For the past few months I have been asking myself more
intently than ever before, how do I come to know Christ? I mean, really know him. My quest for an
answer put me on a path that led to a profound paradigm shift in my personal
life. That journey began with one small verse in the book of Moses.
“…And Adam knew Eve his wife, and
she conceived and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the Lord;
wherefore he may not reject his words.
But behold, Cain hearkened not, saying:
Who is the Lord that I should know
him?” (Moses 5:16 Italics added)
For some reason while reading this verse, the words knew and know seemed to jump out of the page, and I felt impressed that I
really did not understand the meaning of the verb to know as written in this verse.
So, I decided to do some research.
I found that the word “know”
translates into the Hebrew verb, Yada. This Hebrew verb is familiar in our every day
conversation, such as when we say “Yada, yada, yada” to gloss over information
or to skip to the main point. (Yada
Drop, A ohio Columbus Drupal Development Co., 2014) However, the word Yada in Hebrew has a much
deeper meaning.
David J. Whittiker, a professor at BYU, expounded on the
word yada in this way:
Yada. Ancient Israel claimed a divine
relationship identified as a covenant between the people and God. This covenant
relationship, making Israel separate from her neighbors, demanded that ancient
Israelites have yada for their God, as he had for them. The Hebrew verb yada
(or da’ath) is usually translated “to know” or “to be acquainted with.” But the
covenant context adds both a mental and an emotional act. In Genesis 4:1, “Adam
yada Eve” (King James: “Adam knew Eve his wife”); that is, in their covenant
relationship they had mutual obligations
and mutual concerns [Gen. 4:1]. Adam acted out of concern, inner engagement, dedication, and
affection for Eve. The relationship summed up as yada was more than just
physical….Yada describes the covenant relationship of mutual obligation and
concern between God and Israel, his people.
(A Covenant People: Old Testament
Light on Modern Covenants. Ensign August
1980)
In this definition of Yada, to know is something we use to
describe a covenant or mutual obligation. Knowing someone requires concern,
inner engagement, dedication, and affection.
One author described Yada in these three ways:
1.
Yada
is engaging ourselves in such a way that we are investing ourselves with our
love and affection.
2.
Yada
is understanding the needs of those around us and taking care of them.
3.
Yada
is faithfully living out our covenant relationship with the LORD in every area
of our lives.
(Yada Drop, A Ohio Columbus Drupal Development Co., 2014)
In our relationship with God, Yada is both empowering and
humbling because it puts the obligation of knowing on the person who wants to
know. For example, if we look back on
Cain’s statement, “Who is the Lord that I
should know him,” it is not one of doubt, but of rebellion. Cain was not
saying who is God that he would ever make himself known to me, or offer
information about himself to me, but who is God that I should engage my love
and affection in knowing him? Who is God
that I should enter a covenant relationship with him? Looking down the road of Cain’s life, it
wasn’t Cain’s decision to love Satan more than God that caused all the
problems, but Cain’s decision first not to know, yada, God that created the domino effect leading to his perdition. By default, Cain’s original choice not to
love God led him to the choice to love Satan, and the story goes on from
there.
Learning this definition of Yada led to a long, deep
investigation of what it really means to know God. Or, in other words, what it really means to
dedicate and connect with God by showing Him my love and affection. I started looking up several scriptures and
cross references to find deeper meanings for the scriptures that reference the
word “know.” Here are some examples:
John 17:3 “And this
is life eternal that they might know
(Yada) thee the only true God and
Jesus Christ, whom thou has sent.”
Hosea 2:20 “I will
even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness: and thou shalt know (yada) the Lord.”
Mosiah 5:15 “For how knoweth
(yada) a man the master whom he has
not served, and who is a stranger unto him, and far from the thoughts and
intents of his heart? “ How can we know
God unless we are willing in a sense understand and take care of his needs by
serving and taking care of the needs of those around us. Or as it says in Matthew 25:40 “And
the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye
have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.”
Alma 10:5-6 (In this scripture, Almulek
is baring testimony about his personal conversion). “Nevertheless after all this, I never have
known much of the ways of the Lord, and his mysteries and marvelous power. I said never had known much of these things;
but behold, I mistake, for I have seen much of his mysteries and marvelous
power; yea, even in the preservation of the lives of this people.
Neverthe less, I did harden my
heart,…therefore, I knew concerning these things, yet I would not know (yada).”
I’d like to stop and look particularly
at Mosiah 26:26-28. Here an angel is prophesying
of the last days. In verse 25, the angel
prophecies about the second trump, referring to the resurrection for telestial
candidates or “those who received not the gospel of Christ neither the
testimony of Jesus” (D&C 76:82). In
Mosiah, the angel, speaking for Christ says,
“And then shall they know that I am the
Lord their God, that I am their Redeemer; but they would not be redeemed. And then
I will confess unto them that I never knew them; and they shall depart into
everlasting fire….Therefore I say unto you, that he that will not hear my
voice, the same shall not receive into my church, for him I will not receive at
the last day.”
This scripture holds a very different
idea of the word “To know,” because it is Christ who says, I never knew them. But, why would God say, “I never knew
you?”
Here is how I see it:
In a relationship, who has the greatest
control over the success of the relationship?
It is the person who chooses to love the least. In a relationship, who provides the greatest
potential? It is the person who chooses
to love the most.
In my relationship with God, who is
always the person who loves the least?
It is me. Therefore, who is in
control of the relationship? It is me. In our relationship with God, who is always
the person who loves the most? It is God. Therefore who always offers the greatest
potential in the relationship? It is God.
I am the one who is in control of my
relationship with God. It is my choice
whether I will turn to Him, know Him, and love Him, or turn away. However, all to often, I seek to control my
relationship with God by choosing to love less.
I do this when I choose not to submit my will to His. I do this when I refuse to be vulnerable
before the Lord, in fear of receiving more than I can bear. I choose this when my pride and feelings of
entitlement withhold me from loving God, because I feel that I deserve more
than he has already offered. And, by
living in control, I end up with darkness, misery, and loneliness. How selfish!
How foolish!
What I refuse to see in those moments
is that when I give myself to God by giving up my control, and allowing the
full potential of our relationship, I end up finding peace and happiness beyond
all degree. By sacrificing on the altar
my broken heart and contrite spirit, I allow my relationship to become
everything He would have it be: with powers, dominions, kingdoms and riches of
eternity beyond what I can fathom. How
great is my God!
In the context of sacrifice, I’d like
to end by contrasting the most recent scripture we discussed in Mosiah with the
words of a humble convert spoken of in Alma to help us to understand better how
we can come to know God personally and intimately. Here the great King of the Lamanites asks
Aaron what he must do to know God, to feel God’s love, and enter into his rest
in the eternities. Aaron explains that the
king must bow before God and ask for forgiveness of his sins. Note that what the Aaron’s instruction was
the sacrifice of his heart. He had to be
willing to lay on the alter so to speak all of his sins, short comings, covetings
and imperfections. (As an aside,
contrast this to what happened with Cain and his unwillingness to offer an
acceptable sacrifice to the Lord.)
Then without hesitation the King drops to his knees and
prays, “if there is a God, and if thou art God, wilt thou make thyself known
unto me, and I will give up all my sins to
know (yada) thee.” (Alma 22:17) In essence, here the king was saying that he
was willing to give up or sacrifice all that he had to enter a covenant with
God. He had no desire for control or to love less, he wanted God’s full
potential and fulfillment. His desire to
covenant with God outweighed any self righteousness, entitlement or lack of
vulnerability. He wanted to know God and
he was willing to give everything to enter into that covenant, even his deepest
sins.
Sacrifice is one of the greatest ways
we can come to know God personally and intimately. We can do this by sacrificing our time each
day to pray, read our scriptures, or serve in the Church. We sacrifice when we choose to let go of
unkind or unforgiving feelings towards others.
We sacrifice and thus mold our hearts to become more like Christ’s every
time we sacrifice the one thing we that is really ours to offer him: Our will.
It is my hope that each day I can
become more like the King of the Lamanites.
That I can drop to my knees each day and pray each day with a
willingness to give all that I have to know Him, and then get on my feet and do
all that I can to serve him. I know that
as I come to know God that I will receive the same reward that the King of the
Lamanites sought, “even peace in this world, and eternal life in the world to
come.” (D&C 59:23)
