The Third Epistle.
Sunday, November 12, 2000.
God's Knowledge
Is Limitless.
By Rev. James R. Bingham
Special to corndancer.com
POSTED FROM Memphis, Tennessee
Daniel 12: 1-4
12:1 And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people: and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book.
12:2 And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.
12:3 And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever.
12:4 But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and for, and knowledge shall be increased.
Dear Readers and Searchers of Truth,
Upon reading and reflecting on those verses, I submitted to the unction of the Spirit to exegete in the following manner. The twelfth chapter of Daniel, in its entirety, is ominous and links us to a prophetic inference in Revelation. Daniel spoke to the intellects and those of the king's court.
Upon considering Daniel's prophecy, I saw how it relates to the world of today.
What we have in this world of the now is everything we have always had. What we are doing today and what the world as a whole is experiencing in the Year 2000 is the process of building, improving and maneuvering what we have already learned.
Isn't it great, isn't it fantastic how the world is changing. A very simple principle guides the eternal process of change: Once an idea is created, everything else is production. The principle is compounded by the truth embedded in Ecclesiastes 1:9. The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.
From Addition to Multiplication.
Listen to this simple formula. 1 + 1 is 2. Is that right?
Now the sum of 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 is 4. By the same token, but with a little grouping, we can take a couple of these ones and make a 2. If we add 2 + 2 we get 4. Now, if we add 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 we get 8. That's a lot of adding.
Now if we manipulate the add sign just a little bit, sort of turn it on its side, we get a times sign. If we use the times sign, we will be able to take 2 x 2 and get 4, 2 x 4 and get 8, or 4 x 4 and get 16.
Looking back, we find a legion of ones and a multitude of twos. We have learned how to leap from the use of small numbers to the use of larger numbers. We no longer call it addition; we now call it multiplication. Our result is no longer called the sum. Instead it is called the product.
The process of addition was created long ago. 1 + 1 today is the same 1 + 1 it was a million years ago. It is still a process of adding one thing to another thing to arrive at a new thing. When we discover the advantages of multiplication, however, we are building on a foundation that already stands.
Once something is created, everything else is production.
The result of multiplication is known as the product. After a person learns how to multiply, he looks back on the work he has done, the tablets and columns of his addition, and compares them to the ease of the new thing, multiplication. How much easier it is to get to where I want to go! He says, "If I had known then what I know now, I would have been multiplying all the time."
Knowledge Is Increased.
What we know, the sum of our knowledge, the collective known things of the world of thinkers and doers, is constantly changing and adding itself to itself. From the time of Noah to the time of Jesus, which spans about 4,000 years, the knowledge in the world doubled. That means the knowledge of the world multiplied itself by 2.
From the time of Jesus to the year 1750, the knowledge of the world doubled again, this time in 1,750 years. From 1750 to 1900, when the planet entered into the industrial revolution, knowledge doubled again, this time in only 150 years.
From the year 1900 to 1950, the knowledge of the world doubled again. Count them: only 50 years. The pace quickens. In the decade from 1950 to 1960, the knowledge of the world again doubled. As you can see, knowledge is no longer adding to itself, it is multiplying at a rapid rate.
Eventually, having reached a limit, we will arrive at a place where no more knowledge can be received. We will have arrived at the plateau of total knowledge. Man will have accessed all the knowledge he can hold. He will realize all that he needs to know. He will have reached full capacity.
God is full capacity. God is total knowledge. We call Him Omniscient. God is Omnipotent, all power. He is Omnipresent, everywhere. He is Omniscient, all knowledge. In his power and presence, he knows all.
Division: To Halve and Divide.
On the other hand, you can take 16, cut it in half, and get 8. If you cut eight in half, you get 4. Now cut 4 in half and you have 2. Two, cut in half, is one. One cut in half is one-half, and so on toward infinity. Regardless of how deep you go into this numerical abyss, you will always have something more to cut in half, to halve and divide -- that is, as long as you are doing a physical fleshly thing.
When God adds one to one, when God puts one and one together, He gets one. That's because His accounting is a spiritual thing. His product is no more twain, but one.
Close, But Not There.
If you have a line drawn from one wall to the other, you can travel half the distance and be halfway across the room. If you travel half the way of that distance, you will be half the distance from the middle of the room to the wall.
Listen, if you travel half the way again, you will be closer and closer to the wall, but guess what? You will never reach the wall. You will get close, but you will still have half the distance to travel from your last point of origin. That's because the process you are using now is not multiplication, but division.
God does not want us to divide. He wants us to be different from one another in many ways. He wants us to recognize our differences, but He doesn't want us divided. He said, "A house divided against itself can not stand." Do you realize that as long as we live in the flesh, by the knowledge of this world, we can't help but be divided?
God said be fruitful and multiply, but what does this mean? It refers to our experience with knowledge of this world, how it grows, divides, and manipulates itself. Knowledge, indeed, has increased. Yet everything remains the same. In a sense, the knowledge of man has been sealed. Even though we are multiplying and adding, subtracting and dividing, we continue to use the same principle: There is no new thing under the sun. Knowledge has increased, but the limit of what is available to us has already been determined. The limit has been determined for the carnal and physical minded. Let me qualify that a bit: It is given that the spiritual-minded shall know the mind of God, and God is All knowledge.
God's Wisdom Seen as Foolishness.
The New Testament gives us a warning. It says the world will become weaker and wiser. This refers to the ability to sustain and to maintain against the wiles of the devil. It becomes weaker for the things of the flesh.
But what about wisdom? What is wise? Everyone's understanding of wise is not the same. Scripture says in I Corinthians 1:23 that God's wisdom is perceived as foolishness. That in turn, to the discerning believer, means that man's wisdom is foolishness before God. Thus, God's foolishness is wiser than men. The weakness of God is stronger than man because man's wisdom is based on the knowledge of this world, which is a world of flesh with profound limits.
Look at verse 30 of I Corinthians, Chapter 1. It says that by being in Christ, we are inside of wisdom and righteousness, sanctification and redemption. That's not dividing to get inside. You can't get inside sanctification through the flesh. God must join you to it. You must be set apart by God. You must become no more twain but one. Then you are inseparable, declaring that nothing shall separate you from the love of God. You can't do that in the flesh, because in the flesh you will always be divided.
The prophet Daniel received this understanding while receiving the interpretation of visions from the Angel of God. Look at verse 3 of Daniel 12. They that are wise shall shine. And they shall shine bright as the firmament. And Michael, the prince will stand up for those who have come from the fathers of the Faith. And there will be trouble such as there has never been before. In this time of trouble, those who believe in the way of God will be delivered. Many shall be resurrected, some unto everlasting life, and some unto shame and everlasting contempt.
Shut Up the Words.
And those who will rise on that day will say, If I had known then what I know now, I would have worshipped the Lord Thy God with all my heart and with all my soul.
Thank you, Daniel, O great prophet. You could have told me this a long time ago. What must I do now? But Daniel was told to shut up. So Daniel will effectively say, "I have no idea." I do know that you did know, that you knew you weren't living right, and you had every opportunity to change your wicked ways.
Your problem is you don't believe fat meat is greasy. You relied on man's wisdom. You relied on man's politics. You felt comfortable with formulas and axioms, and the exponential increase of man's knowledge. You sought answers in books that were closed a long time ago. All there is to know about that book is already published.
Doesn't the fact that a people from long ago knew how to build the pyramids give you a hint that there is no new thing under the sun? A new day has arrived, but you still have a veil over your eyes. You stood for civil rights, but you refused to stand for human rights. You screamed for religious freedom, but you closed the door to spiritual liberty.
When asked to stand for truth, you debated the significance of knowing the truth, "To Be Or Not To Be…." You practiced the folly of philosophers.
Not Afraid to Call on His Name.
All the people who believed in God's word and were not afraid to call on His name and hearkened unto the signs that you were blinded to, you scorned and persecuted and mocked and called them all kinds of names, and tried to confuse them with flamboyant flashes of light, and silver and bounties of Gold.
But God be praised, your wisdom was confused when the believers stood before your magnificent offerings to pagan gods and said, "Silver and gold, silver and gold? I'd rather have Jesus than silver and gold!"
The men who are wise by their own doings, who are weaker by their own doings, will scream: Give me another chance! The elect, those who love the Lord, will say, "Even though there is trouble on the left of me, and there is trouble on the right, I will stand strong in the Lord and in the power of His might, because I know that trouble doesn't last forever. You see, soon I will be done with the troubles of this world. What do you mean, saints?"
Jesus said in John 14:26, I will send you a comforter. He will bring you into remembrance and teach you all things. He said, "all things." By the grace of God, the comforter is here. Give God praise for the Holy Spirit. He has come to open the words and to make way for the Mighty Lamb of God.
This is not the end of it. We have seen the works of the Lord. We have seen earthquakes in diverse places, we have seen wars and wars and rumors of wars, but these things are but a shadow of things to come.
A period of tribulation is coming like none that has gone before us.
Time to Get Your Life Right.
The time is now to get your life right. The devil is saying, "Come with me." This devil could very well look a lot like your best friend. But never you mind what he looks like, or what he shows you. We war not with flesh and blood, but against principalities, and powers and rulers of darkness and wickedness in high places.
You see, the knowledge of this world can't help you. It has a limit. Go to the place where there are no limits. Give your life to Jesus, the one who cried for you, the one who bled and died for you, the one who was beaten for you with many stripes. By those stripes we are healed, delivered, and set free.
Open your door to spiritual liberty. Let the shackles of the flesh fall to the floor and rise above your worries, mounting up on wings like eagles, cresting the heights of the mountaintops, tipping their peaks with the tip of your wings. Sing a new song that only the angels can hear. Sing glory! Glory! Glory!
Give God Some Praise!
EDITOR'S NOTE: Rev. Bingham
can be reached by E-mail at
jamesrbingham@juno.com.
His phone number in Memphis is
901.785.5691.