Grace Baptist Church, Nokomis, IL.

Text:

I don’t know where it came from originally, but I’ve heard this saying from a few sources: “Between me and my brother, we know everything.” Many people have the desire to be know-it-alls. It’s easier than ever to find out answers to questions about history or the world we live in.

It’s astounding how much information we consume every day. One study reported that the average American spends 12 hours per day consuming information. This comes in the form of reading books, newspapers, magazines, watching television, surfing the internet, playing video games, listening to the radio, and talking on the phone. If we were to translate this information into computer data, it would take up 34 gigabytes of space on your hard drive, every single day. And this is only the information that we intentionally go about consuming.

Additionally, there are the billboards that we drive by. There are the conversations we hear in passing. There are countless sights and sounds which we instinctively tune out, but our brains still digest and filter. But this is only a small fraction of the information that’s available to us to consume.

The CEO of Google, Eric Schmidt, estimates that “Every two days now we create as much information as we did from the dawn of civilization up until 2003.” With the rise of the internet, and blogs, and youtube, there is literally more information created every single day than a person can consume in a lifetime. With so much information being created every day in every topic imaginable, how can we possibly stay up to date with all of it?

The fact is, we don’t need to. We’re called to know the Word of God.

“I write these things to you about those who are trying to deceive you. But the anointing that you received from him abides in you, and you have no need that anyone should teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about everything, and is true, and is no lie–just as it has taught you, abide in him. And now, little children, abide in him, so that when he appears we may have confidence and not shrink from him in shame at his coming.” (1 John 2:26-28)

Satan is tricky in his attacks on us. It would be far too obvious for Satan to come against us as himself. Satan is a lion which prowls around seeking someone to devour! We don’t see him coming. Satan is a thief who comes to steal, kill, and destroy. We don’t see the thief coming. No, Satan uses people just like us in order to deceive us (v. 26). They look just like you and me. They’ve even spent some time in our churches. But Satan is using them to deceive us. They come at us with their negative experiences of the Christian faith. They come at us with arguments based on their view of science. They come at us with arguments from logic. So how do we be on guard against them?

We must abide in Christ (v. 27). If Christ is your Savior, rest in Him. As long as you rest in Christ, no argument can persuade you to renounce Christ. When people see the peace we have in Christ, they will come to desire it as well. If you have the Holy Spirit inside of you, rely on His anointing. Through Him, you have power for living. Through Him, you have conviction of sin. Through Him, you have the Truth of God implanted within you.

Notice that the anointing that we receive from God teaches us about everything (v. 27).It doesn’t mean that we will instinctively know the answers to all the questions in the universe. But through the Holy Spirit and through faithful attention to God’s Word, we will know everything we need to know for living. Knowing the Truth of God is a result of knowing Christ and having the Spirit in you. It’s a great privilege of mine to teach the Word of God among you. But it’s truly the Holy Spirit who teaches you. As you read the Bible for yourself, and as you hear the Word preached, the Spirit inside you teaches you and reveals Himself to you so that you may abide in Him.

Since we have God’s anointing on our lives, we have confidence in Christ (v. 28). We don’t fear the return of Christ: His blood has removed our sin from us. We approach the throne of grace with confidence. We live life confidently, knowing that the God who made the universe is our God. He’s for us, not against us. He’s working out all things for our good.

In order to stand up against those who seek to deceive us, we must be confident in our understanding of God’s Word. Know the gospel. But don’t stop with the basics of the gospel. Really dig in deep. Know why you believe what you believe.

There are a million resources available today to help Christians learn the Bible. There are plenty of good Christian books. There are plenty of good Christian websites. There are plenty of good Christian devotionals. But sometimes we utilize so many good Christian resources that they actually distract us from the one thing that we must give the most attention to: God’s Word.

Make it your aim to know everything you can possibly know about the Bible. But don’t just learn the Bible for the sake of knowledge. Learn the Bible so that you can better praise God by living for Him. Learn the Bible so that your joy will be more found in God, and less in the world.