Very many years ago, Whiteman Hill got converted in a provincial Baptist Church not very far from their little country home. Whiteman being really enthusiastic about growing his Christian life began hunting for knowledge about his new found faith from people who happen to have been converted donkey years before him and based on Whiteman’s upbringing, he was taught by the parent that the older a person is, the wiser the fellow.
Whiteman wasn’t wrong pursuing after relevant knowledge concern what he now believes in because bible says that as new born babes, we should desire the sincere milk of the word that we may grow thereby. 1st Peter 2:2
Just because a fellow has been a Christian for a long time doesn’t necessarily mean he/she would be effective or usable by God in furthering the growth of a young convert or even be useful to God. It might just interest you to know that God is not a respecter of person.
Nigerians might really relate with this analogy where aged Christian feels that by virtue of their age, that they know more than the young people. This thing pisses me off.
Effectiveness in God is by knowledge and not by age or experience. Funny enough we don’t gain knowledge by experience but by revelation through study. To be effective for Christ and for His Kingdom, you got to have to know Him in a very personal way.
While still looking up to the aged Christians in their congregation, I sooner realized that having a knowledge of Jesus is much more beyond age and experience because Whiteman soon realized that all the aged Christians in Church ever knew was all that their preacher or teacher taught them as the case may be.
“If all a fellow knows is all that he has been taught, then the fellow knows nothing now that’s because whatever you are taught is limited to your teacher’s level of consecration, yeildedness, dedication and desire to know Christ and that is why the Apostle Paul prayed a prayer I consider to be the most important prayer for the Ephesian church in Ephesian 1: 16-17.”
You know I remember once the Apostle Paul talked about having zeal without knowledge. You know one could think that he has so much love for God, but if his love is not properly backed up with the word of God, the fellow might be walking in error.
In Ephesians 1:9 Paul made mention of two very important things that is very instrumental in helping our knowledge in God to grow and that’s the “spirit of wisdom and revelation”. Now there is a certain kind of knowledge that happens in us when the spirit of wisdom and revelation is activated in our inner man. It is called “Epignosis” which is a knowledge that relates with the known. This is not a hear say knowledge it is an experiential knowledge. A knowledge of relationship. We are living in a time where we now have too many celebrities and at some point we will always have people laying claims on the fact that some of the public figures are their step grandfathers cousin nephews but if you ask them the least thing like the person favourite food, they can’t tell and that’s not the kind of knowledge we are talking about here. We are talking about the kind of knowledge that you possess based on the fact that you have a very intimate relationship with the person in question and that’s how God desires to relate with us.
If you cast your mind back to the old testament in Genesis, bible says that God will always come to have communion with the man Adam. That’s the kind of knowledge I am talking about. It is called “Epignosis”. It is not an I was told knowledge. It is an I know knowledge.
Without this kind of knowledge, you’ll be just a mere religious Christian, doing things religiously, without having a realer relationship with God. God ceases to be the God of the bible but your God when you have this kind of knowledge and that’s when your praise becomes effective and celebrating your union and oneness with Him becomes your priority.
When Whiteman Hill read this in a Christian magazine a friend gave to him, he began praying for the spirit of wisdom and revelation and in less than a shorter time than expected, the knowledge of the young convert about grow so effectively and became very visible to everyone that sooner than later, he began bringing others into this knowledge too; because you can’t keep this knowledge to yourself when you must have realized it.
