Our Lord Jesus Christ shows us the Father. This perfect Man had a perfect relationship with and understanding of His Father. What language can we use to describe the immensity of the beauty of this relationship? Perhaps it helps to describe it as “in the bosom of the Father” (John 18:1). Albert Barnes indicates that “it denotes intimacy, friendship, affection.”

Please open your Bibles to Daniel chapter 11 and find verse 32. Daniel 11 verse 32. This is the Verse 32. This is the inerrant, all-sufficient, sweeter-than-honey Word of God. Daniel 11, 32.

This verse is the formation of the theme of this conference. All of the men preaching will be bouncing off of this verse to explain those who knew their God. Verse 32, those who do wickedly against the Covenant he shall corrupt with flattery the people who know their God shall be strong and carry out great exploits. Would you pray with me? Your word is so precious.

It's so life giving. You are the everlasting God with an everlasting covenant, with everlasting truth, everlasting salvation, everlasting damnation. And yet you come to us and you speak words of truth that the earth might be filled with your glory. And so we're so thankful for that, Lord. Pray that your glory through your word would be manifested tonight.

Amen. So this text speaks of two kinds of people. There are the flattered by wicked men and there are those who are strong and they do exploits or in some translations take action. There are those who are being corrupted and there are those who are being purified. We see this everywhere.

You know the spirit of insanity is just washed over our world like never before. I think Paul described it very well. He called it a strong delusion. And that's what we're experiencing in the world today. Now, we could talk for a long time about all the bad news.

I'm not here to rile us up about the bad news. There's one thing that eclipses that should in many ways extinguish the fear from all the insanity. And I want us to recognize that just the towering significance, the gravity, the usefulness of knowing God. It would be impossible for us to adequately explain the importance of the subject of knowing God. And yet, you have men here who desire with all their hearts to deliver it as faithfully as they can.

Now for years I've been recommending people to read J.I. Packer's book, Knowing God. I had my children read this book, I've had all my interns read this book. You can get it in the back. Here's how Packer begins the book.

I think I read this when I was in my early 20s. And it was the first thing that came to mind when I considered having a conference on knowing God. What were we made for? To know God. What aim should we set ourselves in life?

To know God. What is the best thing in life? Bringing more joy, delight and contentment than anything else. Knowledge of God. Packer quotes Charles Spurgeon, he says, there is something exceedingly improving to the mind in the contemplation of the divinity.

It is a subject so vast that all our thoughts are lost in its immensity, so deep that our pride is drowned in its infinity. No subject of contemplation will tend more to humble the mind than thoughts of God. But while the subject humbles the mind, It also expands it. Nothing will so enlarge the intellect, nothing so magnify the whole soul of man as a devout, earnest, continued investigation of the great subject of the deity. Tonight I'd like to speak about knowing God under three headings.

The first to know God is to have everything you'll ever need. The second heading to know God is to grow in the way that the Lord Jesus Christ knew God. And then finally, third, how do you know if you know God? So that will be the flow of this. So to know God, first of all, is to have everything you will ever need.

It's astounding that we can know God. We can know the creator of infinite beauty. We can know the power that created the power we can know the wonderful counselor what we can know God We can know the only wise God. We can know God. I can know God.

You know, of all the beings you could know or that you do know, you can know God. Impressed by some other being in the world. Think again, you can know God. I wanna talk about five treasures of knowing God. The first treasure of knowing God is to know that I have all that I need at this very moment and for the rest of my life.

That's why Jonathan Edwards said, he who has God has all. He who has God has all. Those who know their God are strong because they have ever-present resources. You have God. You have riches you can draw on at any moment in your life.

You have an unlimited treasury of God's wisdom. The Bible says that God gives you all you need for life and godliness. The Bible says that God will supply all your needs according to his riches and glory. This is the God who hears our cries all day. Psalm 55, 16, the psalmist says, "'As for me, I will call upon God "'and the Lord shall save me.

"'Evening and morning and at noon I will pray and cry aloud and he shall hear my voice. This is the position of the person who knows God. You can know God who is a good shepherd. David said, the Lord is my shepherd. I have everything that I need.

You can know the God who carries you. In Deuteronomy 131, God says that in the wilderness, in the wilderness in the howling wilderness God says I carried you I carried you like a father carries his son. I carried you all the way through the howling wilderness. You are in my arms. To know God is of infinite value.

To know that you will be carried from this day forth until the end God who is your light in Psalm 18 28 we read for you will light my lamp the Lord my God will enlighten my darkness for by you I can run against a troop by my God I can leap over a wall and I don't think he was meaning that he'll give you a high jump capability He meant that you can leap over the walls that fall in front of you in your life. This is the God who speaks to his children, Isaiah 30. We're told that the people who know their God will be directed. Your ears shall hear a word behind you saying this is the way walk in it whenever you turn to the right hand or whenever you turn to the left. This is the God who teaches me in Psalm 32 eight.

The Lord says to David, I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go. I will guide you with my eye. I will guide you with my eye. It's a very beautiful figurative language to speak of the treasure it is to know God. God is a refuge in trouble.

To know God is to know a refuge in trouble, Psalm 46. God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. You know, many years ago I had a daughter who was bleeding to death on a remote island in Scotland and the helicopters came to pick her up to take her to the hospital because she was losing her blood. And I was by the gurney holding her hand and she was saying, God is our refuge and strength and ever-present help and trouble therefore we shall not fear though the earth should change and the mountains slip into the heart of the sea and she said that all the way she memorized that when she was a little girl if you have God you have all you need at every moment in your life. To know God is actually to be standing before God.

We sing under the shadow of his wings. We are before his face. You know, a few days ago I was reading in 2 Kings in my devotions and in the narratives of the lives of Elijah and Elisha. And at one point, there's a vast army towering, overwhelming army to come and destroy. It was Moab.

And in 2 Kings 3.14, it's very clear, Elisha is not afraid. He says, as the Lord lives before whom I stand. And even though they were vastly outnumbered, Elisha says, this is a simple matter in the sight of the Lord. This is a simple matter in the sight of the Lord. Praise the Lord for God's almighty hand.

There is no war that God is not standing over the war In which is a simple matter to the Lord Now you may not you may not have all you want every moment you want it But you will have all that you need in the moment that you need it. There's really no need to feel insecure. People are so insecure, all of us are insecure. But there's really no need because we have God. We have God.

I was in one of my daughter's houses the other day and she had on her refrigerator, open your mouth wide and I will fill it. That's what it means to know God, to be able to speak something that is true and good in a moment of trial, tribulation. It's such a blessing. Somebody once said, I don't have to know it all, I just need to know the one who knows it all. And you can know the God who knows all.

And that's why the apostle said that knowing God was worth more than anything in Philippians 3, seven and eight but what things were gained to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed, I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord." You can lose everything and still yet have everything in God. So the first treasure of knowing God is to know God is to have all I need at the moment and every moment for the rest of my life. The second treasure of knowing God is to know that God has taken care of all of your long-term liabilities. To know God is to have nothing to worry about forever.

Jesus said in John 17, three, and it's, we're overhearing a conversation between the Father and the Son. The Son is speaking to the Father and He says, and this is eternal life that they may know you, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. He who has God has all. So this second treasure of knowing God is that you can know that God has taken care of all of your long-term liabilities, all of them. The third treasure of knowing God is that to know God is to have balm for every wound balm for every wound Charles Spurgeon in a sermon said it like this, oh there is in contemplating Christ a balm for every wound.

In musing on the Father there is a quietus for every grief and in the influence of the Holy Ghost there is a balsam for every sore. Would you lose your sorrow? Would you drown your cares? Then go and plunge yourself in the Godhead's deepest sea, be lost in his immensity and you shall come forth as from a couch of rest refreshed and invigorated. I know of nothing which can so comfort the soul, so calm the swelling billows of sorrow and grief, so speak peace to the winds of trial as a devout musing upon the subject of the Godhead.

Spurgeon wrote that when he was 20 years old. Are you 20? This would be a good time to learn this. So this third treasure is to know God is to have a balm for every wound. He who has God has all.

The fourth treasure of knowing God is that you spurn the counsel of the flatterers. This brings us to our text. Those who do wickedly against the covenant shall corrupt with flattery. Corrupt with flattery. But the people who know their God shall be strong and carry out great exploits.

The people who know their God are rescued from the corruption of flattery. And Daniel here, he's calling out the flattering corruptors. And he's contrasting them with those who know God and who are strong, they're strong and the word flattery is defined as smoothness, fine promises. The flatterers pander to your lust. They legitimize your idolatry.

They tell you you are okay. They tell you to be yourself. They tell you to celebrate your sodomy, celebrate your transgenderism, celebrate the revolution. That's what the flatterers do. And they fawn over you, they buy you off, they congratulate you, they make you popular.

Some of the most popular people on the internet are the greatest flatterers on the internet. But the people who know their God are unflattered. They're nonplussed. They're not drawn in. They don't like it.

They don't like the ways of the world anymore. They used to like the ways of the world, but they've been converted, they have a new heart, they don't like it. And so they're not flattered by it, they're not drawn in by it. What a blessing it is to have a force against the flatterers in the world, they're everywhere. So the fourth treasure of knowing God is that you spurn the counsel of the flatterers.

The fifth treasure of knowing God is that you live differently. The fifth treasure of knowing God is that you live differently. Our text says that the people who know their God will do great exploits or take action. That means that they're doing something. They are actually living differently.

They are living by God's commands. The exploits are what they do in their life. And When you know God, you think differently, you act differently, you raise your children differently, you operate your marriages differently, you handle your money differently, you're a man differently, you're a woman differently, you engage the church differently. You spend your time differently. We need people who are willing to live differently, but the people who know their God will in the normal course of their life operating as a holy nation, as a separate people, they really just pursue the simple life of knowing God and following God, obeying God in every area of their life.

It's actually very simple. They do it quietly, make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business, and work with your own hands. Those are great exploits for God. It really matters how you live. It really matters if you're living differently.

When the world looks at you, they should say, you are so strange. If the world doesn't think you're strange, something is probably wrong. The Lord says to the children of Israel in Deuteronomy 18. When you come into the land which the Lord your God is giving you, you shall not learn to follow the abominations of those nations. Jeremiah said, do not learn the ways of the Gentiles.

Don't learn the ways of the Gentiles. The ways of the Gentiles are just full of corrupting flatterers. But the fifth treasure of knowing God is that you live differently. And it's such a blessing. So my first heading to know God is to have everything you will ever need.

And the second heading is to know God is to grow to know him like Christ knew him. You can grow to know God in the ways that Christ knew God. And there are two parts to this relationship. The Lord Jesus Christ shows us the purest relationship with God the Father. And the first part of this is the Father's love for the Son.

And the second part of it is the Son's love for the Father. Eight times in the Gospel of John alone we read that the Father loves the Son. To know God is to get to know him like Jesus knew him. Christ's relationship with his father was pure. It was perfect.

And yet in our struggle within the flesh, it will never be pure and it will never be perfect. And yet it will be acceptable to the Father by faith in Christ. Our love for Him will be acceptable because of the work of Jesus Christ. Our burden will always be that we don't love him like we want to love him because we don't love him like we ought to love him. This is the burden that we that the true Christian bears on a daily basis.

Joel Beekie's book, The Beauty and Glory of the Father, he writes, the father's love for the son is the fountain of all theology. This is the fountain from which all theology flows. Nothing so precisely defines who the Father is as the fact that He loves His Son with the totality and fullness of his divine person. In fact, the entire history of life on the planet is the story of a father's love for his son. Every step of the way.

I want to give you 10 ways that Jesus Christ knew his father. There are so many more, I had such a difficult time cutting this up, you know, and trying to narrow it down. It was two vast dozens and dozens of ways that Christ knew his father. The first is that he knew his father's love in 1 John 5.20. For the father loves the son and shows him all things that he himself does.

Jesus heard words of love from his father twice. He hears an audible voice from his father saying, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. This is my beloved son. What a wonderful thing. Do you wanna know God like that?

Would you like to know God like that? Second, the second way that the Lord Jesus knew his father's, is that he knew his father's will and he delighted in it. In John 6 38 Jesus says, for I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. He was nourished by doing the Father's will, And he said, my food is to do the will of him who sent me. Do you want to know God like that?

Third, from John 5.19, we learn that he knew his father's character and he delighted in it. He actually imitated his father. Then Jesus answered and said to them, most assuredly I say to you the son can do nothing of himself but what he sees the Father do for whatever he does the Son also does in like manner. Do you want to know God like that? Fourth, in Luke 6 12 we learn that he knew his father in prayer.

Jesus spent time with his father in prayer in Luke 6 12. He went up into the mountain to pray and continued all night in prayer to God. He knew God and isn't it interesting that God would engage his own children in the earth to do the same, to know God in prayer. You want to know God like that? Fifth, in John 5, 37 and 38 we learn that he knew his father's purpose and he obeyed his commission.

He knew he was commissioned by his father. Is that something you're aware of? In John 5 37 we read, And the father himself who sent me has testified of me. You have neither heard his voice at any time nor seen his form but you do not have the word his word abiding in you because whom he sent him you did not believe. But do you believe that the Son was commissioned by God?

And do you want to know God like that? Sixth, in John 12 49, we learn that he submitted to his father's authority. Jesus spoke what his father commanded. He, in his incarnation, was under his father's authority. For I have not spoken on my own authority but the Father who sent me gave me command what I should say and what I should speak in Christ's incarnation we find this beautiful picture of submission to the Father.

There there are few things in this world that people are more confused about than submission and what submission is really all about. In our culture submission is In our culture, submission is bondage. In Christianity, the whole of Christian life is submission. Submission is not inferiority. Particularly when women think wrongly about submission, it can have really damaging effects on the way that they think about their whole world and this whole matter of submission.

Submission is self-mastery. Submission is self-government. Submission is perfect control. The submission of the Lord Jesus Christ to his Father is power. Submission is not the soft side of Jesus.

Submission is not the feminine side of Jesus. In the son's submission to his father, he crushes the head of the serpent. He destroys the work of the devil. In Revelation he's called a little lamb. He's called a little lamb.

It's the dominion of form. Not the big lamb, but the little lamb. In Revelation, he's called, I believe 28 times, a little lamb. In Revelation 6, 15, the little lamb is so terrifying to the kings of the earth, so terrifying to the rich men, so terrifying to the great men that they want to hide from him and they say, let the rocks fall on us. In Revelation 12, 11, the lamb is destroying the dragon.

In Revelation 14 10 the lamb, this little lamb is tormenting the wicked in hell. David the type of Christ kills Goliath, the Goliaths of this world, the world and the flesh and the devil. He's king of kings, he's lord of lords, he's mighty God, he's alpha and the Omega, he's judge, he's rock, this is not the feminine side of Jesus, this is the mighty power of Jesus Christ under control in submission to his Father. You want to learn that kind of submission, you want that kind of strength, you want that kind of resolve not to do your will but the will of God. The submissive person to God is the most powerful person.

And the submissive wife is truly the most powerful. Paul said, I bring my whole body into submission. And the Lord Jesus Christ submitted to his father so that all of us would understand more clearly what is the glory and the power and the mastery and the beauty of submission. Submission is not inferiority. It's part of knowing God.

Seventh, Jesus knew his Father's glory and manifested it. He says, I have manifested your name to the men whom you have given me out of the world. And Jesus knowledge and love toward his father he wanted to manifest the name of God. Do you want to know God like that? Eighth, he loves his father.

He wanted the whole world to know he loved his father. In John 14 31, he says, but that the whole world may know that I love the Father and as the Father gave me commandments so I do. Do you want to know God like that? Ninth, that. Ninth, he was unified with his father.

John 17 21, he was one with God that they all may be one as you father are in me and I in you that they also may be one in us that the world may believe that you sent me." Do you want to know God like that? And then 10th, he knew that he was held in intimate care of his father. In John 1 18 we see the warmth of the Father to the Son and the Son's warmth toward the Father in one of the most remarkable images. This image is for you and me. No one has seen God at any time.

The only begotten God, the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father. He's in the bosom of the Father. That's perhaps one of the tenderest things that appears in the Bible about knowing God. So to know God is to grow to know him the way that Jesus Christ knew him. First of all by the Spirit's transforming power and regeneration We are unified with the Godhead and we are one body with Christ and all the blessings of our salvation arise out of our union with Christ and they are in Christ and as Christ loved the Father and we will love our Heavenly Father.

And secondly, in our justification, God imputes His righteousness to us through Christ's obedience. His obedience is credited to us. The ways that we don't know God like the Lord Jesus Christ in its perfection, it is credited to us for righteousness. The Baptist Confession of 1689 in Chapter 11 on justification reads like this. By imputing Christ's active obedience unto the whole law "'and passive obedience in His death "'for their whole and sole righteousness by faith, "'which Faith they have not of themselves, but it is the gift of God.

You can know God in the way that Jesus Christ knew God. As you grow in grace, as you're sanctified by the Spirit, there's a continual progress toward knowing God the way that Jesus Christ knew his God. We never loved God with all of our hearts. The Lord Jesus Christ did in our place. We never loved our neighbor as ourselves.

The Lord Jesus Christ did in our place. He who has God has all. So how is it? How is it with you? Are you strong?

Are you weak? Are you among the flattered? I want to particularly address young people who've grown up in the church, young people who've grown up in families where there was a genuine attempt for the beauty of biblical order. And maybe you grew up in a church just like that as well. But you say, I don't know if I have enough passion for God to say that I'm a Christian.

I don't know if I have enough desire for the word of God. I haven't been reading the word of God. I wonder where I am with God. And so I want to speak to you. You're the person who knows the gospel backwards and forwards.

You're the one who's memorized scripture. You're the one who's attempted to honor your father and your mother. You're the one who can explain the gospel better than 90% of the people that are in evangelical churches. That's who you are. But you don't know.

You say, I want to be a Christian, I want to follow Christ, but I don't know, I'm not sure. So I wanna ask you several questions that are based on an assumption. And my assumption is that you believe that Jesus is the Son of God. That you believe that he is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. That you have a clear conscience that you don't want to walk in the ways of the world.

And you do not hate the light, but you're not sure. You're not sure if you're a Christian. And so I wanna ask you some questions. Are you waiting for an electrifying moment to prove that you are saved? Are you waiting for an electrifying moment to prove that you're saved?

You do, you hate your sin, you have repented. You have asked Jesus Christ to fill you. You do believe, but you're waiting for a dramatic moment to happen to you. And I want to ask, are you saying that God is going to have to do something electrifying to you before you know that you're a follower of Jesus Christ? I want to drive a stake as hard and deep into the ground as I can and that is salvation is not by electrification.

Salvation is by grace alone through faith. Sinners are not saved by dramatic moments. They're not saved by lightning bolts that drives them to the ground in tears. Experiences don't save. Romans 3.20 says, by the deeds of the law, no flesh will be justified in his sight.

But the just shall live by faith, Galatians 3.11. Here's another question. Are you waiting for a massive outward change in your life? You grew up in a Christian home. If you grew up in a Christian home, a real Christian home, You might not see the radical outward changes that you see in the person who's been running headlong into drugs, into immorality, into all kinds of debauchery.

The people who are wrecking their lives through drugs and fornication and theft and lying, they fall harder. And what God does with them is he deals with the big things that would destroy them. And there's a massive change. But if you grew up in a Christian home, you might not see changes like that. Because you've always wanted to honor your father and mother.

Salvation is by grace, not by drama. Are you waiting to be holy enough to have assurance of your salvation? I've had so many conversations with young people who tell me this, and I always say the same thing. You will never come to the place where you are holy enough to become a Christian. And if you are a true Christian, you will never be satisfied with your level of holiness.

You will see yourself as a person whose only hope is the holiness of Jesus Christ. There's no salvation by our satisfaction with our level of holiness. But as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become the children of God to those who believe in his name who were born not of blood nor the will of the flesh nor the will of man but of God if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. And of course he's not just talking about lip service. Jesus is Lord.

No, no, no, no. He's talking about the person that says, Jesus Christ is Lord, I want him to be my Lord. I receive his kingdom. I love his kingdom. I want his kingdom.

I don't want my kingdom anymore. Question. Are you waiting for a deep enough remorseful enough repentance to prove your salvation? I wish I had been counting over the years how many young people particularly who've grown up in the church have said that exact same thing to me and you don't think you've repented deeply enough to be saved. No one ever repented to the depth of their sin.

No one. I don't believe I have ever been aware enough to repent to the bottom of my sin. There is so much blinding pride in me. Pride blinds your eyes to your pride. Do you believe in salvation by remorse?

You just have to feel bad enough. You know, some people are like that. They just, they wanna feel bad. They don't feel like they've known God till they feel really bad. The reality is that in the Christian life, you grow in your repentance.

That's the normal part of the Christian life. God only saves people with shallow repents. God only saves people that have shallow repents. Aren't you glad for that? Question, are you waiting for deep enough faith to prove your salvation?

The reality is is that you grow in faith. God says that he distributes faith in different measures to different people. The disciples said, Lord increase our faith. Faith is something that grows. You'll never have enough faith to be saved.

We're saved by grace through faith by the justifying power of Jesus Christ who died in our place. We are saved not by our own works, but by Christ alone. Here's another question. Are you waiting to be passionate enough to prove that you're saved? Do you believe in salvation by passion?

Passion comes and goes. Some people are born with more passion than others. That's just the way it is. Another question. Are you trying to pinpoint the exact moment of your salvation?

Some people can point to a moment, a critical moment when they were saved. That's such a wonderful thing. Most people that I know, they point to kind of a season in life where God was drawing them. And then somehow they knew somewhere along the line in this season of life. But salvation is not by omniscience of what happened to you.

Are you using the right tests of faith? There are emotional tests of faith and there are objective tests of faith. Read 1 John, they're all over the place in 1 John. Objective tests of faith that you can use to ask yourself whether you're a Christian. Here's another question.

Have you taken lightly the promises of God that salvation is by faith through the justifying power of the blood of Jesus Christ. Like, do you take lightly those promises? Is it possible that you need to be rebuked for taking lightly the promises of God? Looking down on the promises of God, God forbid. You say you want to be saved.

You want to be saved. You're asking God to save you. Here's another question. Is your desire to be saved an indication of your regeneration? Regeneration is what changes the heart, which makes you want to be saved.

You have new desires. Is there something keeping you from Jesus Christ? Some fear, some sin, something you want to hold on to? Do you think it's pleasing to God to delay? Perhaps you, even tonight, would be like Jacob, who said, I will not let you go until you bless me.

Jesus said the kingdom of heaven suffers violence and the violent take it by force. Say, Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief. Well, It is such a blessing to know God. I pray that you'll look for all these things in these men that will be preached about because these things are manifested in those who knew their God.

Look for them. To know God is to have everything you will ever need for every moment of your life. To know God is to know God the way Jesus knew God. And to know God is to be transformed by the justifying power of the cross by believing and receiving Jesus Christ as Lord. I pray God gives that to all of you who are asking questions.

Would you pray with me? You're the one who knows all things, oh Lord. Reach down into all of our hearts. For those who know you and love you, Lord, thrill them with the beauty of your grace that to have God is to have all for those who are questioning their salvation who really may be saved that you would confirm it to them that you would confirm the true gospel to them not the gospel of emotions not the gospel of passion and for those Lord Who are running from you who hate you Lord would you open up the windows of heaven and Show them how good you are and Fill their mouths with these treasures from heaven so that they might know you in every moment for the rest of their lives amen