Jump Start # 223

Deuternomy 29:29 The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our sons forever, that we may observe all the words of this law.

  Secrets…that concept takes us back to middle school and some getting in trouble for telling “secrets.” The military has secrets that some try to discover and sell to our enemies. It seems every election season one party tries to find all the dirty secrets of the other party so they can reveal them and sway voters their way. But here, God has secrets. This is not implying anything bad, but rather, the non-revealed things. God didn’t reveal everything. There are some reasons for that.

  First, the Bible isn’t a tell-all or how-it-happened book on everything in history and our universe. The purpose of the Bible is to get us right with God and to show the life and relationship He wants from us. That life will take us to Heaven.

 Second, even if God were to tell us all the “secrets” I doubt we’d get it. For instance, just how did He make light out of nothing. What factors did God have to do to bring this about? It took Edison a long time to make the light bulb and that was after many failed experiments. God simply said the word. But in saying it, many things had to happen.  Another secret, just what is Hades like? God uses language in Luke 16 to help us grasp it, but it’s figurative. When the rich man was in torment he begged for Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool off his tongue. Sounds ok with us until we realize that Lazarus’ finger is on his body in the cemetery and the rich man’s soul really doesn’t have a tongue. Those are simply images to help us grasp the depth of what is going on. Without those images we couldn’t get it. God does.

  Thirdly, God’s secrets are His and not ours. We are fascinated about the “secret things.” We want to talk about them. We want to know what others think about the secret things. We want to make a list of God’s secrets. The “why’s,” the “how come’s” of life make up much of the secret things. It seems that some folks spend their time trying to break through the secrets. They want to be the first to know what was not known before. But the fact remains, they are secrets. They will always be secrets because God has not revealed them. There’s no finding out what God doesn’t want us to know. And because they simply cannot be known, many guess. That’s dangerous. Some preach their assumptions instead of the facts of the Bible. Some make their guesses as factual as God’s revelation. You can’t do that, mostly because you don’t know. There is nothing to support your guesses. I’ve heard folks say, “I just know God likes this…” Do you? Years ago, I had a discussion with a man who was telling me that he was certain that God enjoyed the music in his church. I showed him in the New Testament the church sang. Nothing is said about instruments and the church. He just knew God liked it. I asked him, “Which does God like better, Coke or Pepsi?” His response, “How should I know?” That’s it exactly! What God has revealed is what we know. The “secret” or unrevealed things belong to God. We don’t know.

  There are those who think that every question and every thought imaginable is answered in the Bible. Not true. The Bible isn’t the world’s biggest answer book. It is a book of life that shows us the way back to God.

  God has told us what He wants us to know. God’s revelation is sufficient to get us to Heaven. Our attention ought to be upon the revelation of God. We need to know the will of God. We need to read the Bible, follow the Bible, teach the Bible and live by the Bible. The other stuff falls into the “secret” category that belongs to God. Don’t need to worry about those things.

Roger