Knowledge

There are two kinds of knowledge

There is sense knowledge

This is knowledge we acquire through our five physical senses – sight, sound, smell, taste and touch – to which we then apply the reasoning ability of our brains. The world relentlessly pursues this kind of knowledge believing it to be the only kind of knowledge that exists. The world grades people on the extent of their sense knowledge and on their ability to process that knowledge.

None of us can know God through sense knowledge, although many try to:

1 Cor. 1:21 For in the wisdom of God the world (people) by its wisdom (sense knowledge) did not know God …

Having perfect natural eyesight and hearing and a high I.Q. will contribute nothing to knowing God if we are looking to the natural human faculties of sense knowledge and reason:

Matthew 13:13 Therefore I (Jesus) speak to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand.

Matthew 13:14 And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah, which says, By hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive:

Matthew 13:15 For this people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.

We may be very religious and spend much time in the study of the Bible, mentally trying to understand the scriptures and apply them to our lives, but our knowledge of God can never begin or advance this way. All we will have is an accumulation of sense knowledge of the Bible and some inevitable pride. Many sincere born-again Christians are under the illusion that Christian growth comes this way.

Jesus speaking to the religious leaders of Israel:

John 5:37 …You have neither heard His (The Father’s) voice at any time…

John 5:38 And you have not His word abiding in you: …

John 5:39 Search the scriptures; for in them you think you have eternal life: and they are they which testify of Me.

John 5:40 And you will not come to Me, that you might have life.

John 5:42 But I know you, that you have not the love of God in you.

They knew the scriptures – but only through sense knowledge and human reason – consequently they had never heard the Father’s voice speaking a scripture to them by His Spirit. Therefore the word of God was not in them, in their hearts. Consequently neither the life of God nor the love of God was in them, which God communicates to people through living words. In other words Christ was not in them.

Then there is revelation knowledge - God must reveal it to my heart

Matthew 16:17 Jesus answered and said to him “Blessed are you Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood (people) have not revealed this to you but my Father which is in heaven (has revealed it)

John 3:27 …A man can receive nothing except it be given him from heaven above.

This is knowledge that God reveals to me. It is exclusively a gift from God. None of my natural human abilities, especially my brain, can increase in the slightest way my receiving revelation knowledge of God. Because it is only given to the heart, that is the spirit of a person.

Eph. 1:17 That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him:

Eph. 1:18 The eyes of your hearts being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, and what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints,

1 Cor. 2:14 For the natural man (including the Christian seeking to know God through sense knowledge) cannot understand the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, neither can he know them for they are spiritually discerned (received and revealed exclusively in the heart).

Proverbs 4:23 Keep your heart with all diligence; for out of it flow the waters of the springs of eternal life. (His revealed words)

Many Christians after being born-again of the Spirit, are taught to and seek in vain to know God better and to grow in Christ through a sense knowledge approach to the scriptures. This leads to destruction.

Hosea 4:6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge (revelation knowledge):

Everything God wants to give the new born Christian, who was born-again through God unveiling to his heart the knowledge of Jesus Christ, comes only through further revealed knowledge: