Throughout the gospels, as I read about the life of Jesus, I have come to be amazed at the knowledge Jesus had on everything and even more amazed at how that knowledge did not affect him nor affect his relations. We on the other hand, are avid knowledge seeker. We search for things, we discover, we seek things out, and we get a certain satisfaction when we find them or understand things better. Seeking out matters, searching for knowledge, looking for answers etc. are all good things, but most of the time, we want to know what happens simply out of curiosity. Not because we want to solve a problem but because we want to be in the know; we want to be the person that possesses the knowledge; the person everyone goes to for answers; the person who is above others. Really, what we are after is our own fame and glory. We desire to elevate ourselves through our knowledge so that others will revere us, and even fear us. This unfortunately gives us power which sadly is often abused. I wonder if that might be one of the reasons God speaks to us in parables at times, in a way that will require effort and time on our part to seek and find answers? That way, before we can boast about finding the answers, we would have gone through a process of humility to figure things out? This sounds plausible and it reminds me of this scripture from the book of Proverbs which says, “It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out”. Regardless of the reason behind how God speaks, I believe by taking a deeper look at the life of Jesus in this area of knowledge will help us see how we can apply it to our own so that we do not get puffed up by it.
Jesus’ life was a fulfilment of many prophecies. Some of them specific and others a bit beyond our understanding. An example of a simple prophecy Jesus fulfilled is the one from Zechariah 9:9 which talks about Israel’s saviour and king coming and riding on a donkey. Jesus came walking on a donkey on his triumphant entry to Jerusalem fulfilling that very prophecy. Moreover, Jesus’ knowledge did not stop at the prophecies about him, it also extended to knowledge about his own life and what would happen to him. Not only that, but his knowledge also included knowledge about people and their deepest thoughts and intentions. This is a lot of things to know beforehand! Surely, only Jesus was able to handle that amount of knowledge and not be puffed up.
It is very evident from Scriptures that Jesus knew what was going to happen to him, that is why, close to his death, he started telling his disciples of what sort of death he was going to die and what would happen to him (Matthew 16, Luke 13,Mark 8). Additionally, in the anticipation of his death and the gruesome pain he was going to go through, he prayed to his Father to let this cup pass away from him emphasising that not his will be done but that the will of his Father be done. What he foreknew did not alter the way he prayed. In the same way, John tells us that Jesus knew what was in man, he knew what men thought of and that is why he did not entrust himself to them (John2:24). It is evident he did, because he could always respond to unspoken questions the Pharisees and people had in their hearts (Luke5:22); he knew what Judas was going to do to him beforehand yet that did not change his mind towards Judas, nor did knowledge about the depths of man’s heart change his mind about man. In all this, Jesus remained the same. He continued to love the same. He did not judge, recuse himself, separated himself, avoided those whom he knew either did not agree with him or liked him. In fact, that knowledge did not seem to add a shred of change to the man Jesus. I believe Jesus, as Paul would remind us in 1 Corinthians 8:1, loved. There in lies the difference. Just like in the church the gifts of the spirit are for the edification of the church, knowledge without love is for its destruction. It does not edify anyone. Therefore, to our knowledge we must add love so that it builds up the church and everyone around her. By doing so, we are not seeking our personal interests, we are not seeking to elevate ourselves, nor are we seeking to be the “all knowing” thereby taking the place of God but we are taking our rightful place of servants for the sake others.
It is sad to see how much pain was caused because of prior knowledge that was not used in love. Think about the many people who have heard a word from the Lord, a prophecy that the Lord said about them and went on to ‘provoke’ that prophecy not on God’s terms but on theirs causing much pain in the process? Simply because one could not wait. This is where David was very different from others. He did not ‘provoke’ the prophecy from the Lord but waited faithfully for its fulfilment. Jesus did the very same thing. He did not change the course of action of his life; he did not avoid the dangers he knew were on his path nor did he even attempt to remove them. He simply walked through the life that was his faithfully. This shows us that our knowledge must be to serve; it must be selfless so that what we do with the knowledge leads to the good of others not just ours. May we be humble in our knowledge, and may we love seeking the welfare of others with the knowledge we have.
A Word Aptly Spoken 