The Greatest Gift from God is the Gift of Knowledge of Himself
“For this reason we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God” (Col. 9-10, 1Cor.12:8).
The evidence of God is shown to man from the beginning of time, and His creation testifies Him without words (Psalms 19). However, Yahweh also gives man the freedom of choice, growth, and discernment. The greatest gift that God gave humanity was the gift of knowledge of Himself.
From the beginning, Yahweh made Himself known to man in the garden of Eden and placed the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil in the center. If He had not wanted man to know Him and freely Love Him, He would not have planted that tree; He would have just made puppets (Genesis 2:9).
Unlike the gods of the Mesopotamians, who worshiped gods they had never known nor seen, and made sacrifices to appease their unknown gods for sustenance for themselves and their gods. Every human being worships a god, whether they know it or not; every human can reject God. He gave both trees. One to choose and one to reject; we can’t have both. Adam and Eve chose to eat the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil because they wanted to be like God.
The Knowledge of God is a gift by His grace. In the book of Jonah, God sent Jonah to the people of Nineveh, over six hundred miles away, to warn them to turn away from the evil and violence they had been committing, or they would be destroyed. The Ninevites, who worshiped other gods, never knew Yahweh, the God of heaven and earth and everything in them. Still, because they believed in gods, they were not going to test Him, so they repented and changed their ways, and the Lord God did not destroy the city of over 120,000 people and their livestock because they listened and obeyed; they took small steps.
However, the god Zeus/Satan, who could have been the god they worshiped, would have just destroyed them without warning. Yahweh was gracious enough to give them a chance, and in small steps they believed (Jonah 4). Their personal growth was obtained through obedience and application in small steps.
The knowledge of God gives individuals the skill of discernment to make wise decisions based on what they know about God and His virtues written throughout the Scriptures from Genesis to Revelation. For instance, the book of Psalms describes who He is and what He is like, and Proverbs is a book of wisdom and guidance to help discern and make wise decisions daily (Proverbs 1-31).
The greatest gift that God gave humanity was the gift of knowledge of Himself, because He desires to be known by all humanity and make His Presence known to them. He does not use brute force and mind, like the god Zeus, but by God’s grace, through His Son Jesus Christ, who is God in the flesh (John 3:16, Isaiah 9, Phil.4). It is through Christ that He helps people to become worthy of His calling on their lives and live fruitfully in everything that they do. It is by His Holy Spirit who dwells in His children that we can do His will, and that is to Love Him wholly and Love our neighbor; the two greatest commandments spoken by Jesus.
Lastly, the Ninevites did evil in God’s sight, but they repented and turned from their wicked ways and took small steps in the knowledge of God (Watson/Hill), so can you. You do not have to perform rituals to try to appease Him like other gods to give you what you want, or what you desire to come to pass; I believe that is why He made grandparents! We also need to remember Who He Is, Yahweh (I AM), the creator of all things; (I AM) Sovereign; everything works together for the good. In Genesis, after Yahweh created, He said, “It is good”, but when He created man and woman in His image, He said, “It is very good”.
It doesn’t matter what we are going through; we should remember first His Goodness, and second, what He has made is good. Whatever the outcome may be, we need to trust that He knows why (Prov. 3). His aim is at your heart, and the desires of your heart should be Him, not what you can get from Him. The desire of Yahweh’s heart is for His children to come to the knowledge of Him and seek Him in all things, Emanuel (God with us).
Works Cited
Holy Bible NKJV
References
Prometheus Bound (Aeschylus, pg.156) http://classics.mit.edu/Aeschylus/prometheus.html
Walton, John H., and Andrew E. Hill. Old Testament Today. 2nd ed., 2013.