The following are excerpts from chapter 23, “The Open Secret”, in The Knowledge of the Holy, by A.W. Tozer
“But the God we must see is not the utilitarian God who is having such a run of popularity today, whose chief claim to men’s attention is His ability to bring them success in their various undertakings and who for that reason is being cajoled and flattered by everyone who wants a favor. The God we must learn to know is the Majesty in the heavens, God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, the only wise God our Saviour.
“Knowledge of such a Being cannot be gained by study alone. It comes by a wisdom the natural man knows nothing of, neither can know, because it is spiritually discerned. To know God is at once the easiest and the most difficult thing in the world. It is easy because the knowledge is not won by hard mental toil, but is something freely given”…”But this knowledge is difficult because there are conditions to be met and the obstinate nature of fallen man does not take kindly to them.”
See the the chapter for the details of the conditions to which Tozer refers. I present the introductory statements with these conditions which “as taught by the Bible and repeated through the centuries by the holiest, sweetest saints the world has ever known:”
- We must forsake our sins. The belief that a holy God cannot be known by men of confirmed evil lives is not new to the Christian religion.
- There must be an utter committal of the whole life to Christ in faith. This is what it means to “believe in Christ.”
- There must be a reckoning of ourselves to have died unto sin and to be alive unto God in Christ Jesus, followed by a throwing open of the entire personality to the inflow of the Holy Spirit.
- We must boldly repudiate the cheap values of the fallen world and become completely detached in spirit from everything that unbelieving men set their hearts upon, allowing ourselves on the simplest enjoyments of nature which God has bestowed alike upon the just and the unjust.
- We must practice the art of long and loving meditation upon the majesty of God. This will take some effort, for the concept of majesty has all but disappeared from the human race.
Tozer closes the chapter and book with this statement: “There is a glorified Man on the right hand of the Majesty in heaven faithfully representing us there. We are left for a season among men; let us faithfully represent Him here.”
Oh, Father, with the time I have remaining here, let me faithfully represent you!
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