Saturday, September 23, 2023

Ineffable GodD

True religion confronts earth with heaven and brings eternity to bear upon time.

PPreface to The Knowledge of the Holy by A.W. Tozer

cAN WORDS LEAD US TO gOD?  wELL, IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE wORD.  bUT ON THE OTHER HAND MAYBE THE BEST THEY CAN DO IS STEER US AWAY FROM THINGS THAT AREN'T gOD.  aND THAT'S A GOOD THING IN ITSELF FOR SURE.

rAPT ADORATION.  oF WHAT.  sOMETIMES JUST RAPT ADORATION ITSELF IT SEEMS, THOUGH THERE IS A SENSE THAT THE OBJECT OF IT gOD, gOD NOT HAVING ANY CLEAR DEFINTION OR SHAPE OR CONCEPT AT ALL.  

i'M BABBLING.  bUT i LOST gOD AND i WANT hIM BACK.  i LOST hIM YEARS AGO AND i WANT hIM BACK.  i DON'T KNOW HOW i FOUND hIM IN THE FIRST PLAYCE, THAT'S THE PROBLEM, BUT i HAD hIM FOR A LONG TIME AND NOW i DON'T.  rAPT ADORATION.

oNE OF THE POETS WROTE ABOUT THE MERE THOUGHT OF gOD FILLING US WITH SWEETNESS.  yES THE MERE THOUGHT AND YET THE THOUGHT ISN'T OF ANYTHING THAT CAN BGE DESCRIB3ED.  iT IS JUTS "gOD" AND THERE IS THE SWEETNESS.

i TMAKES THE AUTHEIST DEBATES LUDICROUS.  tHERE IS NO WAY TO ANSWER THIS SORT OF THING AND THERE IS NOTHING THEY CAN SAY TO TURN ONE AWAY FROM IT.  

hAV YOU EVER NOTICED THAT SOMETIMES A cHRISTIAN WILL ACTUALLY SMACK HER LIPS AT THE IDEA OF gOD?  iVE SEEN IT.  THAT'S WHAT IT IS.  TASTE AND SEE THAT THE lord IS GOOD.  tHE nAME OF gOD MAY BE ENOUGH TO BRING THE TASTE OF gOD.

tHE MERE HOUGHT OF gOD, THOUGH THERE IS NO TOHOUGHT OF ANYTHING DESCRIBABLE.

iF gOD IS NOT THE ORIGIN OF EVERYTHING, IF SOME STUPID IDEA SUCH AS EVOLUTION INTERVENES i SUPPOSE IT IS SIMPLY IMOSSIBLE TO HAVE SUCH AN EXPERIENCE.  iF YOU HAVE EVOLUTION YOU SIMPLY DO NOT HAVE gOD, YOU CAN'T HAVE gOD.  TAKE YOUR PICK


Later:  I don't mean to imply that God is not with me at all because He is.  He is sometimes a presence I feel even , especially in His Word, and He answers my prayers or some of them.  He has not left me.  I only mean that because I let myself fritter away my own time on worldly things, however good some of them are in themselves, I lost my much more continuous sense of Him that I had for may years after I was saved, when my attention was almost exclusively on Him.  Now my attention is scattered and I don't know how to get back that blissful easy concentration on god that I once had.