Know him by Experience

INTRODUCCTION

Imagine you need to paint your entire house. You are looking for a good painter. Not only that he paints well but also that he is trustworthy because you are going to go to work and leave him at home working. Peter, a good friend of you, recommends C.J. to you. He is the man you are looking for. Peter assures you that he is a good painter and honest.

That same afternoon you call your best friend John and tell him what you are going to do. John pauses and says, "Are you talking about C.J the Painter?" You say yes, he's very good, that's what Peter told me.

Now you can feel John on the other end of the phone. John says, C.J is the worst choice for painting your house. He is dishonest, he tells you that he buys good paint but buys the cheapest, and I have also been told that he steals things. I don't recommend it at all.

Now what? What is the only way for you to really know who C.J. is? Yes, you need to know him personally and experience with him. You have to take the risk if you really want to know him.

Jesus said:

John 17:3 ““This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”

Why did Jesus say that eternal life is knowing God? How important is it to know God?

The reason is that all the problems of humans begin by not knowing God or knowing Him badly.

That is why Satan works to distored the charcter of God.

THE WORK OF THE DEVIL

Let's go back for a moment to the beginning.

Genesis 3:1–7 “Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?” The woman said to the serpent, “From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat; but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat from it or touch it, or you will die.’ ” The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die! “For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings.”

Genesis 1 told us how God create this earth and Genesis two talked about Adan, Even and the Eden Garden. Now in chapter 3 we jump from the beauty to the fall.

The first question that arises is

Who is this snake?

The serpent, in the Bible, will be identified as the enemy of God. If you read with me in

Revelation 12:9 “And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.” (See also 20:2)

Prophets Isaiah (Isaiah 14:12-15) and Ezekiel (Ezekiel 28:12-19) tell us how Satan arose.

In fact, Satan more than a name is a title that means ENEMY or ADVERSARY.

If you read the prophets carefully, you will see that God create a perfect being named Lucifer. He was a cherub who inhabited the very throne of God.

However, He stop worship God, He stopped look God as a Creator and start to worship himself, then he was filled with pride and selfishness, wanted to be equal to God, and he became an enemy of God.

The prophet said:

Ezekiel 28:17 ““Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty; You corrupted your wisdom by reason of your splendor. I cast you to the ground; I put you before kings, That they may see you.”

When he began to exalt himself and stop exalting God, he created a wrong image of God that led him to reveal himself against God.

Sadly, God had to drive him out of heaven. At some point he came to earth and wanted to share his discontent with God's creatures.

What did Adam and Eve's temptation and sin really consist of?

This requires reviewing some verses in Chapter 2. Let us read

Genesis 2:15–17 “Then the Lord God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it. The Lord God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.””

Several important things.

This was God's first commandment.

It is positive and full of grace. God gives man food to eat. Eating is a great blessing, right! (humor)

Prohibits them from a tree to prevent them from death.

This first commandment is an act of grace and life on God's part for the first couple. But the question remains unanswered. What did Adam and Eve's temptation and sin really consist of?

The temptation basically pursued two objectives.

First, place doubts in Eve's mind regarding the integrity of God. Satan set out to attack Eve's mental image of God using exaggeration. "God said not to eat from any tree." His goal was for Eve to see God as a tyrant and fanatic who enslaved them. It was to distort God's act of grace of food and life. That snake was cunning.

At the very moment a human beings lose sight of God's correct idea, he or she will instantly stop trusting in God and his words.

I remember time ago in my country there were disturbances over political problems. A freelance journalist was interviewing the protesters and one of them angry said, "The problem is that they make us grow up in fear of political authorities so that we can't demand our rights" then he said. "it's like religion, it teaches us to be afraid of God."

It is impossible for anyone to trust God if he sees God as a tyrant. Until now, Eve was clear that God was the creator, sustainer, good, loving, food supplier, and so on. The snake couldn't tell Eve not to trust God unless it made her believe that God wasn't what he claimed to be.

The second purpose of temptation was to awaken in Eve autonomy away from divine guidance. Eve was clear that she could not eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. She herself corrected the serpent who had distorted God's words. But the Snake realized that Eve was changing her mindset. And he offered her the fruit. It was not the fruit of the tree; it was the fruit of immortality without relying on God. Eve said we're going to die if we disobey God. Now the Serpent, for the first time in conversation, openly contradicts God and tells the woman; "You won't die."

He was motivating her to stop conforming to being a God-dependent creature to being independent and defining good and evil without God.

Notice how interesting. Up to this point in the book of Genesis it is God who sees and defines what is good and evil (1:31) But now Eve sees that the tree is good to eat and gain wisdom (3:6).

It is God who takes man and places him in the Garden and takes a rib to create Eve. (2:15, 31) However, Eve takes the fruit (3:6)

It is God who feeds (1:9). Now Eve feeds her husband (3:6).

Eve believed the fairy tale that she would be like God. Now she was doing what only belonged to God.

The snake was injecting into Eve the same poison he had in his heart. A distorted idea of God and the desire to be immortal without God.

What a danger to have a wrong idea of who God is. When I have a wrong idea of God, I want to define what is good and what is bad and without realizing it I start living without depending on God.

Atheism that does not believe in God defines what is moral or immoral in its own way.

Deists understand that although there is a God, it is a God who is far from the human being. So God doesn't care about the way I live— I define the good and the bad for myself.

Ahh what we can say of the religious, legalists. They claim to be Christians, but they don't know God.

Let me share a little be of my experience:

I grew up in a legalistic environment. I was taught that eating meat was worse than committing adultery.

I grew up believing that certain musical instruments belong to the devil.

The gospel was more hair cut, dress code, restricctions than Jesus.

How much I suffered!

I grew up in a small and very loving church. But they have wrong idea of God, and they traded love for doctrines. Those believers who have a wrong idea of God begin to define for themselves what is good and bad as well as Eve and, in the end, live a life of salvation by works.

Adam and Eve forgot the correct idea of who God is and played to be God and the consequences were terrible. Shame (Gn 3:7), Guilt (Gn 3:8-11), seeking a culprit (Gn 3:12-13), wickedness (Rom 3:9-20), death (Rom 5:12).

All of humanity's problems began there. When Adam and Eve stopped seeing God as their loving and sustaining creator and tried to live without his direction.

But today I praise the name of God because in the place where the greatest mistake was made, the best words of hope arose. It was where the greatest sin was committed, where the most abundant grace was poured out. God sent Jesus to show us who God really is.

THE WORK OF JESUS

The Bible says that Jesus came to undo the works of the Devil. Satan brought death, so Jesus came to give us eternal life. But how do we obtain eternal life? The answer is:

John 17:3 ““This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”

When Jesus came to earth the people of Israel had lost the right understanding of God. Religious leaders had turned God into laws, rites, ceremonies, and sacrifices.

For them the temple was more important than the people. They didn't show love. If a person was lame, blind, handicap could not enter in the church. Women were excluded. If someone sinned there was no mercy. That was the God they taught. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. God punishes.

But Jesus, the Nazarene, The Rose of Saron and the Lily of the Valleys came to teach us who God really is. Because knowing God means eternal life.

In his walk on this earth Jesus showed us the true God. We read:

John 14:8–10 “Philip said to Him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? “Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works.”

Jesus said that to see him is to see the Father. What was the image that Jesus came to teach us of God?

Jesus on many occasions called him my father. But more than father he called it Daddy. Read with me

Mark 14:36 “And He was saying, “Abba! Father! All things are possible for You; remove this cup from Me; yet not what I will, but what You will.””

Hallelujah!

Jesus underwent pain and died because he knew his Daddy was with him.

I don't know if it's hard for you to say Daddy to God, but Jesus called him Abba. This was how the children affectionately called their parents in the Aramaic language. That is why the apostle Paul wrote:

Romans 8:15 “For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, “Abba! Father!””

Galatians 4:6 “Because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!””

Let me tell you…

God is your creator; you are a creature. He is Holy, sublime, eternal, almighty, transcendent, sovereign, Perfect, immutable.

But how close do you feel to a God who is all this alone?

A religion that only presents such a God is destined for legalism. That is why, in God perfect wisdom He decided to reveal to humanity in the Father-Son relationship. Jesus, The Son, is Eternal, but He came to this Earth as son so that you and I would understand the right way to understand and relate with God.

He is Father, Grace, Mercy, Patience, Goodness, Love.

God is your Father. God wants to be your father. Today I tell you in the name of Jesus, if you do not relate to God as your Father, you will never have a real Christian experience. You may spend your life worried about what to do and what not to do. And don't enjoy the relationship with your father.

I have a wonderful father. My Dad, I'm talking about my biological father, he's a superman. My hero. However, he raised us in the same way he was raised, with a heavy hand. And sometimes I was afraid of him. I stopped being myself because I didn't know if he would like what I was going to do or not. He tried to do his best, but he treated us hard. The idea I had of him, led me to be afraid of him. Time passed, he improved, and the relationship changed, because my idea of him also changed.

If only you could begin a relationship of God as a Father. You will never be afraid of your father; you do not hide from Daddy. And no matter if you fail, you always know you can go back into the arms of Dad or Mom, he will always receive you.

Do you remember the parable of the prodigal son? That parable was a heresy for the religious of Jesus's time. But that's the right idea you need to have of God.

But you know something else, Father and son must live together to have a good relationship. Have you ever wondered how to know God? Jesus said that knowing him is eternal life. So, knowing him is the only option. Let me tell you how not to know God.

You don't know God because you come to church every week.

God is not known because you return tithes and offerings.

You don't know God because you're a vegetarian.

You don't know God because you believe it's the 28 beliefs of the SDA.

You don't know God because you know prophecies of Daniel and Revelation.

You don't know God because you call yourself conservative or liberal.

You don't know God because you're a Seventh-day Adventist.

Jesus said knowing God is eternal life. The problem is that we believe that knowing has to do with an intellectual knowledge of who God is. If so, even Satan would have eternal life. Because he knows God very well. But when the Bible talks about knowing, it talks about real experience with God. The greek word (Gynosko or yada in Hebrew) talk about a real experience that involve a close relationship. In fact, is the same word to talk about husband and wife intimate relation.

If you want to know God:

- Go and ask Enoch He walked 300 years with God. He didn't have a Bible, but He lived with God.

- Go ask Moses that talking to God face to face. He was not a vegetarian, but no one was as close to God as he was.

- Go ask David the men after God's heart. He worshipped with all kind of instruments and very joyfull. He never lost a war because God was with him.

- Go ask Debora, Ana, Esther, Naomi, Ruth, Daniel, Joseph, Ezra, Matthew, Peter, John.

- Go and ask Paul, who acknowledged being a great sinner, but God promised him a crown of victory.

More that intellectual knowledge we need to experience God in our live.

Ellen White said:

All who are under the training of God need the quiet hour for communion with their own hearts, with nature, and with God… They need to have a personal experience obtaining a knowledge of the will of God.

We must individually hear Him speaking to the heart. When every other voice is hushed, and in quietness we wait before Him, the silence of the soul makes more distinct the voice of God. He bids us, “Be still, and know that I am God.” This is the effectual preparation for all labor for God. (Counsel of Health, 163, The Ministry of Healing, 33).

Ahh my beloved ones, knowing God is a daily experience that is renewed every morning. Each day you must have a new testimony of your experience with God. You can't count the testimony of 5, 10, 15, 20 years ago when you surrendered to Christ. Today you must tell something new the goodness of God is new every morning.

CONCLUSION AND APPEAL

Do you want eternal life? Today I invite you to know God. Sin came in when Eve lost the right idea of who God is. She instantly began to act as if he were God, defining the good and the bad. She instantly wanted to live independently of God. The result was death.

That church that saw me grow up did not teach me a totally correct idea of my Father God, but my Father never abandoned me. Over the years I have had experiences with him that are amazing.

I have experienced freedom, grace, forgiveness, because he is my father. Today God has put in my heart a fire that I cannot put out.

My passion is to take you to a real experience with God.