You Really Don't Know Until You Know

“I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee.” (Job 42:5 AV)

A theologian does not an enlightened saint make.  There is a vast difference between knowing of God and knowing God.  Job, by the rebuke of God, learned the latter.  Job had a lot of theology.  He knew much of God, who God is, and what God does.  What Job was missing was an intimate knowledge of the person of God.  As we spoke of yesterday, the LORD gave Job a thorough dress down.  On the face of it, to us it may seem cruel.  The poor man just buried his sons.  All of them.  He was reduced to poverty by the nomads who resided in that area.  A disease that brought boils on his flesh inflicted him.  He sat by the fleshpots scraping this disease into the vessels.  His wife cursed him and encouraged him to reject God and die.  To add insult to injury, his three friends came to comfort him, but in reality, tormented him.  If anyone deserved pity, it was Job.  Pity was not what he got from God.  At least initially he didn’t.  God soundly rebuked him for expressing how he felt in ways that did not glorify God.  So, the LORD gave him a vivid rebuke.  The lesson Job had to learn was that God was sovereign, and He owes no one an explanation.  Regardless of how horrible our life might be, God does not owe us anything.  It was this eye-opening revelation that resulted in Job seeing God clearly.

Not that you can separate them, but if someone gave me the choice to know of God, or know God, I would take the second.  I have very thick theology volumes in my library.  Some are great cures for insomnia.  Most, however, will stretch the imagination beyond what we thought was possible.  Learning about God is far more fulfilling than anything the world can produce.  Science fiction captivated my generation.  We were the ones who broke the space barrier.  We were the generation that saw man first step foot on the moon.  TV programs like Star Trek, Battle Star Galactica, Lost in Space, etc were the most commonly watched genre of my generation.  Imagining the unimaginable became possible.  The writers became more and more creative.  Movies like 2001:Space Odyssey, Planet of the Apes, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, etc.  We dreamed big dreams.  We saw the fantastic.  We learned more and imagined more than previous generations combined.  Scientific norms were tested against new information from space exploration.  My generation produced a significant amount of new technologies.  It could be said the period following WWII to about 1980 produced more technology than most generations previously.  Or since then.  We were extremely stretched in our knowledge and imagination.  Information, however, may not translate to practical knowledge.  I may have seen movies or programs regarding space, but I have never been there.

Job learned the reality of God when God spoke.  Job learned who and what God was when God revealed Himself as a person.  Job may have aced all his theology exams.  He may have been the professor everyone else went to.  He was the smartest one in town.  Job could have instructed his three friends.  They didn’t know what they were talking about.  As Job stated, “The answer lieth with me”.  Job was not uninformed.  He was not a novice.  He was the most qualified of any as to who and what God was.  But what Job was missing was an intimate exchange with God to a depth he needed.  Job knew of God.  Perhaps he even knew God to some extent.  But he didn’t truly know God as deeply as he possibly could.  The same can be true of anyone.  We will never truly know Him.  He is infinite in scope and being.  A finite person can never truly know the extent of who and what God is.  He reveals Himself over time and circumstance.  We may learn of the same attribute of God more than once in ways we have never seen Him before.  That is the wonder of who He is.  For someone to assume he or she can really know God is the same mistake Job made.  He was called out to it.  He was dressed down because when he thought he knew and understood God, he realized he never will.  And that is truly the wonder of walking with God.