Gospel of John, 17:20-24

We're in lesson 36, question 12. OK, what we are doing verse wise, 20 through 24. Let's see. And actually, the last three questions have to do with verse 24. And I'll just read that verse and then we can spend some time. My father. I will, that they also whom you have given me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory, which you have given me, for you love me before the foundation of the world. And my question 12 was, has Jesus ever used the term, I will, before? And what would you call this kind of a statement? I want you to get the picture here. This is a prayer of supplication. He's been asking his father for things as he's gone along.

And now he says, I will. I will. Has he ever gone at it that way before with the father? I will? It's his own wish. It's his own will. He's petitioning the father on the basis of not what the father's will is, or what the father's wish is, it's what his is.

It's never been used before. He never went at the father this way before. So, as a matter of fact, it's a peculiar way of addressing the father. A creature would be unbecoming under such language. Would you and I ever go to the father and say, Father, I will. or I wish, we beg him all the time, but we wouldn't insert our will with him. Do you understand the point? But here the Lord Jesus does it, and it's not irreverent, and I don't think it's profane. I think, maybe you could say it this way, within a day and a half of this prayer, he's going to be crucified, right?

So what happens with folks that If they know they're going to die and they've got a legacy to live, what do they do? They leave a will. I think this is what he's saying. Father, this is my will. This is my will and testament. And what is his will and testament? He says that those who have given me be with me where I am. I will that that be so.

And I also will, Father, that they may behold my glory. which you gave me, and also that they may understand and live in the love that you have loved me by. So why does Jesus will that they be with him where he is? Why doesn't he ask him for something else? Why this particular thing, be with me where I am? They're going to be positioning us exactly right. Carol, what did you say? That's why he went to the cross. Well, he went to the cross to pay the penalty for the sins of the world. To eliminate the barrier between God and his creation.

Now that he's speaking of He looks at his job as being done, and so his rhetoric to the Father is on the basis of, well, I've fulfilled my end of the bargain. Here's what I'd like you to do. So he speaks as though it's already done, which, if God determines it, it is. Why is this so important, though? Because you see it all through this prayer, this issue of being with Him, being one with Him. Why is that so important? more important to him than it seems to be to us. Come on. Let's go at it this way. Is it important that the Father and the Son bring us into union with them? Why? Fellowship. I think we miss so often that what God's about is for us to have fellowship with Him.

And that's not when we die, that's now. He's given His word and He's given us the Holy Spirit for the specific purpose to reveal Christ to the believer. This is not to reveal the tenants of a PhD. This is to reveal a person to a person. This is to reveal the glorified Christ to you and me on a continual, ongoing basis. And in order to do that, if you're going to have fellowship with somebody, you've got to be with them, don't you?

I mean, my son doesn't believe that because he thinks that text messaging is a relationship. with face-to-face, I mean he got really excited when we discovered Skype, which is that internet face-to-face conversation where he can call somebody up and they got a camera and we have a camera and he can look at them. I said, wow John, isn't that neat? Is that what the Lord wants us to do, is to Skype them? Is that the distance? I mean I have a camera on my computer A couple of weeks ago, she doesn't have a camera, but she has the Skype thing and a microphone, so we called up Eliska in the Czech Republic and we talked to her. And if we had a camera, we would have seen her.

Is that what the Lord is after? When he says, I want them to be with me where I am? No, he wants you in the same room, in the same location, face to face, no technology communicating between you. And Bob said that's a positional truth. It is a positional truth, but is that the way it's going to stay? Is it just some sort of lofty truth that we sort of put under the heading of position and that we don't get to live in it and experience it and it be part of our everyday life? What do you think? Wow, quiet again. No, he intends for that to be right now. He intends for every believer to know and experience experimentally what it is to be with Him where He is, by faith and the work of the Spirit in your life.

So that we can behold, as 2 Corinthians 3.18 says, that we can behold the glory of the Lord, reflectively now, in the mirror. But you get to behold Him. You get to fellowship with Him. I think that's what the Lord Jesus has been after all this time.

I think that's what the Father's after. that we would know him. We would not just know about him. So I think it's when the Lord says, I will, it's interesting, when he says, I will, what does he want? He wants us to be with him where he is, now, not when we die, now. a comment about a friend of mine, I've known her for 20 years and we're just like this.

And we talk on the phone occasionally but we make it short because we can hardly wait to get together. And when we're together we're just riveted. Yeah, that's exactly right. And share everything and it's just powerful. That's cool. And I think that it's going to be better than that. That's a great example because you read, as you were talking I was thinking about reading Anybody read Hudson Taylor's Spiritual Secret? Ever read that book? It's a really cool book. It's about Hudson Taylor's life and how he grew.

He started the China Inland Mission and he was in China by himself with some colleagues around him. Every night when everybody went to bed and they were sleeping in a bombed out building, he would light a candle and take his Bible and go off and be alone with his Lord. He couldn't wait. What did the Lord Jesus do at night? He went off to be alone with his father.

Why? Don't you want to be with the one you love? Absolutely you do. That's what he's after here. And I think we as believers sometimes discount the communion of love that God intends for us to have with him and his son. So Jesus is asking that we be included into the experience That communion of love that the Father and the Son have. Imagine that. Try to think of that relationship between the Father and the Son, that they love each other.

In such a manner that how would we be able to describe it? But what he is asking is that we be brought into that. See that? That we be brought into that intimacy. that you and I should live on this planet with the same intimacy with the father that he had when he was here. That's what he's asking for. And the father's going to say, I don't know, Jesus, guys aren't worthy. We're worthy because of him.

So do you have to wait for heaven to behold the glory of the Lord? How many think, yeah, maybe you do. Let me say, no you don't. Oh, that got some chickens. No, you don't. You can do it right now. When you're spending time in the word of God. I was out walking with Donald this morning, we were talking about this. When you spend time in the word of God, why do you do it?

What's your motivation? Get ready for the class? Why do you do it? So that you can be smarter than the guy sitting next to you? You know, or somebody will give you a C. Oh, that's a big one. Why do you do it? Why do you spend time in the Word of God? You want to know more. That's right.

Not only about Him, but just to know Him. Just to know Him. And that's the attitude you should have every time you open up the Word. I'm here to fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ. And I expect the Spirit of God to reveal Him to me now. Right now. If you go in there, I've got to memorize five verses, I've got to answer all these questions. I'm in there to fellowship with the Son of God, and the Holy Spirit has promised that that's what He's going to do, so I believe Him. I trust Him. He's going to do that. I think it's really important that we have that attitude.

Any questions on 37? I think we ran out of 38's last week, didn't we? Anybody not have a 38? 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 60, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, 81, O righteous Father, the world has not known you, but I have known you, and these have known that you have sent me. And I have declared unto them your name, and will declare it, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.

So, my first question here was, what role or office does Jesus occupy when he is praying this prayer? And I meant the entire prayer. He's praying to the Father and he's assumed a role. Maybe ask it this way. As the second person of the Trinity and being divine, would he pray like this? No, he wouldn't. Why wouldn't he?

He's God. He doesn't need to pray to God. He is God. So what role is he taking here? He's taken a high priestly role as the God-man. He's a man and he's taken the role, he humbled himself, he's made in the likeness of a man and he's become the mediator for us and the high priest representing us before God. So when he prays to the Father, he prays as the head of the church. He's the one that has all the influence. The great thing is that you're in him so you have the same influence. You could pray today this exact same prayer because you're in Christ. You could do it.

Is this a prayer of hope or a prayer of faith? And I said explain because I know when I ask these questions and I give you two one word answers, everybody says either hope or faith and they shut up. So what is it, hope or faith? It's got to be faith because he knows He lives within the hope. Sure, it is a prayer of faith. And he's the man who lived by faith.

So, he's the man of Hebrews 11.1 which is faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. I don't know, a lot of you have been in Hal Malloy's class when he taught about faith. He taught that faith was really the proof of the things of God. That's what he said faith was.

Faith proved the things of God. Does that make sense? It's the proof that the things of God are real. They're for sure. Faith has to have an object and the Father was the object, so the Lord Jesus prays to him in faith. Now, so is faith a powerful thing? Is faith a powerful thing? The Lord Jesus is praying this prayer in faith. Do you think the Father is going to say, well I'll give you 3 and 4 but not 6 and 7? What do you think?

He's going to give them everything he asks. Everything he asks, because he prays in such a manner that they're accomplished things. And we'll expand on that as we go along. The things that Jesus asked for, were they new requests by him to the Father? In other words, at this point in his existence on the earth, he kind of had thought back over his ministry and said, well, here's the five or six things I really want. I'm going to make my petition to you so that you really understand what I want. Are these things new? I see somebody going like this. Okay, why not if they're not new? When did they work them out? That's right. These issues are issues that were worked out before creation.

The eternal covenant between the Father and the Son You know, a lot of times we say what the eternal covenant is, is that the Son agreed to become a man and die for the sins of the world. And the Father said, if you do that, I'll raise you up. Well, is that the end of it? No, all of this was part of that covenant too. Every one of these things. They worked it out.

So that when the Lord Jesus finished His role in the covenant, this is what the Father was going to do for Him. What is a covenant? It's a contract. I'm a realtor. It's a deal. If you'll do this, I'll do this. If you'll give me your money, I'll run off with it. That's embezzlement. If I give you $10, you'll give me your house. That's a contract between the father and the son.

Oh, by the way, where were you and I in the contract? Are we part of that contract? No. We are absolutely nowhere in that contract. Nowhere. The only contribution we made to that deal was that we were the sinners. We were the ones that necessitated the contract. But the deal is between the father and the son. This prayer is between the father and the son. It's their deal. Now we happen to be the beneficiaries of what they worked out. But it's between them.

So what's great about that is that when the salvation of the Lord is presented to you, it isn't about you doing anything. He's already worked it out. And what does He ask you to do about it? Just believe He did. That's it. No spiritual push-ups. No dressing up on Sunday. None of that. No making a commitment. No receiving Jesus into your heart, you just believe Him and He'll give you all of it. All of the benefits of the covenant that He and the Father worked out, you get just by believing Him. That had been agreed to before He ever created anything.

So, what characteristic does Jesus appeal to in the Father and why? And I gave you a verse, Isaiah 42, 6 and 7. I the Lord have called thee in righteousness and will hold thy hand and will keep thee and give thee for a covenant of the people for a light of the Gentiles. To open the blind eyes to bring out the prisoners from the prisons and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house. Now what I'm after is that the Father has certain characteristics that are true of him.

Which one is he appealing to? Courtney says righteousness. What do you think? Do you think righteousness is the right answer? And if it is, why? Why wouldn't he appeal to his love, or his grace, or his mercy, or his big heartedness, or his holiness? Why righteousness? What he's satisfying is righteousness. Satisfied?

What do you mean by that? You're on the right track. Well, with his sacrifice, we can become righteous as God sees us through him. Okay. Let's say Courtney and I make a deal. We make a contract, right? And I agree that I'm going to do X. And Courtney says, okay, if you do X, then I'll do Y. So I do X. And I go to Courtney and I say, O righteous Courtney, I've done X, you have to do Y. That's what the Lord Jesus is saying. Father, I've done X, and because you're righteous, you have to do Y. Does that make sense? When you make an agreement with somebody, and each one of you is going to do certain things, Once you've fulfilled your half, or your third, or your whatever it is, then the other person is obligated to fulfill their end of the bargain.

You see that? So that's why you see this word, O Righteous Father. That's why he terms it, O Righteous Father. Father, you're under obligation to me to respond for what I'm asking. See that? Isn't that cool? That means that you can't mess it up. And neither can they. Because they had an agreement. So when he says, O righteous father, I will that they be with me where I am, he's not begging the father to do something that he hasn't already agreed to do. He's already made this agreement.

See that? He prays that we may realize that when we pray that we are not dealing with a God who is just gracious and merciful, but that we're dealing with a righteous God too. Do you think you can go before God and claim His righteousness for these subjects? You bet your life you can. You can say, O righteous Father, I want to be with the Lord Jesus where He is. Now, I want that to happen. What are you asking for?

You're asking for something he's already agreed to do. So, the Lord rests the salvation of us solely on the faithful promise of the faithful promisor. So he's righteous. When he says, I'm going to do something and I worked it out, he means it. He's not going to change his mind. So this agreement made by the Father and the Son in the eternal covenant are fulfilled in Christ. They mean benefits to us. Describe if you can the ones mentioned in the following verses.

1 John 1.9.

Somebody read 1 John 1.9. Anybody who can faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Okay.

What benefit do you get out of that verse? Forgiveness. Forgiveness of sins. How come you have forgiveness of sins? Because they worked it out ahead of time. Okay. It's a benefit to you and me in which the Father and the Son worked out an arrangement through their covenant. One of the benefits to me is that I get forgiveness of sin. I think that's a good comment to stress because so often I think we think that we're being forgiven because we confess. That's right. Why are you being forgiven? Why? Because they agreed. They agreed. Because you're already forgiven.

In other words, I forgive you because I've already been forgiven. and vice versa. I don't forgive you based on the Lord's Prayer in Matthew that says that I'm forgiving my trespasses only insofar as I forgive you. No. That was before the covenant was carried out. Now that it's been carried out, the terms of the transaction are different.

Yeah, it's cool. Because there's no reason for a believer not to forgive somebody. There's no reason. No legitimate reason, because you've been forgiven and you were forgiven based on what the Father and the Son worked out in their covenant internally. So you have that benefit.

Alright, the next one is Romans 3.25.6. Again, somebody who can read English. or the demonstration, I say, of his righteousness at the present time so that he would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. Okay, what's the word I'm looking for here? What benefit do we get based on these verses because of the eternal covenant? Justification. Yeah, we've been... Justification. What is justification? What does it mean? It's one of those 25 cent Christian words that nobody knows what it means. What does it mean?

Made right. It means not made right. be declared right. God said, I declare them right with me because why? Because the Father and the Son, we worked it out. Alright, 2 Thessalonians chapter 1 verse 6 through 8. Okay, I'll read it. Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you, And to you who are troubled, rest with us.

When the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of God, of the Lord Jesus Christ. What's the word I'm looking for here that is a benefit to us, that we don't often talk about, a benefit to us based on the work of the Father and the Son? Are you looking at the word rest? No, I'm looking at the word vengeance.

The vengeance of God upon those who oppose our souls and the rest enjoyed by us when our warfare and struggle is over and our fight is done. God is going to take care of all of those nasty things that people did to us. All of the ungodliness that was in the world directed towards us. It's not a big deal with us because we don't experience much of that. But I think that's coming soon. So, the Lord is a just and righteous God and nothing gets swept under the rug. Nothing.

Hebrews 6.10. Somebody read it. Somebody else. Should I call on somebody in the way back?

For God is not unjust so as to forget your work and the love which you have shown for it in having ministered and still ministering to the saints. So what am I looking for there? This is something that God does, this is a benefit that we have based on the work of the Father and the Son. What do you think? How about the fact that He accepts your service?

He says in this, I'm accepting what you're doing. And I'm able to do that because of the arrangement I worked out with the Father. He's not unrighteous to forget your work and your labor of love. He isn't unrighteous about that. He is righteous about that.

And which you have shown towards His name. He is going to accept your service. And when you get to the beam of judgment, the least of you will be rewarded. That means you're all in line in front of me. But I still get to get rewarded. That's cool. Okay, second Timothy 4a. Okay, somebody on this side. Anybody?

Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day. And not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing. So, what's the benefit you get based on the work of the Father and the Son? What did he promise you? A crown. A crown. Every one of these things are secure promises because of the righteous covenant relationship between the Father and the Son. And it's based on the veracity of their character, not on you.

We could go through the 34 things we have in Christ. We could go through the list of the 215 blessings we have. All of those are part of it. The blessings that God has in store for us, because of the work of the Lord Jesus on the cross, I want to describe this. They've already begun. They will never stop for all eternity. And they will expand and grow eternally. You'll never get to a point where the Lord is going to say, OK, you've got enough.

OK, in light of Psalm 19.1, the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows its handiwork.

And in light of Hebrews 1.1, God who at sundry times and in diverse manners spoke in times past to the fathers by the prophets, Has in these last days spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed heir of all things, by whom all things were he made the world?

John 14.9 Jesus said unto them, Have I been so long time with you, and yet have you not known me, Philip? He that has seen me has seen the Father. How say you then, show us the Father?

Isaiah 1.3, the ox knows his owner, and the ass his master's crib, but Israel does not know, my people do not consider. How could Jesus say that the world did not know the Father after when you look at these verses? Doesn't it say that he says to his disciples, if you've seen me, you've seen the Father? Doesn't he say in Psalms that the heavens declare the glory of God?

Doesn't he say that You know me, but then he says in Matthew 11.25, O righteous father, the world has not known you. Isn't there a contradiction here? I'm sorry, in John 17, he says the world has not known you.

In Matthew 11.25, Jesus said at that time, Jesus answered and said, I thank you father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hid these things from the wise and the prudent, and you have revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father, for it so seemed good in your sight." So, isn't there a contradiction here? Did I make the case clear that there's a contradiction?

He always knows us. Oh, he does? How about us knowing him? We only know him if we get rid of our earthly facade where we're all caught up in how we're doing and feeling and what our place is on the earth. So it's all dependent on us. Does it have to do with the natural man not receiving the things of God? That's exactly what it has to do with. Did everybody hear what Gail said? Does it have to do with the natural man receiving not the things of God? But understand something else. Before the cross, I termed them the days of darkness. There were some who had at least a cursory relationship with God, but they couldn't see the glory. But now, we are surrounded with light and privilege that they were not. Do I know the God of the Bible? Is that the one that I know? What do I know experimentally about him? Do I know him as my righteous father? Do I know him as father? Just that. A Jew would never call God father.

So I think what I'm after here When the Lord Jesus said to know me and the one who sent me is eternal life, he's speaking of those who are in Christ, those who believe. But those who aren't in Christ still are in darkness, they don't see anything and God isn't going to reveal, didn't reveal to unrighteous persons before the cross who he was and he isn't going to do it now. So that brings up the question that Don and I were talking about on our walk this morning.

As a believer, If you don't walk by faith, will God reveal these things to you? What do you think? As a believer, but you don't live by faith, you live totally by experience and feelings and emotions and your intellect, will God reveal these wonderful things to you? If you're in a state of carnality, is that what you're talking about? You're walking in the flesh?

Answer, no, he won't. Why not? Because the rule still holds. He does not reveal himself to the old man. And so I think a lot of times, if we're not believing him and walking by faith, and then we look at him and say, well, how come I'm not picking up this or picking up that? I know my buddy over here, he seems to talk about the Lord in such a manner that, boy, it's really intimate and it's gracious. How come I'm not there? How come I don't get that? How come? I think the answer is you don't.

Bill? I think in John 14, verse 21 answers that, and I think you're absolutely correct. He says, He that has my commandments and keeps them, he it is that loveth me. And he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will And I will love him and manifest myself to him. So the question has to be, what is the commandment he asks you to keep?

To love one another. But even before that, this is the work of God that we what? We might believe. We are to live by faith. We are to live by what God tells us is true. If we live like that, we are operating in the sphere of this grace. If he says, sin's not going to have dominion over you anymore because you're not under law, you're under grace. And you say, well, I've still got my seven rules here.

You're not living by faith. Well, I've got to. No, you don't. No, I don't got to do nothing. I just have to receive what God is giving me by faith. Just take the grace and live in it. If you live like that, Will you obey his commandments to love him? Yes, you will. And what will he do? He is way more interested in blessing you than you are in being blessed. He is way more interested in your issues than you are. I quoted from, what's that guy's name?

Here's what he said, we can have no experimental knowledge of God but as we have intimate fellowship with Him as our Father. The thoughts, the words, the works, the tastes, the likings, the disliking of too many evidence that we know little practically of God and have very little practically of communion with the Father. He's right about that in the sense that Studying the Word of God is designed to reveal the person of Christ to you.

You learn his character, who he is, what his likes and dislikes are. We know of him. It's like hanging out with your best friend, hanging out with your spouse, hanging out with your children. You kind of know what they're like and they kind of know what you're like. You hang out with the Lord Jesus Christ, you begin to discover what he's like. And because you have and I have the life of the Lord Jesus Christ, we have a taste for the things of God.

We like those things. We like fellowship with him. We want to have more. But somehow we've been convinced that we've got to be smart to be spiritual. That's nonsense. I don't have to be smart to be my wife's husband. I've just got to hang with her. I've got to learn from her. So is ignorance of God the root and source of all evil in the world? She says no. How many no's do I have? How many yeses?

Oh boy. How many chickens? Look at them. Tables full of chickens. So why not? Why wouldn't ignorance of God be the source of evil in the world? It's man's old sin nature, not ignorance of God. You think it's a sin nature? He says, O righteous father, the world has not known you. And it doesn't know him because of man's old sin nature. Would you say that if they knew him, there wouldn't be evil in the world? They don't want to know him. They don't want to know him, that's true. They love the darkness. Maybe even some believers love the darkness. And they love the world and the things of the world. Let me propose this fact.

If he says, O righteous father, the world hasn't known me, what is the moral condition and the filthiness of the world? Doesn't that flow from ignorance of God? But they knew him and rejected him. No, they knew of him. So they reject him so they don't have any knowledge about him. Well, what I'm after is, yeah, they did know of him, but they love the things of the world, and the world, they don't love him. And ignorance of him, the word ignorance means that they, you know, maybe they recognize or at one point recognize there was a God, he was holy and righteous. losing what they have in the world that they value in order to know him better.

Yeah. And so therefore if you keep what you have, what do you end up with? What you have? You have evil. Because that's what you have, right? In the world you have nothing but evil. So if you didn't have ignorance, that's a negative way of going at it. I think ignorance is kind of neutral compared to what you're talking about. Oh, neutral. I hadn't thought of that. I think neutral has no decision. If people know something of God and don't go for more, they are making a decision to turn away. And that's not neutral.

Yeah, you know, Tzitzing, in the Millennial Kingdom, he says that at least the Jewish nation, they're going to all know him from the least to the greatest, right? He's going to write the law in their hearts, at least in that you think there's going to be evil in the Jewish nation? There's going to be sin still here, but not much, and it will be judged instantly. But everybody's going to know God. Everybody. Everybody on the planet. And yet there are all those people who will take part in the rebellion who God actually knows what they're thinking, but he's allowing it.

Well, I think that's irrelevant to the argument here in terms of is there evil in the world or is ignorance of God the root and source of evil in the world? Let me read what my friend Marcus Rainsford said, see what you think. O righteous father, the world has not known thee. This one sentence expresses the solemn fact.

What is low morals but a filthy stream flowing from the ignorance of God? What is the love of the world and the things of the world? What is infidelity? What is sensuous religion, a religion of forms and ceremonies and bowings and turnings, but fruits growing out of the ignorance of God?

Interesting statement, huh? That's not understanding. This ignorance is not understanding. Yeah, or just not knowing. Ignorance means I don't know. See, I think it still goes down to the root, which is the sin nature. I mean, that's the reason why you don't know and why there is evil. So it still goes to the sin nature, the base or foundation of all that is the sin nature. That's why I said ignorance is born out of a sin nature. So that's why I say it's no, because I don't think ignorance has that much to do with it. It's your sin nature that rejects it. And your sin nature is ignorant of God. Yeah, but the base of that is your sin nature. Sure, darkness. Yeah, the darkness.

I was thinking about Romans 1 where God says you know man you're without excuse because you're not ignorant about two things about you know that I exist and you know that I'm the creator and I'm powerful and I'm holy you know that But you won't honor me as God, and you won't believe me, so what does he do? I'm going to give you what you want, which is your sin nature. Even though you know that I am God, and that I exist, and that I require a couple of things from you, you're going to say, no, I'm not going to do that. So there's enough intelligence in that area.

Once God is rejected at that point, what happens to man? It gets darker and darker. It slides faster and faster. He worships the creature rather than the creator. He becomes totally self-absorbed. And he has no understanding or knowledge of God at all.

They're not ignorant in that one aspect. In that one aspect, you're not. That's right. That's what makes them responsible for rejecting. Yeah, if they were totally ignorant, God could not hold them accountable. That's exactly right. And it says in John 1-9 here that besides every man that comes into the world, I take that to mean that he at some point confronts every human being with the fact that he is. He's the light of the world. Yeah, and that they are accountable to him and that they are sinners who need a savior.

And I've been toying with the idea lately that the sin nature recognizes that light as death to itself. Just so fast that we don't realize it's taking place and we turn away. I'll tell you something else I think that's going on along with that equation is that the primary purpose of Satan and his minions is to keep people ignorant of God. Because they know, he knows that the little they know the better chance they have of keeping them in his kingdom of darkness.

And I think you're right, and the reason I agree with you is because that's exactly, this is an anecdotal experience, but that's exactly what I viewed when Christ started coming towards me as a non-believer. I knew, somehow, that if I believed, I was going to die. That it was going to be the death of everything I knew. And that was a real scary thought.

Without the grace of God, I wouldn't have gone for it. I like those broccolis. didn't have a sin nature. Say that again. Adam and Eve didn't have a sin nature until they fell and they knew God according to Romans 1. Because when they knew God, they glorified him not as God who became vain in their imagination. They fell even though they didn't have a sin nature. Yeah, and I think that's not... The thing is that they were not ignorant.

They knew God and yet they still fell. Yeah, they did. You see, and so even Lucifer knew God and he was created perfect in the sense that he knew God. He still had the potential to fall. So the fact that they didn't have a sin nature is not the reason. Because they fell in spite of it. And so they fell even though they knew God. Adam and Eve was not ignorant of God. They knew Him. They fellowshiped with Him. They were intimate with Him. And they walked with Him. And they still fell.

Do you think that Romans 1 is just talking about Adam and Eve or all of that? When they knew God, they had to go back to Adam and Eve. There's only two people that ever knew God. But do you think that a non-believer today can look at God's creation and see that Yeah, they're held responsible for creation, revelation, natural revelation. God gives them that ability to know that there's a creator. They don't know him personally, but they see Christ that they're going to know him. And they know that he holds them responsible. He does. He says that they hold him in truth. He says here that because these are unrighteousness, the men who hold the truth in unrighteousness. So they know the truth.

You know, last week we were talking about, how did he put this verse, and it struck me, and it goes along with where he says, made perfect in one. Remember we talked about that verse? And if you and I are made perfect in one, with a oneness in Christ, is there a possibility that you can fall from that position? The answer was no. but Adam and Eve and Lucifer were created but not made perfect in one. You and I being made perfect in one, there's no chance that we could ever turn away from what we are. That is a really cool thing, I think. It's an incredible safeguard in terms of Well, I'm not in concrete about the ignorance of God as the root and source of all evil, although the ignorance of God results in all evil. It says in 2 Timothy that we are always learning but never able to come to the knowledge of truth.

Well, we aren't. He's not talking about us. I think there's a difference between ignorance and willingly ignorant. I mean, the scripture brings out ignorance and a lot of Christians were ignorant of a lot of things because we're still growing. But to be willingly ignorant is what he's talking about.

They will to be ignorant. In other words, an unsaved man, he looks at creation and you tell him and say, God made it, there's a creator, there's a supreme being. Nah, it can't be. All the evidence we have on the And they choose not to believe. They're willingly ignorant. There's a difference.

In scripture, Paul brings that out. He says there's a difference between ignorance. He says, I would not have you be ignorant about spiritual gifts or ignorant about this. But then Paul comes along in Timothy and says, they were willingly ignorant. So there's no excuse. OK, for all you people who are not willingly ignorant, we're going to pray. Father how we thank you for your grace and mercy towards us and we thank you so for your son the Lord Jesus and we pray to Continue to grow in the knowledge and intimacy with him father and we pray in his precious name. Amen