(Ver 1.1)  I was watching the news on TV and there was a policeman speaking about a crime that had just occurred.  He was on the news asking for people who were near the crime scene to come forward.  He then made this statement, “People don’t know what they know”.  In other words he was saying you might have been a witness to the crime and not realized that you were because you did not know it was a crime.  Maybe you happened upon the crime right after it happened and saw the culprits walking or running away from it.  Maybe you saw a car drive away from the scene and this is the key that will unlock the identities of the guilty parties.  He was clearly saying that someone saw something and that if they would come forward with this information it might be very important to solving the case.  When he said that statement, God spoke to me and said this is the way the Bible is.   People will read something in the Bible and not realize how important it is because they do not understand what it says and how it relates to other subjects in the Bible.  I wrote a very similar lesson a long time ago called “People Generally Don’t Know What They Don’t Know”.  If you did not read that article you should go back and review the concepts given.  They are very profound revelations.  Today’s subject while being very similar to this concept is also diametrically opposed to it.  In the first lesson you have the concept of not knowing the bridge is out and driving off of the missing expanse in the dark to your death.  If you would have just known that the bridge was out, then you would have been spared the tragic outcome.  This is a concept found in the prophet Hosea.  In this verse God reveals some very significant Bible truths to us:

Hos 4:6  My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.

It would appear to me from this verse that “Knowledge” is the key to not being destroyed in this world.  While this could apply to natural knowledge, this verse is speaking of spiritual things as being what is important to know.  The Law of God at the time of this writing represented the Words of God.  The Words of God are what is important for us to know.  Knowledge of the Word of God is the opposite of Ignorance of the Word of God.  A Lack of Knowledge is totally related to your current ignorance level.  So in the one case God says people perish from this world because they do not esteem the Word of God and count it as valuable to know.  They in effect kill themselves because they have rejected the truth.  This in effect, is not knowing what you do not know.  But, we also have the lesson today, which is very similar in nature.  You might know a little bit, but not understand the importance or significance of that knowledge because you lack the knowledge of how important it is to know or to share with others.  In the case of the policeman on the news someone held the missing link to identify the perpetrators but did not know that they had it.

Take for example, the virgin birth of Jesus.  There have actually been churches who have taught that the virgin birth is not important to know to be saved.  However, if Jesus was not born of a vrigin then He was just a man like me.  If you have read my lessons on “Understanding the Virgin Birth” then you already know this is not true.  To listen to an ignorant preacher who teaches something is not important in the Bible, is a very foolish thing to do.  You should never let any preacher do your Bible study for you, and that includes me!  If you hear me say something from the Bible then go and read your Bible and study it for yourself to see if it is true or not.  It is only the Bible that you have seen for yourself that will do you any good in life.  Your pastor’s Bible knowledge will not do you any good when Satan comes and attacks you.  If you are a Christian then the Spirit of God is also inside of you and if I say something wrong the Spirit of God inside of you will bear witness that I am wrong.  So you will have two witnesses that will always agree to show you the reality of every truth in the Bible.  The Bible says the Word of God and the Spirit of God will always agree and bear witness to the truth (1 John 5:7).

So today’s Bible lesson is not a long or complex something to do or understand.  It is actually a very simple concept of seeing what you have seen and then going back and figuring out if it was important.  I do this all the time when I study the Bible.  I constantly review my past Bible readings and notes for things that I may have learned but not fully understood.  I then use these little facts to build a greater knowledge of the truth when reading today’s Bible studies.  I think I have said this before, but it bears repeating for those to remember, that truth always builds upon truth.  When building a house of truth if your house is built upon false teachings then these are weaknesses that will cause your house to topple like a house of cards.  If you build your foundation on the rock of the Word of God, then your foundation is firm and unshakeable.  God’s Word is Truth, Jesus is Truth, but yet the Bible is written in a complex spiritual way that forces us to divide the truth correctly.  I wish I could say this was easy, but after over 20 years of studying the Bible, I am only a little bit closer to understanding everything that the Bible says.  So learn the lessons given today about recognizing that what you don’t know is important.  Then go and continue in your Bible studies to learn more.