Knowing God

by J.I. Packer

The conviction behind the book is that ignorance of God—ignorance both of his ways and of the practice of communion with him—lies at the root of much of the church’s weakness today.

Trend one is that Christian minds have been conformed to the modern

spirit: the spirit, that is, that spawns great thoughts of man and leaves room for only small thoughts of God.

Trend two is that Christian minds have been confused by the modern skepticism.

it is a long time since theology has been so weak and clumsy at its basic task of holding the church to the realities of the gospel.

“Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls”

if what is written here helps anyone in the way that the meditations behind the writing helped me, the work will have been abundantly worthwhile.

the proper study of God’s elect is God; the proper study of a Christian is the Godhead. The highest science, the loftiest speculation, the mightiest philosophy, which can ever engage the attention of a child of God, is the name, the nature, the person, the work, the doings,

and the existence of the great God whom he calls his Father.

No subject of contemplation will tend more to humble the mind, than thoughts of God. . . . But 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.

The most excellent study for expanding the soul, is the science of Christ, and Him crucified, and the knowledge of the Godhead in the glorious Trinity. 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.

I know nothing which can so comfort the soul; so calm the swelling billows of sorrow and grief; so speak peace to the winds of trial, as a devout musing upon the subject of the

Godhead.

Knowing about God is crucially important

for the living of our lives.

we are cruel to ourselves if we try to live in this world without knowing about the God whose world it is and who runs it.

The world becomes a strange, mad, painful place, and life in it a disappointing and unpleasant business, for those who do not know about God. Disregard the study of God, and you sentence yourself to stumble

and blunder through life blindfolded, as it were, with no sense of direction and no understanding of what surrounds you. This way you c...

Five basic truths, five foundation principles of the knowledge about God which Christians have, will determine our course throughout. They are as follows:

1. God has spoken to man, and the Bible is his Word, given to us to make us wise unto salvation. 2. God is Lord and King over his world; he rules all things for his own glory, displaying his perfections in all

that he does, in order that men and angels may worship and adore him. 3. God is Savior, active in sovereign love through the Lord Jesus Christ to rescue believers from the guilt and power of sin, to adopt them as his children and to bless them accordingly. 4. God is triune; there are within the Godhead three persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit; and the work of salvation is one in which all three act together, the Father purposing redemption, the Son securing it and the Spirit applying it.

5. Godliness means responding to God’s revelation in trust and obedience, faith and worship, prayer and praise, submission and service. Life must be seen and lived in the light of God...

What are the themes that will occupy us? We shall have to deal with the Godhead of God, the qualities of deity which set God apart from humans and mark the difference and distance between the Creator and his creatures:

We shall have to deal with the powers of God:

We shall have to deal with the perfec...

We shall have to take note of what pleases him, what offends him, what awakens his wrath, what affords him satisfaction and joy.

“What is God?” the answer read as follows: “God is a Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable, in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth.”

We need to ask ourselves: What is my ultimate aim and object in occupying my mind with these things? What do I intend to do with my knowledge about God, once I have it?

If we pursue theological knowledge for its own sake, it is bound to go bad on us. It will make us proud and conceited.

To be preoccupied with getting theological knowledge as an end in itself, to approach Bible study with no higher a motive than a desire to know all the answers, is the direct route to a state of

self-satisfied self-deception.

there can be no spiritual health without doctrinal knowledge; but it is equally true that there can be no spiritual health with it, if it is sought for the wrong purpose and valued by the wrong standard.

the psalmist’s concern to get knowledge about God was not a theoretical but a practical concern. His supreme desire was to know and enjoy God himself, and he valued knowledge about God simply as a means to this end. He wanted to understand God’s truth in order that his heart might respond to it and his life be conformed to it.

Our aim in studying the Godhead must be to know God himself better.

As he is the subject of our study, and our helper in it, so he must himself be the end of it.

we turn each truth that we learn about God into matter for meditation before God, leading to prayer and praise to God.

Meditation is the activity of calling to mind, and thinking over, and dwelling on, and applying to oneself, the various things that one knows about the works and ways and purposes and promises of God. It is an activity of holy thought, consciously performed in the presence of God, under the eye of God, by the help of God, as a means of communion with God.

Its effect is ever to humble us, as we contemplate God’s greatness and glory and our own littleness and sinfulness,

the Greek New Testament word for grace (charis), like that for love (agapē), is a wholly Christian usage,

there have always been some who have found the thought of grace so overwhelmingly wonderful that they could never get over it. Grace has become the constant theme of their talk and prayers. They have written hymns about it, some of the finest—and it takes deep feeling to produce a good hymn. They have fought for it, accepting ridicule and loss of privilege

if need be as the price of their stand;

the spiritual descendants of Paul and Augustine and the Reformers have been fighting Romanizing and Pelagianizing doctrines ever since.

Why does the theme mean so little even to some who talk about it a great deal?

There are four crucial truths in this realm which the doctrine of grace presupposes, and if they are not acknowledged and felt in one’s heart,

God’s grace becomes impossible.

The four truths are these:

1. The moral ill-desert of man.

in the moral realm they are resolutely kind to themselves, treating small virtues as compensating for great vices and refusing to take seriously the idea that, morally speaking, there is anything much wrong with them.

modern men and women are convinced that, despite all their little peccadilloes—drinking, gambling, reckless driving, sexual laxity, black and white lies, sharp practice in trading, dirty reading, and what have you—they are at heart thoroughly good folks.

they imagine God as a magnified image of themselves and assume that God shares his own complacency about himself.