Every Christian is ignorant of their ignorance. Put another way, we have blind spots. The world even more so.
It’s possible to think you know something but not know it—to see, hear, and read truth; yet see not, hear not and perceive not (Matt. 13:13-15). There’s a way that may seem right to you, but its end is death (Prov. 14:12).
Is it even possible to be unaware of one’s personal state of misery? How can you be so wrong about your internal condition?
The Laodiceans claimed they were rich, increased with goods and in need of nothing, but the reality is, they knew not their depraved, wretched and miserable condition (Rev. 3). Is it even possible to be unaware of one’s personal state of misery? How can one be so wrong about their internal condition?
Paul says, “If any man think he knows anything, he knows nothing yet as he ought to know [it].” You can even think yourself to be something when you’re nothing and deceive yourself (Gal. 6:3). Eye has not seen, ear has not heard, nor has it even entered the realm of your imagination the things God has prepared for those who love Him (I Cor. 2:9); and His thoughts are not our thoughts, nor His ways our ways (Isa. 55:8,9).
David was unaware of his sin of murder and adultery and needed Nathan to give him a “straight testimony” (2 Sam. 12).
It was Jesus who said, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34).
It was Peter who bragged he would never betray His Lord, the reality being he did just that.
It was Peter who bragged he would never betray His Lord, the reality being he did just that. The heart is deceitful above all things; it’s desperately wicked and who in the world can know it? (Jer. 17:9). “The lips may express a poverty of soul that the heart does not acknowledge,” says Ellen White; and you can speak to God of your “poverty of spirit” while your heart is “swelling with the conceit of its own superior humility and exalted righteousness” (COL 159).
You can draw near to God with your lips but have your heart far from Him (Matt. 15:8). Because we’re unaware of our spiritual condition, we don’t even know what to pray for and need the Holy Spirit to pray for us! (Rom. 8:26). That’s why God does “exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think” because we’re often unaware of where we should go and what He desires us to be.
The disciples had the best Teacher that ever lived. Jesus attempted to have His sayings sink deep into their ears (Luke 9:44-45). But their blindness was too thick; their myopia too myopic. When the greatest event the world has ever witnessed took place at Gethsemane and Calvary, they were sleeping, soporific to the reality of realities. For similar reasons, the antediluvian world lost their only hope of salvation. They were living life as usual and knew not their fate until the rain began to fall (Matt. 24).
Christians think they’re saved when they’re actually lost, similar to how anorexics can appear chubby to themselves when they’re actually skinny.
Lot’s family took him to be joking (Gen. 19:14). And to many Christians, Jesus will come as a thief in the night (II Peter 3:10). We’re deluded into thinking everything’s ok, when things are anything but.
That’s how Satan dupes us.
We’re a generation that’s pure in our own eyes, but not washed from our filthiness (Prov. 30:12). Christians think they’re saved when they’re actually lost (Matt. 7:21-23), similar to how anorexics can appear chubby to themselves when they’re actually skinny.
You can also think you’re on God’s side when you’re on Satan’s. You can even kill in His name (John 16:2).
May we come to the realization that spiritual things are spiritually discerned (I Cor. 2:14).
May God open our eyes.
