The Knowledge of God is Relational

Know = Relationship

The word “know” in the Bible also means “to have relationship with”. Therefore, we read in Genesis 4:1. “Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, and said, “I have acquired a man from the LORD” (Genesis 4:1 NKJ). In the bible the word ‘know’ not only means experience it also means relationship. So when you read Genesis 4:1 Adam knew Eve, he had sexual relation with Eve and produced a child. Likewise in the last day Jesus will say to the false followers: “`I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’ (Matthew7:23 NKJ). When Jesus said I never knew you he means I never had a relationship with you, so one aspect of knowing is actually relationship.

                 Relationship implies obligation (Exodus 1:8)

Whenever there’s any form of relationship there’s always obligation or obedience, whether they are stated or not. If I don’t know somebody and he shows up at my house I may decide not to open my door and say I don’t know you Sir. But if I know him I have a moral obligation to open the door. Whenever there’s relationship there’s also obligation [stated or unstated] explicit or implicit.  In our relationship with God, there is also obligation. In the book of Exodus 1:8, we read “Now there arose a new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph”. (Exodus 1:8 NKJ). The King who didn’t know Joseph lived four hundred years after Joseph, so it’s obvious he couldn’t have known Joseph, it means there was another king who didn’t honor the obligations that Egypt was suppose to have towards the children of Israel. Because when Joseph had helped them, the first pharaoh said you could get the best part of the country.  I’ll give you the best treatment because it was Joseph who helped us and therefore we’ll protect him and his people. But there’s a new pharaoh who came to power and who was not willing to honor those obligations. Even today we use the term ‘know’ when we’re in an argument with a person, we say “…I don’t know you.” It doesn’t mean that I’ve never seen you, I may see you but I don’t have any obligations towards you. So to know God is to have certain obligations towards God and abide by them; and when we don’t it is a way of saying we don’t know God. In other words, knowing God could be summarized by one word “obedience”. Knowing God is conceptual, and we get those concepts in the word. Knowing God is having an experience with God, and where do you go to have those experiences? When you received the idea about God, the theory and you go to the lab of prayer and that’s where you test the concepts of God. Your prayer closet is your lab with God. Every time God gives a promise you take it to the lab. “He’s a God who respects covenant and I have covenant in Jesus Christ” and you close yourself in that closet and start praying so that truth could be demonstrated in your personal life. But experience is not enough because the reason why God gives us experience is so we could have a new level of relationship with him.

Knowing God begins with ideas about God, we call it revelation, you go in prayer and experience that idea, now each time you have experience with God the bible says to whom much is given much is required. Every time you have an experience with God he expects a new level of obedience from you because of what you’ve learned. You’ve learned it here and it was demonstrated there so you have both theoretical and practical knowledge of that truth. As a result god will require a new level of obedience. If you are obedient to God he’ll give new ideas that are going to lead to new experiences that are going to lead to new relationship, and you keep moving up. But when you refuse to be obedient you stay at one level and that’s why must Christians never grow in their walk with God. They get saved for ten years and they feel stuck, they feel they never grow in God. It’s because God has already given you some revelations and proven them in your life and as a result he was expect something from you. I expected you to come to church regularly, I expected you to get out of this relationship because now you know it’s not in my will, I expected you to trust me more with your finances  and you don’t want to be obedient in those aspects, he stopped giving you new revelation. Because you don’t have new revelations you don’t have new experiences. Everything you talk about God you always talk about what he did ten years ago and you’re stuck. Where are you stuck today? Are you stuck at the level of revelation ideas, maybe you’re not the words enough, are you stuck at the level of experience, maybe you’re not spending enough time in prayer, are you stuck at the level of relationship maybe you’re not being obedient.