“But how do you know Jesus is the only way to God? But how do you know the Bible is true? But how do you know God authored the Bible? But how do you know you’re right?”

Have you ever been on the receiving end of such questions? Recently I had a relative and then a co-worker giving me the third degree. Which, by the way, I love and certainly welcome. One advantage I do have (I don’t have many) is I used to ask the very same questions. As people say, “Been there, done that.” So I am rarely caught off guard by a query nor do I get frustrated. I’m just thrilled the questions are being asked and the bottom lines about life are being explored.

Neither my relative or my co-worker gave their lives to Christ after talking with me. The relative promised more questions in the future. The co-worker took some reading material I provided and has never brought the subject up again. Did I fail?

Did the people I quizzed a quarter century ago when those questions were mine fail when they saw no apparent results in me? Well, here I am and they did not fail. Even though I debated and doubted and seemingly dismissed their answers, the certitude and conviction they had about Jesus Christ left me no room for permanent retreat. As we wrote about last time - eventually I had to “Come and see.” I hope and pray my family member and friend at work do the same. And if and when they do, I hope and pray they stay.

By the way, those questions above and others like them that people ask Christians (we who come, see and stay) just how do you know? Is it because you went to church all your life? Is it because your grandma told you? Or a friend at work? Those are all great ways to get someone to come and see, but what makes one stay? Where does your certainty and conviction come from concerning the things of God? Even the deep things of God?

The Apostle Paul tells us how we know that we know. “God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.” (I Cor 2:10-12)

Jesus says that no one can come to Him unless the Father draws them. (John 6:44) And there alone is found life now and forever. We who have been drawn and have come and seen and have stayed speak the things of God to others: “…not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.” (I Cor 2:13)

And verse 14 assures us that the natural man doesn’t get it because he or she lacks spiritual discernment. Hence, the thousand - “How do you knows?” And hence people being drawn by the Father to the Son are brought to us or us to them to be taught the things of God.

How do you know? Good question(s).