(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

And what I want to talk about this morning is predominantly knowledge, the importance of knowledge. Now, the Bible here is telling us in Proverbs chapter 2 that if we will search and seek after knowledge, we'll find it. Now, many people today are not on a quest for knowledge as they should be. And many people downplay knowledge and doctrine and learning and things like that. But the Bible talks about this hundreds and hundreds of times, both Old and New Testament. And the hardest thing about putting this sermon together was just cutting out all the scriptures that I wouldn't have time to go over because there's so much information about this. But notice what he says there in chapter 2 verse 1. My son, if thou wilt receive my words and hide my commandments with thee so that thou incline thine ear unto wisdom and apply thine heart to other saints. So how are we going to get knowledge of wisdom? Well, according to verse 1, it comes from God's Word. He said you start out by inclining your ear to His Word, hiding His commandments with you. And then if you jump down to verse number 6, it says, for the Lord giveth wisdom. Out of His mouth come a knowledge and understanding. And so the first place that we're going to get knowledge, according to the Bible, is from the Bible itself, from God's Word. He is the source of all knowledge. Now, there are three words that you see over and over again in the book of Proverbs and really throughout the Bible. And those words are knowledge, understanding, and wisdom. And you see those over and over again. Now let me just briefly explain to you what those three words mean. Knowledge is basically information that you know. Knowledge is just when you know information. Understanding is when you know what that information means. You comprehend or understand that information. And then wisdom is when that information guides your life, it guides your decisions, it guides your actions. Those are the three stages. Now, you can't understand information that you don't have. And you can't have information guiding your life by way of wisdom if you don't have information. And so knowledge is really the first step in this process. Learning something, getting knowledge. And the Bible says that knowledge comes out of God's mouth. It comes from God's Word. But look what he says in verse 2. So that thou incline thine ear unto wisdom, and apply thine heart to understanding. Yea, if thou criest after knowledge, and liftest up thy voice for understanding. God's being dramatic here saying, you should be crying out and begging for knowledge. You know, you think of a baby or a small child. When they want something, what do they do? They cry out, they yell, they scream. It's the only thing they know how to do. And sometimes they're very frustrated at the fact that they can't communicate exactly what they want. Sometimes, for example, my youngest daughter Anna will cry out, you know, what do you want? What do you want? You know, they can't communicate. You know, do you want this? You have to show them everything. Is it water? Is it milk? Is it food? And then finally, you know, that's what I want. But that's the image that you get here of crying out, screaming out. Now, people today are screaming out for a lot of things. People today are crying out for more money or they're crying out for pleasure or comfort or fun or goods or this or that or the other. But what we really ought to be urgently begging for and seeking for and pleading for is knowledge. Why? Well, God's going to explain why knowledge is so important. He says in verse 4, if thou seekest her as silver, he's saying the pursuit of knowledge is a much more important pursuit than the pursuit of money. He says if thou pursueest her as silver and searches for her as for him treasures, then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord giveth wisdom, out of his mouth cometh knowledge and understanding. He layeth up sound wisdom for the righteous. He is a butler then that walketh rightly. He keepeth the paths of judgment and preserveth the way of his saints. Then shalt thou understand righteousness and judgment and equity. Yea, every good path. When wisdom enterth into thine heart and knowledge is pleasant unto thy soul, discretion shall preserve thee and understanding shall keep thee to deliver thee from the man, from the way of the evil man, from the man that speaketh forward things. Later on, he says in verse 16, to deliver thee from the strange woman, even from the stranger which flattereth with her words. You see, knowledge is the most important thing that you can have. And when you have knowledge, the Bible says you're not going to make a lot of the stupid mistakes that people make in life. The reason they make those mistakes is because they don't have knowledge. And because they don't have knowledge, they have no understanding. And because they have no knowledge, they can't have any wisdom. Because they can't apply knowledge that they don't have. And that's what wisdom is. It's knowledge being applied in your life. Now, you're not going to be delivered from the froward or wicked man who's going to deceive you and entrap you and he's going to rip you off or he's going to, maybe young ladies, he'll go out with you and deceive you and lead you down a long path. Young man, you're not going to be delivered from the wicked woman that's going to deceive you and flatter you and trick you and get you into sin unless you have knowledge. He said it's a lack of knowledge that leads people down these bad roads. They don't know what the truth is. And how many people I've talked to that have messed up their life and committed all kinds of sins and done all kinds of damage in their life that they cannot undo and they just say, Pastor Anderson, I wish that I would have known what I know now. I wish that when I was growing up in church I would have heard this kind of preaching and I would have known the things that I know now. I wouldn't have made the mistakes that I made. And how many mistakes do we make in our life? Not because we just willfully go out and do the wrong thing or not because we're just careless or foolish. It's because we just don't know that what we're doing is wrong. We just don't know that what we're doing is a foolish decision because we just simply haven't learned. When preachers preach inaccurate things, some of it is just not that they're trying to be a bad person. They just don't know that what they're saying is wrong. A lot of things that we do and say and the way we live our lives is wrong simply because we don't know. This is why knowledge is so important. And today knowledge is underrated. It's underrated. People downplay doctrine, knowledge, learning, and today church has become more of a place that we go to get a pick-me-up. And people go to church to come out feeling energized and recharged and refreshed. And that's all fine and dirty. But did you gain knowledge when you went to church? That's what I want to know. Did you gain knowledge? Because the Bible says that the reason that God gave us pastors and teachers and evangelists he said was for the edifying of the body of Christ, for the perfecting of the saints. He said till we all come to unity of the knowledge of Jesus Christ. He said grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And when we go to church we should go there to seek to gain more knowledge. Not just a pick-me-up. A pick-me-up will get you through the day. A pick-me-up will get you through the week. Knowledge will guide the rest of your life. When you actually learn something, when you actually learn the truths of God's Word, when you actually internalize and keep the commandments of God and His laws inside of you, and they guide your thinking process and your understanding and your wisdom, that's going to get you through your whole life. Not just a little five hour energy of a Baptist church. Five hour energy Baptist church. Where you show up and it gets you all worked up and pumped up and woo man I just feel so close to God. But you didn't learn anything that's going to guide your life. You're going to make the same dumb decision tomorrow that you made yesterday. You didn't learn anything. But the number one source of knowledge is through reading the Bible. He said out of God's mouth comes wisdom. Now you get a lot of knowledge at church because hopefully the Bible is being preached. But really most of your knowledge needs to come from your own personal Bible reading. That's why I highly recommend if you don't have something like this, like a little chart on how to read the Bible in one year, we have stacks come out there for free. Everything's always free. And Brother Garrett's got a big stack up. You can talk to him. You need to read the Bible cover to cover. If you've never read the Bible cover to cover you need to start right now and read it cover to cover and read the whole thing and start at the beginning and finish at the end and read the entire book at least one time. And if you've been saved for any length of time you need to be reading it at least once a year if not twice a year or three or four times a year. You need to be reading the Bible. You're not going to have the knowledge that you need to get you through life. And so many people today go to church for decades and they've never read the book through one time even. They don't know anything. Out of his mouth comes knowledge. You say, well I have a bachelor's degree. I have a master's degree. I have a doctor's degree. Out of his mouth comes knowledge. He is the source of understanding. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge but fools despise wisdom and instruction. Look how often this is brought up in Proverbs. We just saw that from chapter two. Jump back to chapter one. He says in chapter one verse one the Proverbs of Solomon the son of David king of Israel to know wisdom and instruction. He said that's the purpose of this book. To know wisdom. To know something. So that when you start reading Proverbs and when you're done reading it you know something that you didn't know when you started reading it. That's the purpose of reading. He said the purpose of the book is to know wisdom and instruction. To perceive the words of understanding. To receive the instruction of wisdom, justice and judgment and equity. To give subtlety to the simple. To the young man what? Knowledge and discretion. A wise man will hear and will increase learning and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels to understand a proverb and the interpretation. The words of the wise and the dark saints. You see when you read your Bible your purpose is to gain knowledge. That is why you should read the Bible. Now there are other reasons to read the Bible but the number one reason is to get knowledge. You see the more you read the Bible the more you're going to know about the Bible. And the more you know about the Bible the more you're going to understand how things in this life relate to the Bible. How things in your life relate to the Bible and the more you're going to be able to exercise wisdom to put that knowledge and to put that understanding into practice in a practical way in your life. You see today many go to church and they hear a very practical sermon. It's all about wisdom, wisdom, wisdom. Wisdom is nothing without knowledge because wisdom rests upon knowledge. Knowledge is the beginning. The information needed is the beginning. Jump if you would to chapter 3. Look at verse 1. My son, forget not my law. Again knowledge, knowing what God's laws are. You see part of the reason why people disobey God's laws is because they simply don't know what his laws are. How can you effectively obey God's laws if you don't even know what they are? Do you see how knowledge is the beginning to the obedient Christian life? He says, forget not my law but let thy heart keep my commandments for length of days and long life and peace shall they add to thee. He said, why is knowledge important? Well, because it will give you a longer life, because it will give you peace in your life, because it will give you mercy and truth and all these different things that you need. Jump down to verse 13. Happy is the man that findeth wisdom. Why is knowledge important? Because it will give you happiness in your life. Happy is the man that findeth wisdom and the man that getteth understanding. For the merchandise of it is better than the merchandise of silver and the gain thereof than fine gold. She is more precious than rubies and all the things that thou canst desire are not to be compared unto her. Length of days is in her right hand and in her left hand riches and honor. Her ways are ways of pleasantness and all her paths are peace. She is a tree of life to them that lay hold upon her and happy is everyone that retaineth her. You see, many people will say, I don't have time for church because I'm too busy working and making money. But what they don't understand is that wisdom stands there with riches in one hand and long life in the other hand and saying, look, you're going to get more money, you're going to make more money by learning wisdom and knowledge than by being a fool and going out and working and skipping the most important knowledge that's coming across the pulpit and coming through your daily Bible reading. You see how foolish it is to say, I don't have time to read my Bible, I don't have time to go to church, I'm too busy out working and making money. You know, God says, I can give you more riches than that. And I'm not a prosperity preacher, my goal is not to be rich, my goal is to get knowledge. I'm not out searching for rubies and silver and gold today. My life is a quest to learn the Bible, to gain knowledge, to gain understanding of the Bible, and then to gain the wisdom to live a life that's guided by the Bible. That is the most important goal in my life, not to be rich. But God says here that even riches come to those that are wise and knowledgeable, more than to those that are a fool. Think about it, my friend. He says in verse 19, the Lord by wisdom hath founded the earth. By understanding hath he established the heavens. By his knowledge the depths are broken up and the clouds drop down the dew. My son, let not them depart from thine eyes. Keep sound wisdom and discretion, so shall they be light unto thy soul and grace to thy neck. Then shalt thou walk in the way safely and thy foot shall not stumble. When thou liest down, thou shalt not be afraid. Yea, thou shalt lie down and thy sleep shall be sweet. Jump down to chapter 4 verse 1. Enter ye children the instruction of a father, and attend to no understanding, for I give you good doctrine, forsake ye not my law. For I was my father's son, tender and only beloved in the sight of my mother. He taught me also and said unto me, Let thy heart retain my words. He said, Memorize what I'm saying unto you. Keep my commandments and live, get wisdom, get understanding, forget it not, neither decline from the words of my mouth, forsake her not, and she shall preserve thee. Love her, and she shall keep thee. Wisdom is the principle thing. Therefore get wisdom, and with all thy getting, get understanding. Exalt her. He's saying, Look, do you get it? Chapter after chapter, chapter 1, chapter 2, chapter 3, chapter 4. He's saying, Get wisdom, get wisdom, get wisdom, get knowledge, get understanding. Learn, learn, be instructed. He's saying, This will correct all of your problems in your life. This will guide you. This will keep you. This will make you safe. This will make you profitable. This will make you wise. This will make you free from the snares of man and the snares of woman. He says, Get wisdom. Look at verse 7. Wisdom is the principle thing. What does principle mean? It means it's the number one thing. It comes from the word prince as in first, and it says, Wisdom is the principle thing. Therefore get wisdom. This ought to be the driving force of our life to learn something, to gain knowledge, to learn more about God's word and to learn His commandments so that we can have knowledge and understanding and wisdom. We ought to exalt wisdom. We ought to exalt knowledge. We ought to lift it up as something to be attained for, verse 8. And she shall promote thee. She shall bring thee to honor when thou dost embrace her. She shall give to thine head an ornament of grace. A crown of glory shall she deliver to thee. Hear, O my son, and receive my sayings, and the years of thy life shall be many. I have taught thee in the way of wisdom. I have led thee in a right path. When thou goest, thy steps shall not be straight, and when thou runnest, thou shalt not stumble. Take fast hold of instruction. Let her not go. Keep her, for she is thy life. He says, look at that again, lay, take fast hold of instruction. What does that mean? He's saying grab on to instruction and hold on for dear life and don't let go. You know, you think of a dog, and you ever have one of those dogs that just bites onto something and just will not let go of it? And I remember we used to do this with my dog, and okay, maybe this was a little bit cruel, but we would hold something out for it, and it would bite onto that toy, like let's say a rope type bone or something, you know those ones that are made out of rope, and it would bite onto it, and it would literally just lift it off the ground, and it would be like grrrrr. Now, I don't really play with my dogs that much. The dogs that I have at my house are pretty much just for watchdogs. I don't really spend a lot of time playing with them, but sometimes when I'm over at my mom's house, she has a dog that I really like. She has a Boston Terrier, and I grew up, and we raised up Boston Terriers, and she has this Boston Terrier, and she has this really slippery wood floor, and my favorite thing to do when I'm at my mom's house in Sacramento is I get the dog toy like that, and I let the dog bite the toy, and I just like to just like swing it around the floor, and it just kind of slides around on its stomach, and it just will not let go. It's just sliding all over the place, and then my sister Lisa has a Boston Terrier and I do the same thing. It's biting on. It's holding on for dear life. It will not let go, and sometimes you have to sit there and cry their jaw hard to get it away from it. He's saying, take fast hold on instruction. Let her not go. Keep her, for she is thy life. He's saying hang on to it for dear life. Now what is instruction? Instruction is someone teaching you knowledge. See, knowledge is what you get, the information you get. Instruction is when somebody else gives you knowledge. That could be through God giving you knowledge as you read the Bible, coming to church, listening to the preaching of God's word, you're being instructed other places. Maybe you're at your job, and someone takes you aside and instructs you on how to better perform your job. Some people have an attitude of oh yeah, I know everything. Other people want to learn. They want to be instructed. They want to be taught. They're constantly trying to learn new things because they know they're going to be better at their job if they can learn more. He's saying hold on to it for dear life, as if your life depended on it, as if you're holding on and you know that as soon as you let go you're dead. Picture yourself hanging off a cliff and you're holding on to something for dear life. He says that is how critical it is for you to hold on to instruction. That's how important it is to learn. That's how important it is to show up to church and be instructed in God's word. That's how important it is to open your Bible every morning and read it to learn something, to gain knowledge. He's saying it's your life. Your whole life is depending on this. The failure of your marriage is in the balance. Your child rearing and the success or failure of raising your children all rests upon the knowledge that you're going to get from God's word. Your job, your business, your health, everything, everything hangs on wisdom, knowledge, and understanding. Go to chapter 5. It goes on and on. It says in verse 1, my son attend unto my wisdom and bow thine ear to my understanding that thou mayest regard discretion and that thy lips may keep knowledge. He says in Proverbs chapter 8, if you flip over there, Proverbs chapter 8. He says in verse 8, all the words of my mouth are in righteousness. There's nothing forward or perverse in them. They are all plain to him that understand it and write to them that find knowledge. Receive my instruction and not silver and knowledge rather than choice gold for wisdom is better than rubies and all the things that may be desired are not to be compared to it. I wisdom dwell with prudence and find out knowledge of witty inventions. The fear of the Lord is to hate evil. Pride and arrogance and the evil way in the forward mouth do I hate. Counsel is mine and sound wisdom. I am understanding. I have strength. By me kings reign and the princes decree justice. By me princes rule and nobles, even all the judges of the earth. I love them that love me and those that seek me early shall find me. Knowledge is something that we need to seek early in life. Now no matter what stage of life you're in, obviously it's never too late to start searching after knowledge, but the earlier you begin this quest for knowledge the better. If you're a child and you're a young person, don't just blow off the quest for knowledge and just live a life of fun and games and video games and ice cream and candy and play. Take the time to learn and to study and to grow and to be instructed and to get understanding early in life. Now I thank God for the Bible reading I did as a child, but honestly I wish I would have done a lot more. My children know a lot more about the Bible than I did at their age, but I thank God for every bit of Bible that I read because it did keep me from making a lot of bad decisions. It did guide me into a lot of good paths, but honestly I just wish I would have read a lot more and that's why I'm glad that my children are learning and reading more. But if you're wise children, teenagers, you will learn these things early because then they can guide you for your whole life. You see if you learn things later in life, well then all the life that you lived up to that point, you didn't have that piece of information, you didn't have that knowledge. You're going to make all kinds of mistakes when you don't have the right knowledge. Now I've got tons more here in Proverbs. I'm going to get out of Proverbs because I just have page after page after page of stuff in Proverbs. Let's go to the New Testament though. Go if you would to 1 Timothy chapter 2. I've got a lot to do in New Testament here, but we'll get out of Proverbs. Because really I can just sit here and read the whole book of Proverbs to you. And notice the Proverbs are written to a young man it says in verse 1. He said if this is to a young man, he's saying I'm trying to save you the heartache of destroying your life. I'm trying to save you the heartache of going out and filling your body with disease and going out and wasting all your money on riotous living and flushing it all down the toilet. I'm trying to save you the heartache that fornication is going to cause you and that adultery is going to cause you and that all the mistakes that you can make in life are going to cause you. I'm trying to help you to live a life that's pleasing in the eyes of God. And you can almost get the feeling as you read the book of Proverbs. I don't know about you, but when I read the book of Proverbs I just get the picture of a father just grabbing his son and just shaking him saying please listen to me. Don't be a fool. I mean he says over and over again don't be a fool. Listen to me. Get knowledge. Listen. Learn. Read. Study. You must have knowledge and wisdom and understanding. Now here's the thing. You say why are you preaching this sermon Pastor Anderson? Well number one is to try to get you to understand the importance of reading your Bible. Because that is the most important source of knowledge. And reading the Bible is where it begins. But number two is because I feel like our society as a whole has been dumbed down. Now part of the reason why our society as a whole has been dumbed down is because the school system has been dumbed down and people are relying upon school to educate them. And so because they rely on school to educate them or even people who own school they use the public school system as the measuring stick and say well my kid is one or two grades ahead of the public school system so therefore my kid is learning everything they need to learn. But in reality that is not what we ought to be comparing ourselves to. Because the public school system is so dumbed down it is ridiculous my friend. And it's interesting if you read it. I read a lot of history books. If you read historical books and you've often heard people talk about famous people of the past and say oh that guy only had a fifth grade education. Or that guy only had an eighth grade education. You ever hear of stuff like that? But what they're not telling you is that his fifth grade education from the 1800s knew more than a college graduate today. And that when he was twelve and quit school he'd already learned more than people graduating from ASU. That's what they're not telling you. What they're not telling you is that when Samuel Adams the father of the American Revolution graduated from elementary school he had to get up and give a speech in Latin that he composed himself and speak it in front of a crowd in Latin as part of his final exam. That's what they're not telling you about his elementary school education. And then he entered what I think he went to Cambridge. He went to a university he was like thirteen and it was normal. Okay because back then people had a higher degree of education. Today education has been purposely dumbed down because Satan desires to keep you ignorant in the darkness that's why. God never praises stupidity and ignorance and simplicity. God says how long you simple ones. He says fools hate knowledge. He says the simple need to gain wisdom and gain understanding and gain knowledge. Simple is not a compliment it's a derogatory word. And today we as a culture have been dumbed down. You say why would Satan want to dumb us down? Well so that we can make all the stupid mistakes that God said we're going to avoid if we have knowledge first of all. So we can make all these dumb mistakes and mess up our lives number one. Number two why does Satan want us dumbed down so that we can't understand the King James Bible? How many people do you try to show the King James Bible and they say oh that's way too hard to understand. No you just need to learn something. You're uneducated. There's nothing in this book that's archaic or outdated. Every single word in the book that I'm holding in my hand will be in the 2012 brand newest edition of Webster's desktop dictionary. Not even the big thick one. Just the basic one that goes on your desk. Any dictionary has every word in this book in it. There's nothing in this book. This book is written in modern English. The King James Bible look it up is called modern English. People say oh you're speaking in old English. Old English is a language that's so different that you can't even understand it. Let me quote for you some old English all right. That's old English. Does anybody understand anything I just said? That's old English. It's a poem. I'm not going to recite it to you. But the point is that's old English my friend. This is modern English and if you can't understand it it's because you're just dumbed down. Because you spend too much time text messaging and playing video games and watching TV. That's why you can't understand this book. You know when your language has been so dumbed down all you know is just sup dog. And you wonder why you can't understand the King James Bible. And literally I go out so many. I go out knocking doors and I try to give somebody the gospel and try to show them the Bible. I talked to a girl that was like 13. I was showing her about being saved. I said you know what forgiveness means? No. You don't like to forgive somebody? She's like what is that? She didn't even know what the word forgiveness means. Let alone are they going to know words like I'll ask people do you know what condemnation means? Condemn? You know what it means when somebody is condemned and they don't know? Teenagers don't even know what the word condemn means. I mean is condemn really that hard a word? I mean just basic words forgive, condemn. You ask people just the most basic. You remember Samson in the Bible? No. Adam and Eve? No. Moses? Yeah something about him. Abraham? No. Just lack of knowledge. And sometimes I've had to sit there and to give somebody the gospel that was a teenager it sometimes took me as much as like 45 minutes. Because not only did I just have to give them the plan of salvation, but I had to sit there and define. I had to also just give them an education in the English language. Do you know what sin means? Sin? No. And then you've got to explain to them what sin means. You've got to explain to them what heaven is. You've got to explain to them what hell is. You've got to explain to them what it means for condemnation, being condemned. You have to explain to them what it means to forgive and redemption. You know they think that's recycling. They think that's when you turn in your bottle for five cents. They think that's redemption. And so what I'm trying to say is that the devil wants us to be dumb. And then we'll go down and get the dumb version. You know they'll go down to a Christian bookstore. Can I get the new Indian version that I need? Because I'm too dumb to understand the KTV. And they want it to be dumbed down. And look God is not going to be dumbed down. You need to get some smarts. You need to learn something. You know and these new Bibles they corrupt and pervert God's word but people are falling for them because they're like finally. Finally it's easy. Because it's on a third grade reading level. What kind of a God writes a book on a third grade reading level? I'd like to know. Do you really think that God and his infinite wisdom of the universe is packed into the reading level of an eight year old? And they brag about it. That just tells me that God didn't write it. That's all that means. Because it's dumbed down. Churches today are dumbed down. Schools today are dumbed down. But we as God's people need to rebel against this and say you know what I don't care what the standard is. I don't care what some standardized testing says or SAT or ACT or whatever. I don't care what the school system is doing. I don't care what the church down the street is doing. I don't care what I'm supposed to have as knowledge. I am going to learn and grow and I'm going to get as much knowledge as I can. And I'm going to be an intelligent person. I'm going to have knowledge. I'm going to have understanding. I'm going to have wisdom. I'm going to give instruction. I'm going to learn doctrine. I'm going to know the Bible. We ought not be sucked into this worldly garbage of ignorance and foolishness. We need to shut off the TV. Shut off the video game. Shut off all the partying and fun and get in a book and read something and learn something. I mean books today are what we need. Oh you mean a Kindle? No a book. I'm not against using a Kindle but personally it gives me a headache to stare at a screen all day. I'd rather pick up a book in my hand or look at it. But see a book today is what we need. Reading white pages, black ink. See there's no pictures. There's nothing exploding. It's not 3D. I don't put on 3D glasses to read my life. But it's amazing. Today everything is like that. You know it's funny because when I was a child I taught myself to play piano from piano books that I had. And my sister Ronnie taught me how to play three blind mice when I was a little kid. She taught me that one song and then from there I just learned from books. I just read books and taught myself how to play piano for years and years. And so I wanted to go to the music store and buy some of the same books that I had used when I was growing up to teach my children how to play piano. You know because I wanted to teach them the same way that I learned because then it would be easier for me to teach them. And you look at the books today and everything. It's like it gives me a headache to even look at the page. You open the book and you're like whoa. It's just all these bright colors. It's like this sensory overload on every page. Everything's just blowing up at you. You know then you get the old book and it's just like black and white and just telling you the information that you have to learn. And people say that's boring. Yeah but see knowledge is sweet under those that find it. People who are wise they love knowledge, they love instruction, they love learning. It's not like oh we got to make all learning fun. You know and so we got to just make it a big circus and put on a tutu and dance around to teach them one thing. You know instead of just telling kids to sit down and shut up and learn what they're supposed to learn. And therefore it's been done down. Therefore it's just all about a little fun learning time instead of an actual deep learning time of learning the knowledge of Timothy. Let's get to the New Testament here. Why is knowledge so important? Well number one it keeps you from making a lot of bad mistakes in your life because you didn't know better. Number two it helps you to understand the King James Bible and that's critical. But number three did you know that some people will even go to hell because of a lack of knowledge. They're not even saved and part of the reason why they're not saved is just because they don't know how to be saved. Look at what it says in 1 Timothy 2.4. It says who will have all men to be saved and to come unto the what? The knowledge of the truth. So in order to be saved you got to come to the knowledge of the truth. You got to know some things. You got to know that you're a sinner. You got to know that Jesus died on the cross. You got to know that he rose again. You got to know about heaven and hell. You got to know what it means to be saved. And you have to know what sin is. You have to know these basic words. Go to Romans chapter 10. Go back a few pages in your Bible to Romans. Romans chapter number 10. While you're turning there the Bible reads in Hosea 4.6 my people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. God says there that a lack of knowledge can destroy you. Because thou hast rejected knowledge I will also reject thee. Do you hear what God is saying? He's saying if you've rejected knowledge I'll reject thee. That's how serious God is about this. He says in verse number 1 of Romans 10, Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be saved. For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. So what he's saying in verse 2 is that their heart's in the right place, right? They have a zeal for God. Zeal is this burning desire to serve God. They have a zeal for God. They're excited about serving God. They're fired up about it. But it's not according to knowledge and he says they're not even saved. Why? For they being what? Look at verse 3. For they being what? Ignorant. What does ignorant mean? Lack of knowledge. You don't have the knowledge you need. He says they being ignorant of God's righteousness and going about to establish their own righteousness have not submitted themselves of the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. He's saying look, salvation is by believing in Christ. It's not by keeping the law. We've all broken God's laws. We're all sinners. But he's saying that his people in Israel, they don't know that. The Jews don't know that. They're trying to sit about and establish their own righteousness. He said my heart's desire is that they be saved and he's saying I know that the reason why many of them are not saved is they just don't have the knowledge. They're just ignorant. They just need somebody to come and instruct them and to tell them the truth. You see how important knowledge is? Right from the beginning, knowledge right there is essential for you to even get saved. You have to know some things. You have to understand some things to get saved. But then once you're saved, every stage of the Christian life there are things that you have to know and there's knowledge that you have to have in order to successfully get through the Christian life unscathed. Go to Romans 15 while you're in Romans. He says in Romans 15, 14, and I myself also am persuaded of you, my brethren, that ye also are full of goodness, watch this, filled with all knowledge, able also to admonish one another. Flip over one page to 1 Corinthians chapter 1. In 1 Corinthians 1 verse 5 it says that in everything ye are enriched by him in all utterance and in all knowledge. You don't have to turn there, but over and over again in the Bible. For example, 2 Corinthians 4, 6, you don't have to turn there. For God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God on the face of Jesus Christ. He says knowledge is light. Ignorance is darkness. He's saying God's word is like a light that shines knowledge into our heart and dispels the ignorance in our heart and helps us to know the truth. 2 Corinthians chapter 8 verse 7 says therefore is ye abound in everything, in faith and utterance and knowledge and in all diligence and in your love to us, see that ye abound in this grace also. Go, if you would, to 2 Peter chapter 1. The Bible says in Philippians 1 9, and this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment. Colossians 1 9, for this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. So there you have it all in one verse in the New Testament. Knowledge, understanding and wisdom all in one verse. Paul is saying I am praying for you that you will have these three things in your life. These are the three things that I am praying that you'll get. I'm not praying for you to get a new house. I'm not praying for you to get a new car. I'm not praying for you to get a new job. I'm praying that you'll have knowledge. I'm praying that you'll have understanding and I'm praying that you'll have wisdom because that can give you everything else you need in life. If you have the knowledge and the wisdom and understanding you need, you can do everything else you need to do in life. You'll know how to live your life. You'll know how to make a living. You'll know how to live for God because of knowledge. Now where did I get to in 2 Peter 1? Look at verse 5. Beside all this, beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, and to virtue knowledge, and to knowledge temperance, and to temperance patience, and to patience godliness, and to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness charity. For if these things within you and abound, they may make you that you shall be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, God wants us to be fruitful in our knowledge. He wants us to add to our knowledge temperance. He wants us to add to it these other things. But what do we have to have knowledge to build upon in our life? You cannot make the right decisions in your life without biblical knowledge. And that's why we need to stop underrating this and acting like, well, you know, it's just about where your heart's at. Have your heart in the right place, and as long as your intentions are good, God knows your heart, and you know, you'll be fine. No, because a lot of people have their heart in the right place, but because of a lack of knowledge, they'll make dumb decisions. They'll do foolish things because they don't know any better. Now, foolish people despise instruction. The Bible says, fools despise wisdom and instruction. You see, a wise person, when you come to that person and try to teach them something, they're happy. They're glad that you're doing that. Now, let me define this for you. Being taught something, or learning something, or being instructed in something, let me break this down very simply. It means that you didn't know something, right? And now at the end of it, you do know something. Now you say, why are you explaining that? That's too simple. Because this is key. Instruction, or learning, or gaining knowledge is when you don't know something, right? Somebody tells you something that you don't know, now you know it. Does everybody understand what I just explained? Okay. So, therefore, I like to ask people, whenever somebody goes to a church service or a sermon, a lot of times I ask them, you know, hey, how was church? And they'll say, great, it was an awesome service, like the best service. What did you learn in that sermon? That's what I like to ask. Now, there could be a good sermon that's just stirring you up and firing you up about things that you already know. But most of the time, you know, you're learning something. And when I walk out of a service and I say, that was a really great sermon, it's usually because I learned something. When I want to compliment a preacher, like I was thinking about my friend, Brother Roger Jimenez, you know, whenever I compliment his preaching, I always say to people, when they ask me about his preaching, I always say, you know what? Every time I listen to his sermons, I learn something. That's like the best compliment that I could give. Every time I listen to his preaching, I learn something. Now, what does it mean to learn something? It means that I know something now that I did not know when I started listening to that sermon. So, for example, I'll ask people sometimes, you know, so what did you learn in church? Or, you know, what did you learn in that sermon? And they'll say, oh, well, you know, basically I learned that, you know, you're supposed to love your neighbor as yourself. They'll say, well, did you already know that? Well, then you didn't learn anything. You know, or what did you learn? Well, I learned that, you know, if you believe on Jesus Christ, you'll be saved. Well, did you already know that? You know, learning is something new. But here's the thing. And then you say, where are you going with this? Why are you talking about this? Because you know what? There are people who want to come to church. Listen to me carefully. This is the point I'm trying to make. This is why I just explained that for the last few minutes. There are people who want to come to church and be told things that they already know over and over again. And as soon as you tell them something that they don't know, this is what they'll say. I've never heard that before. You know what I'm talking about? I've never heard that before. I've been in church all these years. I've never heard that anywhere. I'm going to go somewhere else. It's true. Folks, if you've never heard it before, you just learned something. That's great. You ought to be jumping up and down saying, I've never heard that before. This is great. But there's like, well, I know everything. So if I've never heard it before, it must not be true. Because I've been in church for X amount of years and I already know everything. But that's a very foolish mentality. Because you know, I've been in church my whole life. I've read the Bible cover to cover scores of times. I've memorized many old books of the Bible. But guess what? Every time I listen to Brother Jimenez preach, I learn something. And when I go to other services and listen to people, I always learn something. I love to learn. And I walk out of a service where I learn nothing, a little bit disappointed. No matter how much the pastor was screaming and yelling and beating the pulpit and swinging from the ceiling, if I didn't learn something, I'm disappointed. Because to me, wisdom is the principle thing. To me, I'm on a quest for knowledge. I'm seeking instruction. I want doctrine. I want to learn. I want to grow in knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. And so people who have an attitude that says, well, if I hear any doctrine that's different than what I'm used to and if it's something new to me, it must not be true. That's a know-it-all mentality. Because when you hear something, you shouldn't just say, well, I've never heard that before. What you ought to say is, well, is that what the Bible said? And you can sit there sometimes and point blank show people things in the Bible. Because I try not to just get up and preach my opinion. I mean, when I preach, I'm showing verses and saying, hey, this is why I believe what I believe. And you'll show people things point blank in the Bible and say, there it is. I've never heard that before. So what? Thank you for the compliment that I'm actually teaching you something new. Because if you'd heard everything that I'm saying before, then what is the point of even coming to church? I mean, it's ridiculous to me to go to church week after week and to hear the same things that you've already heard before. What would be the point? The whole point is you're trying to learn. You're trying to grow. You're trying to move forward. And so we need to get an attitude that says, you know what? I want to learn something new. Now, sometimes learning something new involves somebody correcting you. Sometimes it involves people telling you things that you don't want to hear. Sometimes when you learn things in the Bible, they're not fun to learn because they expose the sin in your life. Maybe it's something that you've been doing with your life and the Bible tells you it's wrong. Well, but that's part of learning. That's part of growing. And when you learn something new, you ought to thank God and rejoice and be thankful to the person who taught you instead of sitting there and saying, well, I always heard it was this other way. Well, guess what? You just learned that your way was wrong because you just saw it in the Bible. And the Bible has got to be the final authority. The Bible is the source of all knowledge. And so if you hear stuff that I preach that you don't like, well, maybe I just made it up. But if I'm sitting there and showing it to you from the Bible, your disagreement is not with me. It's with the Bible. And if you've got a disagreement with anything I preach, it should be because of something that you know in the Bible that you could show me and say, well, this is why you're wrong because it says right here that you're wrong. Not just I've never heard that. That's dumb. That's not a valid argument. And so we need to understand that knowledge is the best. And look, I've had a lot of people get mad at me because the stuff that I've preached and a lot of it was just based on a lack of knowledge on their part. Like you'll preach things to people and they'll say, the Bible doesn't say that anywhere. The Bible doesn't teach that. They just didn't read it in the Bible. Now, if you read the Bible, you're going to be able to discern and judge between what's right and wrong because you should never go to church and just blindly believe what the preacher's preaching, whether it's this preacher or any other preacher. And the Bible says that those in Berea, they searched the scriptures daily to see whether those things were so. And the things that they were searching, whether it was so or not, was what the preaching was in church. So when you come to church and you hear me preach something, you should have so much knowledge in your mind from all the Bible that you've been reading. You have all this knowledge. And when Pastor Anderson preaches something, you're thinking about it and you're saying, yes, that lines up what I've been reading. Or something pops into your mind, a red flag saying, wait a minute, that contradicts something else in the Bible. You know, I remember I was sitting in a service when I was a pastor and said, you know, you don't need God's word to save you. He said, you know, you just need the truth. It's just the truth that saves you. You don't need a Bible to get saved. Nobody has to show you verses from the Bible. He said, you don't need it. He said, it's just the truth. He said, you should know the truth and the truth shall make you free. And all these resounding amens came from the crowd. Amen. Amen. That's right. But you know what? Immediately my mind went to John chapter 8 and I immediately just, boom, I just went, you know what? John chapter 8. John chapter 3, the truth shall make you free. And I backed up in my mind a few verses where he said, if you continue in my word, then are you my disciples indeed. And you should know the truth and the truth shall make you free. If you just went back one verse, he said that the truth came from the word. And if you would have gone a few chapters forward, Jesus said, sanctify them through thy truth. Thy word is truth. That's right. But the Bible says in John chapter 8, many, it says when they heard the words which he spake, they believed on him. Then said he unto those Jews which believed on him, if you continue in my word, then are you my disciples indeed and you should know the truth and the truth shall make you free. Why all the amens? Because the people didn't know. They didn't even know what John chapter 8 said. They had no clue where it was quoted from. And what he said sounded good. It made perfect sense if you don't know the Bible. If you don't know all the scores, the verse is telling you that you must have the word of God to be saved. And that God's word is what saves us. And that faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. I mean, there's all these different scriptures. But if you don't know that, you're going to be deceived by a false prophet. Many people, they get into marriages and then they get divorced and they marry somebody else, get divorced, marry somebody else, and you know what? They don't even know that that's wrong. Because our society is not going to tell us it's wrong. There are even young people today growing up that literally commit fornication and no one has even told them that it's wrong. I mean, isn't that a strange thought? I mean, you'd think that they would just instinctively know, hey, you're supposed to be married before you do this. But our society is becoming so heathen that some people have never even been exposed to that doctrine. They don't even know. They have no clue. And so they go through life, commit fornication, and then they have all these scars from it, and then it's just, man, I just wish I would have known. And how many people I've talked to said that, I wish I would have known if only I had known. If you're young today, let those words sink in your ears and decide, you know what, I'm not going to say that someday. I'm going to learn it now. And look, I'm not preaching against people who have made mistakes in life that are older and that you've already screwed things up in some ways. And you know what? Nobody's perfect. We've all made mistakes in our life and had problems. But you know what? To the young people, though, I want to make sure that they know the truth and that they start out right and that they understand things and that they have wisdom from the beginning to do the right things and make the right decisions in life. Go to Luke 16 quickly and I'll close with this. Luke 16. See, people make foolish decisions and they do things because they don't know. And the reason they don't know is because they didn't get instructed. Instruction is something, remember, that you're supposed to bite onto and hold onto. It's your life. Don't let go. Remember the illustration with the dog? But many people, when they get instruction, when they get taught something, they don't bite down on it and say, oh man, finally a church that's teaching me something new. Finally I'm learning something new. Or their parents. Children, when your mom and dad take you aside and teach you something, you ought to thank God for that because some parents don't take the time to teach their children things. And whenever your mother or your father says, son, daughter, let me teach you something, let me sit you down and teach you something, don't have this attitude that says, oh, I already know that, I already know that. No. Listen to that. Take heed to that. And thank God that your mother and father are taking the time to instruct you because it's more valuable than gold. You see, my parents did not leave me a huge inheritance. I don't know if they ever will. But honestly, I don't desire a huge inheritance from my parents. You know what I'm thankful for? That my parents gave me something that is more valuable than gold. My parents taught me things. My parents took me to church and they taught me the Bible and they taught me the doctrines of salvation. They taught me doctrines of the Bible. That is so much more valuable than any money. I mean, everybody just, oh, wouldn't that be so great if you had this uncle or grandfather and he's going to leave you $500,000 or a million dollars? That million dollars will destroy your life. Knowledge and wisdom will save your life. It will give you a great life. It's the principle thing. It's everything. The Bible says in verse 13 of chapter 16, he says, no servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. Now, mammon there is referring to money. And if you remember that the Bible kept saying over and over again in Psalms in almost every chapter, he kept comparing searching for wisdom and knowledge and understanding to searching after what? Silver, gold, rubies, money. He said there's two people, two kinds of people in this world. There are those who give their lives to just getting as much gold and silver and rubies and money and things as they can into their hands. And then there are others that are serving God with their life. They are trying to get as much knowledge as they can, to learn as much as they can, to get as much wisdom as they can, to be in church as much as they can, to read the Bible as much as they can, to memorize the Bible as much as they can, to learn about other things in this world, to be a knowledgeable, wise person. He says you can't serve God and mammon. These are two different pursuits of your life. And the Pharisees also, which were covetous, they're the ones who love money, heard all these things and they derived at him. And he said unto them, Ye are they which justify yourselves before men, but God knoweth your hearts. For that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God. The law and the prophets were until John. Since that time the kingdom of God is preached and every man presseth into it. And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass than one tiggle of the law to fail. Whosoever putteth away his wife and marrieth another, comitteth adultery. And whosoever marrieth heard that is put away from her husband, comitteth adultery. Now, there are a lot of people who don't know that. Who thinks that there are a lot of people who don't know what I just read in verse 18 that probably never heard that before in their life. And yet there it is in black and white, crystal clear, when I thank God that when I got married I knew that that verse was in the Bible. Because somebody taught it to me. Somebody preached it to me. And that saved me from making mistakes in my life because that verse taught me the truth. And you know what? I'm glad I knew that. Because a lot of people didn't know that. And then they make all kinds of mistakes and they're like, oh man I didn't even know that. I didn't realize that. Jesus' disciples didn't even know that. Because when He preached that to them they're like, what really? In Matthew 19. He had to tell it to them twice because they couldn't even believe it. It just blew them away. But it's the truth. The Bible says right there that whosoever putteth away his wife, that means divorces his wife, and marrieth another, commits adultery. Most people don't know that. Most people don't know even that if you look up a woman to lust after her you've committed adultery. A lot of people don't know that. My wife said that she was always taught growing up and she always heard that you know, whatever you think, this is what she was taught as a child. You can think whatever you want, but it's just what you say and do that you have to be careful of. Is that biblical? The Bible says the thought of foolishness is sin. And so someone can spend their life lusting and thinking dirty thoughts in their mind and thinking it's okay. Somebody can get married, divorced, remarried, think it's okay. Somebody can go through life, girls stripped down into bikinis and bathing suits. They think it's okay. Why not? And people can commit all kinds of sins because they've never even heard that it's a sin. They don't even know. How can you keep God's commandments if you don't know them? How can you make decisions in life without knowing what the Bible says? Look, I have been saved for 24 years. I've been reading the Bible and every day I have a feeling, man, I need to learn more. I'm God. I lack knowledge. And that's why I gravitate toward preaching where I can learn something. That's why I read my Bible, to learn. And if you're wise, you'll get a mentality that says, I want to learn. I want knowledge. You'll get up every morning, get one of these charts or another chart like it, read your Bible every day. Your life depends on it. And come to church, man, be here when the doors are open because you're missing out on knowledge when you're not here. There's stuff that you couldn't learn, and later on you'll need it, but you won't have it because you didn't learn it because you weren't there. Let's pardon that word of prayer. Father, please just give us wisdom, dear God. And I know that you said in James that if any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God that give it to all men liberally and a brain that not and it shall be given him. And so, Father, I'm praying right now that you would give me wisdom. Help me to gain the knowledge that I need to learn in my life, Father. Help me to understand the Bible. Help everyone who's here to understand your word as they read it, dear God. And there are some people here that are under the sound of my voice who, you know, they won't touch their Bible until next Sunday, maybe, but, Father, their life will be destroyed. And so I pray that whoever that is that hasn't even looked at their Bible since last Sunday or hasn't even looked at their Bible since Wednesday, Father, I pray that they would please just understand the urgency of this sermon and bite down and hold on to knowledge and to open that book tomorrow morning and Tuesday morning and Wednesday morning and read it, study it, meditate on it and to just soak it up like a sponge, dear God. We need knowledge and it will be destroyed without it. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.