“Left to ourselves we tend immediately to reduce God to manageable terms. We want to get Him where we can use Him, or at least know where He is when we need Him. We want a God we can in some measure control. We need the feeling of security that comes from knowing what God is like, and what He is like is of course a composite of all the religious pictures we have seen, all the best people we have known or heard about, and all the sublime ideas we have entertained.
If all this sounds strange to modern ears, it is only because we have for a full half century taken God for granted. The glory of God has not been revealed to this generation of men. The God of contemporary Christianity is only slightly superior to the gods of Greece and Rome, if indeed He is not actually inferior to them in that He is weak and helpless while they at least had power.
If what we conceive God to be He is not, how then shall we think of Him? If He is indeed incomprehensible, as the Creed declares Him to be, and unapproachable, as Paul says He is, how can we Christians satisfy our longing after Him? The hopeful words, “Acquaint now thyself with him, and be at peace,” still stand after the passing of the centuries; but how shall we acquaint ourselves with One who eludes all the straining efforts of mind and heart? And how shall we be held accountable to know what cannot be known?
The yearning to know What cannot be known, to comprehend the Incomprehensible, to touch and taste the Unapproachable, arises from the image of God in the nature of man. Deep calleth unto deep, and though polluted and landlocked by the mighty disaster theologians call the Fall, the soul senses its origin and longs to return to its Source. How can this be realized?”
Yes, deep calls to deep as we are drawn to walk closer to Him to know Him as He desires us to know Him.
In conversations with each of you I am spurred to a greater desire to know Him. Challenged with ideas and thoughts of Him that you have shared with me of your relationships and understanding of Him. Each of us gaining unique visages of His Person and views of His Glory.
Denny: To be like the angels in heaven where at every revolution made around Him brings the discovery of yet another facet of His Holiness – a new feature to behold and know causing them to cry out again and again Holy, Holy, Holy – is the everlasting labor of all of creation. One Holy for each Person of the Trinity. To seek and find Him from that deep yearning for more knowledge of who He is continuing on into eternity. I can visualize this and can recall the image now when God seems far away. It is somehow comforting to have this picture in my mind to focus on.
Tracy: Many are called but few are chosen. To be included in the few privileged who are given the awesome ability and honor to be drawn to know Him. I cannot but wonder why me? Who am I that the Almighty would chose to reveal Himself to me? I know how unworthy I am, and yet He gives me this gift beyond measure that I would have the seed of deep yearning to know Him. What a glorious honor and responsibility to have this desire planted within my insignificant heart. How humbling it is to realize the enormity of this gift and the responsibility that goes with it. This subject bears much more in contemplation for me.
Marc: Eden, how awesome it must have been when walking in the cool of the day with God was the norm!!! What wonders must they have been privileged to behold, to know God in that way? How love and understanding was so palpable in the presence of God. Yes we seek that Eden where knowing Him without the distress of understanding the evil that we have residing in our flesh now. Of course we desire to return there. It is imbedded in our very cells to yearn after that intimacy. The passion and desire I have for Him crystallizes in my heart when I realize that this is the origin of my desire for love.
Praise God for His people, His presence in them, in you, and the faithfulness of His drawing and for placing us together for one another.
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