God is in the Pearl-managing Business
Knowledge is powerful. In the right hands, it changes a life forever. In the wrong hands, it is degraded. Knowledge is a pearl to protect. Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine. (Matt. 7:6)
Even God—and especially God—protects knowledge. Remember back in the Garden of Eden how God did not want Adam and Eve to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? All that He told them was that if they did, they would die. But the desire to be wise—to get that knowledge—was powerful, and Eve ate. Her eyes were opened. She got that knowledge that was supposed to remain shrouded. And that was the beginning of the end for her (and all of us).
Fast forward to Jesus. People ask why He spoke in parables. The difficulty of understanding what Jesus was saying turned a lot of people away from Him, and still does today. Even His disciples questioned Jesus about why He spoke in parables. Listen to His reason.
And he said, Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God: but to others in parables; that seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not understand. (Luke 8:10) Knowledge that is hidden is a mystery. God’s design is that the mysteries of the kingdom of God be hidden from some. Yes, they will hear the words and see evidence, but they won’t understand.
God’s knowledge, or mysteries, are spiritual in nature. A person without God’s spirit in them will not grasp these mysteries, because they can only be spiritually understood (1 Cor. 2:14). By nature, we are missing the spiritual capacity to understand these spiritual things. Things of God will not be understood intellectually. He doesn’t want us to ever claim we figured things out apart from Him. He guards His pearls.
And besides that, Satan doesn’t want people to grasp the knowledge of God.
In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them. 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 Cor. 4:4-6)
Consider all this next to the thought that we are stewards of the mysteries of God. (Read more about that in the blog post just after this one.) How hard it is to get people to understand the mysteries that God and Satan are hovering over.
God has to open hearts to receive spiritual knowledge. In the book of Acts, He did it for Lydia. And a certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira, which worshipped God, heard us: whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul. (Acts 16:14)
A person’s only hope of understanding God’s mysteries, or knowledge, is that the Holy Spirit opens their spiritual eyes to see. That applies not only to the unsaved person grasping and receiving the gospel, but also to us understanding what we read in His word.
“But the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him.” (1 John 2:27)
Therefore, our most valuable prayer for others and for ourselves is that God would open eyes—before we share the gospel and before we read our Bibles. If you know your Bible, you know the verses that, in fact, encourage that. But here is the verse for today.
If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. (James 1:5)
Jody