Thursday, June 4, 2009

Knowledge to action

For too long now, I've embarrassed myself by not knowing God's word.  So I've set out on a journey to know His word so that I can also live what I'm learning (just as Jesus wanted the disciples to do).  There was (and still is) so much of the bible that I didn't (and still don't) understand.  I just started a study on the book of Acts and I'm learning so much!  I'm stoked!  I'm learning how we as followers of Christ are to carry out Jesus' teachings and actions.  I mean, when the disciples were left with the teachings of Christ, they were completely incapable of living them out.  Peter was the so called leader of the pack, and he had denied even knowing Christ.  Luckily, they had the Holy Spirit to guide and empower them.  John MacArthur quotes "There must be an accurate understanding of the content of Christian truth before any ministry can be effective.  Such knowledge is foundational to spiritual power and to fulfilling the church's mission.  The lack of it is insurmountable and devastating to the evangelistic purpose of God."  How can we as believers possibly think that we can reach the entire world without even knowledge of the bible?  At the same time, even if we have the knowledge, what good is it if we don't share it and build disciples as Jesus did?  I think this is one of the best quotes I've ever heard...It's from Charles Spurgeon..."We might preach 'til our tongue rotted, 'til we exhaust our lungs and die-but never a soul would be converted unless the Holy Spirit uses the word to convert that soul.  So it is blessed to eat into the very heart of the Bible until, at last, you come to talk in scriptural language and your spirit is flavoured with the words of the Lord, so that your blood is Bibline and the very essence of the Bible flows from you."  Paul was also very adamant about knowing God's word so that we could live like Jesus did. (Col. 1:9-11, 2 Tim. 2:15)  I think this is something that the Holy Spirit has strongly layed on my heart.  I feel like there are too many Christians (including myself) that don't know the scriptures, and therefore can't live the way Jesus did because we don't know what it means to do that.  I encourage every believer to dig deep into God's word, so we can live like Jesus did and change the world.  How can we expect to see change if Christians are completely incompetent of carrying out Christ's teachings because we don't know what they are.