Unveiling God: Discovering His Presence and Power

In this episode, we dive into the profound question: Is God knowable? Drawing from Psalms 42, John 17, and Philippians 3, the discussion unpacks the journey of seeking and experiencing a relationship with God. From the analogy of a deer longing for water to the unveiling of spiritual truths, the episode highlights how Jesus bridges the gap between humanity and God.

Discover how the "veil" that separates us from knowing God can be removed, allowing us to step into a deeper connection with Him. Hear engaging stories of faith in action, from a near-miraculous moment with a spinning car to finding God's presence in the everyday.

Whether you're seeking inspiration, theological insight, or a fresh perspective on faith, this episode is a reminder that God is not only real but deeply personal and relational.

Tune in as we explore how to walk by faith, find God in creation, and embrace the lifelong journey of knowing Him.

Transcript

Thank you. Jesus, man, I love Christmas time. I'm not sure there's any times I don't really like. I like em all. Thanksgiving. That's my favorite Christmas. It's my favorite. You know what time of the year is my favorite? The one that I'm in and breathing. Oh, thank you, Jesus. Praise the Lord. All right, so we're going to jump in. Now here's what I need from you okay I am going to give you if this was if it was a different crowd. That's not as smart as you guys. This would take me three weeks. But you guys are pretty smart. So I'm going to be able to push this in less than 45 minutes in Jesus name, because you guys are smart, but you're going to have to keep up with me. Okay? We're going to go through some stuff everywhere I go in the things I want to share with you this morning, everywhere I go, I found myself wanting to spend a lot of time there. Now don't make me too loud back there, okay? Thank you. If I get, I get a little excited. The problem is, if he makes me loud when I'm not excited and when I get excited and it's really, really loud. Oh thank you. I'm in Psalms chapter 42. That's in the best way to find Psalms, by the way. It's exactly in the middle of your Bible. Okay, maybe not the best way, but it is exactly in the middle of your Bible Psalms. I'm in Psalms 42, and I guess I don't know if that one is right exactly in the middle or not. Somebody count the pages for me. No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. Psalms 42. Man, we had a lot of fun last night. It was a that that that, uh, progressive dinner is a blast, man. We had food and food and then some more food. Oh, I'm sorry, I'm trying to get there. Psalms 42. Uh, I'm in the King James. I don't know what version you had, so I don't know what word they use in your particular Bible, but it starts out as the heart panted for the water brooks. Now, that word heart is not heart like heart. You know this heart. It's a different word there. Actually, the word translated means a small animal. Or the best answer for us to understand was a deer. So it sounds a little weird. The heart. But if you went to the original, it was referring to a particular animal that was the most similar to what we would call a deer. And he says might as a deer pants after the water, so does my soul. Long after you, O God, my soul searches for God, or thirsts for God, the living God. When shall I come and appear before God said my soul like a like a deer in the summer looking for water. That's how my soul longs after you. My soul longs after you. In John chapter 17 and in Matthew, Mark, Luke, John chapter 17, verse three, John 17, verse three. Every time I start doing this, I always think of my Aunt Adela. She used to sit in and I would go Psalms or John 17 three and she always wanted to go bingo. And I for some reason I sounded like a bingo announcer. I don't know why. John 17 three. Jesus is praying, and he's praying for for his church, for the disciples, for for he's his crucifixion. He's praying before the Lord. Right before this is that night. Remember when Jesus went to pray and he comes back and he keeps finding his disciples asleep and he's like waking him up. So he is praying now, intently praying for you here. And so that's where we're at in this particular place is where God's praying and in 17 three said, and this is life eternal, that they might know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you sent, said, this is the thing that there's other stuff. But he said, this is one of the things I'm praying right now that they, the people of this earth, might know you. The only true God said, this is the big one, said, this is one of the big ones right here. I want them to know you, the only true God. So first of all, I want I want to deal with a couple of interesting issues. And man, this is where I've got to be careful because I'd really like to. There's so much information I'd like to. When I started this, I'm like, oh, we can talk about that and about that and about that. And I'm like, no, cross all that out because we've got to shorten it because they say, if you're not a good preacher, preach short and everybody likes it better. So I'm trying to shorten it. I'm trying to get it down there. And so but this is interesting. Is God knowable? This is the biggest one of the largest theological discussions in our world today. Is, is God knowable? Because maybe you don't know this, and I'm sure you've heard of people, these group of people I can't think of what atheists, I think is what they call themselves atheists. Atheists are divided into many different groups. There's not like one group. They say atheist. That doesn't mean they all believe the same thing. In actuality, that is not the case. They actually are very far apart on what they actually believe. Um, because if you don't have anything to base your belief on, then guess what happens? It gets a lot of weird, a lot of wildly different. Well, I'm an atheist. It's a big word. What does it mean? I don't believe in anything, but it's not. That's not actually true. As a matter of fact, it's kind of a mixed thing, because if you went through and and you would find that there are huge portions of atheists, they believe many different. Some believe there's no power whatsoever and that everything came from nothing. It just took a lot of time. That if you have nothing and you just have it for a long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long time, it will become something. Somebody tell the bank that. It's zero. We're just going to leave it there. We're just going to leave it there for a long time. And someday it's going to become something. Okay. But that is the that's kind of the beginning of it, that basically there's nothing because everybody you see, we have this one problem. We have one problem that you cannot ignore. You're here. Okay. You can't ignore it. Here we are. So because we're here, the first kind of the group is of atheists is basically that enough time. Everything comes into being. I am that there's no scientific evidence that would ever. That makes no sense to me. So then there's a second group of kind of atheists who are, in fact, a little bit more scientific about their approach, and they realize that it requires something to happen, something has to happen, and that there may be something that causes things to happen, but ultimately they don't believe it's something we can know. Actually, probably a bigger group of atheists believe there is probably something, but in reality we can't know what that is. And it's beyond us. And it's it's not some God that we can have a relationship with. And so they, for the most part believe, yeah, there's something because it makes that everything makes there's got to be a designer. How do I know there's got to be a designer? The giraffe. What do you mean, the giraffe? Did you know that if a giraffe, without all the systems being in place, were to reach his head down to the grass, would get lightheaded and pass out because of the elevation change. Do you know what happens when a giraffe's head goes down? The neck? Begins to pinch in incremental places to block the blood flow? As the neck goes down, it begins to pinch at specific areas as the neck drops, because if it didn't pinch at every area and every place in the neck, when the head got to the bottom, he would pass out. And when it begins to raise back up, every vertebrae opens and there's a little pump at the base of the heart and an extra one. And as the neck begins to go up, a little pump goes and squirts a little bit of blood to shoot it up to the head, to keep him from getting up here and get light headed. Not a single one of those systems could be out of place. And the giraffes still live. Every one of those. If any of those systems weren't working when the next stretched, the giraffe would reach to the ground and fall over dead. I think it had to be a designer, had to be a designer. So because because just reality of our world says something, designed it. And you can argue this because it's just the reality. You look at things they don't. There's there are there are spiders that explode. Did you know that? Look it up. They literally put two chemicals out. When they mix they go, wow, they explode. If those chemicals ever touched inside the spider, guess what happens to the spider? It explodes. Okay. Every part of that system had to be in place. Could not have evolved scientifically. Could not have evolved any system that wasn't working in that spider in its completeness. Poof. No spider. Okay. Had to be designed. We're going to go in there. So, so because the reality of the fact that it doesn't make sense that everything came here over a long, long, long, long, long period of time from nothing. Because that really is doesn't make sense. The second group of evolution or of atheists just simply believe God is not knowable. And they believe that because it just that just makes it easier to say there is that God is not knowable. In Philippians chapter three, let's let's turn to Philippians chapter three. Philippians chapter three. Paul, who in. Philippians chapter three, verse eight. Paul, who has now sacrificed everything. Okay? Paul was a he was an up to up guy. He had authority. He had power. He had prestige. He had been given a letter from the leaders to go through and prosecute, persecute the church. He had authority. Paul was a bigwig. And Paul, the bigwig, was going about his normal routine when all of a sudden in the road comes this being Jesus, and he comes face to face with Jesus, gets blinded. The power of God falls on him, and he has a face to face occurrence with Jesus. And now he has a problem because now he knows God is knowable. All right. He has a face to face with Jesus, and now he knows God is knowable. And Paul who who is named Saul and Paul. Some people say that God changed his name. I got to move on. I can't I can't get I can't get rabbit trail here. So Paul now begins to dedicate his life to realizing that not only is God knowable, but now that he has met him and he is, and he knows him and he is beaten, he's prisoned. He's I mean, you want to talk about all the stuff that happened to him and now all of this stuff you think, well, it was he bummed out about it? No, as a matter of fact, he's like all of that stuff that's happened to me. The beatings, the prison, all of it. That means nothing to me. Verse eight. Yeah, I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Jesus Christ, my Lord and my Lord, who I've suffered the loss of all things. And I do count them as dung, that I may win Christ. He's basically saying, listen, yeah, I have given away my prestige, my power, my all of that stuff is gone. I'm living in with with nothing. I'm being beaten. I'm being chased. Him in jail. Who? You know why? You know why. I'm willing to suffer all that? Because I want to know him. Paul realized that Jesus was knowable and he said, it's the greatest thing ever is to know him. John. Chapter ten Matthew, Mark. Luke. John chapter ten. Doing okay? It really help if I throw some pages down to speed things up a lot. John. Chapter ten. And in John chapter ten, Jesus is teaching and he starts out in John chapter ten, verse one kind of one through five. He said that, uh, that, that he is, that there's a door to the sheep and that there's a shepherd and. Said there. One enters in the door. Said, nobody enters in that door, said the porter opens and said, the sheep in verse three said, the sheep will hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep. He begins saying, I'm the I'm a, I'm a, I'm a, I'm the door. I'm a porter. I'm the one opening the door for the sheep. You jump down to verse seven, it kind of from first seven to verse ten. He begins to say, I'm the door. The way in which people enter in to this place of knowing me, of being my sheep. You got to enter in through the door. Said, there's the thief comes to kill, steal and destroy. Said, I'm coming, that they might have life. Verse 11 he said, I'm the good shepherd, I'm the one. I'm that shepherd that's bringing them in, talking about himself, being the one that that brings, that helps everybody come in. In verse 26 of that verse chapter, you kind of jump on down to verse 26. He says, but you believe. He says, you, you believe. You don't believe because you're not my sheep. As I've said unto you, my sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. He said, you don't know me. Because you're not my sheep. That's why you don't know me. Those who don't think God's noble. It's not because God is not noble. It's because they don't have a relationship with him. They don't know who he is. It's kind of like saying that some rock star is not really noble. Because you've never seen him or talk to him. You can't know him bigger than a rock star. Everybody's like, no, it's bigger than rock. Yes, of course it is. But, but, but Jesus is saying, because you don't have because you don't know who I am. Because you are not one of my sheep. That's why you don't know me. Not because God's not knowable. So it's not. Whether or not God is knowable is the issue. The issue is, are you one of his okay. Because if you're one of his, you know him. Colossians chapter three I'm going to I got I gotta, I gotta, I gotta hurry up. Colossians chapter three. Verse one. If you then, being risen with Christ, seek those things which are above where Christ sits on the right hand of God. Set your affections on things above and not on things on the earth. If you are risen with Christ, seek those things which are. So here's the thing. So if you then us, somebody says, all right, God, I want to be one of your sheep. I'm going to join in. I'm going to be part of your fold. I want to be one of your children. I want to know you. You're knowable if I'm one of your sheep. So now I want to be one of your sheep. And he says, so if you're looking for those things, if you're risen with Christ, we're going to talk about that a little bit about how that Christ died for us so we could be resurrected, a new life with him. We're going to talk about that just in a minute. But he said, so if you're with me, set your affections on things above, not on things on the earth. Now let me explain the way things have worked. I'm going to I'm going to do some kind of some jumping around here and give you some verses if you want to write them down, if you want them later, fine. But for the sake of time. But in the beginning, God created all things I believe that I don't. I believe there was a big bang, I believe Jesus, God said it and bang, there it was. That's how I think it happened. I believe he created all things. Why did God create all things? He created all things for us. God created things for me. You're like, what? Yeah, I like it, I like fruit, I like stuff, I like food, I, I like animals in all sense of the words. I like to have animals, all right? To eat. God created things for us. The problem is that when God created things for man, he created man. He made a garden. He made things for man to enjoy sin enter the world. When sin entered the world. The Bible tells us that in Romans chapter one it says, when, when, when the evilness entered into them, they begin to worship the creation more than the God, than the creator. And what happened is sin begin to enter in. When sin begins in, enter in. Then all of a sudden we as people, we start worshiping stuff. Not looking at you. Stuff becomes important to us above the creator. And when stuff becomes important to us above the creator, it becomes very difficult to know the creator. Now let me tell you how God works. Does that mean God doesn't want us to have stuff? No. He created this stuff for you. Okay. He created the stuff for you, but he doesn't want stuff to have you. This is a huge issue. So God begins. He decides he's going to introduce himself to the world. God the creator says, I'm going to introduce myself to the world. And he looks down on earth and he finds this little old man called Abraham. And he says to Abraham, Abraham, you, I'm going to be your God. I'm going to show the world who I am through you. See what I want you to do. Abraham, I want you. Long story. I can't go to all of it. I want you to take your son. They couldn't have children. God had promised him. He's going to be the father of many nations. His wife couldn't have children. It didn't turn out real good at first. We got to move on. He. So Abraham has a son. He finally has a son of promise. And God says to him, take your son and go up there and sacrifice him on an altar. And Abraham then follows God. Please don't start sacrificing children. We don't believe in that. Okay, just to make that clear, Abraham goes up, gets on the altar, gets ready, gets the knife. Big angel grabs Abraham and stops him. Nobody. This isn't the way God works. I want to, I wanted you. I wanted to know if you were willing to serve God more than the creation, more than anything else. If wanted to know where your heart was. Basically, God was like, I want to know where your heart is. Do you see me above everything? Do you know what happened to Abraham? Abraham? God said, good job. Fantastic. Read the story of Abraham. He became one of the wealthiest people on the face of the earth. He became wealthy. Wealthy, wealthy, wealthy, wealthy. I'm not promising you riches. That's not what I said. What I said is he became wealthy because Abraham realized something. God before things. And when Abraham did it. As a matter of fact, if you read through Abraham's life, he had all of this wealth and all of this stuff, and for for Abraham, he was like, yeah, it's on loan. It's God's. It's not mine. Stuff doesn't have me. The truth is that it becomes difficult for us to find God because our life, our stuff, our things, everything around us is more important than the creator. I'm going to quit preaching about that because we need to move on to something funner. All right. God created things for you, but the things of our life can't begin to control. If the things have you, if things have you, it's hard to seek those things that are above because you're seeking the things on the earth. Alright. Number two. Second Corinthians chapter three I. Second Corinthians chapter three. So we got to watch it. Things can get us. Can we have things? Yes, but things can't have you. Are you with me on that? All right. Second Corinthians chapter three, verse 12. I'm in first Corinthians. So that didn't read right. Let me go with you to second Corinthians. Second Corinthians, chapter three. Verse 12. Seeing then we have such hope. We use plainness of speech not as Moses, which put a veil over his face. For the children of Israel could not stand fast and look to the end, which was but to the end that was abolished, and their minds were blinded. For until this day remains the same veil. Verse 16. Nevertheless will it should turn to the Lord. The veil shall be taken up in the original temple. So God, remember God's trying to introduce himself to the world. He he has his people. Moses goes up, gets the Ten Commandments, gets on the law, builds the tabernacle according to God's Word, builds each section of it. The presence of God rested upon the mercy seat, which was in the Holy of Holies, which was protected by a great big veil. Only one person, the high Priest, could go in there, and only once a year. And if he went in there and wasn't right, he was dead, and they drug him out by his feet. Matter of fact, they started tying ropes to the feet of the priest. Just in case he goes in there and dies because nobody's going to go in after him. Because if you go in after him and you're not right, you're also going to be dead. And we find this interesting thing. Remember the the ark where God was sitting there traveling with the ark, right, one time and right. And it tips a little bit and some guy reaches over and touches it because it rocks, and he reaches over and touches it. As soon as he touches the ark, boom! He's dead. Guess what the carriers of the Ark did. That's as far as I'm going. Yeah, yeah. Oh, we're done moving that thing. They were dead. They were killed because of touching the ark. You see, you could not go into God's presence unless you went through all this. He was showing us this ritual when Christ died. When Jesus died on the cross, said, the earth begin to shake and lightning and thundering. And it got dark and a big storm rolled everywhere. And something else happened. This phenomenon that happened is the veil that was in the Holy of Holies, where God's presence was. That veil was ripped from top to bottom, just ripped open, rip ripped right into the temple, just completely split open. And the simple fact is that that to know God, something has to happen in you and it says there's a veil over their face. The problem isn't, is God knowable? The problem is because we are born in a physical world, in a natural world. And because of that, there's literally a battle between us and God. And God is behind the veil, and we don't see him and we don't know him. We don't understand him, because in our life before we there's a veil there, and that veil has to be removed before you can see God. For Paul, he's riding along and all of a sudden there Jesus is and boom blinds him and the revelation of God. Basically, you must have a revelation of God. Nicodemus went to Jesus, said, how do you enter into the kingdom of God? Says, you've got to be born again. What do you mean, man born again? We're talking reincarnation. Got to be a baby again, be diapers, all that. Really. All of that again is like, no, it's a spiritual birth. The veil must be removed. The Scripture tells us that the natural man in first Corinthians 214 says, the natural man cannot receive the things of God because they're spiritually discerned. So the natural man can't understand God. There's a veil between us and God. And because there's a veil between us and God, the veil has to be removed. It isn't that God's not knowable. The problem is we literally have a veil. There's a thing between us has to be removed. The veil has to be torn. The reason when Jesus, when Jesus was died on the cross, the reason that veil was torn because through the blood of Christ, the veil that separates mankind and God has been removed out away from us, the distance, the thing that we could not approach God, the place that we could not find God. The ability of man to experience God has that was restricted has been removed. The restriction has been removed through Christ the door, the Shepherd, the Great one, the plan, the only way. Through me. The veil has been removed. The veil has to be removed. The veil has to be taken. Man. See? God is behind the veil. God is a spirit. The Bible says they that worship him must worship in his spirit. See, the problem is we want God to be inside of our reality. If God is inside the time and matter, then God cannot create time and matter. God was outside of matter. God had to be outside of the creation to create. So God outside. This is a big boy. There's a lot here. We could spend a few weeks talking about this because it's deep. God has to be outside of time and matter. Therefore, we can't find God in time and matter. The veil of time and matter must be ripped from our heart, and we can see God. Those of us who have experienced God will tell you it's very real. When the veil begins to be removed and you begin to experience God, the veil has to be removed. God is knowable. God is searchable. God is findable, but the veil has to be removed. Do you know what the difference between scribes and prophet is? A scribe and a prophet. A scribe is somebody who takes the word and rewrites it. My mother scribed the entire Bible. She literally hand wrote every word. I've got a copy of it in my office. She wrote every single word of the Bible. A scribe there just write the word. A prophet is one who, instead of just knowing the word, the paper, the words on this page is one who speaks of an everlasting, real God. That's knowable. That's a relational. That's a real person. God is a person, not an abstract thing. And so because he's a real abstract, not an abstract thing, but a real person, then we have the ability to know God. We have the ability to have a relationship with God when the veil gets torn, the veil. That's why Paul kept saying, I am crucified with Christ. He's saying, I'm killing the old man. I'm putting the old man down. I'm letting the worldly man go so the spiritual man can come alive. The veil has to be torn. All right, so God is knowable. God. The problem is, we have to realize that it's not in this flesh. It's not the stuff we have that brings us true happiness, peace, joy, all that stuff. Right? We know that's actually true. We have to realize it's not here. It's got to be from somewhere else. Then we have to realize there's a veil that that was placed that we all have from sin, from birth. That's between us and God. That God has to remove that veil so I can find him. And then once that veil is moved, then we move into this idea of learning to find God by faith. And do you know, you seek God once you get to the point where now I know God's real I. I've experiencing God. I've got a relationship with him. I've accepted Christ as the only door, the only shepherd, the only way through Jesus to have a relationship with God. Then I moved through that. Now the veil begins to crack open and I go, hey, there is a God in there! And God begins to become real to us in our life. And then we walk by flesh and then something happens. We begin to realize that everything in creation speaks of the glory of God. The sun comes up and you feel God's presence. Everything in creation begins to cry out to God. And we realize that in the physical world we are living in is the reality of God and everything in the physical. We begin to move into the spiritual and walk by faith. Let me show you what I'm talking about. Most people would say it was pure luck that my wire was exactly the right length that I cut at some point years ago, and threw in my garage to go from that room to the power box. I don't believe them. I don't believe it was an accident. I'll never forget somebody begin to teach me about the idea that as we live in the flesh, we have to live. We have to walk in the spirit. We have to learn to live a life of faith, walking in the spirit, trying to get close to him. He's a spirit. We're trying to move from the physical into the spiritual. The veil is cracked. We now realize there is a real God. We have begun an experience with him. Now we start looking for him everywhere. Everything that happens, everything that goes on around us, we start looking for him. I'll never forget this. This guy preacher us in a conference. He's take it to the spiritual. Everything has a spiritual. God is spirit. Their spirit around you. God is around you. God is involved in it. Take it to the spiritual. Take it to the spiritual. Take it to the spiritual. My wife and I have not always had all the money that we needed. Matter of fact, we've had some times in our life when we've been extremely broke. Never forget it was a church and a family and we didn't have a vehicle. We didn't have a we didn't have a car. We didn't have a vehicle in one of the church. And a family gave us this car here, you need a vehicle. And they gave us a car. I was so thankful for it. I was thank God for it. But the breaks in the car weren't very good. The motor wasn't very. You go up the hill real slow and you better start down real slow. And so because it didn't really stop well. And when you would touch the brakes, it would start going, you know, shaking down the road, hey, it was free and a gift from God. And I remember in this car and I was coming down the exit into Oakland getting ready to take the off ramp to go into Oakland. Now, what I had learned is that when the brakes start shaking real bad, if I would pull the emergency brake just slightly, I could kind of get the car to smooth out a little bit. And slow down without it shaking off the road. So I'm coming down the hill on the on ramp. And I got the emergency brake in my hand. I'm using the emergency brake to get that car to slow down a little bit. Coming down the hill. When I pull the emergency brake a little bit too hard, my thumb tips off the thing and the emergency brake sticks, and the car starts doing one of the spinny wheelie things down the off ramp. Yeah, let me tell you something. You're willing to take it to the spiritual then? I'll never forget when the car stopped. Stopped and I looked beside me. It was a pole right beside me. Never touched the pole, but my car was sitting right next to the pole. I said, God is in everything. He's in everything that happens to me. He's in every part of my life. I begin to realize that God is in and around and doing. God is everywhere. God is everywhere. If I'm just willing to let the veil be opened up, and if I'm just willing to look for him, he's everywhere. Never forget my wife and I, we pull into the church and we pull to the church, and my wife opens the car door to a different car. Still not good. And the whole car door fell off in the church parking lot. The whole door hinge falls up and she looks at me and we're both right. We're at a place in our life where we want this, we want this. We want God in everything. We want to know him. We want our our soul is thirsty for God. We want him in everything. He's got to be a part of everything. And that word, take it to the spiritual, take it to the spiritual, take it to the spiritual. We grab that door and shut it back. Thank you. Jesus, you got this. It's your stupid car. We'll get out the other door. Whatever. Fine. There's a reason it's yours. You fix it. Somebody from the church either saw the door fall off. I don't remember how it all happened. Heard the story of my wife's door falling off in the church parking lot. Came the next day. I'm going to need the keys to your car. Got the car? Took it. Welded the door back on. Fixed it up. We still love that car all the way through. Fixed the car door and put it back on the road. God is in everything. He's everywhere. But if your got the veil on your life, you won't see him. If things have got you, you won't see him. If you're stuck in these places, you won't see him. You're going to be God's not noble. Yes he is. He's everywhere. He's in all things. Number five. I gotta move on because I told you it's going to be done and I got to move. I'm going to move quickly, okay? Not only is God in everywhere, the scripture in Second Corinthians said, let everything be established in the mouth of 2 or 3 witnesses. One of the things that happens is that God uses others to help reveal himself. Somebody will something, I love it. I looked at the song list and we're singing through the song list, and I know I was going to be talking about the veil being torn, and one of the worship songs talks about God removing the veil from it, and I saw that I didn't pick that song. I didn't know, I didn't. I had nothing to do with pulling that song. But I looked at that and I saw God's anointing in picking a song that's about the veil being removed from our hearts. And I look at that worship song and I look at that whole thing, and God is established in me again that God is real. The truth is we find God with each other. Okay. We find him by our love together, by our relationships together. Matter of fact, the Bible says you can't even know God if you can't love each other. You certainly can't love God. We find God in our relationships, and I'm not going to spend a lot of time there. But, but, but ultimately, we find God in our relationships. I see God in you. You see God in me. You. God moves in you. God moves in me. And wow, it was the same thing. We were like, that was God. And we see God in each other. Number six, I want to tell you, one of the one of the things that made him one of the impacts. Everybody has visions as a child, right? Those things as a child that really stand out to you, you just I don't know how somehow you can you can see the details of the picture in your mind of those things that have happened to you. I have one of those, um, it wasn't it didn't occur once. It actually occurred many times throughout my life. And that were the times when I would go looking for my father, and I would go to his bedroom and I would find my dad knelt beside his bed. I found him there a lot. Go looking for my dad. Where's dad? Where's dad? Where's dad? In the middle of the day, late in the afternoon. Whatever. It was early mornings, I don't know. And I would look through the house, maybe find him. For some reason, I would go into his room and I would find him. Knelt down, quiet before God in his bedroom. That picture is still in my head, and the simple fact is that you are going to have to be willing to spend some time, you and God finding him for you. You have to slow down your life a little bit. You need to pause. You need to stop, take a break, slow down life a little bit and look for him, okay? He's knowable. He's real. We need to develop that relationship and look for him. Set a specific place or a time to get away and find him. And number seven, I want to tell you something. Our life with God. And this is this. I'm wrapping it up. I'm doing good. I'm wrapping this up our life with God and finding God and finding a relationship with God and searching for him and knowing who he is. Learning to set our affections on things above. And it's not a destination. You don't arrive. It is a journey that we'll go through. Because when you arrive, your heart is not beating anymore. As long as your heart's beating, you're still on the journey. And you must realize that it's kind of like I got a wife, right? So now I've got a wife. Okay, I'm done with that. It's not going to work very well. Uh, my dad used to say. I told my wife I loved her when we got married. And if anything changes, I'll let her know. Okay. That was a joke, by the way. My dad was an incredibly loving man. If we could be half of the man that he was with his. With my mom, it would be every Saturday morning. Every Saturday morning if you wanted to find my dad. He was spending it with my mom every Saturday morning. Unless something was crazier, there was no other possibility. He spent it with my mom. He loved her dearly. But. But this is how we treat God sometimes. It's a place I've arrived, right? I'm there. I've got it. I've got to figure it out. I'm going to church. Life is good. I'm love. Jesus. It's all good. No, it's a journey. It's a regular path that we're on, that we're going to press in and press on and go forward. We're going to grow and grow and grow and grow and get closer and closer and closer and closer. It's a journey for our lifetime. God is knowable. And the more you see him, the more the veil begins to be removed from you, the more you're willing to live this life looking for him. This is the very creation shows the glory of God. The more you're willing to look for him, you're going to find him. And the more you find him, the more you're going to realize there's so much more to see. And this is an entire lifetime. This is the journey of our life. Paul and Philippians three. There where we were, he says this one thing I'm doing. He says, I'm pressing toward the prize. Everybody heard that before, right? If you've been a Christian at all. Pressed to the prize, did you know what the prize was? Go back a few verses before that. I might know him and the power of his resurrection, and that I might be a partaker of that resurrection. What the prize was for Paul, that I might know him. He said, I don't even got there. I don't have it all. I don't have it figured out. But this one thing I'm do, I'm pressing toward the prize. Of knowing him. This isn't religion. It's not about church. It's not about you being a good person. It's not about you doing right. It's not about you giving money to the church. It's not about you being a member of this church. It's not about you, you, you believing everything I say. It's not about us being just, you know, having a big religious relationship thing. It's it's none. It's not about any of that. It's about you knowing the person of God. Are you with me? You gotta realize this isn't all there is. Things can't have you. You gotta realize that there's a veil between me and God, and that has to be removed. And it is only removed through one door, one way, one place. Jesus Christ, who gave his heart for you, surrendered his life so you could be set free so you could know him. That's the whole purpose. So you could know me. That's the whole reason. Not so I can be. Not so I can make you do nothing. Have no fun because isn't true. So I can know you. It's a lifestyle of trying to find him in everything. And everywhere you go, he's there. Who he is, everywhere. It's discovering God for you. It's the purpose of the creation. It's the reason for life. It's why we're here. It's why he came as a baby. It's why we celebrate Christmas so we can know him. It's the purpose of life stuff. Let's pray. Father, I just come before you. And I thank you so much, because it is so easy to get caught up with the things we have or the things we don't have. It's so easy to get caught up with. Well, the veil that darkens our spirit has happened to all of us. All of us, at one time or another, had the veil upon our heart where we were not willing to say to Jesus, Jesus, open this veil, rip this thing in my heart, forgive me of my sin. Break the bondage of sin in my life. Put the old man down. Let me move into the spiritual. Let me be born again. Let me know you. Let me see you in everything that happens. I thank you and I praise you. In Jesus name. Amen.