1 Corinthians 8:1-2 English Standard Version

Food Offered to Idols

1 Now concerning food offered to idols: we know that “all of us possess knowledge.” This “knowledge” puffs up, but love builds up. 2 If anyone imagines that he knows something, he does not yet know as he ought to know.

We all have knowledge but what makes anyone an academic?

As a noun it is a teacher or scholar in a college or institute of higher education. It is the institution that defines the academic.

The adjective is the pursuit of knowledge and its secondary definition explains its rhetorical irrelevance. “It’s largely academic.” That is knowledge for knowledge’s sake.

Here we must come to terms with knowing Christ Himself rather than the literary work of the bible.

A man of letters knows letters but does he know Christ? He can but it will not be seen in his academic achievements, it will be seen in how he loves.

Academically there is much to be learned from the bible but it has no value if it does not answer the question “What am I to do with so great a love?”

1 John 4:7-12 English Standard Version

God Is Love

7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.

It is not a question of “if” God loves us, He has proven that to us. His love in us is transformative and we are not what we were.

That is our witness.

John 1:1 English Standard Version

The Word Became Flesh

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

1 Peter 1:23 English Standard Version (ESV) since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God;

Hebrews 4:12 English Standard Version (ESV) For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

Numbers 23:19 English Standard Version (ESV) God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?

Do you believe that God does not lie? If God gave us His Word, then you must believe that He is good for His Word. His Word is true.

John 14:6 English Standard Version (ESV) Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

These are the component parts of God’s Word. Jesus is God. He is the imperishable seed. He abides in us who believe by faith. He is alive and active in our lives. He keeps His promises. He is the only way to come before the Father.

We have to place our faith in Jesus in order to activate His Word in us. Without faith we are nothing more than an academic.