I hope you find it in your heart to forgive me if this offends you, but there are some things only Jesus’ followers can know.
I heard an old Bahamian preacher respond to the retort, “You Christians think you know everything!” by saying, “We don’t think we know everything; we KNOW we know everything.” Then he quoted, “You have an anointing from the Holy One, and you know all things.” (1 Jn 2:20)
Whatever did John mean? Certainly not that Christians are experts on the Mohorovicic Discontinuity or that we quiz our kids at dinner on the plausibility of wormholes. What then?
John was explaining that God makes available all the truth we need to live life to the max, but on a need-to-know basis. Paul warned that knowledge by itself “puffs up,” but love builds up. (1 Cor 8:1)
There’s nothing worse than a Christian know-it-all whose knowledge never kicks into action. In fact, Jesus reminded His disciples that you don’t benefit from something until you actually do it: “If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.” (Jn 13:17)
So what are these things that only true believers know? The first is this: we’ve discovered God is so great and wonderful that, compared to Him, we can’t think overmuch of ourselves. Humility knows what God knows we are.
On the other hand, we should value all human beings because we know they’re made in God’s image. We should see their intrinsic dignity, knowing He made them for a purpose. Even if they don’t believe the Bible, their DNA should tell them they’re one-off custom jobs. He has big plans for them.
We know the world now isn’t what it was originally. There’s been a civil war in the universe; we see the wreckage everywhere. It should break our hearts, but it should do more. It should send us on a mission like the Good Samaritan, traveling life’s road with medicine and bandages at the ready, looking for those we can help.
We are also heartened in tough times to know that God did not remain aloof to our pain. In the person of His Son, He became known as a “Man of sorrows” (Isa 53:3), suffering along with His creatures.
But we also know that, though God didn’t cause suffering, He promises to remake our world into a place where tears and shame and broken hearts will be unknown. In the meantime, He’s found a way to use suffering for our good, if we let Him. “No pain; no gain,” says the ballerina, the athlete, the physical therapist, and the surgeon. We ought to let God think the same. Thus “we know that all things work together for good to those who love God.” (Rom 8:28)
One more thing. The believer knows the Adam Improvement Society has never worked a day. It’s “not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us.” (Titus 3:5) The gospel is not about earning your way to Paradise. If it were, the death of Christ is a waste.
“This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.” (Jn 17:3) So in the end, it isn’t what you know; it’s who you know.
Article by Jabe Nicholson first published in the Commercial Dispatch, Sunday, February 27, 2022.