Finding Purpose in All of Life's Sorrows and JoysSample

Transform Knowledge into Purpose

Now, here’s another thing to consider. When you seek knowledge for the wrong reasons, it can sometimes absolve you of personal responsibility. It can justify your inaction. This snuck up on me in seminary. I had given myself to learning the Bible. Yet I found that the deeper I dove into the truths of Scripture and my own heart, the more I used my learning to bypass Scripture’s implications for my life. God was convicting me about some things, and I didn’t want to hear it. Yeah, I was digging, but I wasn’t looking for water. I was looking for an exit.

It is nothing new. Most people know Jesus’ parable of the good Samaritan (Luke 10:25–37). What most people fail to realize is why He told the parable in the first place. Jesus was responding to an expert in the law who had asked Him, Who is my neighbor? (v. 29). It seems innocent enough. But think about it. An expert in the law who doesn’t know his neighbor is analogous to a doctor who doesn’t know her patient. Something else is going on. This law expert was looking for a way out. He didn’t want to be everyone’s neighbor. All that expertise had only helped him sidestep one of God’s greatest commandments—“Love your neighbor as yourself” (v. 27). He was no different than the “good church-goin’ folk” in the parable who sidestepped one of their own, lying half-dead on the road.

Learning leads to lament. Knowledge, if pursued for the wrong reasons, can lead to self-deception. Does that mean you should leave it all behind? Not at all. Knowledge is one of God’s many gifts to us. It should be pursued. But you need to put it in its rightful place. You need to make it serve its rightful purpose. And this means directing your pursuit from a knowledge of something to a knowledge of Someone. If you want your knowledge to be purposeful, it must be personal.

Here’s what I mean. Let me introduce you to my guy Digger. We share the same birthday. I took Dee out to lunch once at Little Five Points in Atlanta. He’s homeless, but he hasn’t always been that way. He used to be an engineer at GM. Then his wife and son died in a car crash, and everything just fell apart. Dee went into a deep depression. Lost his job and his house. He wasn’t someone without knowledge. His knowledge just couldn’t save him. He needed people to know him, love him, and be with him as his life spiraled out of control. And this is true of so many on the streets. They aren’t stupid. Many, like Dee, are very smart. It’s just that what they know doesn’t count for much. They need relationships, support networks, and social opportunities.

I asked Dee what frustrates him most about the people who walk by him every day at Little Five Points. I expected to hear him complain about how they ignore a fellow human who is reaching out to them in need. Nope. He said his biggest frustration is seeing these people walk back and forth with no idea they depend upon God for everything. They just don’t know.

Dee helped me see so clearly. If you want your search for knowledge to draw water, if you want to get out of that bottomless pit, you need to get to the source. You need to know God.

Fam, it’s one thing to know about God, and another thing—as the late, great J. I. Packer said—to know God. Don’t get the two confused. Treat God like He’s something to know about, and you’ll end up no better than the expert in the law, looking for loopholes instead of loving his neighbor. But actually, knowing God is to know the One who knows you better than you know yourself. To know the One who knows the causes of brokenness in our lives and our world and can heal them. That’s the kind of personal knowledge you need.

Reflect

Have you ever used knowledge to justify inaction? What does it look like to evaluate your motivations when studying Scripture? Ask God to grant you wisdom in areas of your life where you are looking for purpose.