Knowing About God Isn't Knowing God
I know about God but there are times that I feel like I don’t KNOW God. I suppose this is a testament to my analyzing and over-thinking nature, but this often becomes an issue because it creates an objective and academic view of the things of God.
When you look at things objectively or academically, it’s easy to focus on concepts instead of the Creator. God doesn’t care about our concepts. He just cares about what we do with Him and what we do because of Him.
When I look at the concept of grace objectively, I have a hard time accepting it because I immediately feel like it’s too easy or that I’m unworthy of it. But if I look at it through faith, the loving sacrifice of Christ, the things He’s done for me in this life and the ways He’s blessed me, I find grace a much sweeter pill to swallow.
I think God emphasized the faith of the child for a reason. Children don’t sit and debate the validity of their father’s love for them when he’s carrying them in his arms or playing with them in the floor.
Children perceive things purely on what they see. They have no need to filter it through the screens of cynical skepticism or doubting their motives.
The reason so many adults walk away from Christ or never accept Him in the first place is because they can’t accept love purely on His word. They think there is always a catch, a catch that will cost them the things they love.
And so we hide behind our walls of reason, cynicism and concepts because it all sounds too good to be true.
The true paradox of Christ is that His love is free and yet by trusting in it we’re handing over our lives, desires, hopes and dreams. The beauty of this exchange is that He strips away those selfish desires for new ones, desires that not only bring glory to Himself, but also joy, hope, purpose and satisfaction to our own lives.
We simultaneously lose everything and yet we gain everything. And then our sin nature senses this change and it slowly starts eating away at us, convincing us that we want those selfish desires, that we can have our cake and eat it too, not knowing that the cake is only the preview to the eternal glory.
So we struggle with wasting our spiritual walk with things that God doesn’t want for us. Then we realize our mistake, and repent. Then we fall back. Then we rebound, repeat as needed (it’s just an expression).
I’m tired of rebounding. I want consistency. I think we all do. The mark of maturity is knowing that there is no finish line. The only way I’ll know I’m finished is when I’m seeing Him face to face.
I’d rather KNOW God intimately than know everything there is to know about Him. When we see Christ, He’s only going to care if we knew Him and what we did with Him. Or He will say “I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness” (Matthew 7:23, ESV).
I want to know His very soul every single day. Because if I’m not walking with Him and having a relationship with Him, then what I am really doing? What are we doing?
God doesn’t want fans or admirers, He wants friends and lovers of His soul. Only then do we truly know Him.
That is what I want every day. I want to be in a spirit of joy, thanksgiving and praise more than a spirit of repentance.
The more you thank God for the things He’s done in your life, the more you realize that He’s never stopped chasing you. And that gives me hope and joy. And it makes me want to love Him all the more. What about you?
This article appeared originally on jarrodterry.com.
