For millennia, people have debated and speculated about the end times. This year, even the secular world is talking about the end of the world as they ponder what is presumed to be a Mayan calendar prediction that the world will end on December 21, 2012!

But, what is the ultimate destiny of mankind? When all the questionable details are set aside, where is this journey headed? Of this, there can be no doubt. Man was created to bring glory to God and when the smoke clears, God will be praised and Jesus will still be Lord!

The Bible says that in the end times, “knowledge will increase,” (Daniel 12:4) and today we see the world’s knowledge doubling every four years or less! Yet, with all that knowledge, is man any closer to fulfilling his real purpose for being here? Is he any closer to experiencing the true Lordship of Christ? Even in the local church, have members discovered the difference between knowledge and relationship?

 

The author of Hebrews wrote, “Yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay”  There is no doubt that Jesus is coming back and He is coming as the King of kings and the Lord of lords!”  The question is, however, when He arrives, will the world really know Him or will it just know about Him? (Luke 18:8)

This Week, Sun., Feb. 5

"Lordship: From Knowledge to Relationship"

When the Lord met Moses at the burning bush, He commissioned him to go into Egypt and tell Pharaoh, “Let my people go!” But, Moses knew that the king of Egypt worshipped many gods. There were gods for just about everything, and why should he obey a foreign god, the God of an enslaved people; a God he did not know?

Moses was right, because when he delivered his message to Pharaoh, the king responded “Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord, and moreover, I will not let Israel go.” (Exodus 5:2)

Yet, one of the most interesting parts of the story is that Moses’ greatest concern was not Pharaoh’s lack of faith; it was the unbelief of his own people! Before he left the burning bush, he asked the Lord, “…If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” And, then he added, “… they will not believe me or listen to my voice, for they will say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you.’” (3:13, 4:1)

In Moses’ day, there was probably not an Israelite who had not heard the stories of how God had appeared to Abraham and given him a promise. They knew the stories, but they didn’t know God. They knew about Him, but they didn’t know Him!

Then, we fast-forward through the centuries past Noah and the flood, David and the Kings, beyond Isaiah and the prophets, and we come to Jesus. In Him we see God’s greatest revelation of Himself. But, we also hear Jesus teaching in the temple, “…Yes, you know me, and you know where I come from. But I’m not here on my own. The one who sent me is true, and you don’t know him.” (John 7:28, NLT) And, once again, we see that men knew about God but they didn’t know Him.

And, after Jesus’ death and resurrection, He returned to heaven with the promise that He is coming back. Yet, before He left, He asked, “…when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” Will they know Him or just know about Him?

Today, more than 90% of Americans say they believe in God and nearly 80% say they are Christians! But, less than half of them ever attend church, and given the moral decline in America, it appears that even fewer are influenced by what they say they believe. Do they really know God or do they just know about Him?

Our world is experiencing a glut of information. Knowledge is ever increasing and a child has more information available in his smart phone than a university professor had access to just fifty years ago! But, does the average person know God? Could it be that the vast majority have knowledge of Him, but very few are experiencing a relationship with Him.