"To Know In Part"

    The first man Adam succumbed to the temptation of seeking greater knowledge than he was equipped to possess - "Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it.  For in the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die… he did eat" (Genesis 2:17; 3:6).

    Conversely, the "second man" (the Lord Jesus Christ), willingly sacrificed omniscience (infinite knowledge) in order to redeem us from our sins - "But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father" (Mark 13:32).  

    Without sacrificing His divinity, the Lord Jesus took upon Himself the limitations of our humanity, including our incomplete possession of knowledge and facts.  This involves a sacrifice of incredible degree and proportion.  What would it be like to know all as God, but then to only "know in part" as man? (I Corinthians 13:9).  I find this aspect of our Savior's condescension to be among  the most wondrous revelations of His great love for us.  Indeed, consider how disturbing lack of knowledge and unawareness can be for ourselves, whose frame of reference involves far less than omniscience.  What would such experience be like for One with infinite knowledge as His eternal background and history?  We cannot even imagine such a challenge and the pains that would accompany not knowing.

    The Lord Jesus lived His earthly life in dependence upon His Father.  "The Son can do nothing of Himself… I live by the Father… the Father that dwelleth in Me, He doeth the works" (John  5:19; 6:57; 14:10).  He lived such a life as we live, as a human being reliant on God (again, without relinquishing the fact of His deity).  Our Savior thus knows what it means not to know.  He knows what it means to look to the Father for wisdom and knowledge.  He knows the question mark of the heart, as it were, as opposed to the Heavenly exclamation point of His pre-incarnate existence as the "from everlasting" Son of God (Psalm 90:2).  

    We do well to remember such sublime and solemn truth when we do not know facts that would seem to benefit us.  In comparison to the Lord Jesus, our challenge recedes into "light affliction" (II Corinthians 4:17).  Surely His was great affliction, to the degree He cried out in agonized bewilderment on the cross, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?!" (Matthew 27:46).  Our Lord was more than willing to bear such pain of heart and mind for our sakes in order to one day fully redeem us "to know, even as also I am known" (I Corinthians 13:12)

"The Father loveth the Son, and showeth him all things that Himself doeth: and He will show Him greater works than these, that ye may marvel."

(John 5:20)

Weekly Memory Verse

     Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them.

(Ephesians 5:11)