I Found God: The God Who Wants To Know You

Formerly, when you did not know God, you were slaves to those who by nature are not gods. But now that you know God—or rather are known by God—how is it that you are turning back to those weak and miserable forces. Galatians 4: 8-9 NIV

The craze of celebrity is a huge part of our society. Magazine covers are plastered with photos of famous people. The Internet is full of rumours about the latest developments in the lives of people we have never met and probably will never meet. 

One of my favourite movies is Notting Hill. The storyline is of a very ordinary man, William Thacker, who by coincidence meets a movie star, Anna Scott, and they fall in love. The beauty of the story is that somehow both lives are enriched, made more meaningful by the relationship. Even though Anna Scott seems to have everything- her life is empty without William Thacker. 

Deep within the spiritual DNA of every person is the need for relationship. To be seen, to be known and to be loved. For most of us, though, our relationships with famous people are very one way. We can know about them through the media and gossip magazines, but they will almost certainly never come to know us.

Antony Flew (1923-2010) was one of the most influential atheists of the Twentieth Century. He argued that one should pre-suppose atheism unless empirical evidence was found for God. True to his argument, as science began to discover the extreme unlikelihood of our existence by chance, through evidence such as the formation of the universes and genetic code, he changed his view of God. In 2004, Thew announced his change of position to deism. The atheistic world we’re in shock. 

For Flew, the for the existence of a deity was overwhelming. But to the best of our knowledge, he remained unconvinced of a God who wanted to know mankind, until he died in 2010. 

Flew joined some very famous people who deists, they believed in the existence of God, but not a God who wanted to know us personally. 

One of the main objections deists (those who believe God exists, but he doesn’t involve himself in our lives) have to theism (belief in a God who does make himself known) is the suffering that is evident in the world. 

On one hand, they argue, God is not evil in nature because there is so much beauty in the universe. On the other hand, there is real pain and sorrow, so God must just ‘stays out of it’. But this ignores big issues, such as mankind’s free will and the existence of evil that has been caused by rebelling against God. 

The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness. Jeremiah 31:3 NIV

To truly love, one must be free not to love. God made us free to choose to love Him- or choose not to love Him. Evil exists not by the direct will of God, but as a necessary consequence of rejecting God’s love. To love, you must be prepared to be hurt. 

God made himself known to Israel as a personal God, with a desire for a close relationship. From the beginning, God sought a relationship with mankind. In Genesis, even after Adam and Eve had sinned, God wanted a relationship with them. He came looking for them, in the garden. Apparently, he desired to fellowship with them.

God decided to make a covenant with mankind through Abraham, who was called- a friend of God, that would bind God to be a faithful friend to Abraham and all his descendants. 

Any idea of a remote, isolated God was destroyed in the coming of Jesus. Not only did God come in the flesh to live with us, but He also came to the least of us. The Bible says, He ‘pitched his tent’ amongst us. John 1, saying that God, took on human form and ‘dwelt’ among us- is saying, he decided to make camp with us. To live beside us and with us. To share our lives. 

“I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. John 17:20-23 ESV

The God who can be known also wants to know us. He wants to do life with us. However, there are degrees of how well we know people. Humans beings are great at projecting onto others, what we believe them to be based on our hopes and fears. Very often the person we thought we knew, is not that person at all.

Marie Antoinette, the last Queen of France was attributed with saying of the peasants, ‘Let them eat cake, "Qu'ils mangent de la brioche”, during a famine. The expression has become iconic of the disconnect that people of privilege have with people of ‘lessor means’. Marie Antoinette thought she knew and understood the peasants. When she heard their complaints of not having enough bread, she thought they complained because they couldn’t have their favourite cheese and herb bread with their subs. No, they were starving, bread was nowhere to be found, let alone cake!

But our sovereign God doesn’t want to know us from a distance. He wants to know how we feel. He has genuine empathy for us. Jesus was only on earth for a short time. But in that time, he experiences the joys and sorrows of life.

We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Hebrews 4:15-17

The second great truth in our ‘I Found God’ series, is that we have a God who wants to know us. Us knowing God and God knowing us, the beginning of a relationship.