“But it was to us that God revealed these things by his Spirit. For his Spirit searches out everything and shows us God’s deep secrets. No one can know a person’s thoughts except that person’s own spirit, and no one can know God’s thoughts except God’s own Spirit. And we have received God’s Spirit (not the world’s spirit), so we can know the wonderful things God has freely given us.”
1 Corinthians 2:10-12 NLT
What were “these things” that God revealed “by His Spirit“? To answer that we have to rewind a bit in this letter to the Corinthian church, and we find that Paul was referring to “God’s Secret Plan” (1 Corinthians 2:1) and the “ … mystery of God—his plan that was previously hidden, even though he made it for our ultimate glory before the world began” (1 Corinthians 2:7).
Paul pointed out that a human being, relying on his or her own wisdom and knowledge, would not understand and appreciate what this secret and mysterious plan of God was. Today, we have so-called wise people who have rejected the things of God and replaced Him with strange, idolatrous ideologies that are at variance with His “secret plan”. Such Godless people cry out, “What do we need a God for – we have all the knowledge and wisdom that we need”. The old Sinatra song “I’ll do it my way” comes to mind. But David had come up against such people in his day, and he wrote Psalm 14. “Only fools say in their hearts, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, and their actions are evil; not one of them does good!” (Psalm 14:1). David continues in the next two verses, “The Lord looks down from heaven on the entire human race; he looks to see if anyone is truly wise, if anyone seeks God. But no, all have turned away; all have become corrupt. No one does good, not a single one!” Paul picked up this theme in Romans 1:18-19, “But God shows his anger from heaven against all sinful, wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness. They know the truth about God because he has made it obvious to them”. In Romans 1:22-23, Paul wrote, “Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship him as God or even give him thanks. And they began to think up foolish ideas of what God was like. As a result, their minds became dark and confused. Claiming to be wise, they instead became utter fools”. What a damning indictment of all those people today who are chasing after strange ideologies that even reject the order God has created, let alone His thoughts, thinking they know better. But as we read in Psalm 2:4, “But the one who rules in heaven laughs. The Lord scoffs at them“. And David finished Psalm 2 with “Submit to God’s royal son, or he will become angry, and you will be destroyed in the midst of all your activities— for his anger flares up in an instant. But what joy for all who take refuge in him!”.
But we can’t leave the terrible thoughts about what will happen to those people who have rejected God and have instead created ideological alternatives to replace Him. Back to Romans 1:24-27, “So God abandoned them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desired. As a result, they did vile and degrading things with each other’s bodies. They traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshipped and served the things God created instead of the Creator himself, who is worthy of eternal praise! Amen. That is why God abandoned them to their shameful desires. Even the women turned against the natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex with each other. And the men, instead of having normal sexual relations with women, burned with lust for each other. Men did shameful things with other men, and as a result of this sin, they suffered within themselves the penalty they deserved”. In the end, God has said to those “wise” people that their foolish behaviour has consequences, in that He will abandon them to their sinful practices. Genesis 6:3a reveals that God’s patience with errant and evil human beings has a limit, “Then the Lord said, ‘My Spirit will not contend with humans for ever, for they are mortal; …’“. Instead of saying to God “Your will be done”, they will hear Him say, “No – your will be done” and they will sadly end up facing the consequences of their sin.
Back to the thoughts of God. We can’t just sit down and logically think through ourselves, with the limited faculties that we have, about what God might be thinking. Such an approach is arrogant in the extreme. God has put in place a process within which His thoughts will be revealed to His people, believers like you and me, but to everyone else His thoughts will remain a secret. God has revealed His thoughts through his Spirit, the third person of the Trinity. The Members of the Trinity are in constant and intimate communication with each other, and those people who are filled with the Holy Spirit will find that they have access to God’s thoughts as well, as He graciously reveals to them. Paul wrote, “we can know the wonderful things God has freely given us” through “God’s own Spirit”. We mustn’t forget that God desires to communicate with His children. He wants to bridge the gulf between His spiritual world and our natural world. He did that through Jesus, and, as Jesus said to His disciples, “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you for ever – the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you” (John 14:16-17). Jesus ascended into Heaven, mission accomplished, but He left us His Spirit to lead and guide us. Of course, the Holy Spirit will not reveal to us all the thoughts of God at the same time. Such a data download would overwhelm us because God’s knowledge is far beyond, even infinitely beyond, what a human being can accept and understand. So the Holy Spirit gently and kindly reveals to us what God wants us to know with one aim – to help us to become more like His Son, Jesus.
So do we pilgrims desire to know the thoughts of God? Do we want to know and understand His plans for us? Are we open to hearing the whisperings of the Holy Spirit in our very souls, leading and guiding us in His ways? Of course, we are, and we pray every day for more of His revelation for our lives, plans, with instructions for the day and days ahead. This is the only way to complete our journey to Heaven. Jesus said, “ … ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me”(John 14:6). How do we know the way to the Father? Through Jesus and His Spirit, He reveals to us His secret thoughts, thoughts designed to make us more like Him.
Heavenly Father. We are indeed a blessed people, given access to Your thoughts. We pray for the ability to receive and understand them clearly day by day. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Being a Pilgrim 