Sanctification and Reformation

My daughter has a beautiful singing voice and recently attended a concert by Tauren Wells, former lead singer of the band Royal Tailor.   He’s a dynamite vocalist and can float through scales effortlessly.   In one of his songs “Known” he writes the following lyrics, “It's so unusual it's frightening - You see right through the mess inside me - And you call me out to pull me in - You tell me I can start again - And I don't need to keep on hiding - I'm fully known and loved by You .” I love the song and the words.   Without sounding like a dictionary, Wells defines what being known means – and that is something far more significant than knowing things about someone.   Celebrities and pro athletes have relayed the challenges of being famous, having millions of adoring fans, but feeling entirely alone.   This is evidenced further by the suicides of famous people like Heath Ledger, Chester Bennington, Chris Cornell, and many others who are surround...

Oldest lighthouse in Scotland OMNIPOTENCE Several decades ago there was an epic show called Star Trek. It was widely viewed by millions every week as the space ship Enterprise would go boldly where no man had ever gone before.   As with many shows, they get misquoted and then the misquote receives the most attention in history – but it didn’t even happen… One of these quotes occurs in "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective" where actor Jim Carrey speaks into the camera saying, “I can’t do it Captain. I don’t. Have. The power!” Supposedly this was a rip off from ship master Scotty in Star Trek but interestingly Scotty never made the quote. However, Jim Carrey’s misquote retained all the attention. What does this have to do with God’s omnipotence? Not much – but that the simple sentiment is something we can all relate to.   There are many things we wish we could do but for which we lack the power.   We’d like to cure poverty, hunger, war, disease, and Washington DC...

Part 2 (of 2) In part 1 of this post we covered the first four characteristics of the omniscience of God. We covered how God has perfect self-knowledge, perfect knowledge outside of Himself, that His knowledge is eternal, and that His knowledge is immediate and instantaneous. Today, we'll cover four more aspects of this amazing attribute of God. 5) His knowledge is exhaustive . He numbers and names all of the stars (which are incalculable). Not even a sparrow falls without His knowledge. He numbers every hair on your head. These are excerpted from verses which all use this language to help the reader grasp how complete His knowledge is. A sparrow was worthless in that day – yet God does not allow even one to fall to the ground without His complete knowledge. He has numbered the hair follicles on your head – which isn’t a particularly useful thing to know.  So if He perfectly knows these things which are not valuable, then He definitely knows what going on with and in y...

Have you ever made a mistake or been caught in a lie? It’s unnerving to know that someone else knows your sin.  But have you had that experience and then thought, “If they only knew the half of my sin they’d disown me.” If someone were to look into my heart or watch a film of my secret decisions, motives, and desires, they’d most definitely run from me. But I imagine I would run from you too because we’re not that different from each other. Sin has infected us like the worst type of spreading cancer; affecting every thought we have. So this attribute of God can be a little unnerving. It can actually cause us to try and block it out as silly and ironic as that is.  God’s omniscience means that he is all-knowing. So in running we quickly resemble Jonah who ran from the Lord and found Himself being held against his will in the belly of a whale. I encourage you, as I study and share my thoughts with you, to think like a follower of Christ. This attribute is incredibly en...