Captain's Log Stardate 2009: November 2007

To give you an idea of the significance of this writing, Billy Graham writes in the book’s forward “A hundred years from now only a handful of books written today will still be widely read and accepted as Christian classics. Dr. James I. Packer’s Knowing God may well prove to be one of them….This book will help every reader grasp in a fuller way one of the Bible’s greatest truths: that we can know God personally, because God wants us to know him.” I will attempt to flesh out that summary with some of the meat I found in this “contemporary Christian classic.”

KNOW THE LORD: Jeremiah 9:23-24 “This is what the Lord says: ‘Let not the wise man boast of his wisdom or the strong man boast of his strength or the rich man boast of his riches, but let him who boasts boast about this: that he understands and knows me.’”

Packer lays the foundation for the book by insisting on the value of the study of God, writing “…while the subject humbles the mind, it also expands it. He who often thinks of God, will have a larger mind than the man who simply plods around this narrow globe…Nothing will so enlarge the intellect, nothing so magnify the whole soul of man, as a devout, earnest, continued investigation of the great subject of the Deity.” This may seem like a selfish motive for seeking to “Know” God, but he goes on to suggest that we, like David, should seek “to understand God’s truth in order that (our) hearts might respond to it and (our) lives be conformed to it.” Psalm 119: 2, 5 “Blessed are they who keep his statutes and seek him with all their heart….Oh, that my ways were steadfast in obeying your decrees!” As we learn more of God, we should meditate and pray upon what we have come to know about him. A man’s prayers are “always the best evidence for a man’s view of God.” As an example, Daniel prays “O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps his covenant of love with all who love him and obey his commands….Lord, you are righteous….The Lord our God is merciful and forgiving….The Lord our God is righteous in everything he does.” Does my praying express how much, or how little, I know God? I must learn to measure myself by “how I pray and what goes on in my heart.”

BEHOLD YOUR GOD! Ecclesiastes 11:5 “As thou knowest not what is the way of the wind, nor how the bones do grow in the womb of her that is with child; even so thou knowest not the work of God who doeth all.”

Packer describes the essence of God as “omniscience governing omnipotence, infinite power ruled by infinite wisdom.” As examples, Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, and later Paul all experienced various hardships in their lives, but through those circumstances they came to know and trust God. He insists this does not mean we will ever see the “big picture.” Quite the opposite! “Christians…may drive themselves almost crazy with this kind of futile inquiry.” Rather we must “be clear-sighted and realistic-ruthlessly so-in looking at life as it is….you simply try to see and do the right thing in the actual situation that presents itself.” Take Solomon’s advice from Ecclesiastes, and give up “optimistic expectations of finding the divine purpose of everything….the truth is that God in his wisdom, to make and keep us humble and to teach us to walk by faith, has hidden from us almost everything that we should like to know about the providential purposes which he is working out in the churches and in our own lives.” He concludes, “This is the way of wisdom….We can be sure that the God who made this marvelously complex world order …knows what he is doing, and ‘doeth all things well,’ even if for the moment he hides his hand. We can trust him and rejoice in him, even when we cannot discern his path.” We must not “frustrate the wise purpose of God by neglecting faith and faithfulness in order to pursue a kind of knowledge which in this world it is not given to us to have.”

THE LOVE OF GOD: 1 John 4:8 “God is love.”

“’God is love’ means that his love finds expression in everything that he says and does….Knowing this, we are able to apply to ourselves the promise that ‘all things work together for good to them that love God and are called according to his purpose.’” Romans 8:28. “The measure of love is how much it gives, and the measure of the love of God is the gift of his only Son…” 1 John 4:11 “Since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.” Packer concludes this chapter with some tough questions: “Could an observer learn from the quality and degree of love that I show to others-… –anything at all about the greatness of God’s love to me?”

THE WRATH OF GOD: John 3:18-19 “This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil.” “Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God.” Romans 11:22 “The Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and win. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished.” Exodus 34:6-7

God has given us freedom to choose and “the unbeliever has preferred to be by himself, without God, defying God, having God against him, and he shall have his preference. Nobody stands under the wrath of God except those who have chosen to do so.”

THE JEALOUS GOD: “None of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God.” Acts 20:24

“God’s jealousy is not a compound of frustration, envy and spite, as human jealousy so often is, but appears instead as a (literally) praiseworthy zeal to preserve something supremely precious.” This said, “Our right response to his jealousy over us is zeal for him. “Does zeal for the house of God, and the cause of God, eat us up? –possess us? –consume us? Can we say with the Master, ‘My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.’ John 4:34….the Lord Jesus once sent a message to a church very much like some of ours-the complacent church of Laodicea-in which he told the congregation that their lack of zeal was a source of supreme offense to him. ‘I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth. Be zealous therefore, and repent.’ Revelation 3:15-16, 19. How many of our churches today are sound, respectable-and lukewarm? What, then, must Christ’s word be to them? What have we to hope for? –unless, by the mercy of the God … we find zeal to repent? Revive us, Lord, before judgment falls!”

IF GOD BE FOR US… Isaiah 53:4-10 “We considered him stricken by God….The punishment that brought us peace was upon him….The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all….For the transgression of my people he was stricken…” 1 John 3:1 “Behold! What manner of love the Father hath bestowed on us, that we should be called the sons of God.”

In this portion, Packer goes into depth on the concepts of propitiation and adoption. He states “the driving force in Jesus’ life was his resolve to be ‘obedient to death-even death on a cross,’ Philippians 2:8, and the unique dreadfulness of his death lies in the fact that he tasted on Calvary the wrath of God which was our due, so making propitiation for our sins.” Jesus’ death didn’t merely pay the price we owed, but it actually turned away the wrath of God, opening the way for a new covenant, adoption into God’s family. He contrasts the old covenant with the new writing “the angels’ song which Isaiah heard in the temple, with its emphatic repetitions- ‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty,’ Isaiah 6:3, could be used as a motto-text to sum up the theme of the whole Old Testament. The basic idea which the word holy expresses is that of separation…But in the New Testament we find that things have changed…believers deal with God as their Father. …. Father has now become his covenant name-for the covenant which binds him to his people now stands revealed as a family covenant. Christians are his children, his own sons and daughters, his heirs….the thoughts of our Maker becoming our perfect parent-faithful in love and care, generous and thoughtful, interested in all we do, respecting our individuality, skillful in training us, wise in guidance, always available, helping us to find ourselves in maturity, integrity and uprightness-is a thought which can have meaning for everybody, whether we come to it by saying, ‘I had a wonderful father, and I see that God is like that, only more so,’ or by saying, ‘My father disappointed me here, and here, and here, but God, praise his name, will be very different,’ or even by saying, ‘I have never known what it is to have a father on earth, but thank God I now have one in heaven.’” Four aspects of fatherhood: 1) authority, 2) affection, 3) fellowship, and 4) honor. “Adoption is the highest privilege that the gospel offers: higher even than justification…a forensic idea, conceived in terms of law, and viewing God as judge, …but not implying any intimate…relationship with God the judge….But contrast this…with adoption,…a family idea, conceived in terms of love, and viewing God as father….To be right with God the Judge is a great thing, but to be loved and cared for by God the Father is a greater.” As our perfect Father, God often “gives us what we should have asked for, rather than what we actually requested….The New Testament message in three words, … ‘adoption through propitiation” In his chapter “thou our guide,” Packer suggests six common pitfalls to guidance. 1)unwillingness to think, 2)unwillingness to think ahead, 3)unwillingness to take advice, 4) unwillingness to suspect oneself, 5)unwillingness to discount personal magnetism, and 6)unwillingness to wait. The good news is that when we miss the road, “our God is a God who not merely restores, but takes up our mistakes and follies into his plan for us and brings good out of them. “I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten….You will have plenty to eat, until you are full, and you will praise the name of the Lord your God, who has worked wonders for you.” Joel 2:25-26. Look at Abraham, Moses, David, and Jonah. “It is said that those who never makes mistakes never make anything; certainly, these men made mistakes, but through their mistakes God taught them to know his face and to cleave to him in a way that would never have happened otherwise.” Concerning the adequacy of God, Packer asks “have you been holding back from a risky, costly course to which you know in your heart God has called you? Hold back no longer. Your God is faithful to you, and he is adequate for you. You will never need more than he can supply, and what he supplies, both materially and spiritually, will always be enough for the present.” He concludes, “’Thou hast said, “See ye my face.” My heart says to thee, “Thy face, Lord, do I seek”’ Psalm 27:8. If this book moves any of its readers to identify more closely with the psalmist at this point, it will not have been written in vain.”

Although I didn't necessarily agree with everything he wrote, this book is a good read for every Christian. There is so much to get you curious and make you want to read your Bible in order to understand things more. If you're in for a challenging, meaty read, this is a good book for you! -Patti