This post is based off of the book “The Knowledge of the Holy” by A.W. Tozer.

“The moral shock suffered by us through our mighty break with the high will of heaven has left us all with a permanent trauma affecting every part of our nature. There is disease both in ourselves and in our environment.” – Page 103

We were created, and we broke ourselves. This break that Adam and Eve made has affected us greatly. The unique thing about this “trauma” is that most of humanity doesn’t notice it. Think about that. How many of us go through a significant trauma that effects every part of our nature, and don’t really notice it. It is like Paul talked about last week in the chapter on Love. Just like we have taken the strength of God’s Love for granted, we have grown accustomed to the unholiness around us.

Tozer does explain this “insensitivity” to unholiness. Tozer states that we all live accepting that it is a necessary evil that we interact with liars, cheats, sex offenders, crooked politicians, and other unholy situations around us. I would go further to say that we do not just accept these as necessary evils. We are fascinated by them. I am going to confess to watching the show “Scandal.” I watched the first season not really enjoying it. I had been advised by a friend that it was a really good show. She was right, the acting was good, so I continued to watch and get more and more connected with the characters. As I connected with them I learned of their multiple affairs both heterosexual and homosexual, one abusive spouse, two sadists, multiple murders, a mass murder of civilians, a case of incestual rape, and many other interesting plot lines.

Holiness… I have to actually read a chapter on Holiness to be prompted to recognize that watching Scandal might not be a promotion of holiness in my life. This is the insensitivity of which Tozer speaks.

Tozer states that it is impossible for us to comprehend or even start to recognize the true holiness of God, because we have nothing to compare it to. Nothing in the world is holy enough for us to say, “Ok, it is like a really, really perfect version of _______.” That is because everything we have ever seen or experienced has been affected by sin.

So how do we have hope of trying to start to understand the Holiness of God? Tozer says it is through Theological Knowledge. The Holy Spirit flows into the human heart through the Theological Knowledge of truth that the brain learns.

Think about it this way: All of humanity can feel something tremendously mysterious about the universe and its contents. We all feel that there is something greater than man, and what he has made. We have a real need to be in awe of something great and mysterious. That is why humans have sought gods and religion since the beginning of their existence. The difference between unguided people and Christians is Theological Knowledge. It is the self-disclosure of God through the scriptures. God has chosen to reveal Himself to us so that we are better able to worship Him. We know of God’s attributes through scripture, and this allows us to have faith that is free to both worship God as Father, and to tremble at His mysterious omnipotent might. Through this knowledge of Him, we are called to holiness.

Here is my next significant quote: “God spoke, saying, “Be he holy; for I am holy.” He did not say “Be ye holy; as I am holy,” for that would be to demand of us absolute holiness, something that belongs to God alone. “ – Page 106

God knows that we cannot achieve perfect holiness, nor are we designed to be perfectly holy. Instead we must “take refuge from God in God. Above all we must believe that God sees us perfect in His Son while he disciplines and chastens and purges us that we may be partakers of His Holiness.” – page 107

We do this by: “constant meditation on the holiness of God, by loving righteousness and hating iniquity, by a growing acquaintance with the Spirit of holiness, we can acclimate ourselves to the fellowship of the saints on earth and prepare ourselves for the eternal companionship of God and the saints above. Thus, as they say when humble believers meet, we will have a heaven to go to heaven in.” – page 107

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