Know

Knew in his spirit (2:8)

In 1963 a young Edmund Gettier published a two page paper in a little known journal under the exciting title 'Is justified true belief knowledge?'. It cannot have been much more than 600 words long, but in those few lines, with just two examples of lucky knowledge, he exploded into fragments the commonly held theory that knowledge could be defined as a belief (something we hold to be true) that is justified (we have good reason to hold it to be true) and true (accords with reality). After Gettier, despite many attempts, no one could any longer say what knowledge was with any certainty. To know was just that, to know, and no more. 

In some ways this seems to leave us dangling, adrift from any secure connection to reality. In another way it reminds us of what all wise people always knew, that in the end you just know that something is true 'in your knower', or, as here, 'in [your] spirit'. In the face of the chill wind of circumstance or the cynical criticisms of culture, we can simply say this: I just know that Christ died for me. I just know that God loves me. I just know that my home is in heaven.