Revelation is the transmission of information from God to you. Revelation is a more accurate finite estimate of infinite reality. Note that this definition means that revelation is inherently circumstantial. It is true up to your level of awareness, but may not be true beyond your awareness. Also note that revelation is indistinguishable from learning. While all truth comes from God, this does not mean that all truth will be religiously oriented or found in explicitly religious channels. In other words, truth is truth no matter where it is found or how it is wrapped.
Because truth is infinite, while you can have no revelation on a subject, you can never get all revelation on a subject. Everything you think you know is either incorrect or incomplete. Even the most amazing revelations are only partial packets of truth.
Revelation can come as impressions, feelings, thoughts, ideas, words, sentences, understanding, visions, voices, and visitations, all of which are expansions of awareness or increased comprehension of good and evil.
Revelation from God is not external to your understanding. It is not something that comes from outside of you. It comes from within in response to what is outside of you. The light within you is the source of the revelation you receive.
The light of Christ is within you, to the degree of your awareness. It will show you all things that you should do (see 2 Nephi 32:2 and Moroni 10:5). Identifying situations where your current awareness does not provide sufficient information to know God’s mind on an issue provides you with opportunities to “search in the light of Christ” (see Moroni 7:19).
What is the light of Christ? It is your conscience; it is the quantity of light God has given you. When you obey God and seek for more light, he will increase this light within you, until you eventually obtain the awareness that God has (“the perfect day”, see Proverbs 4:18 and D&C 50:24).
Your conscience is an incredibly valuable resource. It is what you feel is right, not how you feel about what is right. It is the answer to “what is right”, not “what makes me feel good.” This is sometimes referred to as the burning of the bosom:
8 But, behold, I say unto you, that you must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it be right, and if it is right I will cause that your bosom shall burn within you; therefore, you shall feel that it is right.
9 But if it be not right you shall have no such feelings, but you shall have a stupor of thought that shall cause you to forget the thing which is wrong; therefore, you cannot write that which is sacred save it be given you from me. (D&C 9)
The idea of revelation as coming from an internal source has important implications, one of which is how your level of awareness determines how and what you receive via revelation.
The Holy Ghost reveals the truth of all things according to your present level of understanding. God will speak to you in your own language:
Behold, I am God and have spoken it; these commandments are of me, and were given unto my servants in their weakness, after the manner of their language, that they might come to understanding . (D&C 1:24)
Your “language” doesn’t refer to English, Spanish, etc. It means that he will speak to you in terms of your present awareness. Your present awareness constrains the tools he can use and the breadth and depth of ideas he can explain to you. The Lord explained how he reveals further light and truth to us:
10 And now come, saith the Lord, by the Spirit, unto the elders of his church, and let us reason together, that ye may understand;
11 Let us reason even as a man reasoneth one with another face to face.
12 Now, when a man reasoneth he is understood of man, because he reasoneth as a man; even so will I, the Lord, reason with you that you may understand. (D&C 50)
New revelation always comes just beyond your present level of awareness. The lower your awareness, the more basic the revelation you are capable of receiving.
Therefore, the way to learn the truth of all things is to seek to understand all things. This is why it is so detrimental to have an incorrect understanding of the importance of learning. The simpler you are, the more limited you are in what God can teach you: “But to be learned is good if they hearken unto the counsels of God.” (2 Nephi 9:29)
It is good to have awareness if you reconcile how you use it to God’s will. Not only is it incorrect to see knowledge as bad, it is impossible to grow in God’s light until and unless you acquire more knowledge. Yet, the possession of knowledge does not dictate how you use it.
Note that in order to apply the light of Christ, you have to study it out in your mind and ask if it is right. Too many oversimplify this process into literally and simply asking “is this right?” The Lord himself has clearly stated that this is not the way to obtain revelation: “Behold, you have not understood; you have supposed that I would give it unto you, when you took no thought save it was to ask me.” (D&C 9:7)
If getting revelation were as easy as just asking yes-or-no questions, why would God have said so much regarding learning to discern good from evil? Why would so many scriptural passages be dedicated to the evaluation process, if it were as simple as asking yes-or-no questions?
The vast majority of God’s awareness can’t be communicated through simple yes-or-no questions. If you limit yourself to this narrow channel, you will also cut yourself off from most of what God wants you to know. Furthermore, yes-or-no answers via feelings are the easiest to be mistaken on.
Searching in the light of Christ takes work. If we mistakenly assume it is as simple as asking yes-or-no questions, we will end up either with a very small set of truth, or a cloud of manufactured answers.
Even if we expand our understanding of the domain of revelation to include questions with more complicated answers, we still dramatically restrict our capacity for obtaining further light and truth. Revelation is increased awareness and increased light. It does not necessarily consist of an answer to a question, but of the information you need to “search in the light of Christ”—or to decide what is good and what is evil—beyond what you previously understood.
While it is a mistake to think that it is wise or acceptable to make educated guesses absent sufficient revelation to know God’s will, it is the case that there will be many situations where we can’t sincerely and confidently say that we know which outcome or course of action or idea is right. Rather than throw up our hands in revelatory nihilism, we should instead see every situation where we lack sufficient light as an opportunity to seek more.
Sincere reconciliation to your best knowledge is not the same as an educated guess. If you believe, without doubt, that you know what God would do in this situation (which is not the same as actually knowing what God would do), that is good and what you should do. If you aren’t sure what he would do, you have not yet sufficiently sought his will. You have to search for more revelation to know.
The Lord said: “Without faith you can do nothing.” (D&C 8:10) Asking in faith certainly requires looking into every resource you have at your disposal. This includes everything in the scriptures, as well as all good books and people you have access to. If you have not bothered looking into resources that you have the means to investigate, how can you expect God to show you what to do?