Welcome to The Soul Food Revival Series with your host Jimmy Hilton, “encouraging spiritual intimacy unto Christlike fruitfulness”.  Jeremiah 1:5, “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations”.  I want to talk about this ‘knowing’.   When I ponder that,  it's an amazing thought to think, that even before Jeremiah the prophet was born, even before God had actually formed his substance in the womb, God already knew him. Now, because others have stated... like Ezekiel, Paul...they’ve all mentioned that... and David, they mentioned the ‘knowing’. This is the revelation that the Spirit gives, that God knows us. God is the one who created us. He is our creator. And so, He already has an idea of what He was doing before we were born.     Sometimes we might think, you know, it's my parents choice or I was an accident.  But think about this; what God was saying to Jeremiah. “Even before you were conceived I knew you”.  Past tense, “I knew you”, not, “getting to know you”. Sometimes we think that when we come to Christ that's when God begins to know who we are.  But the reality is before you were even a thought, before your existence, God knew you.   Just think about that. God knew you, He knows us.  He knows us. He knows us better than we know ourselves.  He knows us better than those around us. And yet it should encourage us because like with Jeremiah he was appointed to be this prophet to the nation and he was scared.  And yet God already knew what He was working with even before he (Jeremiah) became a prophet, even before. So were talking about even when he was a child, even when he was a baby, even when he was in the first trimester the second and third in the womb. God already knew him.  And I wonder if we apply it to ourselves and realize (you know) God knows us and why should we try to avoid Him. Shouldn’t that encourage us and build us up to really grow in intimacy with Him; in an intimate relationship, in a more consecrated type of lifestyle with Him? Because before we became a Christian, God knew us.     Or maybe you're not a believer right now.  Maybe you don't believe in God. You don't believe in Christ.  But God says, “before I formed you in the womb, I already knew you. I already know you”.  And he's not disappointed in what He knows. Jeremiah found out that God says, “I have plans for you” (Jeremiah 29:11).  Because He knows us He has plans. And He was saying this to Israel, “plans for welfare and not for evil to give you a future and a hope” (Jeremiah 29:11).  It's not just a crowd of people He’s saying that to. But, He is saying that to us as individuals because God knows us. He knows us in accordance to the plan that He has for us.  These plans are not to make it hard on us, but it's to give us a good life; for us to have a future to look forward to, because that's where hope is.   Hope is for a good expectation not an evil one.  And God says, “No matter where you are now, or how you see yourself, or how others perceive you, it doesn't matter.  I know what I'm doing. I know what I have intended (for us) for you”. And when we come to Christ, sometimes we think that at the time we became born-again that's when God found us.  But the reality is, that's when we discovered that God was already prepared for us. And that should be exciting because even if you don't know Him now, He's already said, like he said to Jeremiah, “Before you were born, I consecrated you.”  Consecration means that, “I've actually set you apart and I've claimed you to be my own. I've claimed you to be my spokesman or my own prized possession”. And you know sometimes we might think, ‘Well I may not be qualified for this, so I don't think that God has any interest in me”.  And that would be a lie.   Paul, the Apostle Paul, he was not always a good guy in regards to the gospel.  He was actually someone who would be working in an antichrist type of spirit when he was Saul, even as a religious leader, a Pharisee amongst the Jews.  But when he had his Damascus Road experience and he was blinded for those three days and received this insight, the revelation that it was the Lord that he was actually working against.  He thought he was trying to serve God but in reality he was fighting against God. And he was humbled by that experience and realized that he was in error.   But Paul has this letter to the Galatians because he says to them, in essence, “what God began in the Spirit, why are you trying so hard to perfect it or complete it with your flesh.” (Galatians 3:3). Because it starts with Him and no matter what you put into it, unless you're relying on Him, it's a failure.  If you're trying to do it in your own strength not being led by the Spirit being obedient in the new creation that He made you, then you're actually just trying to do these works and you're not getting closer to Him. He's the one who formed you in the womb. He knows you. And because He knows you, He still loves you.  He loves you as you are. But He loves you more than that, to not leave you the way you were.   He has plans for good and not for evil.  It's for your welfare. And so Paul, in Galatians 1:15-16,  and he says, “But when He who had set me apart before I was born, and who called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach Him among the Gentiles,...”   You hear that? ‘He set me apart before I was born’, that's what Paul said. And yet, the years from birth to maybe this man was in his 30s or 40s, I don't know before that Damascus Road experience, he was against God.  He was actually operating in an antichrist spirit trying to persecute the church that Jesus built, that the Spirit was leading. And yet here is this man who is violently opposed to that movement, to the church of Christ, and yet God revealed to him that even when he was in that state of mind, and the only reason why he had a change and a transformation is because the reality is God had already set him apart before he was born, before he knew who he was.  And that's something that God wants us to know.   We might be caught up in a wrong identity because we think we know who we are and that might be affecting some type of relationship with Christ.  We think that we're always failing so sometimes some people just don't bother to try anymore. They don't try to enhance the relationship. So they stop praying.  They stop reading the Word. They stop being a witness for allowing God to make changes. And they say, “Well, this is the way I am”. No, God knows the way you are, the real you.  And if you allow Him in, He might be able to remove the layers of the ‘false’ to bring out the ‘real’ in you. And it's by this grace that God is pleased to reveal his Son to us. He's pleased to reveal Christ no matter where we are in our belief; if we’re in unbelief, If we’re in opposition, like Paul.  Paul was in opposition. He was actually one who would, you can say he would be a modern day heckler...or atheist...or agnostic...or New Ager...or someone who just has a strong animosity towards the church. And that could be you right now. You could have a little inclination of animosity or it could be a strong animosity.     But God is saying to you who's listening, “I know you. I know you enough that I love you to send my Son to die for your sins...to carry your burden, because I have plans for you; plans for your good, for welfare, and not for evil. My plans for you are not to bring destruction. I want to reveal my Son to you, so that you might know what you've been set apart for.”  And what God can accomplish in you, He can accomplish in you because he can accomplish it in anybody. And Paul says I'm probably the worst of all sinners, says that the Apostle Paul. He went about with a group of people to execute a type of torture towards Christians. Now whether you’re that type of person and you’re doing it towards other Christians or towards other races, it doesn't matter in the sense that, at anytime, if God is speaking to you, to reveal his Son to you, let it be known you can answer and you can respond because God is faithful.  He knows you. And you just don't know yourself. You don't know the new you in Christ yet.   But if you are in Christ, know this, He has appointed you to something.  And if you're out there kind of drifting through life walking aimlessly about where it says somewhere in the scriptures that, “My people perish for lack of vision”. (Hosea 4:6)  That's not God's will or his intention. if He has consecrated us and appointed us as he appointed Jeremiah or Paul, they're just not that special. God is not a respecter of persons. (Romans 2:11-16).  So if He has an appointment for one He has an appointment for another. That's just the course of history we see that. Abraham was appointed to be a father of many nations, the father of faith, before he knew it. Joseph, appointed to be a deliverer, yet being the youngest son.  Moses, appointed to be delivered and yet he said, ‘I can't even speak. I need help. I can't speak publicly I stutter’. Gideon, appointed to be a leader for deliverance, and yet he's like I'm the least of the least in my tribe. And right now we're oppressed people and I'm scared.     And yet in all these people and all of these individuals in all of their struggles, you know, I even think of with Boaz, Ruth, someone who is a widower, someone who is not in the Jewish, who is not a Jew, a Jewish woman.  And yet God had appointment to bring David through her lineage. Or Rehab, a woman who was a prostitute and yet she would be in grafted in and find safety. She would also be in that lineage for she would be in the lineage with Boaz and Christ in all this.  It's all coming to a point where we just don't know, but we know God knows. God knows you. He knew you before He formed you, and He doesn't want you to miss your appointment. So I encourage you today, pursue Christ, pursue Go