October 13, 2025 • 31 mins
What comes into your mind when you think about God? That question, A.W. Tozer once said, reveals more about your future than anything else. In this message from The Wisdom Journey, Stephen Davey opens a new series on the character of God. From creation’s beauty to the revelation of Scripture, we are invited to study God’s nature, His works, and His attributes. Why does this matter? Because knowing God leads to wisdom for life’s decisions, direction in uncertain times, courage in trials, fruitful living, and unshakable security. This episode also reminds us of a staggering truth: God Himself longs to be wanted. He has revealed enough of Himself so that we can know Him, walk with Him, and trust Him fully. Whether you feel spiritually weary or simply want to grow deeper in your walk with Christ, this study will challenge and encourage you to pursue the greatest relationship of all—knowing the God who already knows you.
Stephen's latest book, The Disciples Prayer, is available now. https://www.wisdomonline.org/store/view/the-disciples-prayer-hardback
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Episode Transcript
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SPEAKER_01 (00:07):
Have you ever met anybody and you've thought that
person has no direction?
If we try to live in this worldwithout knowing about the God
whose world it is, and whohappens to run it, disregard the
study of God, and you tendyourself to stumble and blunder
(00:27):
through life blindfolded, as itwere, with no sense of direction
and no understanding of whatsurrounds you.
This is, he writes, the perfectway to waste your life.
SPEAKER_00 (00:52):
As Christians, it's our desire to know God and to
know him well.
Helping you do that is at thevery heart of our ministry.
But studying God comes with aninteresting paradox.
That's because the more we know,the more we realize that there's
so much more we don't know.
But that's okay.
(01:13):
God has revealed some thingsabout himself, and he wants us
to know those things.
And then we have eternity withhim to know him face to face.
This is wisdom for the heart.
Today, Stephen begins a seriesfrom Acts 17 called Introducing
God.
The message you're about to hearis called Waiting to Be Wanted.
SPEAKER_01 (01:39):
On January 7, 1855, a young pastor stood to preach
to his congregation inSouthwark, England, and he began
by saying, the highest science,the loftiest speculation, the
(01:59):
mightiest philosophy which canever engage the attention of a
child of God is the name, thenature, the person, the work,
the doings, and the existence ofGod.
It is a subject so vast that allour pride is drowned in its
(02:22):
infinity, and all our thoughtsare lost in its immensity.
So preached Charles Spurgeon inLondon 150 years ago when he was
remarkably barely 20 years old.
If you read his writings, one ofthe constant challenges that
would come from him to hisgeneration was related to the
(02:46):
nearly universal lack of adesire to know and study God.
Five years after Spurgeon died,another boy was born.
This young man would become apreacher as well this time in
America.
His name was Iden Wilson Tozer.
(03:07):
Now you know why he went afterA.W.
A.W.
Tozer became known for hispersistent warnings directed at
the church for her doctrinalweakness and her shallowness,
the knowledge of the holy, justa little hardback book.
I think it's about 80 pages.
(03:28):
He writes this openingstatement.
What comes into our minds whenwe think about God is the most
important thing about us.
To answer the question, what isGod like?
The answer to that question willpredict the spiritual future of
(03:49):
that person.
And it will predict the futureof the church based on their
answer.
Who is God?
And what is he like?
Listen, who we think God isdetermines how we walk with him,
why we obey him, how we talk tohim, what we expect of him.
It governs everything.
(04:11):
All of this in volumes more,really, is bound up in this
question (04:13):
who is God?
And as I studied and prayedabout this, this is really as
far as I got, and I knew we'd beout of time by the time we got
through with this.
So let me ask and answer threequestions.
Number one, what exactly is thestudy of God?
Now, the ten cent term for thatis theology.
You'd know that if you spent$250an hour going through seminary,
(04:36):
like some of us had to pay, tofind that out.
You're finding it out tonightfor free.
The Greek term thea, God, andlogia for reasoning or arguing
or explaining.
You put that together and youhave then theology is the
logical, reasonable discussionof God.
Who God is, what's he like?
(04:59):
What are his attributes, hisperson, his nature?
In a rather unusual positivestatement by Tozer, and there
aren't many, by the way.
He was rather caustic andprickly, but he was used by God
to challenge the church.
His work, the pursuit of God,these words, and that's the
second book, by the way, ThePursuit of God, a little longer.
(05:23):
These words.
In this hour of all butuniversal darkness, he wrote
this 60 years ago, one cheeringgleam appears.
Within the fold of conservativeChristianity, there is an
increasing number of peoplewhose lives are marked by a
growing hunger after GodHimself.
(05:44):
They are eager for spiritualrealities.
They are thirsty for God, andthey will not be satisfied until
they have drunk deep at thefountain of living water.
And I read that because thisstudy is really for those who
are thirsty for God.
Question number two (06:03):
what can I study to know God better?
Well, one resource is creation,the natural world, which is why
the psalmist is constantlyinviting us to look around, to
look up at the stars and thesun, moon, planets, the beauty
(06:25):
of the world and the stars inthe sky.
He writes in Psalm 8:1, O Lord,our Lord, how majestic is your
name in all the earth, who isdisplayed.
You have displayed, you haveexposed your splendor to the
world above the heavens.
In Psalm 19, he writes this (06:42):
the heavens are telling the glory of
God.
They're describing his glory,the work of his hands, declaring
that day to day pours speech,day after day pours forth
speech, and night after nightreveals knowledge.
I love the paraphrase of themessage by Eugene Peterson.
(07:04):
On that phrase, he says it thisway: Madam Day holds classes
every morning, and ProfessorKnight lectures each evening.
The older I get, the more Imarvel and enjoy the creative
handiwork of God.
I don't know if I was justmoving too fast in my 30s or
(07:26):
40s, but I'm I'm slowing down,except on Penny Road.
But at any rate, I'm just I'mjust enjoying it.
The other morning, it wasyesterday morning.
I'm standing, little breakfastroom, open shades, it's early,
and I got a cup of coffee, andI'm looking out, and uh my wife
has uh you know filled all thesebird feeders, and I'm standing
there, and there's thisbrilliant display of creativity,
(07:51):
and there are finches of anynumber of colors, and some
bluebirds, there's a cardinal,some morning doves, and I'm just
standing there watching andlooking at the splashes of color
and the creative design onfeathers and over eyes and all
of the different reds andpeaches and grays and blacks,
(08:12):
all the different hues, and asI'm watching, beyond them at
that very moment, out in apasture that belongs to somebody
else to mow, fortunately,galloped three horses.
I mean, you it just doesn't getany better than that.
And that was that was all free.
I had to buy the coffee beansand the bird seed, but you know
what I mean.
(08:32):
This was unbelievable, and Ijust stood there and worshiped
the Lord and his creativegenius.
Look around.
God has given us this naturalworld that points to him.
In fact, Romans 1 gives us theinteresting truth that even if
someone never hears the gospelof Jesus Christ, even without
(08:56):
hearing the gospel, they arestill guilty of rejecting God
and without excuse, Paul says,because they had nature.
And what did they do?
They suppressed the truth thatwas obvious, and they said it
must have just happened bychance.
(09:17):
Rather than all of the order andthe beauty and the creativity
must come from someone whoordered it, someone who is
creative.
And if they hadn't worked sohard to suppress the truth of
creativity and complexity andcolor, they would have been
able, Paul says, to put togetherthe fact that there is a creator
with some amazing, powerfulattributes.
(09:42):
And that's without thescriptures.
And speaking of, that's theother resource then for study.
Beyond creation, by far the mostsignificant is revelation.
Creation opens the door toobservation, revelation opens
the door to inspiration.
All scripture is given byinspiration.
(10:03):
2 Timothy 3.16.
Inspiration, theopnustus, thevery breath of God.
This is God's breath, so tospeak.
Well, what does God's wordbreathe about God?
Who is God and what is he like?
Ultimately, that drives you thento the scriptures where God
(10:27):
discloses the truth abouthimself that you would never
observe in nature.
And of course, with that, theredemptive truth of Christ.
But keep in mind, beloved, thatthe scriptures aren't
comprehensive.
There is much more about Godthan we have revealed in these
(10:48):
66 books.
So we effectively, at the outsetof our study of God, immediately
live with this tension.
We pursue to know Him, and atthe same time, we know that
we'll never know everythingabout Him because everything
about Him can't be revealed.
(11:08):
Part of the thrill of eternityis to have an infinite amount of
time to study the infinity ofGod as He teaches us.
But right now, we have trouble,we have problems, obviously.
You can't reduce down everythingabout God.
Our finite minds can't grasp it.
Anyway, infinity can't bereduced to a paragraph.
(11:31):
It can't be reduced to a set ofvolumes, even if they were as
large as that 30-set ofencyclopedias, the Encyclopedia
Britannica, which I bought as aseminary student.
And when my wife came home fromwork, I was studying and she
said, What have you done?
(11:53):
And I said, Well, it's only$39 amonth for 300 years, but never
mind that.
All of the knowledge, look,honey, I mean, it's all here.
I got it all.
Even that would only begin, it'dbe a drop in the bucket to
reveal the truth of God.
(12:14):
You remember what John theApostle said?
He said in that classic text inJohn 21, he said, look, if you
could fill up the entire worldwith books, you still wouldn't
have enough space to describewhat Jesus did and said in only
three and a half years.
You'd have to fill up the worldwith books to describe three and
(12:38):
a half years.
How in the world can youdescribe God then?
The only thing we can do, andwhat I trust we will do, is get
a little sip, a little taste,but I'm convinced that even the
littlest sip of sovereignty andhis glory and his grace, his
(13:03):
nature, his attributes willboggle our mind.
God hasn't told us everythingabout himself we'd like to know,
but he has revealed everythingwe need to know.
So that we can enter into arelationship with him and walk
with him and know how to talk tohim and know what he expects of
us and know how to serve him andworship him.
And let me add this (13:26):
anybody who thinks they know who God is and
their knowledge of God isdifferent from that which is
revealed in this book istragically deceived.
I have begun reading a recentlypublished biography of the
Wright brothers.
I read one a few years ago, andI'm captivated by these very
(13:46):
creative, very brilliant youngmen.
They invented things thatallowed them to invent the
airplane.
The biography contains, it'srather rather lengthy, it
contains letters, they wrote, itcontains pictures, it contains
descriptions, personalinterests, and a detailed
timeline of their creativeinvention.
After finishing that book, andI'll be finished, you know, in a
(14:09):
few weeks or so, but if I if Ifinish that book, can you
imagine me saying to someone,even with what little you know
about them, you know what, thoseguys, they were amazing,
absolutely amazing violinists.
And they hated flying machines.
You'd wonder what biography Iread.
(14:32):
If you do read their biography,you'll discover they do not play
the violin and they love talkingabout flying machines.
In fact, when they were littleboys watching the birds fly,
they they marveled at them.
They measured the distance athow quickly they flew from point
A to point B, and they measuredthe weight and the distance and
the speed, and their kidsfiguring all this out.
(14:55):
They couldn't play the violin.
It doesn't matter what we mightthink God is like.
The question is, what does hisword say he's like?
And this is the prayer of theApostle Paul for the early
believers in Colossae.
He writes this in Colossians 1,9 through 10.
We have not ceased to pray foryou and to ask that you may be
(15:17):
filled with the knowledge of hiswill, that you might be
increasing in the knowledge ofGod.
Hey, Paul, what are you prayingabout for this church here
today?
What would you pray?
What he prayed for thosebelievers in Colossians.
I'm praying that you willincrease in the knowledge of
God.
Who is God?
What is he like?
(15:39):
Do we really know?
I read this past year theannouncement of Chester Nez, who
had passed away.
It struck my attention.
I tucked it away.
Chester was the last livingmember of a team of Navajo
tribesmen who came to be calledthe Navajo Code Talkers.
(16:02):
Chester Nez was one of theoriginal 29 Navajo recruited by
the U.S.
military to create anunbreakable code used only by
the Allies that the enemy forcescould not figure out.
Navajo is a complex, unwrittenlanguage without an alphabet.
(16:27):
That'd be hard to break,wouldn't it?
Well, only a handful ofnon-Navajo people could even
speak it.
So these men were recruited tocome up with a code that
couldn't be broken by enemyintelligence.
And from 1942 to 1945, thesecode talkers, they were called,
participated in every singlemajor operation the U.S.
(16:51):
Marines conducted in the Pacificregion.
Philip Johnson, the son of amissionary to the Navajo, came
up with the idea to use thesemen to communicate in a way no
one else would understand.
And the code was never broken.
Listen, how in the world can aninfinite creator with a language
(17:16):
unlike ours and a nature sodifferent communicate with a
finite creature?
Well, God has effectivelyrevealed the code here.
The Bible is God's owncommunication with mankind about
who he is and what he's like.
(17:39):
It isn't comprehensive, but itis definitive.
It isn't exhaustive, but it isadequate to reveal enough of who
he is and what he is like sothat we can love him and walk
with him and talk with him andeven come to know him better.
Here's another question.
Number three.
What are the benefits ofstudying God?
(18:01):
Well, I know we'd all say, well,we're not supposed to ask
questions like that.
It's just beneficial.
Well, what are the benefits?
Well, let me give you five ofthem.
Let me give you five.
First, wisdom.
And I'll touch down intoProverbs chapter 9 and verse 10.
The fear of the Lord, Solomonwrites, is the beginning of
wisdom, and the knowledge of theHoly One is understanding.
(18:24):
So Solomon is effectivelytelling us that God will show us
how to live a wise life.
So we're told then thatknowledge, biblical knowledge,
isn't so much related to an IQ.
There are people who got A's ontheir report cards, but they
live life going from one failureto another.
(18:45):
It's not that they don't haveenough information, it isn't
that they don't have enougheducation.
It's just that they don't havewisdom.
Wisdom enables someone to applythe knowledge they have in
making the right decision inlife.
And you can't get that kind ofwisdom apart from knowing God.
(19:05):
So wisdom would be one.
Closely associated with thisidea is another benefit.
We'll call it in a worddirection.
Direction.
To put it another way, Godallows you to maintain this
sense of direction when you needit, as you pursue not so much
that direction, but you pursueHim.
(19:26):
The Apostle Peter writes it thisway in 2 Peter 1: Grace and
peace be multiplied to you inthe knowledge of God, seeing
that in his divine power, he'sgranted to us everything
pertaining to life and godlinessthrough the true knowledge of
Him who called us by His glory.
(19:46):
J.I.
Packer illustrated this idea byimagining how terrible and
unfair it would be to helicopterinto the Amazonian jungle, pick
up a tribesman who's never beenout of the jungle before, and
fly him to London, England, andset him down in the middle of
that city and then tell them,fend for yourself, try to do the
(20:09):
best you can.
Packer goes on to apply it.
We are cruel to ourselves if wetry to live in this world
without knowing about the Godwhose world it is, and who
happens to run it?
Disregard the study of God andyou sentence yourself to stumble
and blunder through lifeblindfolded, as it were, with no
(20:31):
sense of direction and nounderstanding of what surrounds
you.
This is, he writes, the perfectway to waste your life.
Have you ever met anybody andyou've thought that person has
no direction?
What's the solution?
A map?
No.
(20:52):
A course?
No.
The knowledge and the pursuit ofGod.
Another benefit.
It's fruitful living.
Paul wrote in Colossians 1, 9and 10 that he was constantly
praying for these believers thatthe church would be filled with
the knowledge of his will andall spiritual wisdom and
(21:14):
understanding, so that you maywalk in a manner worthy of the
Lord to please him in allrespects, bearing fruit in every
good work and increasing in theknowledge of God.
Those are coupled together,related together.
One of the evidences of gainingan understanding of God is
bearing fruit in good works.
(21:36):
And they can see that you havedirection and wisdom.
Secondly, fruit always reflectsthe character of the tree of
which it is a part.
So when you bear spiritualfruit, you are bearing witness
to the character and the natureof the Holy Spirit, God the
Spirit, who is transforming yourlife.
That comes from growing in theknowledge of God.
(22:00):
There's another byproduct,courage.
Those three Hebrew men respondedto Nebuchadnezzar's command.
You remember in Daniel'sbiography?
Refused to bow to the idol thatNebuchadnezzar had created, and
he said, Everybody now bows whenthe music starts.
And they said, nope, we're notgonna.
Daniel more than likely was outof town, he isn't even entering
(22:20):
into the picture.
Their lives are now literally atstake.
They stopped the music, assumedthey hadn't gotten the message
right, and the king was going togive them another chance, and
bow down or be thrown into thefiery furnace.
You ever thought about the factthat they responded out of their
knowledge of the attributes ofGod?
(22:40):
Daniel 3, 16 says, finds themresponding to the king, oh
Nebuchadnezzar, our God, whom weserve, is able to deliver us
from the furnace of blazingfire.
Now wait a second.
They had never seen God deliveranybody from the fiery furnace.
They were about to be the firstones thrown in.
(23:03):
They had never been threatenedto die by means of fire.
They had never personallyexperienced God delivering them
from a fire.
Here they are saying, God can dothis.
They applied what they knewabout God's sovereign power to
their particular situation.
(23:24):
They knew that God was morepowerful than this king and that
fire.
But they also understoodsomething more about the
attributes of God.
Because they went on to say, intheir saying, understood
evidently his divine prerogativeand his divine right and his
sovereign rule and his abilityto decide what he wants to do
without ever giving them anexplanation.
(23:44):
And so they add to that and theysay, but if he doesn't, we're
still going to follow himbecause he's a true and living
God and he has a right to dowhatever he wants to do, and
you're still following an idol.
It came out of theirunderstanding of the attributes
of God.
Courage and making the rightdecision.
(24:06):
So you see, the question is not,do we really need to know God
better?
The question is how can weafford not to grow in
understanding Him better?
One more.
The list could, of course, go onmuch longer, but one more
byproduct from the study of Godis a sense of security.
David writes in Psalm 46 (24:28):
God is our refuge and our strength, a
very present help in trouble.
Therefore, we will not fear,though the earth should change,
and though the mountains slipinto the heart of the sea,
though its waters roar and foam,though the mountains quake, he's
(24:48):
describing the worst possiblecosmic disturbances you can
imagine.
And then later in that psalm, bestill and know that I am God.
You ever thought about thatwonderful invitation?
Stop, stop, and come to knowthat I am God.
(25:11):
Taste and see that the Lord isgood.
That's an invitation.
Psalm 43, verse 8.
God invites us to get to knowHim.
He's the one that says, taste.
Stop, study me.
Now maybe, maybe you'reconvinced that you'd like to
(25:33):
know God better, but you're nottoo sure He wants the same and
you're not really sure how Hefeels about it.
I mean, who are we after all?
Imagine walking up to, if youcould get past the gate, and I
wouldn't recommend you trywithout an invitation, but
imagine you walk up to the WhiteHouse and you knock on the door,
and they answer the door and yousay to them, you know what, I'm
(25:54):
here because I'd like to get toknow the president.
Well, the question isn't, do youwant to get to know the
president?
The question is, does thepresident of the United States
want to get to know you?
And you'd better hope the answeris yes at that moment.
The question is, does God wantto get to know us?
(26:16):
And does God want us to get toknow him?
Well, here's the stunning truthof this study before us.
It isn't just that you mightwant to get to know God better,
or become a better friend ofGod, or more aware of his power,
or his presence, his attributes.
God wants you and invites you todo just that.
(26:36):
A.W.
Tozer wrote this staggeringsentence or two in his work, The
Pursuit of God.
He says, I want deliberately toencourage this longing after
God.
Ask him to develop in you alonging to long for him.
Ask him to give you a desire todesire to get him.
(26:59):
Tozer writes, the lack of thislonging has brought us to a low
estate.
The stiff quality about ourreligious lives is a result of
our lack of holy desire.
Complacency is a deadly foe.
God, listen to this.
God waits to be wanted.
(27:22):
God waits to be wanted.
What amazing grace.
So he says, Come and find in merefuge.
Find in me strength.
Go over there and there's a potof strength waiting for you.
No, find it in me.
(27:44):
Come to me.
Come.
Let's reason together.
Let's sit down like closefriends and talk about this.
Even though your sins arestained scarlet, I can wash them
as white as snow.
Jesus is praying in John 7 tothe Father, and he's saying,
Father, I long for them to knowyou like I do.
(28:12):
What security there is inknowing that the one we want to
get to know is waiting for us towant to know him, and he, by the
way, knows us fully.
So in this strange paradox, theone we are going to pursue
together in our study alreadyholds us in his hand.
(28:37):
In that sermon preached in 1855,and with this I close, Spurgeon
concluded with these words.
He said this (28:44):
In contemplating Christ, there is a balm for
every wound.
In musing on the Father, thereis quiet for every grief.
In the influence of the HolySpirit, there is ointment for
every sore.
(29:04):
Would you lose your sorrow?
Would you drown your cares?
Then go, plunge yourself in theGodhead's deepest sea.
Be lost in his immensity, andyou shall come forth as from a
couch of rest, refreshed,invigorated.
(29:26):
For I know nothing which can socomfort the soul, so calm the
swelling billows of sorrow andgrief, so speak peace to the
winds of trial as a devotedconcentration on the subject of
(29:46):
God.
So we begin.
SPEAKER_00 (30:00):
Today's message is message one in an eight-part
series called Introducing God.
This message is called Waitingto Be Wanted.
Stephen Davey makes the completearchive of his teaching ministry
available free of charge on ourwebsite.
So if you joined us late, youcan go to wisdomonline.org and
(30:24):
hear this message in itsentirety.
As we close today, I want toinvite you to join Friends of
Wisdom, a free membershipdesigned to help you grow in
your faith and stay connectedwith our ministry.
Just visit wisdomonline.orgforward slash friends and sign
(30:45):
up today.
Then join us next time here onWisdom for the Heart.
Have you ever met anybody and you've thought that
person has no direction?
If we try to live in this worldwithout knowing about the God
whose world it is, and whohappens to run it, disregard the
study of God, and you tendyourself to stumble and blunder
(00:27):
through life blindfolded, as itwere, with no sense of direction
and no understanding of whatsurrounds you.
This is, he writes, the perfectway to waste your life.
SPEAKER_00 (00:52):
As Christians, it's our desire to know God and to
know him well.
Helping you do that is at thevery heart of our ministry.
But studying God comes with aninteresting paradox.
That's because the more we know,the more we realize that there's
so much more we don't know.
But that's okay.
(01:13):
God has revealed some thingsabout himself, and he wants us
to know those things.
And then we have eternity withhim to know him face to face.
This is wisdom for the heart.
Today, Stephen begins a seriesfrom Acts 17 called Introducing
God.
The message you're about to hearis called Waiting to Be Wanted.
SPEAKER_01 (01:39):
On January 7, 1855, a young pastor stood to preach
to his congregation inSouthwark, England, and he began
by saying, the highest science,the loftiest speculation, the
(01:59):
mightiest philosophy which canever engage the attention of a
child of God is the name, thenature, the person, the work,
the doings, and the existence ofGod.
It is a subject so vast that allour pride is drowned in its
(02:22):
infinity, and all our thoughtsare lost in its immensity.
So preached Charles Spurgeon inLondon 150 years ago when he was
remarkably barely 20 years old.
If you read his writings, one ofthe constant challenges that
would come from him to hisgeneration was related to the
(02:46):
nearly universal lack of adesire to know and study God.
Five years after Spurgeon died,another boy was born.
This young man would become apreacher as well this time in
America.
His name was Iden Wilson Tozer.
(03:07):
Now you know why he went afterA.W.
A.W.
Tozer became known for hispersistent warnings directed at
the church for her doctrinalweakness and her shallowness,
the knowledge of the holy, justa little hardback book.
I think it's about 80 pages.
(03:28):
He writes this openingstatement.
What comes into our minds whenwe think about God is the most
important thing about us.
To answer the question, what isGod like?
The answer to that question willpredict the spiritual future of
(03:49):
that person.
And it will predict the futureof the church based on their
answer.
Who is God?
And what is he like?
Listen, who we think God isdetermines how we walk with him,
why we obey him, how we talk tohim, what we expect of him.
It governs everything.
(04:11):
All of this in volumes more,really, is bound up in this
question (04:13):
who is God?
And as I studied and prayedabout this, this is really as
far as I got, and I knew we'd beout of time by the time we got
through with this.
So let me ask and answer threequestions.
Number one, what exactly is thestudy of God?
Now, the ten cent term for thatis theology.
You'd know that if you spent$250an hour going through seminary,
(04:36):
like some of us had to pay, tofind that out.
You're finding it out tonightfor free.
The Greek term thea, God, andlogia for reasoning or arguing
or explaining.
You put that together and youhave then theology is the
logical, reasonable discussionof God.
Who God is, what's he like?
(04:59):
What are his attributes, hisperson, his nature?
In a rather unusual positivestatement by Tozer, and there
aren't many, by the way.
He was rather caustic andprickly, but he was used by God
to challenge the church.
His work, the pursuit of God,these words, and that's the
second book, by the way, ThePursuit of God, a little longer.
(05:23):
These words.
In this hour of all butuniversal darkness, he wrote
this 60 years ago, one cheeringgleam appears.
Within the fold of conservativeChristianity, there is an
increasing number of peoplewhose lives are marked by a
growing hunger after GodHimself.
(05:44):
They are eager for spiritualrealities.
They are thirsty for God, andthey will not be satisfied until
they have drunk deep at thefountain of living water.
And I read that because thisstudy is really for those who
are thirsty for God.
Question number two (06:03):
what can I study to know God better?
Well, one resource is creation,the natural world, which is why
the psalmist is constantlyinviting us to look around, to
look up at the stars and thesun, moon, planets, the beauty
(06:25):
of the world and the stars inthe sky.
He writes in Psalm 8:1, O Lord,our Lord, how majestic is your
name in all the earth, who isdisplayed.
You have displayed, you haveexposed your splendor to the
world above the heavens.
In Psalm 19, he writes this (06:42):
the heavens are telling the glory of
God.
They're describing his glory,the work of his hands, declaring
that day to day pours speech,day after day pours forth
speech, and night after nightreveals knowledge.
I love the paraphrase of themessage by Eugene Peterson.
(07:04):
On that phrase, he says it thisway: Madam Day holds classes
every morning, and ProfessorKnight lectures each evening.
The older I get, the more Imarvel and enjoy the creative
handiwork of God.
I don't know if I was justmoving too fast in my 30s or
(07:26):
40s, but I'm I'm slowing down,except on Penny Road.
But at any rate, I'm just I'mjust enjoying it.
The other morning, it wasyesterday morning.
I'm standing, little breakfastroom, open shades, it's early,
and I got a cup of coffee, andI'm looking out, and uh my wife
has uh you know filled all thesebird feeders, and I'm standing
there, and there's thisbrilliant display of creativity,
(07:51):
and there are finches of anynumber of colors, and some
bluebirds, there's a cardinal,some morning doves, and I'm just
standing there watching andlooking at the splashes of color
and the creative design onfeathers and over eyes and all
of the different reds andpeaches and grays and blacks,
(08:12):
all the different hues, and asI'm watching, beyond them at
that very moment, out in apasture that belongs to somebody
else to mow, fortunately,galloped three horses.
I mean, you it just doesn't getany better than that.
And that was that was all free.
I had to buy the coffee beansand the bird seed, but you know
what I mean.
(08:32):
This was unbelievable, and Ijust stood there and worshiped
the Lord and his creativegenius.
Look around.
God has given us this naturalworld that points to him.
In fact, Romans 1 gives us theinteresting truth that even if
someone never hears the gospelof Jesus Christ, even without
(08:56):
hearing the gospel, they arestill guilty of rejecting God
and without excuse, Paul says,because they had nature.
And what did they do?
They suppressed the truth thatwas obvious, and they said it
must have just happened bychance.
(09:17):
Rather than all of the order andthe beauty and the creativity
must come from someone whoordered it, someone who is
creative.
And if they hadn't worked sohard to suppress the truth of
creativity and complexity andcolor, they would have been
able, Paul says, to put togetherthe fact that there is a creator
with some amazing, powerfulattributes.
(09:42):
And that's without thescriptures.
And speaking of, that's theother resource then for study.
Beyond creation, by far the mostsignificant is revelation.
Creation opens the door toobservation, revelation opens
the door to inspiration.
All scripture is given byinspiration.
(10:03):
2 Timothy 3.16.
Inspiration, theopnustus, thevery breath of God.
This is God's breath, so tospeak.
Well, what does God's wordbreathe about God?
Who is God and what is he like?
Ultimately, that drives you thento the scriptures where God
(10:27):
discloses the truth abouthimself that you would never
observe in nature.
And of course, with that, theredemptive truth of Christ.
But keep in mind, beloved, thatthe scriptures aren't
comprehensive.
There is much more about Godthan we have revealed in these
(10:48):
66 books.
So we effectively, at the outsetof our study of God, immediately
live with this tension.
We pursue to know Him, and atthe same time, we know that
we'll never know everythingabout Him because everything
about Him can't be revealed.
(11:08):
Part of the thrill of eternityis to have an infinite amount of
time to study the infinity ofGod as He teaches us.
But right now, we have trouble,we have problems, obviously.
You can't reduce down everythingabout God.
Our finite minds can't grasp it.
Anyway, infinity can't bereduced to a paragraph.
(11:31):
It can't be reduced to a set ofvolumes, even if they were as
large as that 30-set ofencyclopedias, the Encyclopedia
Britannica, which I bought as aseminary student.
And when my wife came home fromwork, I was studying and she
said, What have you done?
(11:53):
And I said, Well, it's only$39 amonth for 300 years, but never
mind that.
All of the knowledge, look,honey, I mean, it's all here.
I got it all.
Even that would only begin, it'dbe a drop in the bucket to
reveal the truth of God.
(12:14):
You remember what John theApostle said?
He said in that classic text inJohn 21, he said, look, if you
could fill up the entire worldwith books, you still wouldn't
have enough space to describewhat Jesus did and said in only
three and a half years.
You'd have to fill up the worldwith books to describe three and
(12:38):
a half years.
How in the world can youdescribe God then?
The only thing we can do, andwhat I trust we will do, is get
a little sip, a little taste,but I'm convinced that even the
littlest sip of sovereignty andhis glory and his grace, his
(13:03):
nature, his attributes willboggle our mind.
God hasn't told us everythingabout himself we'd like to know,
but he has revealed everythingwe need to know.
So that we can enter into arelationship with him and walk
with him and know how to talk tohim and know what he expects of
us and know how to serve him andworship him.
And let me add this (13:26):
anybody who thinks they know who God is and
their knowledge of God isdifferent from that which is
revealed in this book istragically deceived.
I have begun reading a recentlypublished biography of the
Wright brothers.
I read one a few years ago, andI'm captivated by these very
(13:46):
creative, very brilliant youngmen.
They invented things thatallowed them to invent the
airplane.
The biography contains, it'srather rather lengthy, it
contains letters, they wrote, itcontains pictures, it contains
descriptions, personalinterests, and a detailed
timeline of their creativeinvention.
After finishing that book, andI'll be finished, you know, in a
(14:09):
few weeks or so, but if I if Ifinish that book, can you
imagine me saying to someone,even with what little you know
about them, you know what, thoseguys, they were amazing,
absolutely amazing violinists.
And they hated flying machines.
You'd wonder what biography Iread.
(14:32):
If you do read their biography,you'll discover they do not play
the violin and they love talkingabout flying machines.
In fact, when they were littleboys watching the birds fly,
they they marveled at them.
They measured the distance athow quickly they flew from point
A to point B, and they measuredthe weight and the distance and
the speed, and their kidsfiguring all this out.
(14:55):
They couldn't play the violin.
It doesn't matter what we mightthink God is like.
The question is, what does hisword say he's like?
And this is the prayer of theApostle Paul for the early
believers in Colossae.
He writes this in Colossians 1,9 through 10.
We have not ceased to pray foryou and to ask that you may be
(15:17):
filled with the knowledge of hiswill, that you might be
increasing in the knowledge ofGod.
Hey, Paul, what are you prayingabout for this church here
today?
What would you pray?
What he prayed for thosebelievers in Colossians.
I'm praying that you willincrease in the knowledge of
God.
Who is God?
What is he like?
(15:39):
Do we really know?
I read this past year theannouncement of Chester Nez, who
had passed away.
It struck my attention.
I tucked it away.
Chester was the last livingmember of a team of Navajo
tribesmen who came to be calledthe Navajo Code Talkers.
(16:02):
Chester Nez was one of theoriginal 29 Navajo recruited by
the U.S.
military to create anunbreakable code used only by
the Allies that the enemy forcescould not figure out.
Navajo is a complex, unwrittenlanguage without an alphabet.
(16:27):
That'd be hard to break,wouldn't it?
Well, only a handful ofnon-Navajo people could even
speak it.
So these men were recruited tocome up with a code that
couldn't be broken by enemyintelligence.
And from 1942 to 1945, thesecode talkers, they were called,
participated in every singlemajor operation the U.S.
(16:51):
Marines conducted in the Pacificregion.
Philip Johnson, the son of amissionary to the Navajo, came
up with the idea to use thesemen to communicate in a way no
one else would understand.
And the code was never broken.
Listen, how in the world can aninfinite creator with a language
(17:16):
unlike ours and a nature sodifferent communicate with a
finite creature?
Well, God has effectivelyrevealed the code here.
The Bible is God's owncommunication with mankind about
who he is and what he's like.
(17:39):
It isn't comprehensive, but itis definitive.
It isn't exhaustive, but it isadequate to reveal enough of who
he is and what he is like sothat we can love him and walk
with him and talk with him andeven come to know him better.
Here's another question.
Number three.
What are the benefits ofstudying God?
(18:01):
Well, I know we'd all say, well,we're not supposed to ask
questions like that.
It's just beneficial.
Well, what are the benefits?
Well, let me give you five ofthem.
Let me give you five.
First, wisdom.
And I'll touch down intoProverbs chapter 9 and verse 10.
The fear of the Lord, Solomonwrites, is the beginning of
wisdom, and the knowledge of theHoly One is understanding.
(18:24):
So Solomon is effectivelytelling us that God will show us
how to live a wise life.
So we're told then thatknowledge, biblical knowledge,
isn't so much related to an IQ.
There are people who got A's ontheir report cards, but they
live life going from one failureto another.
(18:45):
It's not that they don't haveenough information, it isn't
that they don't have enougheducation.
It's just that they don't havewisdom.
Wisdom enables someone to applythe knowledge they have in
making the right decision inlife.
And you can't get that kind ofwisdom apart from knowing God.
(19:05):
So wisdom would be one.
Closely associated with thisidea is another benefit.
We'll call it in a worddirection.
Direction.
To put it another way, Godallows you to maintain this
sense of direction when you needit, as you pursue not so much
that direction, but you pursueHim.
(19:26):
The Apostle Peter writes it thisway in 2 Peter 1: Grace and
peace be multiplied to you inthe knowledge of God, seeing
that in his divine power, he'sgranted to us everything
pertaining to life and godlinessthrough the true knowledge of
Him who called us by His glory.
(19:46):
J.I.
Packer illustrated this idea byimagining how terrible and
unfair it would be to helicopterinto the Amazonian jungle, pick
up a tribesman who's never beenout of the jungle before, and
fly him to London, England, andset him down in the middle of
that city and then tell them,fend for yourself, try to do the
(20:09):
best you can.
Packer goes on to apply it.
We are cruel to ourselves if wetry to live in this world
without knowing about the Godwhose world it is, and who
happens to run it?
Disregard the study of God andyou sentence yourself to stumble
and blunder through lifeblindfolded, as it were, with no
(20:31):
sense of direction and nounderstanding of what surrounds
you.
This is, he writes, the perfectway to waste your life.
Have you ever met anybody andyou've thought that person has
no direction?
What's the solution?
A map?
No.
(20:52):
A course?
No.
The knowledge and the pursuit ofGod.
Another benefit.
It's fruitful living.
Paul wrote in Colossians 1, 9and 10 that he was constantly
praying for these believers thatthe church would be filled with
the knowledge of his will andall spiritual wisdom and
(21:14):
understanding, so that you maywalk in a manner worthy of the
Lord to please him in allrespects, bearing fruit in every
good work and increasing in theknowledge of God.
Those are coupled together,related together.
One of the evidences of gainingan understanding of God is
bearing fruit in good works.
(21:36):
And they can see that you havedirection and wisdom.
Secondly, fruit always reflectsthe character of the tree of
which it is a part.
So when you bear spiritualfruit, you are bearing witness
to the character and the natureof the Holy Spirit, God the
Spirit, who is transforming yourlife.
That comes from growing in theknowledge of God.
(22:00):
There's another byproduct,courage.
Those three Hebrew men respondedto Nebuchadnezzar's command.
You remember in Daniel'sbiography?
Refused to bow to the idol thatNebuchadnezzar had created, and
he said, Everybody now bows whenthe music starts.
And they said, nope, we're notgonna.
Daniel more than likely was outof town, he isn't even entering
(22:20):
into the picture.
Their lives are now literally atstake.
They stopped the music, assumedthey hadn't gotten the message
right, and the king was going togive them another chance, and
bow down or be thrown into thefiery furnace.
You ever thought about the factthat they responded out of their
knowledge of the attributes ofGod?
(22:40):
Daniel 3, 16 says, finds themresponding to the king, oh
Nebuchadnezzar, our God, whom weserve, is able to deliver us
from the furnace of blazingfire.
Now wait a second.
They had never seen God deliveranybody from the fiery furnace.
They were about to be the firstones thrown in.
(23:03):
They had never been threatenedto die by means of fire.
They had never personallyexperienced God delivering them
from a fire.
Here they are saying, God can dothis.
They applied what they knewabout God's sovereign power to
their particular situation.
(23:24):
They knew that God was morepowerful than this king and that
fire.
But they also understoodsomething more about the
attributes of God.
Because they went on to say, intheir saying, understood
evidently his divine prerogativeand his divine right and his
sovereign rule and his abilityto decide what he wants to do
without ever giving them anexplanation.
(23:44):
And so they add to that and theysay, but if he doesn't, we're
still going to follow himbecause he's a true and living
God and he has a right to dowhatever he wants to do, and
you're still following an idol.
It came out of theirunderstanding of the attributes
of God.
Courage and making the rightdecision.
(24:06):
So you see, the question is not,do we really need to know God
better?
The question is how can weafford not to grow in
understanding Him better?
One more.
The list could, of course, go onmuch longer, but one more
byproduct from the study of Godis a sense of security.
David writes in Psalm 46 (24:28):
God is our refuge and our strength, a
very present help in trouble.
Therefore, we will not fear,though the earth should change,
and though the mountains slipinto the heart of the sea,
though its waters roar and foam,though the mountains quake, he's
(24:48):
describing the worst possiblecosmic disturbances you can
imagine.
And then later in that psalm, bestill and know that I am God.
You ever thought about thatwonderful invitation?
Stop, stop, and come to knowthat I am God.
(25:11):
Taste and see that the Lord isgood.
That's an invitation.
Psalm 43, verse 8.
God invites us to get to knowHim.
He's the one that says, taste.
Stop, study me.
Now maybe, maybe you'reconvinced that you'd like to
(25:33):
know God better, but you're nottoo sure He wants the same and
you're not really sure how Hefeels about it.
I mean, who are we after all?
Imagine walking up to, if youcould get past the gate, and I
wouldn't recommend you trywithout an invitation, but
imagine you walk up to the WhiteHouse and you knock on the door,
and they answer the door and yousay to them, you know what, I'm
(25:54):
here because I'd like to get toknow the president.
Well, the question isn't, do youwant to get to know the
president?
The question is, does thepresident of the United States
want to get to know you?
And you'd better hope the answeris yes at that moment.
The question is, does God wantto get to know us?
(26:16):
And does God want us to get toknow him?
Well, here's the stunning truthof this study before us.
It isn't just that you mightwant to get to know God better,
or become a better friend ofGod, or more aware of his power,
or his presence, his attributes.
God wants you and invites you todo just that.
(26:36):
A.W.
Tozer wrote this staggeringsentence or two in his work, The
Pursuit of God.
He says, I want deliberately toencourage this longing after
God.
Ask him to develop in you alonging to long for him.
Ask him to give you a desire todesire to get him.
(26:59):
Tozer writes, the lack of thislonging has brought us to a low
estate.
The stiff quality about ourreligious lives is a result of
our lack of holy desire.
Complacency is a deadly foe.
God, listen to this.
God waits to be wanted.
(27:22):
God waits to be wanted.
What amazing grace.
So he says, Come and find in merefuge.
Find in me strength.
Go over there and there's a potof strength waiting for you.
No, find it in me.
(27:44):
Come to me.
Come.
Let's reason together.
Let's sit down like closefriends and talk about this.
Even though your sins arestained scarlet, I can wash them
as white as snow.
Jesus is praying in John 7 tothe Father, and he's saying,
Father, I long for them to knowyou like I do.
(28:12):
What security there is inknowing that the one we want to
get to know is waiting for us towant to know him, and he, by the
way, knows us fully.
So in this strange paradox, theone we are going to pursue
together in our study alreadyholds us in his hand.
(28:37):
In that sermon preached in 1855,and with this I close, Spurgeon
concluded with these words.
He said this (28:44):
In contemplating Christ, there is a balm for
every wound.
In musing on the Father, thereis quiet for every grief.
In the influence of the HolySpirit, there is ointment for
every sore.
(29:04):
Would you lose your sorrow?
Would you drown your cares?
Then go, plunge yourself in theGodhead's deepest sea.
Be lost in his immensity, andyou shall come forth as from a
couch of rest, refreshed,invigorated.
(29:26):
For I know nothing which can socomfort the soul, so calm the
swelling billows of sorrow andgrief, so speak peace to the
winds of trial as a devotedconcentration on the subject of
(29:46):
God.
So we begin.
SPEAKER_00 (30:00):
Today's message is message one in an eight-part
series called Introducing God.
This message is called Waitingto Be Wanted.
Stephen Davey makes the completearchive of his teaching ministry
available free of charge on ourwebsite.
So if you joined us late, youcan go to wisdomonline.org and
(30:24):
hear this message in itsentirety.
As we close today, I want toinvite you to join Friends of
Wisdom, a free membershipdesigned to help you grow in
your faith and stay connectedwith our ministry.
Just visit wisdomonline.orgforward slash friends and sign
(30:45):
up today.
Then join us next time here onWisdom for the Heart.
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