The Study of God - Pt. 2

Knowing God, p. 19 “The world becomes a strange, mad, painful place…for those who do not know about God. Disregard the study of God, and you sentence yourself to stumble and blunder through life blindfolded...”

At first reading, I thought, “Of course. Life is confusing and strange without God.” Certainly before I knew Christ the world was a strange and mad and painful place. Yet, this quote is not referring to those who are not in Christ. The world is strange “for those who do not know about God.” This quote is for me, who am now a Christian. I know that many Christians “stumble and blunder through life blindfolded.” I have seen this happen in my own life. Initially I would not think to describe the life of a Christian, who does not know about God, as prone to blundering. Yet, it does not take much for me to see the correlation between knowing about God and being sure-footed. The world is God’s, and He runs it. The understanding that I often lack is found in knowing God. This seems to relate back to what C.H. Spurgeon said: “the proper study of a Christian is the Godhead.” Understanding the world, including ourselves, comes from knowing about God. No philosophy of this world will make us wise. As I think about what knowing God means for my own life, I see some of the benefits, including a sense of direction and understanding the world better, as Packer describes. Yet, even more than a desire for these benefits, I pray that my motivation for knowing God would be out of wonder for who He is, knowing that to delight in God is like what C.S. Lewis describes as “a holiday at the sea” and that anything else is settling for “mud pie.”