Tonight I was reading through a section of Tozer's "Knowledge of the Holy" on God's omnipotence. It's quite a good read, actually, if you can take the time to not be distracted. That kind of time comes is exceedingly rare for me these days. Something clicked in my brain that I want to share both because it may help someone else and because if I don't right it down often I forget. There's a reason the children of Israel built stone monuments.
Over the past year the LORD has been seemingly on a crusade to root out many of my foundation level, psychologically based, wrong ideas. They are generally emotional in nature and as such logic hasn't really had that much effect on them.
The primary wrong headed idea that He dealt with tonight, while reading Tozer, was that I fear appearing before Him. I fully believe I will be accepted into heaven because of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus; He paid the debt and nothing needs to be added to that to save my soul. I do fear, however, the knowledge and understanding that will suddenly converge upon us as we begin to understand many things. Chiefly, I am very uncomfortable with the fact that suddenly I'll realize my understanding on earth was incomplete and I fear the shame of my actions as a result. I DREAD the idea that God could look at me and say, "Well...you got this wrong and that wrong...and what were you thinking with THAT idea? It was clearly written over here and you missed it." I can't imagine that God would call me an idiot...and yet I pretty much feel like that's precisely what I will think of myself as my illusions start crashing down around me and I go, "Ooooohhh....right" on the other side of the veil.
While reading Tozer's words on omnipotence I began to see a glimpse of just how many of His attributes come together and are dependent on one another. He is all-powerful. He is all-knowing. He is sovereign.
And here I am...what...going to surprise an all-knowing God with my ignorance? Is my wrong headed thinking going to supplant or complicate an all-powerful God's plans? His sovereignty goes well beyond any idiocy that I could utter or think.
I've spent a lot of my years with this anxiety feeling an enormous amount of pressure to study, perform, to know, and to understand. I have been motivated by fear of that moment before God and it has overwhelmed me to the point that I've just mentally shut down because, "Why try?". It is just too much of an expectation...that God never put on me. I put it on myself. My wife often has accused me of being a perfectionist. I've rejected that analysis with the weak idea that if I was actually a perfectionist I'd be expecting perfection of everyone else. As it stands I only apply that standard to myself.
Two big problems with all of what is contained in that paragraph. 1) Jesus specifically tells us to be anxious for nothing. Yes, I want to grow in my understanding of the LORD. Yes, I want to grow and bear fruit as a Christian. But! An all-knowing, all-powerful, sovereign God already knows what I need, when I need it, and the manner in which I will best receive it. 2) God wants us to be motivated by His great love for us and not by fear. It is important that we are motivated out of a love we already have rather than a love we mistakenly believe we can earn. Jesus covered us, full stop. God cannot love us or be impressed with us more than He already is because when He looks at us He sees His son covering all our faults and failures. What is left to us is to walk with Him and obey what He gives us to do.
It is my job to seek. It is like climbing a ladder, in a sense. I am climbing, obediently moving from one rung to the next and trusting that He will place the next wrung where and precisely when my hand will reach to grasp what I cannot yet see. My faithfulness will make room for His already beautiful, steadfast love to be proven out.
Pax,
W
