God Omniscient

Omniscient means to be all-knowing. This is written to declare the scriptural truth that God knows all completely and eternally without exception.

God’s Omnipresence Assures His Omniscience
God’s omniscience is inseparable from his omnipresence. It is perhaps easier to some to understand God’s omnipresence, i.e., God is every where at all times. God is “the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity” (Isaiah 57:15). He lives in eternity. He is present in timelessness. I might say that he dwells from one end of eternity to the other. Yet eternity has no ends. He lives in a place that encompasses or encloses or surrounds our space/time world. There are dimensions other than our space/time world and these are encapsulated by eternity as well. God is not living in just another dimension - extra dimensional, he is also outside all dimensions - outer dimensional. “the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain thee” (I Kings 8:27). He dwells in a place where the past, present and future in all dimensions is always present before him. Inhabiting eternity he rhetorically ask, “Do not I fill heaven and earth?” (Jeremiah 23:24).

To acknowledge the doctrine of God’s omnipresence demands that the doctrine of his omniscience be acknowledged as well. For if God dwells everywhere at all times then it only follows that he knows all that is - in all dimensions at all times. He cannot be in a time and place and not know what is happening there. He is present in all eternity and thus in all eras of time and dimension. Therefore he knows explicitly all that is. There is no moment or place or void where something is or isn’t happening and he is not intimately aware of it. He knows all things - atoms ,electrons, split-second quarks - at once and forever, because he is eternally there.

God Knows Himself
I find it exciting that God knows Himself with perfect understanding. This is in contrast to man who is deceived in understanding and cannot even know the deceit of his own heart. But God knows himself perfectly. Every glorious attribute of his perfect character is present before him eternally. The depths of his eternal being radiate in his sight. His perfection is known to him in the fullness of its beauty. His image of himself (Colossians 1:15) is understood in such absolute completeness that it stands forth as an exact representation of himself (Hebrews 1:3) and is himself again - known as the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. And he, as such, is eternal deity. (For more information on this subject see my article on this blog - Joy In Considering The Trinity).

God Knows Each Person
I know very little concerning myself. A lot of what I have known about myself I have forgotten. I do not comprehend what a miserable creature I am nor do I have a grain of understanding of the glory of God. The functioning of my body is outside my grasp. I am totally oblivious to it when I am asleep or unconscious. Not understanding my body, it is clear my soul and spirit are a complete puzzle. My future on this earth and date of my departure are a mystery to me. The contents of this article will surprise me when it is done.

Yet God knows me in total. Allow me to summarize the first sixteen verses of Psalm 139. He actively formed me in my mother’s womb. He knows when I sit down, get up and the word I am about to speak. My thoughts are no secret to him. There is nowhere I can go to escape him - neither heaven, hell or the farthest part of the sea. Neither darkness nor light hide me from him. He wrote the book on me before I was. He is fully aware of the contents of the article I am now writing - from the beginning to its end.

God Knows All Creation
God does all things for his glory (Ephesians 1:9-12; 3:9-11). That which God does will be the thing that brings him the most honor. It will most highly exalt his name. It will best make known his righteousness. It will manifest who he is.

Thus, God must choose the best world for this purpose, i.e., the display of his glory. A second-choice world would not be sufficient. It would be a dishonor to God if he were not to choose the world through which he would be most highly exalted. Therefore we can be assured that the world in which we live is the world that will bring the most glory to God.

For God to choose or decree this world demands that he be intimately acquainted with it. He cannot decree the best world without knowing it. Before the world was, God knew all his works (Acts 15:18). He informs us that he has numbered the stars and calls them all by name (Psalm 147:4). Because he is great and powerful he knows that none of them are missing (Isaiah 40:26). As for the nations, he determined their length of time and the boundaries of their territory (Acts 17:26). All things that be are determined and known by God at the same time - eternally.

God Knows Other Possible Worlds
At this point I am seeking to be careful for it is easy to find those that enter into weirdness and the absurd. These are those that will ask such questions as, “Can God create a world in which he does not exist or where a circle is square, etc?” These are the questions of fools. Any one can put the words “Can God” in front of a logical fallacy and come up with nonsense. Doing so does not diminish God but rather shows the stupidity of man and his enmity for the holy God. This is not where I am going.

However, we previously noted that God would have created the best possible universe in order to bring the most glory to himself. But how would God know that this is the best possible world to honor himself? Would he not have to know all possible worlds? I believe it necessary that he would.

There is a possible world that is identical to this world except there is one more leaf on the hickory tree in my front yard. There is another possible world which differs from this one only in that I have one more hair on my head. Has God thought of these possible worlds? I believe so. If he is omniscient he must know all possible worlds in order to choose the one that glorifies him the most.

How many possible worlds are there? There must be an infinite number of possible worlds. We could throughout all eternity never conceive of them all. An infinite number of possible worlds could only be known by an infinite God: that is, an infinite God who is omniscient - who knows all things possible.

There is scripture that gives us detail on things that God knows would have happened but did not. One such place is I Samuel 23:1-13. King Saul was desiring to kill David. God had sent David to fight the Philistines at Keliah. David defeated the Philistines at Keliah and then learned that Saul knew he was there. David asked two questions of God. Would Saul come there after him? God answered yes. Would the people of Keliah surrender him to Saul? God answered yes again. So we have God confirming what would happen if David stayed in Keliah. David, armed with this information, took his army and left Keliah. God knew a possible event that would not be actual and gave the information to David to direct him.

In Matthew 11:20-24 Jesus knew that the works that he was doing at that time would have caused repentance if they had been done at another time in Tyre, Sidon and Sodom. To know this information he would have to have considered another possible world that in our reality did not exist. Such is true in Luke 19:40 as well. Jesus entered Jerusalem and the people were praising God. He made known to his enemies that if this were not happening the stones would cry out. A possible world in which stones speak? Yes!

Thus the infinite God knows an infinite number of worlds. This is the best possible world to bring glory to God. Thus it becomes the only possible world for all others are deficient.

God Has Never Acquired Knowledge
Isaiah 40:13 ask the rhetorical question, “Who has directed the Spirit of the LORD, or being his counselor has taught him?” No one has ever directed or taught God anything. He didn’t ask me to what family, race, nation, time, economic standing, etc. I would choose to belong. He didn’t even inquire of me if I wanted to be born. Nor did he get up one day and look into the future to find me here doing whatever I am doing. He is eternally mindful of me and of you. Indeed, my times and yours are in his hands (Psalm 31:15).

God’s knowledge is complete. He has never learned or will learn something new or discover anything. No information exist that he has not previously known. “With whom took he counsel, and who instructed him, and taught him in the path of judgment, and taught him knowledge, and showed to him the way of understanding?” (Isaiah 40:14). The answer to this rhetorical question is an obvious “nobody” for he “is perfect in knowledge” (Job 37:16). He, himself, is the origin of his knowledge. As he eternally exist, so does his infinite knowledge eternally exist. To say that he knows all that is known is no less mystery than when he told Moses, “I am that I am” (Exodus 3:14).

Was there ever a moment in which God considered all infinitely possible worlds and then decided on this one that would most glorify him? Actually, no. All things are eternally known to him and are thus eternally decreed. If there ever was such a time that God made a decision then we must conclude that God has not always been omniscient. We would then have to say that God has evolved in his thinking. This would be absurd.

We who are finite think in ways that are limited to our mind and understanding. God uses language in the scripture that communicates as best as possible to a fallen finite mankind. These are anthropomorphisms, God using human attributes - forms, actions, emotions, etc. to convey information in a way we can understand. Yet there is no one like God, no one to whom we can compare him. As he rhetorically asks, “To whom will you liken me, and make me equal, and compare me, that we may be like?” (Isaiah 46:5).

Conclusion
I conclude in finite human writing as best I can what I perceive as true about this one attribute of an infinite God. God, being always omniscient, has always known and presently knows all things about himself, me and the creation. He even knows an infinite number of possible worlds. Yet this knowledge of possible worlds is, in one sense, of no use to him because all such worlds, excepting the one that brings him the most glory, are eternally rejected. The one world that he created, in which we are a part, is the only world eternally decreed as not only truly possible, but necessary. This world is the only one that can bring the required glory that is appropriate to honor God. This is the world that results from the omniscient God who says, “My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure” (Isaiah 46:10). He who knows all things decrees that which pleases himself.

Hopefully this information leads one to worship and conformity to Jesus Christ. Where else do you find a God who eternally knows and decrees all things? Would you be happy with a lesser one? It would not be the One True God. For this is the God who does not compromise his sovereignty and his beauty. He adores himself and overflows and thus the proper creation that glorifies him comes into being.

This creation is such that man rebels and opposes God. Then Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ and eternal Son of God was conceived by the Spirit and born of a virgin and ultimately “delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, you have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain: Whom God has raised up, having loosed the pains of death: because it was not possible that he should be held by it” (Acts 2:23,24).

Astounding! This is the God who declares his righteousness: both the glory of his justice is preserved and he is able to justify those that believe in Jesus. For the blood of Christ is the propitiation (appeasement of God’s wrath) for sins. Thus on that basis (the redemption that is in Christ Jesus) God can forgive the sins and justify (declare people to be in right standing) freely (without works) by grace (unmerited favor) all those who come in faith to Christ (Romans 3:24-26).

Thus Jesus Christ commands not the proud and self-sufficient but the humble and needy: “Come to me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and you shall find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30).

“O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out! For who has known the mind of the Lord? or who has been his counselor? Or who has first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen” (Romans 11:33-36).