LACK OF KNOWLEDGE by Oscar Sampson

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 18, 1901

LACK OF KNOWLEDGE.

By Oscar Sampson

OSCAR SAMPSON. (Kansas City, Kan.)

“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee.” These are solemn words. As we trace the history of God’s people, we can realize to some extent their import. When the Saviour beheld Jerusalem, He wept over it, and said: “If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes.” Because they did not have a knowledge of these things, they were destroyed. Christ reproved the Pharisees, saying, “O ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky; but can ye not discern the signs of the times?” God had given signs whereby they might know the time of their visitation. It was a lack of the knowledge of these signs that brought destruction upon them.

We are living in a time when a lack of a knowledge of the signs God has given us will bring destruction to us. Have we a knowledge of the great deception Satan is practicing in the world, and the greater ones he is going to practice, and that soon? Christ, our example, met Satan’s temptations with a “Thus saith the Lord.” If we have a knowledge of these deceptions, we can meet him likewise. Remember that Satan, through his agents, is going to “show great signs and wonders; insomuch that if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.” God says, in Joshua 1: 8: “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayst observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success.” “Thou shalt meditate therein.” Meditation brings knowledge. Knowledge is power. “The word of God is quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword.” A knowledge of the word of God is power against the great deceptions of Satan.

“This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be . . . lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof; from such turn away.” Here is a class who, Paul says, deny the power of God, because they love the pleasures of this world so much that they let them absorb their time instead of meditating upon God’s word. Again Paul says, “Thou hast known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.”

We should seek God, and meditate upon His word, that we may be able to escape the deceptions that are multiplying around us.

“If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.”