Scripture reading: Jeremiah 9:23–26

Yada, Yada, Yada

Let us know; let us press on to know the Lord. (Hosea 6:3)

 

In pop culture, the phrase “yada, yada, yada” means idle talk or meaningless chatter, as in “blah, blah, blah.” But the true meaning is radically different. The word “yada” is a Hebrew term used over 800 times in the

Old Testament. Its basic meaning is “to know” or to have “knowledge” of some- thing or someone. Our Greek roots cause us to think of “knowledge” in terms of cognitive awareness of facts—intellectual comprehension. But the Hebrew concept is much richer. For the Jew, “to know” meant to experience something or someone in a personal way. For example, the Bible tells us that Adam “knew” Eve (Genesis 4:1). The point is not that he had an awareness of certain information about her or that they were casual acquaintances; rather, the word clearly means that Adam had sexual relations with his wife so that “she conceived and bore Cain.” The difference between knowing about someone and knowing someone is similar to the difference between a lightning bug and a lightning bolt! They sound similar but in reality are radically different.

Over and over again in the Bible we are told that the whole point of salvation is to “know God.” Knowing about him is not enough: the demons do that. God wants for us to know him personally, to walk and talk with him, and to be intimately involved in a face-to-face relationship. As J. I. Packer put it in his classic book Knowing God, “A little knowledge of God is worth more than a great deal of knowledge about him.”

Knowing God opens the door to multiple blessings:

Knowing God enables me to know myself. How can the clay pot ever understand itself without knowledge of the potter who made it? And how can we ever answer the question “Who am I?” without a personal relationship with the one who created us? I know, O Lord, that the way of man is not in himself (Jeremiah 10:23). When we find God, we find ourselves.

Knowing God makes it possible to live a life that matters. Scripture tells us that the people who know their God shall be strong and do exploits (Daniel 11:32 KJV). If we know him, we will by definition be committed to pleasing him by doing his will in matters great and small. No one can know God and be a passive spectator to life!

Knowing God means I will become like him. Living in face-to-face relationship with the Holy One makes it impossible to live in sin and causes us to grow ever more like him in holiness. This explains why the apostle John could say, Whoever says ‘I know him’ but does not keep his commandments is a liar (I John 2:4).

Knowing God is the only assurance of eternal life. In his final prayer with his disciples, Jesus made the issue crystal clear: And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent (John 17:3).

Perhaps you desire to know God but wonder where to begin. Jesus put the matter succinctly: If you had known me, you would have known my Father also (John 14:7). In other words, the best way to know God is to develop a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

 

Our wisdom, insofar as it ought to be deemed true and solid wisdom,

consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves.

—John Calvin  (opening sentence of The Institutes)

 

point to ponder • Jesus came not that we would know about God, but that we would know him.

prayer focus • For Bible teachers, that their face-to-face relationship with God would be as intense as their study of God.