Good afternoon. Please turn with me to the book of Hosea chapter 4. I'll be reading the first three verses of Hosea 4. Follow along as I begin reading. Hear the word of the Lord you children of Israel for the Lord brings a charge against the inhabitants of the land. There is no truth or mercy or knowledge of God in the land. by swearing and lying, killing and stealing, and committing adultery, they break all restraint with bloodshed upon bloodshed. Therefore, the land will mourn and everyone who dwells there will waste away with the beasts of the field and the birds of the air. Even the fish of the sea will be taken away. This is part two of a study titled America's departure from the knowledge of God based on Hosea four, one through three, in which we identify a process of moral decline and deterioration of a nation or culture leading to the outpouring of God's judgment upon them. In our present case, it's Israel, but of course there are many, many applications to many nations. And the three points we began with last week, which we touched upon point one, and we will continue to look at point one, is the decline of knowledge, verse one, two, the resurgence of sin, verse two, and three, the effect upon society, verse three. We began with the decline of knowledge, which is based on verse one, and we discussed the importance of hearing the word of God as we learn here that there was no truth in the land, Secondly, we looked at the fact that God deals in judgment with four groups of people, and these groups are identified and dealt with in the book of Hosea. He deals with nations and then individuals, which are not groups, but obviously persons. Thirdly, churches and church leaders. Here, God warns the nation, of course, in our present consideration in verse 1, God is warning the nation of Israel. The third thing we looked at last time was that God charges the nation with the loss of truth and mercy and the knowledge of God. We looked at the loss of truth and mercy last time. One of the purposes of this study is to identify the parallels between Israel's sins and America's sins. If there's any application we can look at as a nation we must do that. And you can't help but notice them in the book of Hosea that it's very important therefore that we make application to our present situation. And I mentioned last time that the parallels between Israel's state or condition and America's state in condition in the progression of sin and God's judgment are remarkably striking. Israel was at the very end of a very long period where God warned the nation over hundreds of years not only the northern 10 tribes of Israel but the southern two tribes of Judah and Benjamin to repent. They did not listen. Actually things got worse and worse morally and the decline into sin began to intensify and accelerate. The same thing is true with America I believe. As sin has sped up, God's warnings have increased, and as Israel was just basically poised to receive great judgment upon God, including being carried away into captivity, I believe we are poised to receive greater and greater judgment by the Lord. We're already seeing many of those judgments manifested in our culture, in our society, in the political realm. In every single way, God's judgment is growing in our nation. And I believe many forms of his wrath will continue to be manifested in our nation as long as we continue to rebel against the Lord as a culture. Righteousness exalts a nation, the Bible says, but sin is a reproach to any people. And we are in the throes of great reproach and the reproach of God's anger and wrath. So we can't help but notice the parallels between the judgment against Israel as well as America, including the church. The evangelical church is in complete disarray with rare exception. We see also many individuals in our nation are without help and without Christ of course and they have no moral compass they have no clue as to what is the right thing to do in many ways and in many things so many are doing what is right in their own eyes and going their own way and of course we see the abject failure of church leaders today in general and the result is that our churches are Very very weak many are dead and it's very very sad to see anyone who has the spirit of God in the moans and groans as I do day in and day out seeing incrementally the decline of the evangelical and Protestant church as we go on. And so as we go along in our study. We need to remember that the lessons we learn in Hosea are intended for our benefit as the Bible says in first Corinthians 10. Now all these things happen to them as examples and they were written for our admonition. Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall for whatever things were written. Romans 15 says were written for our learning that we through the patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope. So the lessons we learn in the book of Hosea in 2016 here at Christ Bible Church because that's where everything begins in our own home. Judgment must begin at the house of God right. Everything we learn in Hosea has an application to our individual lives. to our churches, to our church leaders, and to our nation. And God, in great mercy then, through these many applications and the exposition of Hosea, warns us to flee from God's judgment. Don't walk very close to the line. Don't even get close to it. And therefore, the charges we see in verses one through three of God, the controversy that God has with Israel, shows Israel's desperate spiritual condition, which of course reveals America's desperate moral plight as well. Now, today we're gonna focus on the third of these three controversies that God has with Israel is the knowledge of God. That is, they don't have the knowledge of God. They lack the knowledge of God. Now you remember that The institution of national Israel is God's representative people to the whole world. Just like the churches in the new covenant, Israel was in the old covenant. They were caretakers of the oracles of God. They were supposed to be shining the light of God's covenant, his law, his truth to the entire world. They were supposed to be teachers of the lost and those who go astray, they were to be the spiritual ones to bring them back as the church is supposed to be today. It was national Israel that was to communicate the knowledge of God so that... not only the 12 tribes of Israel, but any proselytes that would come into the kingdom through the knowledge of God would have very clearly, both through the gospel, the word of God taught, as well as the example of the priests and the Levites and the people, the Jewish people themselves, they would be drawn into the truth through the light of the word and through godly behavior. But of course, this has not been the case for a very long time, and this is where we find ourselves in the book of Hosea. We can learn a very, very heartfelt lesson as a church to not be lukewarm. The longer a church is lukewarm, the more that local body is in danger of God's chastising program. And Israel is at the very end of a very long period of God's great patience and forbearance. And they are about though to have the anvil of God's wrath fall on them. In a very short period of time, the entire nation, except for the two tribes to the south, will be carried away into captivity. And they will lose most of their possessions. except what they can carry, but they weren't able to carry much because they were led away in chains naked by their captors. Families were separated and they would cry on their way to Assyria until they had no tears left because of the afflictions of body and soul, because of the deprivation, the bodily pain and the loss of family. that some of them wouldn't see anymore. And most of these judgments came down upon them over a very short period of time, whether it be a month, a week, or a day. Sometimes that's the way God works. He is very patient for even years, sometimes decades, and then all of a sudden, the floodgates of his punishing ministry is opened up. And unless those people who are the recipients of his wrath have prepared themselves to hide from the wrath of God to be found as a believer having Yahweh as their object of faith under his protection and provision very rarely very rarely will one be saved from that wrath. Now we've got to define what we mean when we talk about the knowledge of God. Let me say what we don't mean. First of all we don't mean the knowledge of God's existence, the apprehension and belief of truths in the Bible, dogma. Uh, because even the demons believe in tremble, but they hate God. They believe in God's existence and they believe in his attributes, but they don't have the heart and spiritual knowledge of God. We don't mean secondly, a partial knowledge of the character of God, which is related somewhat to the first point. You see, the Jews were somewhat familiar with God's character. And yet Jesus said to them you neither know me nor my father. So they had information in their minds religious data they comprehended comprehended intellectually but they didn't know God they had not the knowledge of God. Thirdly we don't mean a dry detached notion of God. However accurate it may be to the Bible we're not talking about the knowledge of God in those three ways. The knowledge of God includes far more than this. It's a real, personal, experimental, sanctifying acquaintance with him. It's a knowledge that sees you as reconciled to God through the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ as the basis of your confidence. Without this knowledge, all our progress and other branches of knowledge are vain and unprofitable. Other knowledge may be somewhat useful and entertaining, but if it doesn't lead you to salvation and a deeper heart union with Jesus Christ, what does it matter? It just adds to your culpability and accountability the more head knowledge we pile up without actually the heart knowledge of God. So God has the highest and greatest knowledge possible for us to experience in the knowledge of God. The Bible does not have any boundaries. when it describes the heart knowledge. Certainly head knowledge has limits and parameters but not heart knowledge which is unfathomable in many places in the New Testament. The Bible says that the knowledge of Christ is a treasure that knows no bottom or top or length and breadth and depth. The Holy Spirit sheds abroad this knowledge. He bestows it into our inner man as much as we can take of it. There are times when some of us walk so close with God that we have to say, no more Lord, I can't take any more joy. That's a good problem to have. Lord, I can't take any more of the floodgates opening up and pouring your peace and your love into my heart. But we can only know so much of the knowledge of God because God is infinite of course and we are finite. God nevertheless is knowable and he's personal but our knowledge is confined to certain borders as much of it. as God will give us God has revealed himself in creation and of course supremely he's manifested himself and the knowledge of God through the Lord Jesus Christ who is the chosen prophet spokesman and servant of the Lord to communicate the knowledge of the Trinity to us Jesus himself is the brightness of God's image he's the supreme revelation of God who alone knows the Father perfectly, and He alone reveals God to us. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son and the One to whom the Son wills to reveal Him. But the Bible describes this knowledge of Christ as life eternal. in John 17 3 you remember and this is eternal life that they may know you the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have said this is the knowledge of God it's bound up in Christ and when the Holy Spirit by way of revelation and illumination peels back the layers of deadness and dullness and blindness Revealing Jesus Christ to our hearts and spirits, our entire inner man, including our understanding, our intellect. This is the height of knowledge and the depth of it that a human being can assimilate and comprehend. Knowing God is to know Jesus Christ. and God affirms the knowledge of God or as a synonym we use the term the knowledge of Christ God affirms this knowledge by placing a witness in our hearts and man experiences this knowledge in his deepest being and the Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are his children and that we possess certain features of of God himself. We are made in his image, but we can also know him personally. Now, I said all that to say that the knowledge of God is the major theme of the book of Hosea. There are about half a dozen major themes, but rising above all of them, and of course there's about a hundred minor themes, But rising above all the themes of Hosea, the knowledge of God is the greatest one. And it behooves us to listen carefully and to study very carefully because we can learn some life changing lessons for the better for the improvement and growth of sanctification and maturity in our lives as Christians. If we learn this one lesson because if we do it has a sanctifying effect on all the other lessons God designs for us to learn in the book of Hosea. The reason Israel is getting ready to suffer unspeakable punishments in the book of Hosea is because primarily they lost the knowledge of God. When God says in verse 1 that there is no truth nor mercy and knowledge of God in the land, we need to understand that What are truth and mercy? But they are fruits of the knowledge of God. Truth and mercy spring from the knowledge of God, right? When the Holy Spirit so works to illuminate, proclaim, and reveal Jesus Christ to our hearts, does he not go before Christ and communicate truth about Christ to our minds? that we might rightly behold and understand the attributes of Christ to some degree, the perfections of Christ, who Christ is in his person and work, in his glorious offices, prophet, priest, and king. He lays a foundation of truth in our hearts and then begins to build on that foundation with the heart knowledge of Christ, laying layer of heart knowledge head knowledge, heart knowledge, head knowledge on top of each other as we grow in Christ. Now let me quickly give you an overview of the theme of knowledge, the knowledge of God in the book of Hosea. There are nine texts in Hosea that directly relate to the knowledge of God, this relational knowledge, this intimacy, this personal relationship that we have with the living God. Now, the word know or knowledge is used more than nine times, but the other times it's used, it refers to knowing about something. But it only uses the word knowledge with respect to relationship, intimate spiritual relationship nine times. And I want to take you through it very quickly just to show you without much comment why this theme is incredibly important. Hosea 2.20 comes up the first time. Few of these instances reveal knowledge in a positive way in terms of God's relationship with Israel. He says in 220, I will betroth you to me in faithfulness and you shall know the Lord. Chapter four and verse one, of course, is our text, but then look down to verse six. My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge. because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you from being priests for me, because you have forgotten the law of your God, I will also forget your children. We have a more, we have a greater hint in this text as to why they forgot truth or there is no truth or mercy in the land. They're destroyed for lack of knowledge because they forgot the law of God, okay? Then in chapter 5 and verse 4, they do not direct their deeds towards turning to their God for the spirit of harlotry is in their midst and they do not know the Lord. Then chapter 6 verse 3, let us know. Let us pursue the knowledge of the Lord. Of course this is a positive admonition from God to his people. And in verse 6 of the same chapter for I desire mercy and not sacrifice and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings. Please follow along with me in your Bible. Chapter 8 and verse 1. Israel will cry to me my God we know you. Of course God tells them in chapter 4 verse 1 and in other places that he doesn't know them. So they're getting the message and they are answering him back, no, no, no, no, wait a minute, we do know you. And God says, no, you missed something somewhere. You don't know me. Is there something familiar about, is there a familiar ring in this statement? Compared with a text in the New Testament, Matthew 7, where on the last day many will say to him, in that day, have we not done this, that, and the other thing? And God will say to them, I never knew you. In both texts here in Hosea 8.1 and in Matthew 7.21-23, the text I just quoted, God tells religious people in the Old Testament and religious people in general I don't know you. So there's many religious people who think they know God, but they don't. And that's why it's very important that if we hope to maintain the knowledge of God, we ought never depart from the law of God, from the truth of God, because God's word is the only infallible way to know where we stand with the Lord at any given moment. as we read the Word of God and meditate on it and hide it deeply in our hearts to show up and reveal and expose any areas of darkness, misunderstanding, deception, and blindness. And from there, make course corrections in our relationship with the Lord, in our knowledge of the Lord. That way, we can prevent waking up on judgment day and hearing those words, I never knew you, because the word of God is living and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and joints and marrow, and is a discerner, a searcher of the thoughts and intents of the heart. So the word of God can provide that spotlight of constant knowledge and awareness of where we stand before God so that we could take measures now while we're alive to make sure that. We have the righteousness of Jesus Christ we have the imputed righteousness and imparted righteousness of Jesus Christ. So that when God tests us by fire on judgment day not only will our righteousness be found to be perfect because it's imputed by Christ but also our works will be acceptable well many of them anyway. Because. of the grace of Christ now in chapter 11 verse 3 God says I taught Ephraim to walk taking them by their arms but they did not know that I healed them chapter 13 verse 4 yet I am the Lord your God ever since the land of Egypt and you shall know no God but me for there is no savior besides me. And chapter 14 verse 9, Who is wise? Let him understand these things. Who is prudent? Let him know them. For the ways of the Lord are right. The righteous shall walk in them, but transgressors stumble in them. Who is prudent? Let him know them. So with that backdrop let's move then into a brief discussion about the knowledge of God. In the first place, head knowledge versus heart knowledge. God says there's no knowledge of God in the land. What do you mean there's no knowledge of God? The Jews are the stewards of the oracles of God. They have a lot of knowledge, but it's not the kind of knowledge God is talking about here. He wants that knowledge. The foundation of knowing God rests upon certain cognitive truths that we must understand. but God here is not condemning them because they don't have enough commentaries in their Talmud about the Old Testament. They don't have enough systematic theology of the Old Testament. He's not condemning the priests or the Pharisees, there weren't too many Pharisees back in this time, or the scribes that they didn't have enough scrolls in their library in the temple. He's condemning them that they, that they lack a certain kind of knowledge that must be a companion with head knowledge. If you have one without the other, God is going to let you know about it. This is the problem with the church today. We have so much head knowledge, but so little heart knowledge. Augustine, one of the greatest theologians of the church said, A healthy relationship with God must begin with an intellectual knowledge of who he is, which then matures into a deeper personal experience of knowing God in life. Simple way of saying it. I like when theologians use simple language. You see, there's a difference then between head knowledge and heart knowledge. Head knowledge, as I said, consists of facts and dogma. without necessarily having heart knowledge and experience. And of course when we talk about experience we must be very careful, because the Bible is like a dictionary. It tests and defines every professed experience that we have. And if our experience does not match the experience of a Christian, If it does not fall within the biblical definition of Christian experience as we compare scripture with scripture then our experience is not valid. Let's talk about this knowledge. It really comes down to a matter of knowledge versus wisdom. You can have a lot of knowledge but no wisdom. You know there's a difference between knowledge and wisdom. Knowledge is purely intellectual, but wisdom is often experiential, intuitive, and relational. Let me give you some examples in scripture. In 2 Timothy 3.7, please turn to 2 Timothy 3.7. I'm gonna move pretty quickly here. We read there, especially concerning the perilous last times, one of the features of our day and age will be in verse 7, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth, 2 Timothy 3.7. That seems contradictory. How can you be always learning? but never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. What do you have? Perpetual amnesia? The minute you learn something you forget? No, it's juxtaposing or comparing two kinds of knowledge. Always learning intellectually, but never able to come to the heart knowledge of the truth. You're never able to get wisdom. So see the difference between the two? Let's look at John 5, verse 38. John 5, verse 38. Jesus speaking to the Pharisees in John 5, verse 38 says, But you do not have his word abiding in you, because whom he sent, him you do not believe. you search the scriptures for in them you think you have eternal life and these are they which testify of me but you're not willing to come to me that you may have life I do not receive honor from men but I know you that you do not have the love of God in you Jesus here is comparing knowledge with wisdom he's comparing knowledge intellectual knowledge with the heart knowledge of God. How do we know that? Well, they had the letter of the law. Search the scriptures, he tells them. He says, you have that written word, but the Pharisees gloried in being caretakers of the written word. They prided themselves on their knowledge of theology. but they lacked heart knowledge. They were not converted. They were not born again. And Jesus said that the scriptures themselves lead a sincere genuine seeker to Jesus Christ. If your study of the scriptures was proper then you would have been led to him or Jesus. And a couple of Cues from the text show us, especially in verse 42, that they didn't have wisdom. They didn't have the heart knowledge because he tells them, he says, I know you, you don't have the love of God in you. If you had the heart knowledge of Christ, one of the first evidences and fruits is the love of God, right? We call that a fruit of the spirit. Well, they had the scriptures, they were religious, they knew a lot about the Bible, but they didn't have the knowledge of the Lord, they had head knowledge but not heart knowledge. And then 1 Corinthians 2 expands and amplifies a little bit on this heart knowledge, it's described maybe a little differently here. but it's saying the same thing. In verse six, however, we speak wisdom among those who are mature, yet not the wisdom of this age nor of the rulers of this age who are coming to nothing. He's comparing two kinds of knowledge, the knowledge that the rulers of the age have compared with the knowledge or the wisdom that you get from God. If you read the entire chapter, the first half of the chapter, or almost the entire chapter talks about this knowledge or wisdom that the Holy Spirit gives you look at verse 10 but God has revealed them to us how through his spirit for the spirit searches all things yes the deep things of God so you can have a superficial theological knowledge about the Bible even a deeper Expansive knowledge of the scriptures but only the spirit of God can give you the wisdom of God can give you the heart union of Christ. And then. And so we see the difference between head knowledge and heart knowledge a person may know about God without knowing God. The false prophet Balaam it's good example. of having head knowledge without heart knowledge. He had a profound knowledge of God and of the Jewish people, the mission of the Jewish people, and the God that the Jewish people worship. Yet his heart was so perverted that he used his knowledge to try to destroy Israel. You remember? He's an example of people who hold the truth in unrighteousness. There are some church members like this, not necessarily in our church. but we call them Mr. and Mrs. Stumbling Block. They're so religious, he's been a deacon for 50 years, I've been a Sunday school teacher for 40 years, but that person is constantly stirring up problems and divisiveness and dissension within the body. They have head knowledge, but they don't know how to apply it. They don't know how to love people. They don't have wisdom at the moment to know what not to say and to know what to say. It's intuitive. It's supplied by the Holy Spirit. Applying the scriptures to the moment wherever you are. That's a supernatural gift from God. And it gives all believers this discernment. This humility and discernment combined. And so salvation combines both head and heart knowledge. You need both. And if you lack the heart knowledge eventually God's going to get stirred up. And he's going to have a ministry of chastisement in our lives. To have true fellowship with God, we've got to have both. It's more than knowing about God. Scripture describes believers as joined to God in righteousness. If you know that he is righteous, you know that everyone who practices righteousness is born of him. The Bible talks about the heart knowledge. It's manifested by love, love in the believer's life, the love of God. Jesus told the Pharisees, I know you, you don't have this love. You don't have the love of God in you. Beloved, let us love one another for love is of God and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God. Is that any clearer? For God is love. maintaining the knowledge of God, which you and I are called to do. Did you know that as a Christian? We're called to maintain both head and heart knowledge and add to them. Maintaining this knowledge is expressed in the word abide, which occurs 26 times throughout the epistles. To abide in God is to share the identity of Jesus Christ and to experience God's traits of life, light, and love. All three of those work in us. We become conduits of the life of God the love of God and the light of God to others. But also obedience is the preeminent trait of the knowledge of God. I'd like you to turn to Jeremiah. No no there's another Jeremiah verse I'll have you turn to not to this one but he says there in 22 16 and 17 Jeremiah he judged the cause of the poor and needy then it was well talking about a true believer was not this knowing me says the Lord yet your eyes and your heart are for nothing but your covetousness he told most of the Jews for shedding innocent blood and practicing oppression and violence the same thing that the Jews were doing that Hosea addressed we find Jeremiah addressing they didn't have the knowledge of God because the knowledge of God is always manifested in love to obey God the love of God constraineth us And then the knowledge of God is the grounds of all fruits of the spirit. Like I said this is what the statement there is no truth or mercy or knowledge of God in the land truth and mercy here can serve as fruits of the spirit fruits of the knowledge of God. These truths truth and mercy always go together because they spring from the knowledge of God because God and rather knowing God requires the love and compassion of God in our hearts. Secondly, that's point number one, head knowledge versus heart knowledge. Number two, the priority for the local church. Let me ask you a question. Don't answer me out loud. Is knowing God the highest priority of the local church? I see a lot of head shaking, yes. You know what, you're right. You're right. So many present the word as if salvation is the be all end all of teaching. Salvation just begins an eternal relationship whereby the church knows God. We're in a marriage. In Genesis we find the statement at the beginning I think in chapter 2 Adam knew his wife Eve and she bore a son and called his name Cain. That knowledge was the most intimate way a husband can know his wife. The root word is the same. When God rebukes Israel for not knowing him. God wants to maintain this intimacy with his people. And when we don't, he's upset. How about if you're married five years or 50 years and all of a sudden your spouse got bored and just wanted to have a superficial relationship. Let's just play checkers together. You would think something is wrong. The Jews lost their heart for God. And you can't have that happen without a spouse getting upset. God calls us to maintain the knowledge of God. This is the priority for the local church. Three examples from the Apostles Peter, Paul, and John concerning why maintaining the knowledge of God in church members is the priority for pastors, not administration. Yes, as a pastor you have to be involved with some administrative responsibilities, but It's so easy to shift the focus from those who give themselves over to the word of God and prayer and shepherding and intercession, intercession for the saints. You've got to know the people and their issues, their needs, their problems to be able to pray for them. And you've got to have a heart for them. to be able to pray for them. And you've got to understand how critical and vital the knowledge of God is not only to God himself, but as the driving ministry in the local church for you as a pastor and me to focus your efforts and your resources on knowing God. you're preaching on knowing God. That's why I couldn't pass up Hosea 4.1 without devoting a whole message to that one phrase, knowledge of God. It's gonna come up about eight or nine more times in the book of Hosea, namely verse six deals with the knowledge of God in a much deeper way. I'm only giving you an introduction in this message. I'm not saying I'm gonna preach three messages on verse six. Hosea 4.6. What I am saying is I want to give you an introduction generally and broadly to the knowledge of God because of its importance and because this theme comes up so many times in Hosea. And whenever there is a truth that emerges constantly from a chapter or a book or the whole Bible as a whole, we need to sit up and take notice because God is speaking loudly to us. Amen. He's saying, place your attention on this thing. This is where I need you to dwell and meditate on so that you can grasp this truth, not only in your head, but also in your heart. So many of the truths we learn, they're glorious, they don't change, they'll always be wonderful, but they go no further than our heads. Every word of God was intended to be applied to our lives. The truth must travel south and melt our hearts and grasp our affections and continue to travel south and move our feet. Amen? The first example of the priority for the local church is what Peter said in the chapter that Brother Walter read in 2 Peter 1. I'd like you to turn back there. 2nd Peter 1, beginning at verse 5, he says, but also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue to virtue, knowledge to knowledge, self-control. He lists about eight or nine different fruits of the spirit, including godliness, brotherly kindness, and so forth. But he brings up knowledge. This is heart knowledge he's talking about. And then in verse eight, he says that, If these things, these fruits of the Spirit including heart knowledge are yours and abound, you will neither be barren nor fruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. So the fruit of the Spirit. which is the work, which is the evidence of the Holy Spirit working in our hearts, working in our lives, bringing about greater attributes and characteristics of Jesus in our personality, developing our personalities and characters to be powerfully like Christ in word, thought, and deed. These are all rooted in the knowledge of God, these fruits of the Spirit. They're rooted in the knowledge of God. If we lack the knowledge of God and the fruits that come with it, God says we're temporarily blinded. If we're true Christians, we're temporarily blinded, we're short-sighted. We forgot a very important experience. I'm not talking about an important doctrine. You can forget experience just as much as you can forget a notion, an intellectual notion. If you don't experiencing something vital for Christians to experience, God says you forgot that experience. Whenever you walk with God, when the Holy Spirit works in your heart and opens the scripture up for you to see Christ and be powerfully impacted by what you're reading about Christ and about the great glorious truths of the kingdom, God deeply and powerfully touches your heart. And from there comes the experience, right? You feel the joy. You feel love for God. A spirit of worship stirs up within you. You have to pause in your study to praise him, to thank him, right? And that may even lead to a time of prayer. Perhaps God exposed the sin and led you to repentance, and that spirit of repentance led you into the presence of Christ, trusting him for his blood to cleanse you afresh and wash you from all sins committed. and then from there you move on in your prayer to worship, adoration, exalting Christ, you feel the assistance of the Holy Spirit helping the infirmities of your flesh and you're rising up from earth and as it were you arrive at a place where your whole concentration is fixated on the Lamb who is on the throne of God and earth becomes strangely dim in the light of his glory and grace and you're praying and worshipping and suddenly he just blesses you with the spirit of adoption who enlarges your heart and that spirit of adoption just begins to testify with your spirit, that you are a child of God and you find instinctively this supplication and groaning within you, Abba Father, you have this familial identity with God Himself as your Father and with Christ as your Holy Husband. What is that called? Well, Peter calls it, you forgot that you were purged from your old sins. There is in verse nine. In other words, one of the automatic fruits and responses of the heart of the child of God, when cleansed afresh in heart and conscience, when enabled with liberty of the spirit to apprehend a fresh view of Christ and to be given liberty to worship him, the first thing that God attests to in your heart, that your sins are forgiven. Right? Now, when that process of what the Bible calls renewal does not continue, the Holy Spirit and your own walk and your reading of the word doesn't go deep enough for God's work of reminding you that your sins are forgiven and you are His child. This spirit of adoption that is such a large part of our comfort and consolation as Christians in our affliction and in our persecution and suffering, right? This is one of the greatest plagues of the church, not our church per se, but of the churches, the evangelical churches in general. That in America, and for many other reasons, the distractions and the responsibilities and the problem with time management and worldliness in the church and the cares of this life are so great, the pressure is so enormous, that we just find we don't have the time to go this deep with the Lord. We all struggle with this, but I'm here to remind you that we have a savior who is so ready to restore the knowledge of God, the deep knowledge of God in our hearts, because he preserves the knowledge of God. I don't have time to go into it. I need to close right now. We'll pick up where we left off next time. But Jesus Christ restores the knowledge of God. in the way he has restored you 10,000 times and kept you from falling, where some of you feel that you're saved, you're a Christian, you're washed in the blood, you know your sins are forgiven, you've gotten these constant, you receive these constant messengers that God is keeping you from falling back into your old sins. On the one hand, but on the other hand, you're not at a level where you want to enjoy the deeper knowledge of Jesus Christ that renews your joy, the joy of the Lord, your peace, the peace of God, which passes all understanding, and his love, the love of God in your hearts. The fact that you're still in the faith and still longing and groaning for more of Christ is a good sign, not only that you're saved and that your sins are forgiven, but that our Lord Jesus is just so awesome in guarding and keeping his flock and keeping his promises that nothing shall separate us from the love of God. But at the same time, there's this other dimension of not only restoring the knowledge of God but increasing the knowledge of God that we often forget and lose sight of is that there's this whole ocean of Christ and the knowledge thereof that he desires to increase in our daily lives and he will if we would but trust him trust him don't look to yourself don't try harder How many times have you succeeded by trying harder. The flesh is weak. It cannot produce a spiritual pang of love for Christ in your heart. Everything you receive from God you must receive through the mediator through the head of the church through the one who died not only for justification but also for our sanctification. The Lord Jesus Christ and faith in him. Go to Him. Turn away from your works and go to Christ. Tell Him what you've done wrong. Yes, that's part of it, but don't stay there. Trust in Him to pour out some of that unfathomable depths of love and joy and peace on your heart. He will not just barely keep us, but as 2 Peter 1 says, He will usher us into those sanctuaries where That abundance of life and love and light are ours for the taking. The knowledge of God, so critical. This is where the combined focus and expectation and hunger of every member of the church needs to bear upon, needs to impinge upon. All of us must want the knowledge of Christ. God uses his word and the doctrines of his word as a tool. Let's not be like the Pharisees who looked at the Bible as an end unto himself where they could have put the Bible on an altar and worshiped it. No, Christ and the knowledge of him is the goal of all Bible teaching, preaching, study, and every other amenity and support and aid and ordinance that Christ has given to the church for edification. These are all supports and helps and ordinances and so forth from Him to bring us into a deeper treasure ocean of His knowledge. And with God's help, by His grace, I'm never going to stop talking about this because this is a priority for Christ's Bible Church. And it comes up everywhere in the scripture, almost every chapter, on almost every page. Something about the person and work of Christ, either by direct teaching or in type and figure, comes out of the scripture and just in a neon sign kind of flashing, just whispers to us, come unto me. All ye that labor and are heavy laden, Jesus says, and I will give you rest. Let us go unto our rest, which is the Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you, Lord Jesus, for your unspeakably glorious, incomprehensibly wonderful grace and mercy, which has kept us all to this moment as your people. You have not dealt with us according to our sins nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. Oh how we praise you and adore you and worship you. Thank you Lord Jesus that though we have wandered and gone astray in the way of our hearts 10,000 times yet your love is so great it is greater. It is grace greater than our sin and you've brought us back every time. You've kept us and you've bidden us to seek your face for more of your love and your joy. Help us Lord. Give us wisdom. Give us strength of heart. Give us strength of will by the power of your spirit. Help us to trust you for more of the knowledge of God. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.