Knowing God

“How can we turn our knowledge about God into knowledge of God? The rule for doing this is simple but demanding. It is that we turn each truth that we learn about God into a matter for meditation before God, leading to prayer and praise to God.” (J.I. Packer, Knowing God, p.23)

I could do some research and tell you all kinds of information about President Abraham Lincoln, where he was from, how he rose to power, when he was married, inaugurated, and died. I could quote for you from some of his speeches and legislation. I could tell you a lot about him, but that doesn't mean that I actually know him. There's a big difference between head knowledge and experiential knowledge. The same is true regarding knowing God.

One of the great risks of theological education is that we fill our heads with knowledge about God, but we never actually come to know God Himself. This idea has come to the forefront as I prepare to teach a course this semester on the theology of God. We could read lots of theology books and study the details of God's attributes and perfections, His character and His work, and never actually have a true encounter with the living God. We could read our Bibles all day, but if it remains only a piece of historic literature then we will never experience God through it.

The study of God is simply the means through which we encounter Him. Our aim and ultimate purpose is not the knowledge in itself, for "knowledge puffs up" (1 Cor 8:1), but our goal is the God whom that knowledge is about. This is, as Packer notes above, where disciplines like meditation, prayer, and praise come in. So the question is, am I seeking knowledge about God for its own sake, or am I seeking to dive deep into the infinite depths of the God whom I'm studying, to let wave after wave of His greatness crash over me and overwhelm me, and to love Him deeper for the knowing?