Thursday, May 31, 2012

The Knowledge of the Holy

Currently I'm reading the book The Knowledge of The Holy by A. W. Tozer.  I'm nearly done and I'd highly recommend the book.  The book attempts to address the attributes of God and their meaning in the Christian life.

Every chapter is extremely quotable.  In fact, the reason I wanted to read this book is because other authors I enjoy incessantly quote Tozer and I find each quote to be brillant.  That being said I really enjoyed one quote in particular:

"We can hold a correct view of Truth only by daring to believe everything God has said about Himself."

He goes on to say:

"God's being is unitary.  He cannot divide Himself and act at a given time from one of His attributes while the rest remain inactive.  All that God is must accord with all that God does."

What Tozer so brilliantly states is that God is God all the time.  He can best be described as Himself.  We, as finite humans with finite minds, can only understand God by viewing His attributes.  This leads us into a grave misunderstanding of who God is.  We think, "Is God merciful in this situation or just?  Is God loving or is He sovereign in this?  Is God good or is He holy here?"  God is never one and not the other.  The answer is always "yes!"

That is incomprehensible for us.  We can't be completely faithful in full strength to every attribute of ourselves so we believe God can't either.  But here's the kicker... we are not like God and God is so completely unlike us.

Isn't that wonderful?

Again, I'd recommend The Knowledge of The Holy by A.W. Tozer to you.  It's so refreshing to take a new and better look at who our God is.  So, pick up the book and focus on the beauty of the essence of our Great God today.

2 comments:

  1. You know, so many times I've wondered and tried to wrap around how God can be all of those things, and then try to pick it apart so each characteristic of God would fit into whatever I wanted and desired Him to do at any given situation.

    It REALLY helped to hear you say this...I will have to add this book to my readings sometime. If you own the book, could I borrow it from you?

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  2. I borrowed the book, but I'm sure you can borrow it when I'm done. It's Jim's book.

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