In the Bible, there’s this short but troubling passage from Jesus near the end of his famous Sermon on the Mount. He’s just given several examples of how to tell the difference between good and evil. Then he says, “Not everyone who says to me Lord, Lord will enter the Kingdom of Heaven.” Ok, Jesus, you have my attention. He explains how some people will protest, “Didn’t we do miraculous things in your name?” Then, Jesus says four words that terrify me. 

“I never knew you.” 

Let that sink in. Despite the miracles. Even though these people have apparently been speaking as his representatives, Jesus says, “I never knew you.” 

Is it possible that I could spend my life doing good things – good Christian things that I claim to be doing for God – and miss him entirely? 

It could’ve happened to Philip, one of Jesus’ closest followers. Jesus told him, “Have you been with me so long and still don’t know me?” Wow. Think about that. Philip was right there with Jesus almost every day for three years. If he missed it, do we even have a chance? 

Can you and I really know God?

What is God like? What does he think about? Even better – what’s going through his mind when he thinks about himself? Is it even possible for us to know? Are our human minds capable of thinking God's thoughts? 

Honestly, I don’t know the answers to any of these questions. 

Let me ask a few more.

Does God want us to know him? How much of his inner thought-life is he willing to reveal?

I think he does want us to know him. Not only does he want it, I believe that’s why he created us. But to what extent is he willing to pull back the curtain and let us in? How much of himself is he ready to reveal? That I’m not sure about.

These are the questions that I want to explore. But that’s only half of our journey. I am deeply curious about what it means for me that God wants me to know him. How does that help me answer the question, “What should I be like? What kind of person should I be?”

If God is down here in our reality, trying to give us a glimpse of what he’s really like, then I want to ask, “Why? What’s his purpose?” Does he want something from me?

Even if we do our best to understand God, the puzzle is still incomplete. But we have enough to get us started – to whet our appetite and awaken our desire to know more about this alien God — a being so foreign that our highest words and ideas can only paint pale shadows of his reality. Throughout the Bible, we can trace a thin thread of mystery about the nature of God. But that same thread runs throughout history and even into science. Let’s delicately grasp the fragile thread together, careful not to stain it with our oily fingerprints. We must approach the idea of God with awe and reverence, precision and humility. Sometimes, God’s spirit whispers through our instincts and intuition, revealing more truth. Other times, our experiences and emotions drive us to the wrong conclusions. 

The Bible has stories to help us with the question, “What is God like?” Moses and the Burning Bush shows us how God miraculously introduces himself to an unsuspecting man in the desert. Zaccheus, a tax collector for the Roman Empire, abruptly stops his dishonest business practices after one conversation with Jesus. There are so many stories in the Bible to help us follow this thread, but this podcast… this isn’t really a Bible study.

Expanding our search, we can see that God has left his fingerprints throughout the history of humankind. Even Science wrestles with tough questions about where we came from and where we’re headed as a species. 

Was there an uncaused cause that precipitated the creation of the universe? 

Why does it appear that specific attributes of our physical world are fine-tuned for human life? 

But this podcast… it isn’t just a historical or scientific exploration of these questions. 

And this is absolutely not a course in Christian apologetics!

This is a study of God, or more accurately, how to think about God. We’ll learn to ask questions and be curious. But this won’t be a purely intellectual pursuit. I believe the more we understand who God is and what he’s like, the more we will be compelled to change who we are. And I hope we will learn that we can’t do anything without God’s help.

God isn’t just dropping clues and hoping we’ll find him like a cosmic game of Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? God’s Spirit is our guide and teacher, revealing God's mysteries. He gives us the power to understand, allowing our finite minds to pierce the shroud of mystery. Like Jesus standing on the rough seas, gesturing to a bewildered but curious Peter to join him, God has invited us to investigate and explore. 

It seems like everyone has an opinion about what God is like and whether he even exists at all. If you spend enough time scrolling through social media, you’ll find folks with well-formed opinions and arguments. But I’m not interested in winning debates. I can’t get that image of Jesus out of my head. I keep hearing those haunting words echo in my head.

“I never knew you.”

I don’t ever want to hear them. That’s why I want to follow the thread of God’s mysterious revelation. If you’re curious. If you want to see where this thread leads us, come along with me. In every episode, we’ll examine the questions, “What is God like?” and “In light of that, what should I be like?”

We will begin our exploration with A. W. Tozer’s book, The Knowledge of the Holy. Tozer was a self-taught theologian whose timeless teaching has awakened hungry minds for decades. His inspired words bring us closer to God. In Knowledge of the Holy, he studies the attributes of God, reacquaints us with his majesty, and reminds us what it means to be in awe of him.

We’ll go chapter by chapter exploring God’s omniscience and omnipotence, his transcendence and immutability, and more. 

If your soul is hungry for a more accurate image of God – if you are disillusioned with stale religion – if you find it hard to trust a church, but God is genuinely compelling – then let’s go on this journey together. Follow. Subscribe. I’ll see you in the next episode.

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