This post is based on the book The Pursuit of God by A. W. Tozer.

So, “The Blessedness of Possessing Nothing.” I first thought, “This shouldn’t be that bad.” Christopher and I live pretty simply. We drive older cars. We took Financial Peace University, so I feel like we are good stewards. This should be pretty cut and dry. Um… in a word, “Nope.”

Tozer starts the chapter by saying that in Genesis, God created things, which were made for man’s use, and they were meant to be external from the man under his rule. God was at the center of the human heart, not the things created by Him. Yet, a time came when humanity forced God out of the center place in its heart and things took over.

Proof of that take over are the words “my” and “mine.” Things have become necessary to us and we live as if we cannot live without them. In order to battle the “my” mentality, we must be willing to lose our lives, to take up our cross, and follow Jesus. We must be willing to expel every external thing in our lives in order to make room for God.

Do you remember when you were little, and you were with your family at a friend’s house. Perhaps that family didn’t have quite enough chairs at the table, so you split a chair with your friend. We used to call that, “Hanging a cheek,” for obvious reason. Well, not to be irreverent, but God doesn’t get to sit on half of a thrown. He doesn’t share well. He is not going to let our things, or our work, or our friends, or even our family split a seat with Him.

This is where the chapter got harder for me. Tozer addresses the story of Abraham and Isaac. He talks about Abraham’s fierce love for his son, and how God challenged Abraham to offer Isaac as a burnt offering. Tozer talks about Abraham’s extreme agony with the thought of sacrificing his only son, who carried of all of God’s promises for him. It was through Isaac that Abraham was going to be a great nation, and through Isaac that the Messiah would come. Now God was asking him to give up his most beloved son. Because Abraham decided to obey God and take his son to the mountain to offer him up, God renewed his promise to Abraham and promised him many more blessings. Tozer states that Abraham was finally a wholly surrendered man.

In the margin of my book I wrote, “It makes me afraid to hold people dear to me.” Although this discouraged me a lot, I didn’t stop reading there. Here was the next quote that I read.

“God could have begun out on the margin of Abraham’s life and worked inward to the center; He chose rather to cut quickly to the heart and have it over in one sharp act of separation. In dealing thus He practiced an economy of means and time. It hurt cruelly, but it was effective.” – page 34

Abraham had a “mine” problem. He held things dear, and he was getting old. Whatever God had to do, it needed to be effective and it needed to be fast in order for God to regain a strong hold over Abraham’s life. God recognized that although Abraham held many things dear, the being on the throne of Abram’s heart was Isaac. So God challenged Abraham to remove the greatest issue, and in doing so, he rid Abraham of all of his other “mine” issues.

Here is the big truth that brings the Love of God back into the equation for me. Because I know without question that I would lay my life down to bring others into Heaven, but if you were to ask me to give up Christopher or Vivienne so that others could be saved, I don’t know if I could do it. Yet, for that feeling, God has a promise.

Tozer says:

“Everything is safe which we commit to Him, and nothing is really safe which is not so committed.” – page 35

Why are we reluctant to give to God what doesn’t belong to us? I need to be honest before God and confess that sometimes I want to take His job of loving and protecting my family because they are MINE. Instead I need to recognize that I am just holding the hands of those that I hold dear. I do not hold them in my hand or in my heart as the possessor and protector. That is God’s job. If I am holding the hands of my loved ones, then the throne in my heart is reserved for Jesus my King.

Categories: Jennifer Chlumsky The Pursuit of God

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