Dear Folks,
What have you been reading lately? Perhaps some do not read, or do not read too much. Then I might ask, what have you been watching lately? Or hearing? Or doing? In today’s post-modern milieu, it’s probably true that more people gain the majority of their knowledge and insights from watching video or film rather than from reading books or print. Both video and the printed word are powerful tools for learning. Contrarily, both can be equally misappropriated for immoral or unethical purposes. Also, both can be misused, for example, where much time that could have been spent being productive, doing!, instead is consumed and generally wasted. However, if you take a moment to consider God’s purpose, and His will to reveal Himself to you, then in regard to that, how do you answer any of those four questions above?
Before books were readily available and certainly before the advent of radio, film, video or social media, ancient cultures used live storytelling to guide the growth and development of their people. Live storytelling is still a powerful means of teaching and learning, yes, even entertaining. And certainly storytelling is easily incorporated within video or the printed word. Certainly, the greatest storyteller of all was Jesus Himself, and through the pages of the Bible we can “hear” His voice perhaps a little more clearly, gleaning a little more knowledge and understanding with each new reading.
Yes, God, the infinite, omnipotent, omniscient God who has revealed Himself through nature and more certainly and more directly through His Word is ever working to reveal the knowledge of Himself to you. Take that word, “milieu.” Yes that is a good word for you to understand. It really is about “the totality of surrounding conditions and circumstances affecting growth or development.”1 That includes your’s and your children’s and children’s children’s growth and development.
Does it matter to God that you are able to gain more knowledge of Him? And His will for you? Yes! It matters that you can and it matters that you do! And that you might continually do. For this reason He has given His Holy Law as a standard to guide those who seek to know Him. A standard to guide you! Through the Printed Word, otherwise known as the Bible, He has testified through the Law and the Prophets of what is good, what is truth, and even what is to come. The Psalmist declares about this same God that “You have magnified Your word above all Your name.” Psalm 138:2. Therefore, we can trust the Bible as surely as we can trust the God of the Bible, that by reading it regularly, even daily, we may understand and know Him who created us in His own image (Jeremiah 9:24; Genesis 1:26).
For it is God’s will that we may know Him, therefore, God has clearly revealed the Savior of the World, Jesus, the Son of God through that Word. It was this same Jesus who was arrested for no crime except righteousness, who was falsely arraigned and abused before He was crucified, who bravely stood before the Roman Governor Pontius Pilate, and said, “For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.”
Do you hear His voice? For this same Jesus has manifested more clearly who God is, as the Apostle John testifies to the fact that, “No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.” John 1:18.
Yes, God does in fact desire to reveal more and still more of Himself to you. Therefore, it is my prayer that each one should take a moment, long or short it’s up to you, and consider what you have been hearing, reading, watching or doing lately to help you “grow in the grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” 2 Peter 3:18.
1 (definition from iPhone app, The Free Dictionary by Farlex).
Grace & Peace,
Pastor Dean
Last Day's Grace 