The Purpose of Theology

“Knowledge puffs up. . . . The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know” (1 Cor 8:1–2).

To be preoccupied with getting Theological knowledge as an end in itself, to approach Bible study with no higher motive than a desire to know all the answers, is the direct route to a state of self-satisfied self-deception. We need to guard our hearts against such an attitude, and pray to be kept from it. . . . There can be no spiritual health without doctrinal knowledge; but it is equally true that there can be no spiritual health with it, if it is sought for the wrong purpose and valued by the wrong standard. In this way, doctrinal study really can become a danger to spiritual life, and we today today, no less than the Corinthians of old, need to be on guard here.

But, says someone, is it not a fact that a love for God’s revealed truth, and a desire to know as much of it as one can, are natural to every person who has been born again? Look at psalm 119: “teach me your decrees”; “open my eyes that I may see wonderful things from your law!”; “How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!”; “give me discernment that I may understand your statutes” (vv. 12, 18, 97, 103, 125). Do not all cildren of God long, with the psalmist, to know just as much about our heavenly father as we can learn? Is not, indeed, the fact that we have received a love for his truth in this way proof that we have been born again? (See 2 Thess 2:10.) And is it not right that we should satisfy this God-given desire to the full?

Yes, of course it is. But if you look back to Psalm 119 again, you will see that the psalmist’s concern to get knowledge about God was not a theoretical but a practical concern. His supreme desire was to know and enjoy God himself, and he valued knowledge about God simply as a means to this end. He wanted to understand God’s truth in order that his heart might respond to it and his life be conformed to it. Observe the emphasis of the opening verses: “Blessed are they whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the Lord. . . . Oh, that my ways were steadfast in obeying your decrees!“ (vv. 1–2, 5).

The psalmist was interested in truth and orthodoxy, in biblical teaching and theology, not as ends in themselves, but as means to the further ends of life and godliness. His ultimate concern was with knowledge and service of the great God whose truth he sought to understand.

And this must be our attitude too, our aim in studying the Godhead must be to know God himself better. Our concern must be to enlarge our aquaintance, not simply with the doctrine of God’s attributes, but with the living God whose attributes they are. As he is the subject of our study, and our helper in it, so he must be the end of it. We must seek, in studying God, to be led to God. It was for this purpose that revelation was given, and it is to this use that we must put it.

—J. I. Packer, Knowing God (InterVarsity Press, 1993), 22–23.

Hat Tip: The Purpose of Theology « Already Not Yet

(Passages like this are the reason I so highly recommend this book!)