Friday
I have a good friend who used to say that it was his life long dream to own his own business and to be successful. He spent a long time building and developing his business and did indeed achieve the success that he had dreamed of. Ironically, after he came to know and follow Jesus, this same friend eventually ended up selling his businesses and moving his family to another part of the world in order to serve the Lord. I remember him telling me that if he had known everything Christ was going to do in his life from the start, he probably wouldn’t have signed up to follow Him. I think that is true for most of us. We say that we want to know God’s will for our lives, we say we want to know what His future plans have in store for us…but the truth is that we probably couldn’t handle it if God were to tell us everything up front. This is something like what Jesus was saying to His disciples in John 16…
I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you. – John 16:12-15
Jesus has much more to say to them, but this is not the time because they are not ready to hear it all. Has it ever occurred to you that God is actually gracious in what he does NOT tell us? God withholds from us those things we do not need to know, those things which would only cause us needless anxiety or confusion if we did know them. Jesus withheld information from His disciples for their own good. It was another manifestation of His grace not to tell them all they wanted to know. God is gracious, both in what He reveals, and in what He conceals. I don’t know about you, but this not how I generally feel about all of the “unknowns” in my life.
Jesus is not saying that His disciples will never know these things. In fact He says that He has much more to tell them. This ought to encourage and excite us as His followers – Jesus has more for us! This is the reason that the Holy Spirit comes, to give us more of Jesus! God reveals His truth to us progressively, we are all in process, none of us has arrived at a perfect knowledge of who God is or of what God is doing in us.
But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
– 2 Peter 3:18
As a father, there are certain things I want my children to know before they grow up and leave my house. There are certain truths about God, certain values and principles for their lives that I want them to have before they are out on their own. The problem is that I cannot give them those things all at once. I cannot sit my son down when he is 7 years old and tell him everything he needs to know about life in one shot. It would simply be too much for him; he would not be able to comprehend it all because he is not ready for it yet. This is what Jesus is saying to us, He has so much more to teach us and to show us about who God is and who we are to become by His grace – this is why He sends us the holy Spirit, to be our teacher in His place.
Jeff Frazier
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