[aron]

The Word presents us with the person of Jesus Christ, and Jesus Himself leads us to the Father.

So, if we think that we know the Word, does that keep us from knowing Jesus Christ, and thus the Father?

More and more I have to abandon what I thought I knew in order to progress at all. All those RecV footnotes which I read, the training outlines which I considered, and messages I sat through; they familiarized me with the Biblical text somewhat, but as tools or vehicles to "know" God I think that they were nearly useless.

As James73 says, "Witness Lee convinced people they needed (his) answers." He convinced us that his words and teachings and speakings were keys opening the Word of Christ and showing us details of the Father's kingdom. If we listened to Lee we could know God.

But what does the Word say?

"Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not."

and

"You have heard these things; look at them all. Will you not admit them? From now on I will tell you of new things, of hidden things unknown to you."

Like manna from heaven, we may partake of it and still ask what it is, without getting an answer.

The Word, Christlike, leads us into the "bright cloud of unknowing" where we acknowledge an awareness of but cannot fully understand our mysterious God. We sense God's glory, we wonder; we feel God's breath, and an entry of divine presence. And the deeper we may get, the deeper yet lies the mystery. Unlike Lee's teachings, our only consistent answer from the Word is to abandon what lies behind.

I like outlines; I find them neat, concise, and penetrating. I use schematics -- remember the "three parts of man" with the three concentric circles and the arrows? I still do that kind of thing, because something inside wants to try; it is an essential part of my curious nature. But to what extent that I abandon logic and just follow the receding horizons of God's Word, with each new depth suggesting further depths beyond, to that extent I can abide in the wonder and joy that I first felt when I confessed the name of Jesus Christ as Lord. On that day I didn't understand Christ, but I joyfully received Him.

"Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away."

The longer this journey lasts, the more I feel that true wisdom is surrendering to God's love. That was how my journey began, because that is the journey itself; it is intrinsically and essentially bound up in the revealed truth of God's Word, but the truth is not revealed knowledge, but rather revealed love. The Word continually leads us deeper and deeper into the surrender of love.

"God loved us so much that He sent His only Begotten Son..."