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Christian Perspective: What do you know

We've all heard this phrase when someone is surprised about some fact that they have just heard, read or seen and they exclaim, “Well, what do you know? …”, and they then describe what it is all about. We live in an information age where knowledge is readily available to anyone with an Internet connection!

I recently heard it said that “The Internet knows everything and what it doesn't know it makes up!” Not everything one reads on the Internet should be believed as being true without knowing that the information's source is reliable and can be trusted since anyone can write anything they want.

In contrast, newspaper reporters adhere to a code of ethics while trying hard to diligently ask all the right questions from reliable sources for the story. Their editor also has a final say about whether the article with its sources are worthy to be published.

Have you heard the expression that “knowledge is power”? It is powerful because we usually make our decisions based on the facts we believe.

Here's a true saying: “It is very dangerous to reason and decide with insufficient data.”* If we don't know all the pertinent facts there is a strong probability that we'll be coming to an erroneous conclusion that may lead to failure later, during the implementation stage.

Beware of overconfidence. We may think we know everything we need to know but our senses can be tricked and deceived so we may not see the hidden traps laid out before us. That's why we often ask for advice from someone who has experience – a person who has successfully “been there and done that”. But, only God knows everything and He is trustworthy. If we ask Him, He will tell us the truth we need!

Often we want to see things with our own eyes before we believe. But another quote I found says, “Some things have to be believed to be seen.”* Furthermore, some beliefs have to be acted upon before any results can be seen!

I'll explain using an incident that happened in our Lord Jesus Christ's life while He walked and taught people here on earth (i.e. during His earthly ministry). In the Bible, John 7:15-19, the Jewish leaders were amazed that Jesus knew how to read and write when, as far as they knew, He had never been formally taught.

Where did He get the knowledge and doctrine that He was teaching? Jesus claimed to have received it from the One they worshipped as God! He told them how they could determine if this was true [and I'm quoting from the Amplified Bible]: “If any man desires to do His will (God's pleasure), he will know (have the needed illumination to recognize, and can tell for himself) whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking from Myself and of My own accord and on My own authority.”

Jesus is saying that if we're willing to DO what pleases God then we will KNOW that what Jesus was teaching is from God and can be trusted. These Jews were trying to kill Him so obviously they were not doing the will of Father God and therefore they wouldn't be given knowledge about where Jesus' words came from.

Making a broader application I can say that those who are cultivating a personal relationship with God, who also love Him and who desire to OBEY Him, will KNOW in themselves that the Bible IS true.

There are other strong proofs that the words written in the Bible are true but I haven't space to discuss these. This article gives us something anyone can do: Just honestly ask the author of the Bible, we believe that is God, and He will show you all the proof you need. Trusting and obeying God as the ultimate “good source” of the information we read makes His Word trustworthy enough to build our life's winning decisions on. What do you know?

[*The two quotes I've marked with an asterisk were taken from our sign book, “701 Sentence Sermons: Attention-Getting Quotes for Church Signs, Bulletins, Newsletters, and Sermons” by L. James Harvey, published by Kregal Publishing, Grand Rapids, MI.]

By Jack Gault, Bethel Chapel, Shelburne

Post date: 2013-11-21 09:55:32
Post date GMT: 2013-11-21 14:55:32
Post modified date: 2013-11-27 13:25:53
Post modified date GMT: 2013-11-27 18:25:53