In Christ: Know It, Live It - 21 (Knowing Through the Word)

Paul prays in Ephesians 1:17 that God would give the Ephesian believers (and us!) "...the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him." We have written previously about the Holy Spirit as the One who gives revelation of God. He teaches us and shows us what we could never know apart from His ministry. He opens blind eyes to SEE CHRIST and the GOSPEL.

It is important when we speak of the Holy Spirit's work of revelation (or ILLUMINATION, once we are believers and know Christ) to remind ourselves that He does His revealing work THROUGH THE SCRIPTURES. So...we can PRAY for Him to open our eyes to know Christ and to know our spiritual blessings in Christ, but if we do not ALSO devote ourselves to reading and meditating in the Scriptures, we do not put ourselves in the PLACE OF REVELATION.

If I am a beggar and do not put myself in a place where people with money pass by, I won't receive much financial compassion. I can and should and MUST cry to the Spirit to make me know my Savior, but if I do not put myself regularly WHERE THE SPIRIT GIVES REVELATION, my prayer has no environment for being answered.

Of course this means that not only should I regularly read and meditate on the Scriptures, but also:

• I should read and meditate in portions of the Scriptures that most specifically focus on the object of my prayers. For example, if I want to see Christ more clearly, I can go to Colossians 1 or the Gospels or the book of Revelation. Of course Christ is revealed in ALL of Scripture (Luke 24:27), but some portions focus more specifically on His attributes or deity or passion. If I am asking for insight into God's will re: finances, there are weighty passages in Proverbs or 2 Corinthians 8 and 9.
• I should also regularly put myself under the PREACHING and TEACHING of the Scriptures. How MANY times the Spirit has opened my eyes to some needed truth as I sat and listened to a brother open the Word. This is why "...He gave some...pastors and teachers" Ephesians 4:11. If God has planted you in a local church body ( and I PRAY HE has!) then it is important to trust that HE will feed you, His sheep, THROUGH the shepherds in YOUR CHURCH.
• Another wonderful place for the Holy Spirit's revealing/illumining ministry to reach us is in books written by godly, scholarly, devotional-hearted saints. I have loved reading the Puritans (though at times the conviction was painful) or Martyn Lloyd-Jones or J.C. Ryle or present day authors such as John Piper or Iain Murray.
• Today there are wonderful and FREE sites for downloading biblical, Christ-centered sermons and teaching onto MP3 players. www. biblicaltraining.org features Bible-college and Seminary levels courses in most subjects (like preaching, OT Survey, NT Survey, Systematic Theology, etc.) at no cost. DesiringGod.org offers many hundreds of messages by John Piper and others, including some MP4 video sermons. Many larger churches offer downloads of their pastor's sermons. Use these to SUPPLEMENT your church's teaching, not to REPLACE it!
• MEMORIZING the Word is critically important as it allows you to MEDITATE on a portion of Scripture that you are learning from or studying. I have been meditating on Colossians 3 lately and from past study and meditation have memorized much of it. It is a valuable thing when asking the Spirit to teach you to have a critical passage in memory so that you can mentally "chew" on it during spare moments during the day.

Fellow beggars, let us park ourselves everyday in the Word where the Spirit will meet us and "turn on the lights" of our souls to SEE JESUS.