KNOWLEDGE OF SELF
A look in the mirror.
For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, BUT their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.
General revelation accomplishes more than making us aware of God. It also provides us with a certain knowledge of ourselves. It begins by planting the questions, 'Where did I come from?' and 'How did I get here?' As a human being, wonder and awe at all we see compels us to ponder, 'What is this all about?' or as Sam asks Froto in The Lord of the Rings, "What sort of a tale have we fallen into?" From the beginning, really, we're cognisant of our self and something other. This is the work of God's first book--general revelation--upon us.
Look again at the lyrics of the song Hallelujahs I posted as entry 2.2 in this series. Do you see how the artist/lyricist makes mention of those things external, the waves and whales, and also the things internal, the beating of his own heart? Do you see how he testifies that there is no language where this testimony of God cannot be heard? Beautiful picture, isn't it? And do you see how he depicts its effect on us--knowledge of self? It draws us to respond with hallelujahs. But...
We come to the verse that starts this post, from Romans chapter one. The context there paints a picture: It is not that God is impossible to find and know, but (great word, eh?) it is that human beings willfully reject him. The consequence of that rejection is that human hearts move further from, while growing colder toward God. They tend not to sing those hallelujahs, in fact, they tend not to acknowledge or thank him, but ignore him.
Proverbs 1:7 offers us this basic truth: The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. We cannot be wise and knowledgeable people, unless we see ourselves in relation to God. That proverb continues, ...BUT fools despise wisdom and knowledge. As Paul points out in Romans, we've no one to blame but ourselves. Look at the person next to you and say, 'What up, fool?'
The picture that general revelation offers us and humanity's response make it clear that our problem is not a lack of knowledge about God, but rather a refusal to act on that knowledge and live in response to it. As the Proverbs verse and Romans text explain--we've exchanged knowledge for folly.
Have you done the assigned readings thus far? Genesis 1 & 2, Psalm 19, and Romans 1? If you did the reading you've seen, that's not all that humanity has exchanged. We've exchanged a walk in the garden with our God for enmity toward him. We've exchanged intimacy with our God for all sorts of attempts at false intimacy; affection for lesser affections. We've exchanged how it was intended to be for what we wanted.
Knowledge of God and knowledge of self via what is revealed through general revelation (all that we see and experience), paints a picture of our need for God--and our accountability before him.
Read Genesis 3 and spend some time meditating on a handful of verses within Psalm 119 for next time.
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