God and Reason (11)
For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height— to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Ephesians 3.14-19
Reason and beyond
God has given human beings the gift of reason so that, in everything we may come to know, we may know Him, and knowing Him, find the fullness of life and joy for which we have been created.
As we saw in Romans 1, people do in fact know God, reasoning from the things He has made that He exists and is divine and sovereign. We must insist: Everybody knows this. However, the law of sin, operating in the soul of every human being, leads many people to suppress what reason tells us. They erect new foundations for their thinking, foundations built on self, and on that flimsy foundation, reason wrongly about God, the world, and themselves. Only as God grants the gift of His Spirit unto salvation in Jesus Christ can right reason be restored, and people, now saved, can begin to use reason as God intends for knowing and loving Him.
At the same time, the knowledge and love of God, in which we seek to increase (2 Pet. 3.18), goes beyond anything we can know by reason alone. There are things about knowing the Lord, living in Him, obeying and serving Him, that we cannot fully understand by reason, or that we may not be able to explain logically or satisfactorily to others.
Knowing the Lord requires that we use the gift of reason as fully as possible. But it also requires that we not be limited by reason as we seek to increase in love for the Lord.
The Spirit and reason
The convicting, teaching, filling, prompting, leading, fruit-bearing, gift-bestowing, power-enabling Spirit of God works with but not exclusively by the powers of reason. As the Spirit brings us into the Presence of God and His glory, we experience and know things that we cannot explain, and we grow to love God in ways more agreeable to feeling than thinking (2 Cor. 3.12-18; Rom.11.33-36). In the Presence of God and His glory we encounter mysteries which we know, and know truly, but which we can neither fully fathom nor explain. These experiences of God and His glory excite and overwhelm us. We do not plan these encounters, and we may not always be prepared as they break in upon us.
But we can encounter God in His glory, both in our times of focused seeking and devotion as well as in the normal activities of everyday life. And when we do, we know that we have seen the Lord.
At such times, whether through the medium of God’s Word or creation, things happen within us which are real, and even transformational, yet we cannot fully understand what has happened or how; nor can we make these experiences completely comprehensible to others. They are the work of God’s Spirit, and they are mysteries beyond our ability fully to comprehend. As C. S. Lewis puts it, such experiences are “only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited” (Weight of Glory). We can only say that God, by His Spirit, has made Himself known to us beyond what we may know by reason, yet not entirely without the aid of reason.
So, since the true knowledge of God lies beyond reason, should believers still seek to know the Lord by the skillful use of reason? Certainly we should. But we should also learn to know the Lord apart from mere reason—with the heart, in the Presence of God’s glory, in faithful submission to the indwelling Presence of Christ.
Knowing God beyond reason
Daniel H. Whittle captured well the essence of this “knowing beyond mere reason” in his 1883 hymn, “I Know Whom I Have Believed”:
I know not why God’s wondrous grace
To me He has made known,
Or why, unworthy, Christ in love
Redeemed me for His own.
But I know Whom I have believed,
And am persuaded that He is able
To keep that which I’ve committed
Unto Him against that Day.
Whittle goes on to declare that he cannot explain how the gift of saving faith came to be his, or how it brings such peace to his heart; how the Spirit works to convict men of sin and reveal Jesus to them; what his life will be like in the days to come; or when the Lord will come again to lead him home. The best reasoning of all human minds together would not be able to sort out such mysteries.
The most determined reasoning cannot make one who has come to know these mysteries deny that they are true. The result is that the things of the Lord which we come to know beyond reason serve to extend the guidelines for reason as we continue to seek the Lord further each day.
By all means, let us use our reason to know the Lord, and to increase in love for Him. Let us reason actively with others, that they might begin to think differently about their own cherished perspectives and beliefs. And let us plead with God for His Spirit, so that He might teach us the love of God which surpasses knowledge, and bring us into greater mysteries of the knowledge and love of God, than we by reason alone, could ever hope to attain.
For reflection
1. Reason can lead us to the knowledge of God, but the knowledge of God goes beyond what reason can grasp. Explain.
2. What does it mean to know God?
3. How does the knowledge of God shape the use we make of reason?
Next steps—Preparation: What are some things you “know” about God and your relationship with Him which you have not come to by reason, and which you cannot fully explain by reason? Talk with the Lord about these mysteries, and wait on Him to confirm your beliefs all over again.
T. M. Moore
If you have found this meditation helpful, take a moment to give thanks to God. Then share what you learned with a friend. This is how the grace of God spreads (2 Cor. 4.15).
Two books can be helpful in applying reason to the times in which we live. You can download a free PDF of both Understanding the Times and Winds of Doctrine by clicking those links.
This week: Our Read Moore podcast continues readings from our book, The Joy and Rejoicing of My Heart. In our Crosfigellteaching letter, we are studying examples of the spiritual poetry of the Celtic Revival. And in our daily Scriptorium column we are working our way through the Gospel of Matthew. Click here to see all the other columns and writers available to you.
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