The Pursuit of God by Tozer - Reflections (16)

 

“Our gifts and talents should also be turned over to Him. They should be recognized for what they are, God’s loan to us, and should never be considered in any sense our own” (page 28).

 

The first “gift assessment” I saw was around 1990. I’m sure they existed before then, but the first one I saw was when a friend brought one to me that his church was doing. This particular assessment required that the participants have people who knew them fill out portions of the assessment based on their knowledge of the participants. I dutifully and politely (unusual for me I suppose) filled out the request form, but I did so with inner hesitation.

 

Since then, I have seen many forms of gift assessment, and I have yet to see one with which I am comfortable – not one. In fact, the more sophisticated they become, the more I am not only uncomfortable, but the more I fear in terms of a descent into Gnosticism and beyond (more on this below).

 

The most critical element which these gift assessments lack is the Cross of Christ. 

 

As our chapter on possessing nothing emphasizes, all that we have must go to and through the Cross, it must be offered up to God. Without having been to the Cross, and remaining in the Cross, our gifts and talents are poison for they are rooted in self-reliance and not in Jesus Christ. When Jesus says, “Apart from Me you can do nothing,” He includes our talents and gifts. This means, in part, that our greatest gifts are also our greatest weaknesses and dangers, for if we rely on ourselves and our own abilities we will live according to the flesh, the natural – and our fruit will be death, death to ourselves and death to others.

 

Our fruit may not look like death, it may look, “Good for food, be a delight to the eyes, and desirable to make one wise” (Genesis 3:6), but it will most certainly result in death.

 

Then we have the assumption that God wants us to primarily use our “natural” gifts and talents and to not venture into areas in which we are not naturally gifted. This thinking is carnal and not spiritual; it rests on the natural and not on the Holy Spirit – it requires no dependence on God. We ought not to make such assumptions.

 

Moses argued with God that he was not, “eloquent,” and that he was “slow of speech and slow of tongue” (Ex. 4:10). Paul writes to the Corinthians, “I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom…” (1 Cor. 2:3 – 4). Jeremiah protested to God, “I do not know how to speak, because I am a youth” (Jer. 1:6).

 

God calls people into areas of service for which they are not naturally gifted; let us not be so foolish as to look at the outward, or to evaluate people and church life the way the world does, Christ Jesus is the Head of the Body. The Word of God may very well come to us through the most shy and soft-spoken man or woman in our midst, but we will never know if our eyes are focused on the natural and not on the Cross of Christ. We are too easily impressed.

 

It is easy for us to forget that God’s strength is “made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9). We tend to forget that it is the Holy Spirit who works in us, the Body of Christ, as He wills, not as we will (1 Cor. 12:11). Our presumptions are dangerous. Just because we can do things does not mean that we should do things, things done in the “natural” are best left undone. If it is not of Christ Jesus, if it is not through the Cross, then we had better leave the task alone.

 

One of our problems today is that we have built edifices ourselves rather than in Christ, ignoring Psalm 127:1, “Unless the LORD builds the house, they labor in vain who build it; unless the LORD guards the city, the watchman keeps awake in vain.” What we have built ourselves we must maintain ourselves, what we have artificially built, must be artificially maintained.

 

Then we have groups and ministries that were born of the Spriit, but at some point veered into the flesh or worse (Galatians 3:3; also see Revelation chapters 2 and 3). Naturally we justify our actions and thinking, for we must grow, we must acquire more, we must be bigger and better each year. We end up riding a tiger which will devour us if we dismount.

 

Let’s recall that Isaac was a child of promise. In the “natural,” Abraham and Sarah could not produce Isaac, they were old, they were just too old. When Isaac was given to them, he was not given to become an idol, he was not given so that Abraham and Sarah should center their lives around him, he was not given to be taken into the inner most shrine of the heart – the place where only God is to dwell.

 

So with us, so with our churches, what God gives us is never ours to possess, it is given to us in trust and we are to be good stewards of God’s gifts and resources – we are to own nothing – how can we own anything if we are owned by Jesus Christ? The words “my” and “mine” ought to never enter our minds, for all is to be surrendered to the Cross, and all is to remain in the Cross.

 

Before we conclude this reflection (in our next reflection we’ll ponder what Tozer writes about how we can respond to Christ in obedience), I’ll comment on gift assessments which include personality and temperament analysis (more and more gift assessments now include this element).

 

Only God truly knows us (Psalm 139) and only the Holy Spirit can reveal what we need to know about ourselves (Psalm 19:11 – 14; Psalm 139:23 – 24; Hebrews 4:12 – 16; Philippians 2:12 - 13). Preoccupation with self-analysis is never-ending and leads downward and downward into Gnostic darkness. The great question of life is not, “Who am I?” but rather, “Who is Jesus Christ?”

 

Our lives are transformed into goodness, truth, and beauty as we behold Jesus Christ, not as we ponder our emotional and psychological navels (1 John 3:1 – 3; 2 Cor. 3:17 – 18; Rom. 12:1 – 2). We are not capable of defining ourselves, of truly understanding ourselves, only our Creator – Father truly knows us. (I have written more extensively about this on Mind on Fire when exploring John 15:1ff.)

 

I have seen people become trapped within psychological assessments, adopting them as core identities and using them to pigeonhole others. I have witnessed people obsessed with these assessments. Some of these assessments have their roots in anti-Christian teaching, and one which is quite popular in some Christian circles has been propagated by a heretical “Christian” teacher who is opposed to the Christ of the Cross and the Cross of Christ.

 

In Christ, we discover our gifts and callings as we live in relationship in the Body of Christ, as we experience daily life with other disciples. Our gifts and callings can change, for sure they ought to mature, we have various seasons of life, and we must always abide in the Vine. The fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, which humanistic assessments offer, leads to death.

 

Because I can hear some readers protesting, I will add that I have used basic assessments before, both in business and in the church, that make no pretense of exploring the “inner person.” People in church tended to make more of them than intended, often confusing them with their identity – I would not do this again. People in business tended to see them as tool to help them understand how they make decisions and communicate, nothing more.

 

We are a supernatural people, living in communion with a supernatural God, let us trust our Lord Jesus in these things as we live in relationship with one another.

 

Let us recall that all must be offered to Christ on the altar of the Cross, including ourselves.

 

Have your gifts and talents been crucified with Christ?

 

Galatians 2:20.

The Pursuit of God by Tozer - Reflections (15)

 

“Now he was a man who possessed nothing. He had concentrated his all in the person of his dear son, and God had taken it from him” (page 27).

 

“I have said that Abraham possessed nothing. Yet was not this poor man rich? Everything he had owned before was his still to enjoy…He had everything, but he possessed nothing. There is the spiritual secret. There is the sweet theology of the heart which can be learned only in the school of renunciation” (page 27).

 

We are generally told that as long as our treasures are “good” that we can set our hearts upon them, that we can make them the center of our lives, that we can bring them into the shrine of our hearts. We make gods of our families, of our children, of our jobs, of our 401ks, of our houses and cars and boats and travel experiences and positions of influence and of hobbies. We can make idols of pretty much anything. Again, my idols are probably not your idols.

 

Consider that John concludes his first letter with, “Little children, guard yourselves from idols” (1 John 5:21).

 

Congregations can have idols, denominations and parachurch ministries can have idols, colleges and seminaries can have idols – idols are insidious. I could write that idols are always knocking at the door of our hearts, but that is not true. More often than not idols are attempting to seduce us, they do not knock, they whisper, they coo, they offer comfort, they stroke our egos, they appeal to what we consider our better selves. They can be pragmatic and they can also be altruistic.

 

But the blessedness of possessing nothing is not really about idols, it is about loving God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength; it is about being conformed to the image of the Firstborn Son, it is about being the sons and daughters of our Father in heaven (Romans 8:29; Matthew 5:43 – 48).

 

In offering Isaac, Abraham was being conformed to the image of our Father, who gave His Only Begotten Son. In Abraham we see our Father, and in Isaac we see the Son. We are called to both, we are called into the fellowship of the One who gives His Son, and into the fellowship of the One who gives Himself according to His Father’s will, for the life of the world.

 

There ought to be only One Light in our lives, One Light in our City, that of the Father and the Lamb (Revelation 21:23).

 

Paul wrote concerning himself and his coworkers that they were, “As poor yet making many rich, as having nothing yet possessing all things” (2 Corinthians 6:10).

 

When we experience trials some of us may retain positions and possessions, and others may not. Whatever the case may be, we are called to trust our kind and loving heavenly Father.

 

“I know how to get along with humble means, and I also know how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need” (Philippians 4:12).

 

It seems to me that we tend to play the part of Peter in Matthew 16:21 – 23, we want others to avoid the Cross. In other words, rather than present the call of Jesus in Matthew 16:24 – 26 to take up the cross and deny ourselves, our churches and message are designed to have us avoid the Cross and self-denial and the offering of our Isaacs. We think we know better than Jesus Christ, for we think that if we proclaim what Jesus commands – the Cross and self-denial and faithful witnessing – that people won’t come to church and won’t come back; yet, it was the Gospel of Jesus and the call to discipleship that changed the world, not a message that catered to our whims and fancies and self-indulgence.

 

People are transformed by the Christ of the Cross and the Cross of Christ, not by Christian entertainment, therapy, sociology, or an appeal to their superficial needs.

 

“After that bitter and blessed experience I think the words my and mine never again had the same meaning for Abraham. The sense of possession which they connote was gone from his heart. Things had been cast out forever. They had now become external to the man” (pages 27 – 28).

 

“We are often hindered from giving up our treasures to the Lord out of fear for their safety. This is especially true when those treasures are loved relatives and friends. But we need have no such fears. Our Lord came not to destroy but to save. Everything is safe which we commit to Him, and nothing is really safe which is not so committed” (page 28).

 

Can we trust Jesus and our Father with our obedience?

 

Are there things or people in our hearts and souls upon which we have hung signs that say to God, “Hands off! Do not touch!”?

 

 

The Pursuit of God by Tozer - Reflections (14)

 

Now we come to a section of the chapter, The Blessedness of Possessing Nothing, that shocked me and made me ashamed when I read it. It also brought me back to my previous reflection on how things have changed in the professing church in the seventy-seven years since Tozer wrote The Pursuit of God.

 

“Abraham was old when Isaac was born, old enough indeed to have been his grandfather, and the child became at once the delight and idol of his heart. From the moment he first stooped to take the tiny form awkwardly in his arms, he was an eager love slave of his son. God went out of His way to comment on the strength of this affection. And it is not hard to understand. 

"The baby represented everything sacred to his father’s heart: the promises of God, the covenants, the hope of the years and the long messianic dream. As he watched him grow from babyhood to young manhood, the heart of the old man was knit closer and closer with the life of his son, till at last the relationship bordered upon the perilous. It was then that God stepped in to save both father and son from the consequences of an uncleansed love." (Page 24).

 

“Now it came about after these things, that God tested Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” He said, “Take now you son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will tell you.”” (Genesis 22:1 - 2).

 

When I was a young Christian, this passage was often referred to in the things I read, in conversation, and in teaching. My early mentor, George Will, spoke of it often as a central element of the working of the Cross in our lives and in our following Jesus. There was a time, when those who desired to go deeper into Jesus knew that Genesis 22:1 - 2 was a situation they would all face, they knew it was a Way of Life that they were called to - and they taught this Way to others. 

Unlike our own day, they did not teach that our calling is to accumulate things and possessions and to fill our hearts with idols (which can include people, which can include family), but rather that our calling is to follow Jesus and His Way of the Cross, denying ourselves. It was once taught that God alone ought to be in the sanctuary of our souls and hearts, that God alone ought to be worshipped.

 

There are many facets to Genesis 22, for not only do we see Abraham tested, but we also see the Father offering His Son, and the Son being a willing offering from the Father. We also see Isaac becoming the resurrected seed of New Creation, a picture of Christ Jesus, the grain of wheat falling into the ground, dying, and coming forth in much fruit, the Risen Holistic Body of Christ (John 12:20 – 26).

 

I am shocked and ashamed that I have not preached on this passage with this emphasis of God “saving both father and son from the consequences of an uncleansed love,” and have not thought about it for many, many years. Considering that Abraham is our father of faith, and considering that we see the Cross of Christ working within our inner sanctuary in this passage, this is inexcusable.

 

We can make people our idols just as we can make things our idols, and this is something we do not want to hear in our age of self-focus, self-improvement, of Sunday morning gatherings which are often group therapy sessions more than anything. We don’t want to hear that we can make marriage, family, and children idols – even when this is all under the label “Christian.” God, and God alone is to be within our inner sanctuary.

 

“He that loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it” (Matthew 10:37 – 39).

 

This is hardly “seeker sensitive.”

 

Yet, let’s remember that when God fills our inner sanctuary that we lay down our lives for others, including our spouses, our children, our families, our brothers and sisters in Christ, and our neighbors – as our Way of Life. (John 13:34 – 35; 15:12 – 13; 1 John 3:16; Mark 12:31).

 

All love requires cleansing at the Cross, a death and a resurrection in Jesus Christ. And consider that Isaac was a gift from God, Isaac was the fulfillment of a promise, a grand and glorious promise – we can make the promises of God and their fulfillment our idols, we can worship them rather than God.

 

Somewhere Oswald Chambers writes about us using others as an excuse for disobedience. He says that when God commands obedience that we tell Him that if we obey that others won’t understand it, that it will adversely affect others, and that therefore we can’t do what He commands. We think that God does not know the effects of our obedience on others.

 

Surely if anyone could have made this argument with God it was Abraham.

 

Tozer writes, “Possibly not again until One greater than Abraham wrestled in the Garden of Gethsemane did such mortal pain visit a human soul” (page 25).

 

“God let the suffering old man go through with it up to the point where He knew there would be no retreat, and then forbade him to lay a hand upon the boy. To the wondering patriarch He now says in effect, “It’s all right, Abraham. I never intended that you should actually slay the lad. I only wanted to remove him from the temple of your heart that I might remain unchallenged there. I wanted to correct the perversion that existed in your love"” (page 26).

 

While we will pick Abraham and Isaac back up in our next reflection in this series, I will point out two things in closing.

 

The first is that only God knows our inner sanctuary, and I think we must respect this with one another. The principle of the Cross is the same with each of us, but the working of the Cross is individual. My idols are not necessarily your idols, my possessiveness is likely not your possessiveness. Let’s also keep in mind that our idols are often good things and good people, professing Christians generally do not worship overt evil and ugliness – though they can slide into these things. Our idols can be wonderful religious things, as in Abraham’s case, our idols may even be the promises of God and their fulfillment, they may be the very gifts that God has given us.

 

The second thing is that when God’s Word is living within us, it will pierce deeply, even to dividing soul and spirit – penetrating into our inner sanctuary (Hebrews 4:12 – 13). We have become such a superficial and soulish people that we seldom experience the deep working of the Word, and when we do we run from it rather than submit to the Holy Spirit. We simply can’t imagine that God would bring discomfort to us, that He would require anything from us that would lead to the Cross, to our own crucifixion, to us actually experiencing distress in our minds and hearts and souls in order to purify our love and form us into the image of Jesus.

 

We are all about the group hug. God is all about the Cross.

 

How are you experiencing Genesis Chapter 22?

 

Are there Isaacs in my life?

 

In your life?

The Pursuit of God by Tozer - Reflections (13)

 

 

“Our Lord referred to this tyranny of things when He said to His disciples, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life for my sake shall find it” (Matt. 16:24-25).

 

“It would seem that there is within each of us an enemy which we tolerate at our peril. Jesus called it “life” and “self,” or as we would say, the self-life. Its chief characteristic is its possessiveness: the words gain and profit suggest this. To allow this enemy to live is, in the end, to lose everything. To repudiate it and give up all for Christ’s sake is to lose nothing at last, but to preserve everything unto life eternal.” (pages 22 – 23).

 

As I ponder what Tozer says, I wonder if I missed this as a pastor and Bible teacher. While I emphasized the intercessory life, while time after time I recited Jesus’ call to take up our cross, deny ourselves, and follow Him, did I fail to make the connection for others that this directly affects our attitude toward possessions? While I did teach about us being stewards of all that God has given us, did I fail to explicitly challenge my people concerning the idolatry of possessions?

 

I have often thought about reading Ron Sider’s, Rich Christians In An Age of Hunger, and then asking the leader of a marketplace ministry about the book. It seemed to me natural that we’d want to introduce successful businesspeople to Sider’s challenge. I was told that if the ministry did that it would lose many of its participants.

 

While I did not press the issue with my friend, our interchange helped convince me that all ministry, including marketplace ministry, must have its nexus in the Cross.

 

I am not sure that we would have lost folks if we had presented Sider’s book, after all, the men and women we were serving were professing Christians and the very reason we were connected to them was because they wanted to go deeper with Jesus.

 

Yet, I also recall a response to some Bible teaching of mine (I don’t recall the specific teaching), some people were concerned that I was saying they couldn’t seek profits and wealth and possessions – in other words, they wanted to avoid the Cross working these things out in their lives, they wanted easy answers and they weren’t getting them from me.

 

It is good to remind ourselves that we ought to desire God to reveal our hearts to us and that we ought not to judge others, we can’t really know the hearts of others. For that matter, we can’t really know our own hearts, which is why we must seek the Holy Spirit and the Word of God and trust our Father to reveal to us what we need to see, trusting God to give us grace to respond to Him in obedience.

 

A person with many possessions may have God in the shrine of his heart, and the possessions may be external to his soul. A person with few possessions may worship them as idols and may have placed them in the depths of his heart, and God may be on the outside.

 

What we do know is that we live in a society obsessed with possessions. We are obsessed with the stock market, with economic reports, with investments, and with the accumulation of things. We check the financial markets the way a sports fan checks the Super Bowel score – except we do it as a way of life, not one day a year for a few hours.

 

“There can be no doubt that this possessive clinging to things is one of the most harmful habits in life. Because it is so natural, it is rarely recognized for the evil that it is. But its outworkings are tragic” (page 28).

 

Jesus says, “Beware, and be on your guard against every form of greed; for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions” (Luke 12:15). Jesus then proceeds to tell the story of a rich man planning to build bigger barns to store his increasing harvest. God calls him a “Fool!” Jesus then says, “So is the man who stores up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God” (Luke 12:16 – 21).

 

We measure life by money and possessions, and as Tozer says, it is “so natural,” and yet, isn’t it also so foolish?

 

Many churches and church leaders measure themselves by how much money they bring in and by their physical campus. I can’t count the number of times over the years friends and acquaintances have told me how big their capital campaign was, how much their new building cost, how much they spent on a new multimedia system.

 

I recall having lunch with an associate pastor at a church we were attending. Vickie and I had been bombarded with building fund marketing, as had the entire congregation. I said to the pastor, “Since this capital campaign began some months ago, I don’ recall one time we were told by church leadership that this is a result of prayer, or that leadership sensed God was leading them and the congregation in this direction. All we have heard is that consultants recommended we build a new building.”

 

The pastor thought for a few moments and then said, “You are right. This has not been about prayer or our sense of God’s direction.”

 

I guess everyone assumed that the more we had, the more money, the more buildings on campus, the more space, the better off we would be as a congregation. Bigger must be better.

 

Why don’t we speak of our pursuit of God? Why don’t we talk of loving Jesus more today than yesterday? Why don’t we rejoice in the members of our congregations growing in the Word, sharing the Word with one another, sharing the Gospel with those who don’t yet know Jesus, praying for one another, becoming a mature Body of Christ Jesus?

 

“The way to deeper knowledge of God is through the lonely valleys of soul poverty and abnegation of all things. The blessed ones who possess the Kingdom are they who have repudiated every external thing and have rooted from their hearts all sense of possessing…These are the “poor in spirit.”

 

“These blessed poor are no longer slaves to the tyranny of things. They have broken the yoke of the oppressor; and this they have done not by fighting but by surrendering. Though free from all sense of possessing, they yet possess all things. “Theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”” (page 23).

 

To teach such things today seems impossible in our nation and in our churches. For pastors it would be a sure way to lose your job.

 

This is a result of us making conversion mechanical (as Tozer has pointed out) and of our failure to make disciples in obedience to the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18 – 20). Instead of asking people to “receive Jesus,” we are to call people to Jesus as Jesus calls people to Himself, “If anyone desires to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the Gospel’s will save it” (see Mark 8:34 – 38).

 

As Tozer writes, the root of possessiveness is the self-centered life, the selfish soul which is as a black hole, pulling all things into its dense self-centered gravity. Arguments, broken relationships, anger, emotional and mental problems, divorce, wars, fraud, the list of the poison fruit of the “self” and possessiveness is endless – when we make ourselves gods we make the world hell.

 

We are drunk with the hemlock of profit and gain and consumption and we can’t get enough, perhaps we should take a good look at Revelation Chapter 18 and see that we are not only fools, but that we are dancing with demons.

 

What have we done with our lives? With our marriages and families? With our churches? With our nation? With our world?

 

Might not the fact that what Tozer says is so foreign to our experience, that it is so impractical, that it seems like it is from another world, indicate how far we have departed from the Gospel and the Word of God and the Cross of Jesus Christ?

 

Well, for sure it is from another world, it is from heaven. Since we are to be citizens of heaven (Phil. 3:20), perhaps we ought to pay attention to it.

 

Tozer has more to show us in the blessedness of possessing nothing, there is more to come, including a way out of our dilemma.

 

O dear friends, let us remember that life is about knowing Jesus, loving Him more today than yesterday, and being the Presence of Christ to those around us. As Jesus laid down His life, we are to lay down our lives for others. What a blessed calling, and what a glorious future obedience to this calling assures us.

 

“Yet not I, but Christ,” (Galatians 2:20).

 

Shall this be our testimony today?

The Pursuit of God by Tozer - Reflections (12)

Chapter Two – The Blessedness of Possessing Nothing

 

“Before the Lord God made man upon the earth He first prepared for him a world of useful and pleasant things for his sustenance and delight. In the Genesis account of the creation these are called simply “things.” They were made for man’s use, but they were always meant to be external to the man and subservient to him. In the deep heart of the man was a shrine where none but God was worthy to come. Within him was God; without, a thousand gifts which God had showered upon him. [Italics mine.]

 

“But sin has introduced complications and has made those very gifts of God a potential source of ruin to the soul.

 

“Our woes began when God was forced out of His central shrine and things were allowed to enter. Within the human heart things have taken over.” [Italics mine]. (Pages 21 – 22).

 

Why does Tozer decide that we must deal with the “blessedness of possessing nothing” so early in our pursuit of God? If he thought this important 77 years ago, what might he think today?

 

“There is within the human heart a tough, fibrous root of fallen life whose nature is to possess, always to possess…The roots of our hearts have grown down into things, and we dare not pull up one rootlet lest we die…God’s gifts now take the place of God, and the whole course of nature is upset by the monstrous substitution” (page 22).

 

As I read this chapter once again, I wonder if I have ever truly read it; I wonder if I have ever truly seen it; I wonder if I am even seeing it now.

 

The first extended teaching that Jesus gave is what we call the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew chapters 5 – 7. This is the first extended Word from God on earth, speaking not just to a crowd 2,000 years ago, but speaking to all humanity for all time, and speaking to you and me in our time. Instead of speaking in a cloud on Mount Sinai, God has come down to speak plainly to us on earth; we see His face, we hear His Voice…or do we?

 

For in God’s first message to us on earth, he says many things which ought to unnerve us and shake our souls and perspectives…but do they?

 

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:19 – 21).

 

How do we respond to these words from God?  Make no mistake, Jesus is God (John 1:1 – 18). Where is our treasure? Where is our heart?

 

Are things which were meant to be external to us now living within us? Do we now serve things which were meant to serve us? What inhabits the shrine of our heart?

 

I have asked over the years whether a fish knows that it lives in an aquarium, and I wonder if we realize that we live in a prison of consumption and possession. We have been trained from childhood to consume and to possess, to acquire; we are all engaged in a game of Monopoly in one form or another.

 

Money, money, money is our arbiter; money is our national policy, money forms our international relations, money and possessions form our lives and the lives of our families, and money and possessions form much of the professing church. Can we not “see” that we are living in the system portrayed in Revelation Chapter 18? Does a fish know that it lives in an aquarium?

 

What do people talk about? They talk about possessions and money. How do we vote? We vote our pocketbooks. When grandparents talk to me about their grandchildren, what do they talk about? Their financial success. What is the purpose of education? It is to get a good-paying job.

 

What will our children and grandchildren say to us before the Throne of God when they find out that they’ve wasted their lives in the pursuit of possessions, rather than pursuing God? Will they say, “Why didn’t you tell us?”

 

What will congregations say to their pastors? “Why didn’t you tell us what Jesus said? Why didn’t you challenge us with the Christ of the Cross and the Cross of Christ? Why did you countenance and encourage our pursuit of possessions when we should have been making ourselves God’s possession?”

 

Then we have the Satanic teaching called the “Prosperity Gospel.” While its tentacles have reached into most churches, in its blatant form it is the whore of Revelation 18 parading herself within the professing church and its institutions. The whore has no need to seduce, she intoxicates with promises of health and wealth and “blessing” – and in one sense her sin is her openness, she does not care about decorum. The fact is that many of us will go along with the intoxication as long as it operates within certain social norms – we must not tear away our facades.

 

Do we realize that our economic and social and political system depends on our worship and consumption and possession of things?

 

Well, the good news is that there is a way out of all of this, and Tozer will lead us through it before we conclude the chapter, but I wonder if we will be able to hear what he says and see what he writes.

 

My sense is that we ought not to say, “Have things taken possession of my heart? Have they entered into the shrine of my soul?”

 

Instead, perhaps we should ask, “How have things taken possession of my heart? How have things entered into the shrine of my soul?”

 

Making ourselves the exception, making our church the exception, is probably the dumbest thing we can do.

 

Let’s recall, that “one man’s junk is another man’s treasure” means that what takes root in my heart may not be what takes root in your heart. What I serve may not be what you serve.

 

What things are inside me that ought to be outside me?

 

 Is God, and God alone, with love for others, exclusively living inside me? (Mark 12:29 – 31).

 

Am I God’s possession?

 

What about you?

 

 

The Pursuit of God by Tozer - Reflections (11)

 

 

“We need not fear that in seeking God only we may narrow our lives or restrict the motions of our expanding hearts. The opposite is true. We can well afford to make God our All, to concentrate, to sacrifice the many [things, whether religious or otherwise] for the One” (page 18).

 

“The man who has God for his treasure has all things in One. Many ordinary treasures may be denied him, or if he is allowed to have them, the enjoyment of them will be so tempered that they will never be necessary to his happiness. Or if he must see them go, one after one, he will scarcely feel a sense of loss, for having the Source of all things he has in One all satisfaction, all pleasure, all delight. Whatever he may lose he has actually lost nothing, for he now has it all in One, and he has it purely, legitimately and forever” (pp. 19 – 20).

 

In Tozer’s time, there were men and women still preaching and teaching Jesus, I am not sure about our own time. I’m not saying there are none, but I am saying that they are harder to find. As Tozer pointed out, we seem to be seeking Jesus and, God and, the Holy Spirit and. God alone is not enough. We are such products of this thinking and practice, we have grown up in it, that we don’t know what we don’t know, we don’t know what it is to seek Jesus and only Jesus.

 

We are so embedded in this way of life, that to threaten it is to threaten our existence, our identity, our movements, our organizations, the core of our beings – it is to suggest that we have brought idols into the Temple, and since the idols are our livelihood – our religious and emotional and psychological and financial currency - what shall we do?

 

We think that if we make Jesus our only desire that we will have nothing, yet Tozer tells us that we will have all things. What do we believe? Do we believe this is possible?

 

Is it worth the risk to try? To try only Jesus?

 

Let’s remind ourselves that we are not speaking of bad things, but of good things, of moral things, of ethical things. Yes, they can be self-centered things, and at their core I suppose they are; but there could be worse things…or could there?

 

Let’s also recall Tozer’s warning that the Bible is not an end in itself but a means by which we may know God intimately. We can know the Bible and not know God.

 

Let’s remember, that we are talking about knowing God as a Person, as a person knows a person; progressively, revealingly, deeply; so that we know and sense His desires, His joys, His sorrows, His love, His holiness, His justice, His mercy, His grace, His very Personhood, and character. Are we seeing the face of God?

 

Are we making Jesus Christ our All in all? Are we pursuing Him with all that we have and all that we are?

 

“The man who has God for his treasure has all things in One…Having the Source of all things he has in One all satisfaction, all pleasure, all delight. Whatever he may lose he has actually lost nothing, for he now has it all in One.”

 

Perhaps we could ask, “What music are we playing?” What is the keynote of our message, our demeanor, our practice, our gatherings, our conversation throughout the week, our lives at work, at school, at play, in the civic arena, in entertainment, with our neighbors?

 

I cannot, I must not, depart from Mark 8:34 – 38, Jesus calls me to deny myself, to lose my life, to take up my cross, and to follow Him…always and forever Him. My heart is to be wedded to Him; not to a tradition, a group of doctrinal distinctives, a way of worship or music or preaching or experience or economic or political agenda or exegesis or self – help or sociology; I am to be wedded to Jesus with all of my heart, soul, mind, and strength – He is to be the total source of my life, forever and always.

 

In Jesus Christ are “hidden ALL the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Colossians 2:3). I am to be always “Looking unto Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of my faith” (Hebrews 12:2).

 

While Mark 8:34 – 38 has been a foundational passage for me since my early weeks as a Christian, there have been others, one is Psalm 73:25 and another 1 Corinthians 1:30 – 31.

 

There are, I think, two types of Christians, those who know and live by Psalm 73:25 and those who don’t. (Yes, there are other passages that express the same sentiment, such as John 6:68. What similar passages do you know? Not “know” intellectually, but “know” as your way of life?)

 

“Whom have I in heaven but You? And besides You, I desire nothing on earth” (Psalm 73:25).

 

This verse, this declaration, this cry of the heart, was a core theme in my early Christian reading, for the people I read, Andrew Murray, A. W. Tozer, Oswald Chambers, Watchman Nee, and others, desired Jesus and only Jesus. Later writers continued that pursuit of God, they added to the theme of “seeing only Jesus” (Matthew 17:8).

 

To be sure I have had my seasons of “Jesus and,” to be sure I have had seasons of sin; but Psalm 73:25 and its companions has pulled me back to Jesus, I have never outrun its cords (by God’s mercy!) The blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin – this is a promise to the Christian, to the child of God (1 John 1:5 – 2:2). I know what it is to eat swine’s food, and I know what it is to return to the Father’s House and fall into His embrace.

 

Nothing can take the place of God’s embrace in Jesus Christ.

 

“But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption, so that, just as it is written, ‘Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord’” (1 Corinthians 1:30 – 31).

 

This is, I suppose, the sum of all true Christian theology, and without it there is no true north. If you have graduated from seminary and do not know this, get your money back. If you have been “attending” church and do not know this, ask your pastor why you do not know it.

 

I was taught this by my friend George Will when I was a lad, a dumb lad, a stupid lad, a self-centered lad. I heard this from George when I was 16 years old, and I continued to hear it from him until I was into my 60s, in which season he went into the Presence of Jesus. George was teaching me all that I ever really needed to know, and I was too dumb for much of my life to realize it.

 

Let us not glory is our doctrinal distinctives, in our traditions, in our worldviews, in our spiritual experiences, in our insights into social dynamics, in our nationalism, in our methods of worship, in our attendance numbers (nor be discouraged by them), in our exegetical methods…let us glory in Jesus and only in Jesus.

 

Why O why do we insist on exchanging our glory in Jesus for oxen that eat grass, why do we reject our identity in Him and His inheritance in us? (Psalm 106:19 – 21).

 

Is Jesus our treasure? For where our treasure is, there our hearts will be also (Matthew 6:21).

 

Is Jesus our All in all?

 

Is He mine?

 

Is He yours?

 

Will Psalm 73:25 and 1 Corinthians 1:30 – 31 become your way of life?  

 

Will you pursue God today?

The Pursuit of God by Tozer - Reflections (10)

 

 

“The simplicity which is in Christ is rarely found among us. In its stead are programs, methods, organizations and a world of nervous activities which occupy time and attention but can never satisfy the longing of the heart. The shallowness of our inner experience, the hollowness of our worship, and that servile imitation of the world which marks our promotional methods all testify that we, in this day, know God only imperfectly, and the peace of God scarcely at all” (pp. 17 – 18).

 

“If we would find God amid all the religious externals, we must first determine to find Him, and then proceed in the way of simplicity…We must simplify our approach to Him” (page 18).

 

As I pondered the above, it occurred to me that programs program us. We have become programmed to program, and now we have come to the point where AI is taking this beyond the comprehension of most of us. Now those who programmed are being programmed. Tozer writes, “The evil habit of seeking God and effectively prevents us from finding God in full revelation. In the and lies our great woe” (page 18).

 

Jesus is no longer enough for professing Christians, Jesus is no longer enough for the church, Jesus is no longer enough for our congregations.

 

Tozer writes of the simplicity of Christ being rare in his time. Paul writes, “I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ” (2 Corinthians 11:3). What would Tozer say about our time? Is the simplicity of Christ rare, or is it virtually nonexistent?

 

Of course, it is hard to argue with success, and if some churches are growing and others are closing, well, that’s just the way it is. If the social sciences work better than the Holy Spirit, if marketing is more fruitful than the Holy Spirit and the Word, if we are meeting the needs of the people, then even if they don’t really know Jesus Christ, that is just the way it is. We can’t have unrealistic Biblical expectations these days, bills need to be paid, organizations must be sustained, the world is changing and we need to change with it. We may say that our message hasn’t changed, but do we really believe that?

 

In the previous reflection there was a quote from page 16 that included, “How tragic that we in this dark day have had our seeking done for us by our teachers.” I’m not sure what Tozer meant when he wrote this, but I do want to say that we are all products of a system from which we cannot very well extricate ourselves, even if we want to. I think this was probably true when Tozer wrote The Pursuit of God, and I am sure it is truer today after 77 years.

 

When we do have pastors and teachers and leaders and professors who understand, in some measure, that we are captives in Babylon, there is usually little that they can do to help us – for we have been programmed to want programs, we have been addicted to what Tozer terms “nervous activities,” and our servile adoption of the world’s promotional methods has far exceeded anything that Tozer dealt with a generation ago.  Jesus is no longer enough for us, gathering together in His Name and Nature is no longer enough.

 

Tozer saw a hunger for God in his time, I don’t see that today. I see people satiated with programs, with Gnosticism (a perpetual looking inward instead of beholding Jesus), with entertainment that is termed “worship,” with a view of justification that, as Tozer says, actually keeps us from God, with humanistic approaches to the Bible – many cloaked in what is supposed to be a “high view” of Scripture, with a rejection of the Cross of Christ as the way of life...well…I could go on. The seeds which Tozer saw being planted, the plants coming up from the earth that Tozer discerned, have now had a generation to grow – what would Tozer say today?

 

What would Tozer say to our capitulation to economic, political, social, and nationalistic agendas? What would he say to our prostitution to these spirits which are not the Holy Spirit of God, which are not the Gospel of Jesus Christ? Jesus is not really enough, is He? It must always be, as Tozer writes, God and.

 

What shall we do?

 

Let us seek Jesus, let us pursue God.

 

“Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you. For behold, darkness will cover the earth and deep darkness the peoples; but the LORD will rise upon you and His glory will appear upon you” (Isaiah 60:1 – 2).

 

I do believe these words of God through Isaiah with all of my heart, and I deeply believe the trajectory we see in Romans Chapter 8 of the manifestation of the sons and daughters of God…otherwise, why would I continue on this pilgrimage? Am I not looking for that City (Hebrews 11)? Must we not follow the Lamb wherever He goes (Revelation 14:1 – 5)?

 

Yet, perhaps even Tozer contributed to the problems he saw. Perhaps we all do. I know I have been part of the problem more than once – I thought I was doing what I could and should for the people I was serving, but as I look back I would most certainly do some things differently…trusting Christ (I hope!) more than making things happen (Psalm 127).

 

I think Tozer does miss the mark on page 14 when he downplays the importance of the body of believers in our communion with God – for we need one another in our pursuing God, in our knowing God, in our growing in Christ. Our pursuit of God is personal, but it is also communal. Yes, there most certainly are private elements to our koinonia with the Trinity, but we do not have a privatized communion – that would hardly be the Nature of the Trinity! I will even say that our vision of the Body of Christ (Ephesians 4:11 – 16) ought to motivate us to obedience and faithfulness and our pursuit of God. Yes, I want to know God for me, but I also want to know God so that others may know Him in Jesus Christ – I cannot separate the two.

 

(The first full paragraph on page 14, that begins with, “This intercourse between God and the soul…” is, I think, the weakest paragraph in this chapter; it is exceptionally problematic. It betrays a parochial view of the Body of Christ, rather than a view that embraces the many streams of the Church which contribute to our heritage. This is all I’ll say about this because it is not central to Tozer’s theme, it is a tangent that perhaps should have been omitted in the final draft.)

 

When Tozer writes that, “We must simplify our approach to Him,” we need only ask, “Where is Jesus?”

 

Where is Jesus in this Bible passage?

 

Where is Jesus in this sermon or teaching?

 

Where is Jesus in this curriculum?

 

Where is Jesus in our congregation?

 

Where is Jesus in marriage and family?

 

Where is Jesus in my soul, my heart, my mind?

 

Is my friendship with Jesus growing and deepening daily?

 

Is Jesus my Way of Life?

 

Tozer concludes Chapter One on a challenging and positive note, we’ll explore that in our next reflection, the Lord willing.

 

The Pursuit of God by Tozer - Reflections (9)

 

 

“God is a person, and in the deep of His mighty nature He thinks, wills, enjoys, feels, loves, desires, and suffers as any other person may.  In making Himself known to us He stays by the familiar pattern of personality. He communicates with us through the avenues of our minds, our wills and our emotions. The continuous and unembarrassed interchange of love and thought between God and the soul of the redeemed man is the throbbing heart of New Testament religion” (pp. 13 – 14).

 

When I was a lad in Christ I learned Psalm 103:7, “He made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the sons of Israel.” It is one thing to know about God, it is another thing to know Him. It is one thing to know what He does, it is another thing to know who He is. Jesus says that eternal life consists in knowing the Father and the Son (John 17:3).

 

As much as we attempt to justify Martha, Jesus is clear that “only one thing is necessary” (Luke 10:42), “Mary has chosen,” what are we choosing? Are we choosing to know Him?

 

Paul’s desire, after years of knowing and serving Jesus, was to know Him yet more, “That I may know Him” (Philippians 3:10).

 

On page 15 Tozer writes, “Moses used the fact that he knew God as an argument for knowing Him better.”

 

In the beginning quote above, Tozer tells us that God reveals Himself to us through the “familiar pattern of personality.” We see this throughout the Old and New Testaments, we see this in His relationship with Abraham, Moses, and David; we especially see this in the Incarnation. Jesus revealed Himself while on earth, and He continues to reveal Himself, as He said to Paul, “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting” (Acts 9:5). Paul would spend the rest of his life learning to know Jesus.

 

While to be sure, the personality of God is with an upper case “P,” transcendent and engulfing us, He is also intimate and personal, for He is our dear Father. He invites us into a relationship in which we can “fully know as we are fully known” (1 Corinthians 13:12).

 

When Tozer writes about God’s mighty Nature, that God thinks and wills and enjoys and feels and loves and desires and suffers, do we relate to this? What do we know of our God in these areas? Are we sharing in His Nature in these things? Are we knowing Him in His desires and sufferings? Do we know God in His joys?

 

“The continuous and unembarrassed interchange of love and thought” with God is what we are called to experience every day of our lives, it is to live in the Trinity and to know the Trinity living within us – as individuals and as His People, the Body of Christ. This is why John could write that to know him and his fellow Christians was to know the Father and Jesus Christ (1 John 1:3) – this is how intimate our koinonia with God is, this is what it is to know God. In the Person of God we discover our own person, we truly begin to discover who we are…for it is only in Him that we sense who we are.

 

“How tragic that we in this dark day have had our seeking done for us by our teachers. Everything is made to center upon the initial act of “accepting” Christ (a term, incidentally, which is not found in the Bible) and we are not expected thereafter to crave any further revelation of God to our souls” (page 16).

 

We’ll return to this in our next post, the Lord willing, because Tozer has more to say that may help us understand his perspective. As I’ve said before, I think we are pretty much all the prisoners of a system that is self-perpetuating separation from God in Christ even though we claim a high view of Scripture and often insist on doctrinal preciseness and various “distinctives” and even though we know how to orchestrate a good Sunday morning experience – across the theological spectrum.

 

Perhaps what we have developed is a “readers theatre” in which we show up, are given scripts, enact the play and then go home. We even have choirs, as did the ancient Greeks.

 

We are more likely to talk about our favorite author or teacher than we are to speak of Jesus, who ought to be our true Author and Teacher to the point where we share the fruit of our relationship with Him with others, both within and without the Church.

 

Vickie and I have always had vegetable gardens, and we have often worked with others who have had vegetable gardens. In every instance that I can recall, working with folks who have vegetable gardens means that there will be vegetables in the office for folks to take home – people that grow and harvest produce tend to share their produce with others. We have always done this, others we have worked with have done this.

 

Why don’t Christians do this? Why don’t Christians share with their fellow believers the richness of their relationship with Jesus Christ? Why don’t they share Jesus with others? Why aren’t people bringing squash and tomatoes and okra and string beans and lettuce and cucumbers, all of various varieties, to church on Sunday, in their conversations during the week, to their jobs, to their schools, to their civic and recreational activities?

 

Another thing about gardeners, they talk to each other about their experiences, about their successes and failures, they exchange knowledge and experience as a way of life – why don’t professing Christians do this? I have known folks who have sat in pews next to each other for decades and have never shared the life of Christ together, never shared about their experience with Jesus, never prayed together, never shared joys and sorrows, never shared insights from Scripture.

 

This is, frankly, nuts…just plain nuts…yet we not only perpetuate it, we think the notion that something may be amiss is dangerous.

 

We can’t share about Someone whom we don’t know. We can’t share about a Land that we’ve never lived in. To know someone as a child is not the same as knowing that person as an adult. To serve as a child or adolescent or young adult in a family business is not the same as serving with a parent in the ownership of the family business (see Galatians 3:23 – 4:11). I have known many good folks who have been attending church for decades, but I have met few adults who have been attending church for decades.

 

As so Tozer can argue that our view of justification by faith has been made a barrier to our relationship with God…exquisitely tragic…and, I think, tragically true.

 

All we need do to test Tozer’s point is to ask others when we gather, “What have you brought from your garden of relationship with Christ to share today?”

 

Shall we try it?

 

Shall we share?

The Pursuit of God by Tozer - Reflections (8)

 

 

Earlier I mentioned that The Pursuit of God is dense, and now we come to a section which I experience as exceedingly dense. (As if the previous section in which Tozer writes that our interpretation of justification by faith now actually bars men from the knowledge of God isn’t dense!)

 

I wonder if, for those of us who find Tozer’s writing style difficult, that the difficulty isn’t the style so much as it is the content, for if the style is from a different time, the content is from a different place, a foreign place. Tozer’s concepts and concerns and reading of the Bible, Tozer’s knowing God, is so far different than ours that he might as well be writing in early 20^th century Greek as early to mid-20^th century American English.

 

Chapter One consists of pages 11 – 20. On pages 11 and 12 Tozer makes it clear that we can only pursue God because God pursues us. Then at the bottom of page 12 and at the top of page 13 Tozer makes his claim that our understanding and practice of justification by faith has become a barrier to men knowing God, and that the idea of “receiving Christ” is a problem (which he returns to on page 16). Then from the balance of page 13 through the conclusion of the chapter, page 20, Tozer moves into the heart of the matter; God is a Person and we are to know Him as a Person, we are to be in ongoing and unfolding relationship with Him.

 

This is so dense that I really don’t think it can be understood without rereading, and meditating, and reading again, with our hearts and minds attentive to the Holy Spirit and the Word of God. It is so dense that I don’t think its depths can be plumbed in a lifetime. This is a mark of a classic, whether by Augustine, or Fenelon, or Murray, or Chambers, or Lewis, or MacDonald; a classic is a lifetime companion that challenges and encourages us and keeps pointing us to Jesus, keeps revealing Jesus to us. A classic does not run the race for us, it does not do our work for us, but it helps us run the race.

 

I am reminded of ultra marathons, like the Moab 240. Runners often have pacers at various points in the race. These are companions who help the competitor pace himself (or herself) for a section of the race, for example it might be 30 miles or 50 miles, pacers usually pick the runner up at a rest stop or aid station and continue with the runner for a predetermined distance. While there are volunteers who help with encouragement, nourishment, and medical attention at the various stops along the way, the pacers actually run with the competitors – helping to keep them on track, awake, alert, and on time.

 

We all need folks at aid stations and nourishment stops, and we most certainly all need pacers, folks we can trust to run with us for segments of the ultra-marathon. I never know when Oswald Chambers will show up at a rest stop and run with me for a day or two or three, run with me in a season of life…or Tozer. Then there are friends I’ve known, and who have known me, and we have run together. Some have crossed their finish lines, and I will cross my finish line before others – I want to cross strong…what about you?

 

You really need to be reading Tozer to benefit from the fulness of his writing, for while I am tempted to quote extended sections I need to resist the urge, after all, this is a blog and space is limited – his writing is so tightly interwoven that I will not be able to do it full justice, but I will do my best by God’s grace. I hope what you read here will encourage you to read The Pursuit of God.

 

“We Christians are in real danger of losing God amid the wonders of His Word. We have almost forgotten that God is a person and, as such, can be cultivated as any person can. It is inherent in personality to be able to know other personalities, but full knowledge of one personality by another cannot be achieved in one encounter” (page 13).

 

“All social intercourse between human beings is a response of personality to personality, grading upward from the most casual brush between man and man to the fullest, most intimate communion of which the human soul is capable. Religion, so far as it is genuine, is in essence the response of created personalities to the creating personality, God. “This is life enteral, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent” (John 17:3)” (page 13).

 

What do you see in these passages? As you read it, what do you think, how do you feel? What are the key threads? How is Tozer challenging us?

 

When Tozer writes that we “are in real danger of losing God amid the wonders of His Word,” let’s recall that in his preface he has already told us that “The Bible is not an end in itself, but a means to bring men to an intimate and satisfying knowledge of God, that they may enter into Him, that they may delight in His Presence…”(page 10).

 

Knowing the Bible is not the same as knowing Jesus. Knowing the Bible is not the same as living in intimacy with God. Just as a false understanding of justification is a barrier to people knowing God, so a false understanding of the role of the Bible, of the Nature of Scripture, is a barrier to relationship with God – this is exquisitely tragic, and yet we see it in the Pharisees and Sadducees, we see it throughout Church history, and if we will have the courage to look around us, we will see it today.

 

I am reminded of a friend who shared her experience of a Sunday school in a congregation which professes a high view of Scripture. The class dutifully had its study guide, it read the Scripture for the week, and it engaged in discussion. Our friend said, “But they didn’t speak as if they knew Jesus. They spoke of Him as a stranger, as someone far away, far away in the present, far away in the past, not as their Friend.” Our friend was not judgmental; she was perplexed and was hurting for the group.

 

If we are unwilling to acknowledge the possible truth of what Tozer writes, then we likely have a problem. I do not say that we must agree with Tozer (though I do agree with him), I only think that we ought to consider the possibility that he has a point. When we are not open to discussion, then we are likely defending an indefensible position. And consider, Tozer’s one motive, as far as I can discern, it that we pursue God and know Him deeply.

 

The Bible is not an end in itself. This can garner harsh criticism from professing Christians, who see their salvation and righteousness rooted in Bible knowledge; a Bible knowledge that usually is rooted in humanistic interpretive processes and exegesis and teaching and preaching.

 

“We have almost forgotten that God is a person.”

 

This is, I think, the crux of Chapter One, indeed of the entire book, God is a Person. Do we know God as a Person? Are we coming to know God more deeply as our way of Life?

 

Tozer writes that “full knowledge of one personality by another cannot be achieved in one encounter.” Here we go back to Tozer’s warning that our view of conversion “has been made mechanical and spiritless.”

 

As Jesus says to the Father in John 17:3, knowing God is eternal life…not knowing about God, not believing is a set of propositional truths, not reciting a Creed (and I do value the ancient creeds)…it is in actually knowing God as a Person, as The Person, that we have eternal life in and through Jesus Christ.

 

“God is a person, and in the deep of His mighty nature He thinks, wills, enjoys, feels, loves, desires, and suffers as any other person may.  In making Himself known to us He stays by the familiar pattern of personality. He communicates with us through the avenues of our minds, our wills and our emotions. The continuous and unembarrassed interchange of love and thought between God and the soul of the redeemed man is the throbbing heart of New Testament religion” (pp. 13 – 14).

 

The Lord willing, we will pick this quote up in our next reflection. In the meantime, as you read the above paragraph, what does it look like in your own life? Do you know God as a Person?

 

How is your relationship with God unfolding in your life?

 

If I asked you to tell me about your best friend and your relationship with him or her, what would you say and how would you say it?

 

If I asked you the same question about God, how would you respond?