Knowing and KNOWING

Don’t get me wrong, studying and learning from God’s Word is invaluable. Jesus referenced, read, and quoted all kinds of passages from the Old Testament, ample proof that he had studied God’s Word with great care and diligence. The problem isn’t knowledge. The problem is that you can have knowledge without having intimacy. In fact, knowledge can be a false indicator of intimacy. Clearly where there is intimacy there should be a growing knowledge, but too often there is knowledge without a growing intimacy.

Not A Fan Facebook Page

Inside Before Outside

HT: Not A Fan

Is Jesus Your Homeboy?

Hat Tip: Parchment and Pen

Crying Abba

“You cannot open the pages of the New testament without realizing that one of the things that makes it so ‘new’, in every way, is that here men and women call God ‘Father’. This conviction, that we can speak to the Maker of the universe in such intimate terms, lies at the heart of the Christian faith. Through Christ, says Paul, we have ‘access to the Father’ (Eph 2:18).”

- Sinclair Ferguson, Children of the Living God (Carlisle, PA: The Banner of Truth Trust, 1989), xi.

From: Of First Importance

He is Blood

"Jesus is not a pop song, snuggly sweater, affectionate boyfriend, a poster on your wall, self-help book, motivational speech, warm cup of coffee, ultimate fighting champion, knight in shining armor, or Robin to your Batman. He is blood. And without blood, you die."

(From Your Jesus is Too Safe: Outgrowing a Drive-Thru, Feel-Good Savior, by Jared Wilson, coming in July from Kregel)

Hat Tip: The Thinklings

Surprised by a Jealous God

"Any relationship, to remain alive, requires at least two living participants. In this case, a God who does not exist as a convenience, magically giving us what we want, or feel we deserve, but a God who simply IS- the ground of being, the great "I Am." And with this God, experienced by the prophet Jeremiah as "the true God... the living God" (Jer. 10:10), we can come into our own, no longer in fear of "being nothing,"but people who can listen, who can change, who can be surprised. Even surprised by a jealous God, who loves us enough to care when we stray. And who has given us commandments to help us find the way home."

(Kathleen Norris, Amazing Grace, page 87)

Personal Relationship with Jesus

"Most of us are familiar with the concept of a personal relationship with Jesus. The problem in common understanding is that we imagine it is something we do and over which we have control. A relationship with Jesus, rather, is his act in the freedom of his love, through the work of the Spirit, in which he binds us to share in his life as the truth of God. It is not truth as an idea, an argument or a proposition. It is truth as personal being who encounters us on his own terms by being in relationship with us. Here is knowing on a wholly new level."

Andrew Purves, The Crucifixion of Ministry, pages 95-96