KNOWING GOD

            In 1974 J.I. Packer wrote a classic book called Knowing God. He makes an interesting observation at the beginning of his book. He points out that there is a difference between knowing about God and knowing God. That statement has had a profound effect on me.  

            While teaching a class on the Doctrine of God, I was struck by how easy it is for us to learn a lot of facts about God and yet not really know God. My greatest desire is to truly know God.

            One of God’s attributes that captured my attention is His omnipresence. I have always heard omnipresence defined as God is everywhere present. I have always accepted that in a theoretical sense, but it didn’t really seem real to me. Then I read the definition in Wayne Grudem’s book on systematic theology. “God does not have size or spatial dimensions and is present at every point of space with his whole being, yet God acts differently in different places.”

            As I read that definition and pondered it, I was struck by its implications. God is not just present in some amorphous, intangible way. God is present in all of His glory and power, all of His attributes, right here, right now. God is fully interactive with my world. I have not been able to let go of that thought.

            I try to live in the reality of His presence. I try to always recognize that God is truly with me. I don’t know how to explain how that makes me feel. I guess the best word is awe. I am in awe of the fact that God is completely and totally present wherever I am.

            I have often gone to Psalm 139 in a time of crisis to bring assurance to others. As I contemplate God’s omnipresence, this Psalm has taken on much greater meaning and significance.

Psalm 139:1-18, 23-24

    O Lord, you have searched me and you know me.

    You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar.

    You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways.

    Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O Lord.

    You hem me in--behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me.

    Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.

    Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?

    If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.

    If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.

    If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me," even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you. 

    For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb.

    I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.

    My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.

    How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them!

    Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you.

    

    Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.

    See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

            We serve a God who is incomprehensible yet knowable, boundless yet present with all His being. I stand amazed in His presence, literally!