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Knowing God

Today I am not going to share my own words.

I am going to share the words of JI Packer, an English-Canadian Theologian who wrote one my favourite books of all time – Knowing God. In it he addresses what I believe so many of us struggle with— the adequacy and satisfaction of God.

May his words (much better than mine ever will) bless you and inspire you today to trust that “all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”

Enjoy.

“We are unlike the Christians of New Testament times.

Our approach to life is conventional and static; theirs was not. The thought of “safety first” was not a drag on their enterprise as it is on ours. By being exuberant, unconventional and uninhibited in living by the gospel they turned their world upside down, but you could not accuse us twentieth-century Christians of doing anything like that.

Why are we so different?

Why, compared with them, do we appear as no more than halfway Christians? Whence comes the nervous, dithery, take-no-risks mood that mars so much of our discipleship? Why are we not free enough from fear and anxiety to allow ourselves to go full stretch in following Christ?

One reason, it seems, is that in our heart of hearts we are afraid of the consequences of going the whole way into the Christian life.

It is these half-conscious fears, this dread of insecurity, rather than any deliberate refusal to face the cost of following Christ, which make us hold back.

We feel that the risks of out-and-out discipleship are too great for us to take. In other words, we are not persuaded of the adequacy of God to provide for all the needs of those who launch out wholeheartedly on the deep sea of unconventional living in obedience to the call of Christ.

Therefore, we feel obliged to break the first commandment just a little, by withdrawing a certain amount of our time and energy from serving God in order to serve what is false. This, at bottom, seems to be what is wrong with us.

We are afraid to go all the way in accepting the authority of God, because of our secret uncertainty as to his adequacy to look after us if we do.

Paul’s “all things” is not a plethora of material possessions, and the passion for possessions has to be cast out of us in order to let the “all things” in. For this phrase has to do with knowing and enjoying God, and not with anything else.

The meaning of “he will give us all things” can be put thus: one day we shall see that nothing—literally nothing—which could have increased our eternal happiness has been denied us, and that nothing—literally nothing—that could have reduced that happiness has been left with us.

What higher assurance do we want than that?” 

- J. I. Packer

Be Blessed,

Aaron

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