Knowing Truth

I’ve an online app for Selwyn Hughes’ wonderful devotionals called “Every Day with Jesus.” Today’s reading blessed me using verses about the guidance of the Holy Spirit. His focus was on Jesus words:

When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. (John 16:13)

Hughes adds that obviously this means spiritual truth, but suggests all truth means truth about everything. His words reminded me of a couple of personal experiences. A few years ago, I thought I’d like a book of prayers that were different from the way I usually pray, mostly to prompt me to pray in a new way. I never told anyone.

However, a family member who is a believer gave me two prayer books, exactly what I was looking for. I told him this was an answer to prayer. He said he saw them in a department store, read a few pages to make sure they had good entries, and thought I would like them. The odd part is that he isn’t going to church or doing much praying that I know of, but the Holy Spirit used him anyway.

The other story was a visit to a family member who also once made a profession of faith but is not in church either. However, she drove by a church and thought it was the one we would like and told us that was where we should go. We did, and it was the right place for us to be the two Sundays we were able to attend. How did she know? All truth given from the Holy Spirit, even to a prodigal?

Hughes pointed me to several passages:

These things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. 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. 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. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ. (1 Corinthians 2:10–16)

In Galatians, Paul said he did not receive the gospel from anyone but through a revelation of Jesus Christ. (Galatians 1:11–12) These days, many people in the Middle East are being saved by this same thing. They have no Bibles or churches but the Holy Spirit is revealing Jesus to them in dreams and visions. Can He not also direct people to buy the right books or select the right church? How about the right food to eat or the best store to find the coat they need? Or where to travel? Or what house to buy?

When  Paul was headed for Jerusalem, “constrained by the Spirit, not knowing what will happen to me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies to me in every city that imprisonment and afflictions await me.”  This was not a problem for him as he did not consider his life of any value nor precious to himself. He also knew that those with him would not see him again. (Acts 20:17–25) How was this possible unless the Spirit revealed it!

So many people look for guidance each day. Sadly, many look in the wrong place. For millions it is horoscopes in the nation’s newspapers that people often governed by ‘science’ in the rest of life can believe that the planets’ positions affect what might happen to them that day. For Christians, such things are not only forbidden, they are totally unnecessary; for God himself has promised to guide us.

This reading blesses me. God can use anyone, even backsliders who are His yet not walking the way Christians should walk are still guided by Him anyway. As for the two I mentioned, I see God’s Spirit at work in their actions and concerns for justice and truth.

PRAY: Lord, You are Lord. Your Spirit is guiding those who You want to guide, whether they realize it or not. You do this for me, but how delightful that Your guidance has no limits. Thank You.

Learning God’s way . . .

Educators speak of learning styles. They say people learn by seeing, hearing or doing, or a combination of those three. However, there is a fourth. It might happen through a teacher, friend or preacher, but it can happen without any other person involved. It happened to the Apostle Paul . . .

For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man’s gospel. For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. (Galatians 1:11–12)

When a team of cult members came to my door, they asked who taught me, meaning which church or which faith tradition told me what I was supposed to believe. I told them the truth, that one day I was reading a book that was about reincarnation (and false), yet it had a verse of Scripture in it. As soon as I read the verse, God made me aware of His presence and revealed to me that Jesus Christ is God in the flesh. No one taught me; God revealed it to me.

The cult members at my door turned up their noses and left. They may have thought I was mentally unbalanced! However, if I was, so was Paul. I never became the person he was but I do identify with him in one way — I also received the Gospel through a revelation of Jesus Christ.

After knowing the Lord for many years, I can say that all I have learned about Him and about myself is by revelation. Sometimes I hear Him speak through others, or through nature, or some secondary messenger, but without a doubt in my mind, I know His voice. Knowledge of Jesus comes from Jesus.

God reveals His Son for a purpose — first to save and second to change sinners into servants. My salvation didn’t take me the same way as Paul’s did, nor do many Christians have the same clear path put before them, yet all of His followers are led by God in the way He wants us to go. That path includes a learning curve, sometimes of many years. For Paul, the timeframe is not clear, but it was a while before he started his well-known ministry, not immediately after that first revelation. He tells how God . . .

“ . . . was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately consult with anyone; nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me, but I went away into Arabia, and returned again to Damascus. Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him fifteen days. But I saw none of the other apostles except James the Lord’s brother. (In what I am writing to you, before God, I do not lie!) Then I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia. And I was still unknown in person to the churches of Judea that are in Christ. They only were hearing it said, ‘He who used to persecute us is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.’ And they glorified God because of me. Then after fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus along with me. I went up because of a revelation and set before them (though privately before those who seemed influential) the gospel that I proclaim among the Gentiles, in order to make sure I was not running or had not run in vain.” (Galatians 1:16-2:2)

In only a few verses, Paul describes how he was in training for many years. All that happened to him was credited to revelations from the Lord and eventually verified through the other disciples.

Reading this today stresses to me the importance of paying attention. I must not set my own path and pattern just as I must not interpret the Gospel in any other way than it has been revealed to me. I can check revelation against the Word of God — not every idea is from Him — but can depend on the Holy Spirit and that gentle whisper from God to guide me. Most of the time I can also rely on godly people for assurance.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Lord, it seems that this day will be one of those days; no specific direction or challenge, just pay attention. I know that when I am shopping, I often hear You say, “It’s time to go home” or in a library and hear You say, “Borrow that book.” That first revelation was life changing yet every time I hear You and do what You say, I am blessed and changed. Thank You!

Today’s thankful list . . .

The still, small voice of God.

Grocery stores and the ability to purchase good food.

Friends.

My sister.

The ability to fall asleep whenever I need to.

Soup and crackers.

Nothing is too hard for God

Yesterday I read an incredible description of the size of the known universe. It began with the distance of the earth from the sun, 93 million miles. Then it said to imagine that distance as the thickness of an ordinary sheet of paper. 

It continued, asking me to think of the distance to the nearest star in those terms. That would be a stack of paper 71 feet high. Remember, each sheet of paper represents 93 million miles. Using that parallel, the next measurement is our galaxy, which is a stack of paper 310 miles high. After that, the description leaped to the outer fringes of my imagination in describing the size of the known universe. It is a stack of paper 31 million miles high, with each sheet representing 93 million miles. The author asks, “Are you getting a headache?”

The intent of this description is to show not just the amazing size of the universe, but also the awesomeness of the God who created it. He merely said, “Let there be…” and spoke it into existence. 

We don’t think about God like that, at least not very often. He, like these numbers, is beyond the grasp of our brains. He can do whatever He pleases. Nothing is too hard for God, not creation, not the management of human affairs, not even the task of reaching the entire world with the good news about Jesus Christ.

The eleven disciples went … into a mountain where Jesus had appointed them.… Jesus came and spake unto them saying … Go ye and teach all nations… (Matthew 28:16, 18-19)

At first glance, this command (known as the Great Commission) seems like a task for those who follow Jesus. We have been told to go and teach others what God has taught us. However, anyone who is a disciple of Christ knows that even this is impossible without the power of the Holy Spirit. I cannot teach anyone about Jesus because spiritual truth is hidden from people who do not have His Spirit.

The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. (1 Corinthians 2:14)

For example, when Peter correctly identified Jesus as the Messiah, Jesus said, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.” (Matthew 16:17) 

God showed Peter the identity of Jesus Christ. God showed me the same thing. God reveals spiritual truth, not human reason, insight, intelligence, or even a good sermon. Paul gave the same testimony.

For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man’s gospel. For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. (Galatians 1:11–12)

As for passing on to others this revelation, in ourselves we are helpless. When Jesus gave the Great Commission, it was like telling sighted people to explain color to those born blind. As much as it is clear to those who see and believe, the gospel is not clear unless God opens hearts and reveals it.

How is this relevant to the awesomeness of God? When I read about the immensity of His creation and think about His power, then my stress about all things vanishes. Who can outsmart God? If He touches any person (like He touched me) they will fall on their knees before Him. When God reveals our sinfulness and our need of Jesus, we cannot resist agreeing with Him no more than we can condense the distance to the nearest star.

Lately my prayers are filled more with worship than they are with requests. When I ask God to reveal Himself to someone walking in spiritual darkness, I have no doubt that He can do it. I do not need to nag Him with my worries that this is too hard because, for God nothing is impossible.