Let Us Press On To Know Him (Knowing God - 2) Sunday Morning, Jan 19 2024

Today we are continuing on the topic of knowing God.

What we typically call knowledge is “facts.” The world refers to “knowledge workers” or a “knowledge economy.” In information science, it is merely information that has a useful application. However, what the Bible calls knowledge is an experiential awareness of truth that has the power to change us. The knowledge of God has the ability to transform us.

Last week, we talked about the general revelation of God through nature and the special revelation of God through the word of God, the Bible, and in particular Jesus, the son of God, who is God's greatest and most complete revelation of himself to us to reveal the father unto us. He is the brightness of God's glory and the express image of his person.

It is very important that we know God because if you do not know God and are known by God our eternal destiny is in question. Jesus said in John chapter 17 and what is commonly known as the high priestly prayer after the Last Supper, the Lord prayed in front of his disciples, telling God that the time had come to glorify the Son as the Son had glorified the Father. Then He goes on to define eternal life: Eternal Life is knowing the Father and Jesus Christ whom He had sent. (John 17:3). Eternal life is not just unending life. And it does not begin when we die in an afterlife. It is the experience of knowing God while we are in this world. Once we come to the saving knowledge of Christ's sacrifice, when we begin walking with Him and being part of His kingdom, knowing the Father and Jesus whom He sent, is eternal life. 

Let us look at three signs displayed by a person who knows God:

1. LOVE - You cannot love God if you do not know God. The corollary is also true, if you know God, you will love God. And you will have His love in you.
   “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.”
   1 John‬ ‭4‬:‭7‬-‭8‬ ‭NIV‬‬
   How much do you love? Do you love enough to sacrifice? Do you love enough to not complain about what you have to do? Do you love enough to forgive the faults of others and not just tolerate them, but also deeply love them? Do you love them knowing that they as much as you are created in the image of God and that they are as special to God as you are. That God's purposes for their life are as important God's purposes for your life.

2. SANCTIFICATION - If you know God, you will be sanctified and hold your body in self control.
   “For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God;”
   ‭‭I Thessalonians‬ ‭4‬:‭3‬-‭5‬
   This is easy to understand. I don't want to explain it, I only want to stress its importance. The Holy God who dwells within us wants us to keep our vessel (or our body in sanctification and honor) not in lustful passions. Because it is those that do not know God that do that. If think that immorality, especially sexual immorality, is a modern problem that is not true. However, what has happened since the last 50 or so years is how open it is in popular culture. So badly such as it is an influence not only on the general population, but also upon the Christians. It is so important to have godly standards for our life than what the world offers as standards.

3. TRUE DEVOTION - If you know God, you will avoid external, fleshly, superficial religion and focus on internal transformation
   “However at that time, when you did not know God, you were slaves to those which by nature are no gods. But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how is it that you turn back again to the weak and worthless elemental things, to which you desire to be enslaved all over again?”
   ‭‭Galatians‬ ‭4‬:‭8‬-‭9‬ ‭
   Paul, while admonishing the Galatians for going back to religious practices, such as that followed by Jewish people is giving a warning to each of us not to make religious practices more important than got himself. We always have a tendency to accomplish by works instead of trusting in the finish work of Jesus Christ. We always have a tendency to establish our righteousness. Whether it is how much we pray how much we read the Bible or how much we worship or however we pray, or how much scripture we have memorized, or how many people we have shared the gospel with, how many people we have encouraged Christian, let me warn you against it, establishing your own righteousness, and not leaning onto the righteousness that comes my faith in Jesus Christ let me warn you against adding to the finished work of Jesus Christ. God does not want us to focus on Christian religious traditions by which we try to please Him without knowing that it is by faith in the finished work of Christ alone that we can please Him.

These are changes that come to our lives when we truly know God. However, ultimately, these results do not come by striving. If we try to attempt these by human strength or willpower we will certainly fail. We can only do this when we live the life of God.

“For through the Law I died to the Law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.”

‭‭Galatians‬ ‭2‬:‭19‬-‭20‬

If we are unable to love someone, because of it is difficult to forget something they did, remember that you died and your old nature is crucified with Christ. Christ is able to love everyone and so can you do it through His love.

If you are facing temptation that is difficult to overcome, remember that your old nature is crucified with Christ. The life that you live is His, let Him deal with the temptation and He will overcome. 

If you are struggling with religiosity and the need to please God through your own works, remember that you no longer live and Christ's work on the cross is complete. There is no need to establish your righteousness because God sees you as righteous because of what Christ did on the cross. 

‬‬“So let us know, let us press on to know the Lord. His going forth is as certain as the dawn; And He will come to us like the rain, Like the spring rain watering the earth.””

‭‭Hosea‬ ‭6‬:‭3‬ ‭‬‬

Therefore, let us press on to know Him and may His life shine through us.‬‬

That I May Know Him (Knowing God - 1) Sunday Morning, Jan 12 2024

What is God's purpose for us in this world?

YWAM, one of the best known missionary organizations in the world has its caption as "To Know God and to make Him known." As a new believer, when I heard about it, I was so thrilled. Later found that it is the caption of many other organizations as well. For example, the Christian Research Institute, even the church that we used to be a part of uses the same caption. It is so popular a caption because it is really succinct, and perhaps the most accurate statement of purpose that a Christian organization can have.

The Bible encourages us to boast in our knowledge of God. In knowing God as the One who exercises loving kindness, justice, and righteousness on the earth.

“Thus says the Lord, “Let not a wise man boast of his wisdom, and let not the mighty man boast of his might, let not a rich man boast of his riches; but let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the Lord who exercises lovingkindness, justice and righteousness on earth; for I delight in these things,” declares the Lord.”

‭‭Jeremiah‬ ‭9‬:‭23‬-‭24‬ ‭

Just like knowing a person is knowing what type of person they are, what their values are, knowing God is understanding Who He is, in understanding what type of person He is.

When Moses requested to see God and His glory, God revealed His nature and attributes to Him, after hiding him in the cleft of a rock.

"Then He said, “I will make all My goodness pass before you, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before you. I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.”  But He said, “You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live.”  And the Lord said, “Here is a place by Me, and you shall stand on the rock.  So it shall be, while My glory passes by, that I will put you in the cleft of the rock, and will cover you with My hand while I pass by.  Then I will take away My hand, and you shall see My back; but My face shall not be seen.”

Exodus 33:19-23

That is a beautiful prophetic picture of how we can seek to know God. There are two important lessons to learn here:

1. To know God is to know His nature, His attributes.

2. We can only approach God while being hidden in the Rock, which is Christ. 

Since no one can see God's glory and live God allows us to see that in the face of Jesus Christ. Jesus, is that Rock on which Moses stood as He saw the glory of God pass by, the Rock that was cleft for us. Hallelujah!

Ways that are not guaranteed to help us know God

It is important to know what does not constitute knowing God. 

• Knowing about God - One can know much about God while knowing God very little. It is not by gaining doctrinal correctness or intellectual knowledge about God that we know God. In fact, mere knowledge often alienates us from God since it becomes just an intellectual exercise. To know God, we cannot just learn to recite His attributes. we must really experience His attributes in our life. While we speak about the love of God, we must first experience God's love. And so on. An intellectual understanding of those attributes is not

• Learning Bible concepts or memorizing scripture - One can quote large portions of scripture without letting the word of God work in us. We need to first have a relationship with the Author of the word before we can use the word to know Him.

“For My hand made all these things, Thus all these things came into being,” declares the Lord. “But to this one I will look, To him who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at My word.” (Isa 66:2)

How then do we know God?

Because God desires that we know Him, He has provided a revelation of Himself:

1. Nature - Through His works or the world around us.

   "The heavens declare the glory of God;
   And the firmament shows His handiwork.
   Day unto day utters speech,
   And night unto night reveals knowledge.
    There is no speech nor language
   Where their voice is not heard." (Psalm 19:1-3)

   "For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse" (Rom 1:20)

   The creation of God around us is a marvelous reminder of the greatness of God. The heavens and the earth, the heavenly bodies, the wonder of the human body, each cell in the body, prompt us to search for the One behind it and marvel at that. Most scientists begin with an assumption that everything was created by a lot of time and infinite chance. Honest scientists know that as we learn more about the complexity of the world and the amazing intricacy and purposefulness of creation, it is impossible to be the result of random chance. The child of God knows that the world was formed by the purpose of God and for His pleasure. 

2. His written word - The written word of God is the most accurate method of God's revelation that He has given to us. Proper studying of scripture is the method we understand who He is. 

3. Our Lord Jesus Christ - God's ultimate revelation is through the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ.

   “God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,” Hebrews‬ ‭1‬:‭1‬-‭3‬)

Jesus is the perfect revelation of God. He is the brightness of God's glory and the express image of God's person. If we want to know God, we need understand who Jesus is. Studying His person (who He is) and His work (what He did) is the greatest way of knowing God.

Imagine the disciples who spent three years with Him and watched the brightness of God's glory and the express image of His person walk with them and talk with them. After His resurrection, they spent several more weeks with Him. Being with the person who is the brightness of God's glory and the express image of His person transformed them so completely that they not only decided to live for Him and great lengths to serve Him, but they were also willing to die for Him, that too suffering violent, brutal death for their faith in Him. Knowing God transforms us.

It also transformed Paul, who did not meet Jesus in person, but had a personal vision of Him. His encounter with Jesus changed him so much that after boasting about his pedigree as a Pharisee and teacher of the law, Paul says in Philippians: 

“But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.”

‭‭Philippians‬ ‭3‬:‭7‬-‭11‬ ‭‬‬

Let us also count everything but loss for the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. That we may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His suffering. 

May God enable us to know Him, and may that knowledge transform us.

The Days After The Day of Pentecost (Sunday Morning Jan 5, 2025)

Learning from the early church

The lessons of the first days since the church was formed are instructive in what we should be doing as a congregation of believers in this new year

“They were continually devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone kept feeling a sense of awe; and many wonders and signs were taking place through the apostles.”

Acts 2:42-43

Acts chapter 2 records the birth of the church on the day of Pentecost. 10 days after Jesus ascended on Mount Olives, about 120 disciples join together in prayer in the upper room of a building in Jerusalem. They were in there in one accord in one place. The Holy Spirit descended on them with the sound of a rushing wind and what looked like tongues of fire on each of them. And the disciples started speaking in different languages. People from across the world who came in to see the commotion heard the disciples who were all from their speak in their languages in a miraculous occurrence. Peter rose up and shared a powerful message that led the hearers to respond by asking how they could be saved. 3000 people were added to the church that day. I want to speak about the next few verses of what happened after the first day of that revival meeting.  

1. Apostolic teaching

Apostolic teaching or as some translations call it, the apostle’s doctrine. It's basically what the apostles taught the early disciples. And today we have it in written form. The instructions for life and living that came to them in the form of spiritual concepts and practical instructions for life. The apostles taught that the prophecies of God about the Messiah were fulfilled in Christ and what the Kingdom of God meant and how our lives out to be. These teachings are recorded in the writings of the new testament: the historical books: the gospels and The Acts, the letters and the book of prophecy — Revelation. We need to have a zeal for the word of God. Read more, study more, and meditate on it more.

2. Fellowship (communion or koinonia)

What is described next is true fellowship; the true sharing of lives. Not saying "hi" or having a rushed cup of coffee together. Not a 10 min chat and a smile. True sharing of lives. Does your fellow brothers know of your struggles? Do you know theirs? Do they know your challenges? Do they know your desires? Do they know what the Lord is speaking to you about? Do they know enough about you to pray accurately for your biggest needs? Do they know enough about you to provide any help you may need appropriately? Do you know details about their lives and their walk with God?

When we grow in fellowship with one another, we will know all this and more. Our lives will be deeply intertwined. We have different personalities and these are easier for some than for others. However, as we grow in relationship with God, he desires that we grow in deep relationship with one another as well. Let us continue meeting one another and spurring them on in the faith. Let us recognize the body of Christ as being made of all blood-bought children of God, not those from this church alone. 

3. Breaking of bread

This probably meant both sharing a meal with your brother and sisters and the spiritual partaking of the Lord's Supper. It is a deeper level of the sharing of lives between Christian believers. When we come together in a simple meal together, it becomes a blessing. Don't wait till there is an opportunity to put together a major feast. Invite other believers to share in whatever you'd eat. Spend time praising God over your table. This glorifies God. 

4. Prayers

Since the Bible specifically mentioned this in plural. Many types of prayers are recorded in the Bible: supplications, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving. 

“First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings, be made on behalf of all men,”

1 Timothy 2:1

“praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints—”

Ephesians 6:18

Our Christian life and ministry is built on the foundation of prayer. What we need is more love and more power in our life. Without prayer we become loveless and without love we become a clashing symbol or a sounding gong: we make sounds, but there will be no life in us. God wants us to pray with prayers of confession, prayers of consecration, prayers for healing, prayers for others (intercession), prayers of adoration, prayers of thanksgiving, prayers for specific requests. We ought to pray more and pray more deeply. This year, we will be encouraging everyone to pray more, first individually and then as a body.

5. Sharing and Charity

“And all those who had believed were together and had all things in common; and they began selling their property and possessions and were sharing them with all, as anyone might have need.”

Acts 2:44-45

This part of scripture speaks about the early church in Jerusalem selling all they had, believing the Lord's coming was imminent, and sharing with those that were in need. The Jerusalem church that followed this soon ended up being the poorest among believers and the worldwide church at that time was encouraged to make collections on behalf of those in Jerusalem, clearly showing us that God wants us to be wiser. He does not expect us to share everything we have and give to the poor in this age. 

What we should learn from this incident is that we ought to also be aware of the needs of our fellow saints and share with them, helping them as God enables us. Do not close your eyes to those that are in lack, especially your brother or sister in the Lord. This is pleasing to God.

6. Unity

“Day by day continuing with one mind in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they were taking their meals together with gladness and sincerity of heart,”

Acts 2:46

They continued with one mind in the temple. They broke bread from house to house.

It is very important that we be of one mind. It also seems to be very difficult in practice since people are different; they have different priorities, preferences, and personalities. The way to accomplish this is to have the same mind that was in Christ, who humbled Himself and did not seek His own. (Phil 2:5 onwards). Often we divide ourselves with minor doctrinal differences. God wants us to focus on His bigger plan, His purposes, His commission while being charitable to one another. That will help us move forward in unity.

7. Outreach

“praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved.”

Acts 2:47

They maintained connection with one another, without breaking their relationship with those outside the body of Christ. Seeing the love in their lives, the joy in the midst of suffering, the peace in the midst of trouble, chaos, and persecution, those outside wanted to be a part of it. Our purpose is to reach out to those outside. Maintain connection with those outside Christ's body and seek to reach out to them.

This new year, let us commit to these goals. To grow in the study of the Word of God, fellowship, prayer, sharing and charity, unity, and reaching out. May that help initiate a fresh move of the LORD in our midst. Praise the Lord!