John, the Apostle whom Jesus loved, tells his spiritual children that he is writing to them because they know the Father (1 John 2:13).
Somehow, that simple statement struck a deep chord with me recently in my morning devotions. Immediately as I read it, a still, small voice inside of me gently said: “Remco, do you truly realize what a privilege it is that the God of the ages wants you to know Him? Do you really know Him?”
I was reminded of my prayer almost 7 years ago, as I turned 60, that this would be the decade of knowing the Father more intimately and developing friendship with Him. Remembering that, and hearing these gently rebuking questions, filled me with a fresh desire to really get to know the Father as much as possible in this life.
After all, that is the Father’s deepest desire for His relationship with us. Psalm 25:14 says, “The friendship (in some translations, “secret counsel’) of the Lord is for those who fear Him, and He makes known to them His covenant.”
That verse stirs my heart because it reminds me that God longs to reveal Himself to us. Our openness to His self-disclosure lies in the degree to which we live in awe of Him. The fear of the Lord, which is so often mentioned in Scripture as a key to knowing Him and receiving spiritual abundance, is a constant state of awe and hunger for intimacy. When you are in awe of something or someone, you automatically want to get to know everything there is to know about them.
Just thinking about Who God is fills me with awe at the realization that He presents Himself to me as my Father Who wants me to know Him. He existed before anything else did. He filled the universe with billions of stars, nebulae, and planets hung together in perfectly formed galaxies, in which our planet is smaller than a pinhead. He was present in the Garden of Eden more than 5,000 years ago. He was present with mankind in every era and generation, from the flood, through the desert, into the promised land, and in the reign of judges and kings. He became flesh in Christ, died for me on the cross, and rose again to be exalted above every name that exists. He birthed the Church on Pentecost and saw it evolve through the Roman Empire and become stuck in rigid, pagan-laced religionism during the Middle Ages. He brought reformations, revivals, and missionary movements to gather for Himself a people of His own possession, of which you and I are part.
It is amazing that the God Who knew Adam and Eve, Enoch and Noah, Abraham and David, Peter and Paul, also knows me, my every thought, emotion, hope, and fear. That in and of itself fills me with awe.
How, then, do we get to know God better? After all, He is invisible and so vast that our knowledge of Him could only amount to a thimbleful from an ocean of what there is to know.
The Scripture gives a few clues that help guide us.
First, the Holy Spirit Who listens to the Father and declares what He hears to us (John 16:13). He is always ready to reveal, through insights in the Scripture and by speaking to us directly as we listen to Him in prayer. His revelations only come to the degree that we listen to Him. We should ask ourselves: Am I satisfied with flighty impressions, or do I want to feed and savor what He brings me? Do I want to deepen my knowledge of God by letting His Word dwell in me richly, feeding on it, meditating on it, and studying it? Or am I satisfied with just a nibble here and there, just enough to get by and give me a good feeling?
Secondly, we know God through faith. According to Hebrews 11: 1 it is a way of seeing. Paul concurs: “We look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen”(2 Corinthians 4:18). Holy Spirit-activated faith gives us insight into the thoughts, emotions, likes, dislikes, character traits, will, and purposes of God. We will not see His face or His physical shape until we get to heaven, but we do get to know Him by insight into Who He is.
Thirdly, we get to know God through obedience. 1 John 2:3 says, “And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments.” That’s a toughie. We know we can acquire knowledge through study, learning, and perceiving, but through obedience? How does that work? In my mind, it’s a not-so-vicious circle. As we get to know God by learning about Him and our love for Him increases, we desire to please Him. We get to know what His design for human life is and how that is expressed in His precepts and commands. Because we love Him, we love His precepts and want to obey them. When we do, we learn new things: we learn how the Holy Spirit helps us obey. We also know the effect of obeying His commands and find out that they are true and good, and improve our quality of life. We get to know what holy living looks like, and that, in turn, gives us greater insight into the holiness of God.
Where are you at this stage of your relationship with God? Do you long for friendship with Him and get to know Him, not only as One Who cares for you, but the deeper things of His heart and mind?
There is much of Him that is beyond our ability to understand. But the least we can do is eagerly respond to His desire to reveal Himself to us and see where that will take us on this side of Heaven!