Knowing God
In Part 1 of this series we started to discuss the pitfalls that so many of us face as we grapple with the disconnect between our experience and the promises of God. We talked about how important it is to start out with the right premise in order to arrive at the correct conclusions that make all the difference in our daily lives.We always start with Who God really is to access what He has provided for His kids. If you haven’t read Part 1, I suggest you do so first.
2 Peter 1:2 (TPT) says:
2 May grace and perfect peace cascade over you as you live in the rich knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.
What happens as you live in the rich knowledge of God and Christ? Grace and perfect peace cascade over you! Isn’t that amazing?!!
How much grace to you need?
How much peace are you craving?
It all comes through knowing God intimately – and that comes from spending time with Him. Dedicate time to simply practice communing with Him throughout your day. We’ll get back to this in a bit.
Everything We Need
2 Peter 1:3a (TPT) goes on to say
3 Everything we could ever need for life and complete devotion to God has already been deposited in us by his divine power.
What do we need? We need provision for our day to day lives. We also need God’s character displayed through us. Verse 3 says that this has already been deposited within us through His divine power! Not only that, but the rest of Verse 3b goes on to say:
For all this was lavished upon us through the rich experience of knowing him who has called us by name and invited us to come to him through a glorious manifestation of his goodness.
Lavish Provision
This was lavished upon us through knowing Jesus. Don’t you love that word lavish?! And it was not impersonal – you were called by name and invited to come to Him and experience all His manifested goodness! He doesn’t just want us to know of His goodness, but to experience His lavish goodness!
Provision is released through the rich experience of knowing Him. And He is a God Who longs for intimacy with His kids. You’re His favorite treasured thought. He is Love and you were created in Love (Ephesians 1:4)!
Connecting with Divinity
If this were not enough, verse 4 of 2 Peter 1 goes on to say:
4 As a result of this, he has given you magnificent promises that are beyond all price, so that through the power of these tremendous promises you can experience partnership with the divine nature, by which you have escaped the corrupt desires that are of the world.
God invites us to partake of His very nature. We are divine because He is Divine. We are God’s kids, and by that virtue, we are divine. We are as Christ right now (1 John 4:17). We are not big “G” God – we did not create ourselves or creation. But we are, indeed, little “g” gods (Psalm 82:6, John 10:34-35).
So, what does this have to do with manifesting the promises of God? Sitting with these earth shaking truths releases faith to receive what is already ours.
All these things are provided simply but lavishly by God’s grace.
And we access everything through faith (Ephesians 2: 6-9).
Romans 5:2 (NKJV) also says:
2 through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
So, faith definitely comes into play. However, we need to understand faith rightly, otherwise we can end up striving or feeling condemned for our “lack of faith.” God is clear – there is no condemnation in Him (Romans 8:1) and He wants us to operate from rest (Hebrews 4, Matthew 11:28-28, John 15:5). And we will pick up right here in the next in the series!
Much Love,
Catherine
