Who Told You?

The burden of knowledge and the weight of awareness

It is often said that knowledge is power[ful], and I agree. I also believe that statement holds from another perspective - the weight and responsibility of knowledge. And I was reminded of this by a recent experience.

I was driving late at night through a quiet country road. Having grown up in contexts where nighttime travel required prayers and extreme caution, I found relief in the orderliness and the serenity I experienced on these roads. Unless there is a mechanical failure or human error (like rough driving), there is a sort of guaranteed expectation of arriving safely. For months, I drove these roads with a peace I didn’t take for granted, my prayers shifting from pleas for safety to simple gratitude.

Then, one evening, everything changed.

I overheard a conversation where someone was being cautioned against driving or, at least, speeding down empty country roads at night—not because of bandits or particularly bad roads, but because wild animals could leap across the path at any moment. That single sentence planted a seed of worry that hadn’t existed before. Now, I can’t see those roads differently again.

I was fine until I knew.

The Weight of Awareness

This is the burden of knowledge; it alters the trajectory of our thoughts and concerns, often without our consent. We move through life unburdened by certain worries until exposure introduces us to possibilities we never considered. Suddenly, our peace is compromised not by changed circumstances, but by expanded awareness.

Scripture illustrates this reality in the opening pages of Genesis. When God placed Adam and Eve in Eden, He intentionally restricted their access to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. This was not an arbitrary limitation; it was protective love. There existed a category of awareness—of evil, of corruption, of fear—that would fundamentally change how they navigated the world. Once they tasted that knowledge, they could not untaste it. They bore the burden of awareness, the weight of discerning good from evil, without the simplicity of pure trust.

Of course, Adam and Eve’s example is used quite loosely, as Adam chose that access as an intentional act of rebellion. But here is the point:

Filtered Through Faith

Not all knowledge serves us. Some information God intentionally shields from us to preserve our peace and dependence. Other knowledge, while factual, becomes harmful when it enters our hearts unfiltered by divine perspective. We cannot always control our exposure—we might overhear a conversation, scroll past a headline, or inherit cultural anxieties we never chose—but we can control how we process what we learn.

The safeguard is this: we must filter every new awareness through the lens of what God has said about Himself and about us. When we encounter information that introduces fear, division, or cynicism, we hold it up to Scripture. Does this align with God’s character? Does it increase my trust in Him or erode it?

The Freedom of Dependence

But then there is the danger of coming to God with pre-existing conclusions. We already have a definition of what is good and beneficial (which came particularly from Adam’s transgression). However, we must realise that we lack the capacity to independently classify which knowledge will build us up and which will burden us (simply put, good and bad). What appears disastrous may be the very tool God uses for our redemption (Romans 8:28). What appears advantageous may lead us away from dependence.

For example, overhearing that conversation about the country roads that day can be a way for God to warn me not to speed on those roads, thinking that because it is quiet, it is free and safe.

This is why our utmost dependence on God is beneficial. When we filter life through deep, grounded knowledge of Him rather than exhaustive knowledge of circumstances or what we have been taught to be good and bad, we find a framework that sustains us. We learn to hold loosely to our own definitions of good and evil, trusting that He orchestrates beyond our sight.

The goal here is not ignorance, but discernment. Not naivety, but childlike trust in God and a sharpened understanding of His ways and character. We must learn to release ourselves and our understanding of life at the feet of the One who sees the full picture. In the end, our safety does not depend on knowing every potential danger that lurks in the dark, but on knowing the One who guides us through it.

Till later,

AB