The Alternative

Dr. Tony Evans: You can take notes on every sermon you've ever heard and not be transformed by them.

Narrator: Dr. Tony Evans says change begins when we allow scripture to shine its light on our lives. Illumination is where God takes the truth of his word and gets deep down in the core of your being.

Narrator: This is The Alternative broadcast, featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans.

Dr. Tony Evans: Have you ever read something over and over and then one day it just clicks? That aha moment doesn't come from us. It's the Holy Spirit opening our eyes to understand God's truth.

Narrator: Today, Dr. Evans explains how the spirit brings scripture to life, helping us grasp things our natural minds could never comprehend. Let's join him as he reveals why real understanding of the Bible always starts with divine illumination.

Dr. Tony Evans: Turn your Bibles to 1 Corinthians, chapter 2. And I want to talk to you about illumination. I want to talk to you about having a face to face with God.

When I am talking about illumination, it is the work of the Holy Spirit through the Word of God which opens up the mind of the Christian, causing them to learn, understand, and perceive God beyond the natural into the realm of the supernatural.

God is not giving new revelation today. He has already told us time and time again that nobody is to add to his words. If he wanted to say more, he would have said it. You've got Genesis, the beginning, you've got Revelation, the end. That's it. All God wanted revealed has been inspired in the Bible. But there is plenty of new illumination.

Which is where God takes what he has written and in a multiplicity of ways, all over the world, every day, he illumines believers to its reality in their experience.

In 1 Corinthians, chapter 2, we're introduced to illumination, verse 9. As it is written, things which I have not seen, ear has not heard, and which has not entered into the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love him, for to us God revealed them through the spirit, for the spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God.

When the Spirit of God takes the Word of God in the life of the believer, guess what he gives us? He gives us things eyes cannot see. He gives us things ears cannot hear and he gives us things that you haven't thought about yet, that have not entered into the heart of man.

In other words, it transcends the natural and takes you to the spiritual realm. There are three levels of hearing. There is auditory hearing where you just can pick up the sound, you hear it. But you can hear things and not understand them. That is, you can repeat what somebody said but not knowing what they meant by what they said, which is the second level of hearing.

One is just to be able to pick up the sound wave, the other is to understand what the sound wave means. So, hearing in terms of external or understanding that has to do with meaning. But there is another level of hearing because you can hear it and understand it but not experience it.

In other words, it hasn't gotten deep down in you and caught a hold of your bones yet. It hadn't grabbed you and gripped you and become attached to you. You can understand it and explain it and repeat it, but it not mean anything to you.

Spiritual understanding has to do with God personalizing his word to you. The Bible was not written simply as an autobiography on God, where you can learn important facts about him. You can take notes on every sermon you've ever heard and not be transformed by them.

Why is illumination necessary? Illumination is necessary because sin has produced static on the line. God wants to illuminate you or personalize his truth to you. He wants to put your name on what he wants to tell you from his word. Now all of a sudden, reading the Bible isn't so boring anymore if he's going to talk to me.

If he's going to say something specific to me, if he's going to leap off the pages of the Bible, not not leave the Bible, but leap off the pages of the Bible to illuminate my understanding and my experience to how the truth has hit me.

For illumination to take place, you must have more than human wisdom. Illumination is, I want the truth to reach me, where I live. I don't just want to know about it. So, for that to happen a combining must occur and he calls it spiritual thoughts with spiritual words.

We know what the spiritual words are, they are the Word of God. These are the spiritual words. These words of spirit, this word is life. But in order for us to be illumined, the Holy Spirit must link our minds with these words. So that there is a combining that occurs.

The best way to illustrate this is through your Xerox machine. The picture that is taken of the paper, put on the Xerox machine, is then combined with another paper. And it is transferred from the paper that's the original onto the copy so that what was on the paper now shows up somewhere else.

Let me tell you about the new covenant. Jesus says, "I will write my words on your heart." So, guess what the Holy Spirit's job is? To Xerox the scripture. So that it shows up on your heart. He wants to Xerox it on you. So that it becomes not only God's word, but God's word to you.

The reason why you don't just want revelation, you don't just want inspiration, but the reason why you want illumination is because you want application. You say then, "How come I'm not getting any illumination?" Because God knows you're not going to do anything with application.

If there is no application or willingness to apply, he will not illumine. That's why you must have spirit and truth. Jesus told the woman at the well in John 4, "If you worship God, you must worship him in spirit and truth."

The reason why you need spirit and truth and not spirit or truth is because there are two extremes as a Christian you want to avoid. One extreme is over-spiritualizing the Bible. Not taking the Bible as it is. But the other extreme is over-intellectualizing. Thinking somehow you're more spiritual because you have more information.

Information does not equal illumination. Many a person has gone on a blind date and been sorely disappointed. Because what you heard and what you read and what they lied, your lying friend told you, you were sorely disappointed. In other words, the illumination wasn't even related to the information.

Not so with scripture. The Holy Spirit works through the word, not apart from the word, to Xerox the word and its application onto our hearts. In order for there to be inspiration, the biblical writers writing the Bible, there had to be illumination. Why? Because much of the Bible was written years after the discussions. Of which they weren't taking notes.

A lot of the Bible was written without notes. But guess what Jesus told the disciples in John 14? "When the helper comes." I love that word for the Holy Ghost. See, if you want to be, if you want to be really like real sophisticated sounding, he's the Holy Spirit. When you want to get nasty with it, he's the Holy Ghost. You know. But when you want to get relational with it, he's the helper.

"When the helper comes." Anybody here need help? Guess what? You got a helper. But you won't get help from human wisdom. He says, "It's divine wisdom." And he says, "When the helper comes," guess what he'll do? "He will bring to your remembrance all I've said to you." Do you know some of this was years later? Stuff long forgotten.

Some folk be taking notes, and it's impressive when I look out and see people taking notes. Okay, so don't feel bad. But not only can they not remember the sermon, they don't know where they put the notes. They can't, they can't even remember where they put the notes. No, they can't even remember to bring their Bibles to church sometimes. They just, they just, you know, it's, it's something deeper than that.

He says, "When the helper comes, he will bring back to your remembrance." So you can, you can't remember something you never had. But if you have exposed yourself to it with the goal of applying it, the Holy Spirit will remind you of it.

Narrator: That kind of supernatural recall doesn't come from memory tricks. It comes from something much deeper. Dr. Evans will explain the powerful role of the anointing when he continues in just a moment. First, though, if you've been encouraged by what you've heard so far, I hope you'll take a moment to check out the full-length version of this message and even more importantly, the complete 10-part series it comes from.

Narrator: It's called "The Glory of God's Word," and in it, Tony takes a deep dive into the power, purpose, and authority of scripture. And right now, we're offering the entire collection on both digital download as well as on either CD or USB flash drive. They're our thank you gift when you support The Alternative with a financial contribution. Plus, for a limited time, we're also including a powerful companion book from Tony called "The Power of Knowing God." This well-received resource will challenge and encourage you to make knowing God more than an intellectual exercise, as you pursue a relationship with him that reaches into every part of your life. Visit tonyevans.org today for the details or call us at 1-800-832-2222 to make your request. That's 1-800-832-2222.

Narrator: Well, let's get back to more from Dr. Evans, talking today about "The Illumination of Scripture."

Dr. Tony Evans: This process of connecting with us through the word, not apart from the word, through the word, you know it as the anointing. Turn to 1 John. This is the word you need to be familiar with, the anointing.

First John chapter 2, verse 20. "But you have an anointing from the Holy One and you all know." Okay, let's get something straight. Everybody is anointed if you're a believer. And you all know. All. Every believer has the anointing.

Sometimes you say, "Boy, he sure is anointed." Okay? Well so are you if you are a believer in Jesus Christ. You are anointed. All right? So let's get something straight. You have the anointing if you are a true believer. Let's go down to verse 24.

"And as for you, let that abide in you which you heard from the beginning. If what you have heard from the beginning abides in you, and you also will abide in the Son and in the Father." Verse 27. "And as for you, the anointing which you received from him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about all things and is true is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in him."

I got to say something about the anointing. The anointing is the process of the spirit bringing spiritual reality to the believer through the word. So it's the same concept of illumination. The anointing is the same general concept of illumination.

Every believer has a built-in satellite dish. Every believer has a dish. The Holy Spirit in you functions as a receiver and you have the signal. The anointing or the divine capacity to receive from God, the understanding and personal application of his truth to you through the word.

He takes the Word of God that has been placed in the mind, spiritual thoughts, and he brings it down into your deepest level. I'll explain that in a moment. So that you are able to see its relevance to where you are in your life.

The greatest thing you've got going for you is your dish. And you got it. You have your own dish. That's what he means when he says, "You don't need anyone to teach you." Now, you got to learn things for your mind, but you don't need anyone to teach you the spiritual application of divine truth for you because the Holy Spirit will tell you directly.

That's why he says in chapter 4 these words, "Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see which ones are from God, for many false prophets are out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God, every spirit that confesses that Jesus has come in the flesh is from God, everyone that does not is not from God."

He says, you can be able to determine what's real and what's not, what's true and what's false, what's right and what's wrong, what's good and what's bad, and guess where it's located? In you. The Holy Spirit is like a translator in a foreign country. Even though you can't speak the language, he'll tell you what's being said.

Okay, how many want to experience this illumination? Well, then the commitment is simple. There must be the decision to learn and obey the word. The Bible says, "He that desires to do my will shall know it." Don't reverse the order. He will only tell it to those who have decided to do it.

The reason why, as I said before, we're not getting more illumination, the reason why we're not responding more is because God knows we, we're not going to do it. God did not write his word for us to evaluate it. He did not write his word for us to decide which parts we want, which parts we don't want, which parts we like, which parts we don't like.

If you want the illuminating ministry of the Holy Spirit, there must be the in-advance decision to respond to him. Many of us, most of us, probably have alarm systems. One of the things you have in alarm systems is motion detectors. When you move across the room, the light will come on on the motion detector because there's movement. No movement, no light. I'm going somewhere.

A lot of people want the light who don't want the movement. They don't want to move, but they want to see the light. God says, "When you move, you'll see the light." No motion, no light. You'll just sit complaining. "I don't know what to do. I've been going through this for so long. I'm tired. I don't know what to do."

God says, "If you decide to move in concert with my will, I will show you the light. I will be your illuminator." You must agree with the revelation to experience the illumination. He uses a word in John 2, it's abiding. That's his relational term for staying closely, intimately, relationally connected to.

In other words, the motivation here should be to stay close to a person. Don't read a book, look for a person as you read a book. Stop living for the menu and start looking for the meal. As you've heard me say many times, you don't go to a restaurant to become an expert in the menu.

"I memorized the menu. I can explain every meal. Time to go home." But that's how a lot of people come to church. They come to read, "Pastor, what's on the menu for today?" They even come to me and ask me, they say, "What's the special for today? What you preaching on? What's the passage?" And they look at the menu and make the determination.

What good is a menu if you don't eat a meal? The goal of the menu is to introduce you to the meal. That's why Jesus told the leaders of his day, John 5:39-40, he says, "You search the scriptures, but you're no better off because you miss me." You miss me. Information is not enough. It's abiding in a relationship with a person.

It says, "I want to know you, I want to love you, I want to experience you and I'm going to find out about you through this word, but it's about you." It's one thing for a mother to hear she's pregnant. It's a whole different ball game for her to see that first ultrasound picture and sonogram, or that baby moving.

One is information. That's nice to hear. Another is life. That's a whole different ball game. I've never seen a mother record the doctor's statement. "You're pregnant." "I have it on tape! The doctor said I'm pregnant!" I've never seen that.

But I have seen a bunch of mothers walking around with pictures that you can't make nothing out of, can't tell head nor tail, walking around talking, "Look at my baby! Look at my baby!" Well, I hope it gets to look a lot better than that. That, "Look at my baby!"

Why? Because one is information, the other is life. Jesus says, "Pursue relationship through the word." Put it another way, abiding means the closer you get to the Holy Spirit the more you'll be able to see. What's the result of all this in closing?

You get to freely experience and roam around the spiritual realm. You get to roam around the spiritual realm. You get to roam around there for free. Remember he said, "Freely given." It makes the truth of God experiential. You'll know it for yourself because you'll experience it at the deepest level. What does he say the deepest level of knowing is? Your spirit.

Not your brain. That's not your deepest level. It starts there, but it's got to get deeper than there. It's one thing to believe somebody loves you because they say, "I love you." That's information. It's another thing to feel it. Because it's so deep. It's gone so low.