For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 4:5 - 6).
" + "Sir Francis Bacon is noted to be the first to declare that "knowledge is power." However, in light of what we know the Bible says, Sir Francis Bacon sounds completely unoriginal. Why? God from the beginning of time has been telling the world that all power belongs unto him, that he has given it unto us through his knowledge. By comparison, the power that God offers us through his knowledge completely overwhelms whatever kind of knowledge we could ever receive from the world. But like Francis Bacon, we seem to think that all knowledge is power. Truth be told, every single form of knowledge we receive does not give us the power that we need in the world.
" + "Every single thing in the world needs power. From the smallest creature, to the largest, everything needs power. Power, very roughly defined, is the ability to do work. Thus, if something lives, it must breathe, it must emit and take in fumes of sorts to survive in the world. In other words, the body of any organism needs power; it needs to work, in order to live. Power is necessary from the basic level of life to the most complex level. True enough, in this sense, we all have power. Our body parts contain databases of information by which they function. Each member has its own sense of knowledge by which it operates. But the knowledge that our body parts have is incomparable to the knowledge of God. Would you take a pebble and compare it to Mount Everest? No! The knowledge of God provides a power that transcends the present reality and breaks forth unto the reality of God. The reason is that this knowledge does not come from humans it comes from God himself. When we come to the Lord, we receive a knowledge more precious than any other knowledge the world can offer. Many of us spend thousands of dollars to attain the world's knowledge. Would we sacrifice the same for the knowledge of God?
" + "Paul says that the knowledge that we have received of the Lord is like a light. In fact, he said we have received the "light of the knowledge of the glory of God." All of these words together seem to be confused. Which is it, light or knowledge? Is it glory or light? Glory has its own shine to it, its like light. What are we dealing with here? The answer to the puzzle is summed up in what he says in the end: "in the face of Jesus Christ." Jesus' face holds the answer to all of the puzzles of life. Everything is answered in the description of his face, for all of creation is a reflection of his countenance. When God needed a reference for the beauty of creation, he looked to himself. We can therefore say that the knowledge that we would receive from him is not just a marginal knowledge, some information one would need to bake a cake or start a car. It is not even the knowledge on the basic level that all things need to function. This knowledge is the sense one gets when one knows one has seen the face of God. It is a transformational knowledge which contains the light, the glory, of God which makes us into new creations. We become something wholly different than what we thought we could ever become. The reason is because this knowledge is not simply the knowledge one needs to work, or to have the ability to do something. This knowledge is intrinsically active. It works something out in us that we cannot understand in our present states. The Apostle John explains it to us: "Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is" (1John 3:2). My brothers and sisters, let us consider these thoughts every time we choose to listen to someone or something over listening to God. Let us consider that we are choosing a pebble over a mountain. We are choosing a drop of water over the great oceans. God's knowledge is more power than the greatest power we could ever think the knowledge of the world is. God Bless.
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