The Knowledge of the Holy: A Reminder of Reverence
“The Church has surrendered her once lofty concept of God and has substituted for it one so low, so ignoble, as to be utterly unworthy of thinking, worshipping men”
In 1961, A. W. Tozer, the self-educated Christian Pastor, author, and magazine editor, wrote that the Church was in a state of critical danger.
Tozer argued that the Church had lost its reverence and awe of God.
"What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us" (p. 4).
This often-quoted phrase opens Tozer's first chapter in which he argues for the reason why Christians must think rightly about God. In his estimation, the majority of American churches in 1961 had failed to do so.
It is week 26 of 52 in the Tim Challies 2020 reading challenge, and the assignment was to read a book less than 100 pages. A. W. Tozer's book, The Knowledge of the Holy is 154 pages, depending on which version you read, but I couldn't resist re-reading this exceptional work.
No one can award The Knowledge of the Holy anything less than five stars as it is a timeless foundational work for the American church. Tozer never completed high school, and yet he writes and argues with such impeccable reasoning and clarity that it is no wonder that both Wheaton and Houghton Colleges provided him with honorary doctorates.
Tozer doesn't waste words or time in his rather short but theologically packed book. I cannot overstate the necessity for all Christians to read this book. I firmly recommend it and have bought multiple copies as gifts for family and friends.
For this review, I will simply reproduce several of Tozer's quintessential arguments and comments on the attributes of God that address one specific question.
What do you think about God?
"It is not a cheerful thought that millions of us who live in a land of Bibles, who belong to churches and labor to promote the Christian religion, may yet pass our whole life on this earth without once having thought or tried to think seriously about the being of God" (p. 37).
The prevailing theme throughout The Knowledge of the Holy is the seriousness of contemplating the person of God. This short book is centrally focused on God's attributes, but beyond that is a call for the American church to awake from the stupor and realize who they are worshiping.
Our culture continues to point us toward tools, gimmicks, and tricks to gain control and happiness in our lives. These practices have indeed infiltrated the church today as they were evident in the 60s. We have become so utterly self-focused that we have lost a sense of the severity of God.
"In a world of change and decay not even the man of faith can be completely happy. Instinctively he seeks the unchanging and is bereaved at the passing of dear familiar things" (p. 66).
Our souls long to know the perfect one. The creator, sustainer, and orchestrator of all things. When we make him into a Jinny in a lamp, we fail to meet our created need to comprehend his incomprehensible person.
The simple reminder from Tozer is that when you think about who God claims to be, your world will shatter. Your secular ambitions will fade. Your earthly purpose will become wanting. All because what matters most is the unapologetic, total submission and worship of him alone!
"We can hold a correct view of truth only by daring to believe everything God has said about Himself" (p. 102).
For Tozer, objective truth is sourced in God. To know truth is to know God.
There is a movement within Christianity that is choosing to reject objective truth and instead reframe God to love. That God is love and also love is God. Tozer addressed this false philosophy pointedly.
"Equating love with God is a major mistake which has produced much unsound religious philosophy and has brought forth a spate of vaporous poetry completely out of accord with the Holy Scriptures and altogether of another climate from that of historic Christianity" (p. 127).
To embrace love as the definition of God is to make love God. Which means rejecting all his other equally strong attributes such as his unequivocal demand and execution of justice.
Thinking on the attributes of God puts our unworthiness on display and produces tremendous humility.
Tozer rightly concludes, "Until we have seen ourselves as God see us, we are not likely to be much disturbed over conditions around us as long as they do not get so far out of hand as to threaten our comfortable way of life. We have learned to live with unholiness and have come to look upon it as the natural and expected thing" (p. 135).
Our natural tendency is to validate our unholy irreverent contexts because they are normal. To expose blind spots and potential errors in our thinking and practice we need to start or return to thinking about God.
Tozer puts it this way, "to regain her lost power the Church must see heaven opened and have a transforming vision of God" (p. 149-150).
Consider Isaiah's words when he encountered the presence of the living God.
"Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!" (Is. 6:5).
Isaiah feared for his life. In the presence of God our true selves are revealed. Our churches today need to enter the throne room of heaven and be undone by the severity and holiness of God. For in so doing we better understand the amazing grace given to us in Jesus Christ.
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John Owen came from Welsh descent, was educated at Queens College, and became a renowned Puritan theologian, Oxford professor, and passionate pastor who lived from 1616 to 1683. In 1647, he wrote the exhaustive treatise The Death of Death defending Limited or Definite Atonement against the Arminian view of Universal Atonement or Unlimited Atonement.