Knowing God

by J.I. Packer

They think the work of the Spirit is to give them experiences that

are like LSD...

this quest for an inward

explosion rather than an inward communion shows deep misunderstanding of the Spirit’s ministry.

the Spirit is given to Christians as “the Spir...

his task and purpose throughout is to make Christians realize with increasing clarity the meaning of their filial relationship with God in Christ, and to lead them into an e...

a recognition that the Spirit comes to us as the Spirit of adoption is the key thought for

unlocking, and the focal thought for integrating, all that the New Testament tells us about his ministry to Christians.

his work has three aspects.

In the first place, he makes

and keeps us conscious—sometimes vividly conscious,...

that we are God’s children by free grace throu...

This is his work ...

faith, assurance ...

In the second place, he moves us to look to God...

This is his work of making us cry

“Abba, Father”—the attitude described is what the cry expresses.

In the third place, he impels us to act up to our position as royal children by manif...

furthering the famil...

and maintaining the fa...

This is his work of sanct...

this progressive deepening of filial consciousness and character, with its outworking in the pursuit of what God...

he hates, “we are transformed by the Spirit of the Lord in ever-increasing splen...

So it is not as we strain after feelings and experiences but as we seek God himself, looking to h...

fellowship, and finding in ourselves an increasing concern to know and please him, that the reality of the Spirit’s mini...

This is the needed truth which can lift us out of the quagmire of nonspiritua...

Fourth, and following on from what we have just said, our adoption shows us the meaning and motives of “gospel holiness.”

“Gospel holiness” is

no doubt an unfamiliar phrase to some. It was Puritan shorthand for authentic Christian living, springing from love and gratitude to God, in contrast with the spurious “legal holiness” t...

appearances, maintained from self-rega...

two short points to make about “gosp...

First, what has already been said shows us its e...

It is simply a consistent living out of our filial ...

God

It is just a matter of the child of God being true to type, true to his Father, to his Savior and to himself. It is the expressing of one’s adoption in one’s life. I...

Second, the adoptive relationship,

provides the motive for this authentically holy living.

and that this involved his eternal intention that “we should be holy and without blame before him in love”

What flows from such knowledge?

“Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure”

The children know that holiness is their Father’s will for them, and that it is both a means, condition, and constituent of t...

Paternal discipline exercised through outward pressures and trials helps the process along:

The Christian up to his eyes in trouble can take comfort from the knowledge that in God’s kindly plan it all has a positive purpose, to further his sanctification.

In this world, royal children have to undergo extra training and discipline which other children escape, in order to...

throughout their lives he is training them for what awaits them, and chiseling them into the image of Christ.

only he can maintain his assurance of sonship against satanic assault as things go wrong. But he who has mastered the truth of adoption both retains assurance and receives blessing in the day of trouble:

the Christian’s primary motive for holy living is not negative, the hope (vain!) that hereby he may avoid chastening, but positive, the impulse to show his love and gratitude to his adopting God by identifying himself with the

Father’s will for him.

This throws light at once on the question of the place of God’s law i...

We are free from ...