relationship of value and importance, connection or union, an active relationship

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO KNOW GOD?

Knowing God is a matter of relationship – Hosea 2:19-20

19 And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy. 20 I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. And you shall know the LORD.

CAN WE KNOW GOD WITHOUT KNOWING EVERYTHING ABOUT GOD?

Yes - Romans 11:33-3633 Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!

34 “For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor? 35 Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?”

36 For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.

THE POWDER RIVER“HALF MILE WIDE AND AN INCH DEEP”

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• His Son has made Him known

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• His Son has made Him known - John 14:6-106 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7 If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• His Son has made Him known - John 14:6-108 Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” 9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• His Son has made Him known - John 17:2-32 you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. 3 And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• His Son has made Him known - John 17:25-2625 O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. 26 I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• His Son has made Him known – I John 5:2020 And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true; and we are in him who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us – John 14:16-20

16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, 17 even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us – John 14:16-20

18 “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. 19 Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me Because I live, you also will live. 20 In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us – Eph. 1:16-19

16 I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, 17 that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation that you may know Him better,

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us – Eph. 1:16-1918 having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, 19 and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us – Eph. 3:14-1914 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, 16 that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us – Eph. 3:14-19

—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us – I Corth. 2: 9-12;16

9 as it is written,

“What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him”—10 these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us – I Corth. 2: 9-12;16

11 For who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God…

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us – I Corth. 2: 9-12;16

16 “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us – Heb. 8: 10-1210 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my laws into their minds, and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

HOW ARE WE ABLE TO KNOW GOD?

• We know Him by His Spirit in us – Heb. 8: 10-1211 And they shall not teach, each one his neighbor and each one his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. 12For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more.”

WHAT INHIBITS US FROM KNOWING GOD?

• Unrepentant Sin

WHAT INHIBITS US FROM KNOWING GOD?

• Unrepentant Sin – Hosea. 5: 3-43 I know Ephraim, and Israel is not hidden from me; for now, O Ephraim, you have played the whore; Israel is defiled. 4 Their deeds do not permit them to return to their God. For the spirit of whoredom is within them, and they know not the LORD.

WHAT INHIBITS US FROM KNOWING GOD?• Unrepentant Sin – Jeremiah 9:2-3; 5-62 Oh that I had in the desert a travelers' lodging place, that I might leave my people and go away from them! For they are all adulterers, a company of treacherous men. 3 They bend their tongue like a bow; falsehood and not truth has grown strong in the land; for they proceed from evil to evil, and they do not know me, declares the LORD.

WHAT INHIBITS US FROM KNOWING GOD?• Unrepentant Sin – Jeremiah 9:2-3; 5-65 Everyone deceives his neighbor, and no one speaks the truth; they have taught their tongue to speak lies; they weary themselves committing iniquity. 6 Heaping oppression upon oppression, and deceit upon deceit, they refuse to know me, declares the LORD.

“It means that in everything I do and in all of my decisions, I do what God wants me to do.”

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO KNOW GOD?

John Rucker – Age 99

HOW DOES KNOWING GOD AFFECT US?

HOW DOES KNOWING GOD AFFECT US?

• We keep His commands – I John 2:3-43 And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. 4 Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him,

HOW DOES KNOWING GOD AFFECT US?

• Especially His command to Love – I John 4:7-8

7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.

HOW DOES KNOWING GOD AFFECT US?• We surrender and die to ourselves – Phil 3:7-117 But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. 8 Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him,

HOW DOES KNOWING GOD AFFECT US?• We surrender and die to ourselves – Phil 3:7-11

not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith— 10 that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

HOW DOES KNOWING GOD AFFECT US?

• We don’t act worldly – I Thess. 4:4-54 that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, 5 not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God;

HOW DOES KNOWING GOD AFFECT US?

• We don’t act worldly – Gal. 4:8-98 Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods. 9 But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more?

HOW DOES KNOWING GOD AFFECT US?

• We do what is right and just and defend the cause of the poor and needy – Jer 22:15-16

Did not your father have food and drink? He did what was right and just, so all went well with him. 16 He defended the cause of the poor and needy, and so all went well. Is that not what it means to know me?” declares the LORD.

HOW CAN WE KNOW GOD BETTER?

HOW CAN WE KNOW GOD BETTER?

• Press on to know Him – Hosea 6:33 Let us know; let us press on to know the LORD; his going out is sure as the dawn; he will come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth.”

HOW CAN WE KNOW GOD BETTER?

• Press on to know Him

• The Lord is with you while you are with him. If you seek him, he will be found by you (2 Chron. 15:2)

• Draw near to God and He will draw near to you (James 4:7)

HOW CAN WE KNOW GOD BETTER?

• Spend time in relationship (walk with Him)• Prayer• Scripture• Meditation

• Develop a love relationship with Him

If anyone loves God, he is known by God. (1 Corth. 8:3)

THE BIG QUESTION