What does the Bible say about how the omniscience of God affects you?
Sep 10th, 2017 / Salt and Light
A universal “mom-ism” is “It’s not polite to stare.” You know the discomfort you get when someone stares at you. In fact, you will do practically anything to get that person to stop. You shift in your chair, you suspect you missed something when you last looked into a mirror, and you wonder if you spilled your lunch down your chin. You certainly wonder what that person knows that you don’t! When others know something you do not and you suspect you are the only one who does not know it, you are highly motivated to disappear! We quickly become uneasy, embarrassed, confused, and fearful.
The reality about us is even worse than our insecurities. We like to control what is known about us. We are masters at hypocrisy, facades, and manipulations. But there is One that you cannot fool! To admit that God is omniscient is to embrace the idea that God “stares” at us and the unease that such knowledge produces is overwhelming.
There is absolutely no comfort to the unsaved man when he discovers that God is omniscient. For an unbeliever to acknowledge that there is a God who knows all about everything is also to acknowledge that such a God knows the inner me. All men have rebelled against God and therefore fear exposure of that truth. The unsaved man is left with a stark choice. Either admit that God is omniscient, which seals man’s doom, or pretend and deny that God really knows all.
The Bible plainly states that our lives are an open book to God. Psalm 139:1ff declares, “O LORD, You have searched me and known me. You know my sitting down and my rising up; You understand my thought afar off. You comprehend my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with my ways. For there is not a word on my tongue, but behold, O LORD, You know it altogether.” In Isaiah 66:18, God says, “For I know their works and their thoughts….”
God’s knowledge is infinitely comprehensive. He is infinitely above creation. Certainly all we can imagine concerning Him merely scratches the surface of His majesty, and yet, His knowledge of us, His knowledge of our nature, His knowledge of past, present, and future, is absolutely complete. He does not learn, nor need to, for He knows all!
To admit the reality that God knows all things about us is a nightmare, but grappling with such a truth is what brings a man to humble trust in the finished work of Christ through faith. The knowledge that our sin has offended the holy God, and that our heart has been in open rebellion against Him since our conception, is what triggers the overwhelming guilt of the awakening soul. The truth of our lostness and helplessness before the Almighty is a powerful catalyst in working repentance deep into the soul, and makes the whole man cry out in need of his Savior!
The early chapters of Genesis recount the entrance of sin and moral guilt into the human race. Adam and Eve were created under the Dispensation of Untested Innocence. They were not sinners and were, therefore, not ashamed before God (Genesis 2:25). After they sinned by disobedience, they experienced moral guilt, they were ashamed before one another, and they futilely attempted to hide themselves from God.
We know that God confronted them and then He clothed them. This pictures a fundamental truth about man’s situation before God: We are guilty sinners full of shamefulness, and if that shame is not embraced now, it will be personally felt at the Judgment! Man needs to be clothed in the righteousness of the sinless Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. Only then are we both known by God and clothed at the same time. God is not ignorant about our sin. He has not overlooked it. Rather, He has dealt with our sin permanently. Isaiah 61:10 reads, “I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for He has clothed me with the garments of salvation, He has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.”
It is only because of this “robe of righteousness” that the omniscience of God can now be embraced as a source of comfort and joy for the believer. The fact of such knowledge concerning us should produce joy. God knows all things, He knows all about us, and yet, despite such comprehensive knowledge He loved us and saved us. There is nothing within us or in our past, present, or future, that can arise and bring God’s wrath down upon our heads!
God also knows the best about us, even when others do not know our pure motives and misread our actions and intentions. In fact, He knows what He is initiating within us, imperfect though we are.
Also, God knows what He is going to make of us as He forms us into the image of His Son. Romans 8:28ff tells us so.
Now that you have reviewed the omniscience of God, ask God to help you recognize where any form of hypocrisy resides within you and be done with it. Pursue repentance and consciously come into the presence of God clothed in the righteousness of Christ! Trust and obey.