Excerpts from The Knowledge Of The Holy

The Attributes of God: Their Meaning in the Christian Life
A.W. Tozer

True religion confronts earth with heaven and brings eternity to bear upon time. The messenger of Christ must speak to the condition of his hearers. The church has historically experienced a loss of the concept of majesty of God. The low view of God is the cause of a hundred lesser evils everywhere among us. With our loss of the sense of majesty we loose our spirit of worship and our ability to withdraw inwardly to meet God in adoring silence. The loss also robs modern Christianity from producing the kind of Christian who can appreciate or experience the life in the Spirit.

The words "Be still, and know that I am God" mean next to nothing to the self-confident, bustling worshiper. The decline of the knowledge of the holy has brought on our troubles. A rediscovery of the majesty of God will go a long way toward curing them. If we would bring back spiritual power to our lives, we must begin to think of God more nearly as He is.

Why We Must Think Rightly About God

The gravest question before the Church is always God Himself, and the most momentous fact about any man is not what he at a given time may say or do, but what he in his deep heart conceives God to be like. Without doubt, the mightiest thought the mind can entertain is the thought of God, and the weightiest word in any language is its word for God. That our idea of God correspond as nearly as possible to the true being of God is of immense importance to us. Our real idea of God may lie buried and may require an intelligent an vigorous search before it is finally unearthed and exposed for what it is. Only after an ordeal of painful self-probing are we likely to discover what we actually believe about God.

A right conception of God is to worship what the foundation is to the temple; where it is inadequate or out of plumb the whole structure must sooner or later collapse. All the problems of heaven and earth, though they were to confront us together and at once, would be nothing compared with the overwhelming problem of God.

That He is; what He is like; and what we as moral beings must do about Him. When a man comes to a right belief about God he has a burden of an obligation to God. It includes an instant and lifelong duty to love God with every power of mind and soul, to obey Him perfectly, and to worship Him acceptably. Unless the weight of the burden is felt the gospel can mean nothing to the man. The essence of idolatry is the entertainment of thoughts about God that are unworthy of Him. "When they knew God," wrote Paul, "they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened." Then followed the worship of idols fashioned after the likeness of men and birds and bests and creeping things. This series of degrading acts began in the mind.

Wrong ideas about God are not only the fountain from which polluted waters of idolatry flow, they are themselves idolatrous. The first step down for any church is taken when it surrenders its high opinion of God.

The heaviest obligation lying upon the Christian Church today is to purify and elevate her concept of God until it is once more worthy of Him - and of her. In all her prayers and labors this should have first place. God Incomprehensible What is God like? God is not like anything. That is, He is not exactly like anything or anybody. The effort of inspired men to express the ineffable has placed a great strain upon both thought and language in the Holy Scriptures. These being often a revelation of a world above nature, and the minds for which they were written being a part of nature, the writers are compelled to use a great many "like" words to make themselves understood. When the Spirit would acquaint us with something that lies beyond the field of our knowledge, He tells us that this thing is like something we already know. But to think of creature and Creator as alike in essential being is to rob God of most of His attributes and reduce Him to the status of a creature. It is to rob Him of His infinitude. Whatever we visualize God to be, He is not, for we have constructed our image out of that which He has made and what He has made is not God.

If what we conceive God to be He is not, how then shall we think of Him? If He is indeed incomprehensible, as the Creed declares Him to be, and unapproachable, as Paul says He is, how can we Christians satisfy our longing after Him? The Gospel according to John reveals the helplessness of the human mind before the great Mystery which is God, and Paul in First Corinthians teaches that God can be known only as the Holy Spirit performs in the seeking heart an act of self-disclosure. The yearning to know What cannot be known, to comprehend the Incomprehensible, to touch and taste the Unapproachable, arises from the image of God in the nature of man. Deep calleth unto deep. How can this be realized? Through Jesus Christ our Lord. In Christ and by Christ, God effects complete self-disclosure. He shows Himself not to reason but to faith and love. Faith is an organ of knowledge and love an organ of experience. God came to us in the incarnation; in atonement He reconciled us to Himself, and by faith and love we enter and lay hold on Him. God is of infinite greatness. Whenever the heart begins to burn with a desire for God, she is made able to receive the uncreated light and inspired and fulfilled by the gifts of the Holy Ghost, she tastes the joys of heaven. She transcends all visible things and is raised to the sweetness of eternal life. Herein truly is perfect love; when all the intent of the mind, all the secret working of the heart, is lifted up into the love of God. That God can be known by the soul in tender personal experience while remaining infinitely aloof from the curious eyes of reason constitutes a paradox best described as: darkness to the intellect but sunshine to the heart.

In approaching God, the seeker discovers that the divine Being dwells in obscurity, hidden behind a cloud of unknowing. This cloud is between the seeker and God so that he may never see God clearly by the light of understanding nor feel Him in the emotions. But by the mercy of God faith can break through into His Presence if the seeker but believe the Word and press on. God will take the soul by the hand and lead her through the way of pure faith, causing the understanding to leave behind all considerations and reasonings He draws her forward. Thus He causes her by means of a simple and obscure knowledge of faith to aspire only to her Bridegroom upon the wings of love.

A Divine Attribute: Something True About God. For the purpose of this study an attribute of God is whatever God has in any way revealed as being true of Himself. In examining these we might be wise to follow the insight of the enraptured heart rather than the more cautious reasonings of the theological mind. If an attribute is something true of God, it is also something that we can conceive as being true of Him. God, being infinite, must possess attributes about which we can know nothing. An attribute as we can know it, is a mental concept, an intellectual response to God's self-revelation. It is an answer to a question, the reply God makes to our interrogation concerning Himself. What is God like? What kind of God is He? How may we expect Him to act toward us and toward all created things? Such questions touch the far-in reaches of the human spirit, and their answers affect life and character and destiny. When asked in reverence and their answers sought in humility, these are questions that cannot but be pleasing to our Father which art in heaven. The idea that God reveals Himself in the creation is set for in the inspired Word. It is a sacred and indispensable part of the Christian message that the full sun-blaze of revelation came at the incarnation when the Eternal Word became flesh to dwell among us. Though God in this threefold revelation has provided answers to our questions concerning Him, the answers by no means lie on the surface. They must be sought by prayer, by long meditation on the written Word and by earnest and well disciplined labor. It can be seen only by those who are spiritualy prepared to receive it.

"Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." We must break ourselves of the habit of thinking of the creator as we think of His creatures. As nothing is more easy than to think, so nothing is more difficult than to think well. If we ever think well it should be when we think of God. Man is both created and made. Man possesses a body, a soul, and a spirit. He has memory, reason, will, intelligence, sensation. To give these meaning he has the wondrous gift of consciousness. These together with various qualities of temperament, compose his total human self. The Father is made of none, neither created nor begotten. The son is of the Father alone, begotten. The Holy Spirit is of the Father and the Son, not made nor created, nor begotten, but proceeding. God exists in Himself and of Himself. His being He owes to no one. His substance is indivisible. He has no parts, but is single in His unitary being. There is but one God. God is simple, uncomplex, one with Himself. The harmony of His being is the result of the absence of parts. No contradiction can exist. All His attributes are one. All of God does all that God does and works in the total unity of His being. An attribute, then is how God is, what God is (as far as the reasoning mind can go), though exactly what He is He cannot tell us. Of what God is conscious when He is conscious of self, only He knows.

The divine attributes are what we know to be true of God. They are how God is as He reveals Himself to His creatures. His love is the way God is and when He loves He is simply being Himself. And so with the other attributes. Let us be encouraged to begin the practice of reverent meditation on the being of God.

The most extraordinary fact about any man is not what he at a given time may say or do, but what he in his deep heart conceives God to be like. God Incomprehensible Whatever we visualize God to be, He is not, for we have constructed our image out of that which He has made and what He has made is not God. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, God effects complete self-disclosure. He shows Himself not to reason, but to faith and love. Darkness to the intellect but sunshine to the heart. (Frederick W. Faber) God will take the soul by the hand and lead her through the way of pure faith. Lord, how great is our dilemma! In Thy Presence silence best becomes us, but love inflames our hearts and constrains us to speak. Were we to hold our peace the stones would cry out; yet if we speak, what shall we say? Teach us to know that we cannot know, for the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Let faith support us where reason fails, and we shall think because we believe, not in order that we may believe. In Jesus' name. Amen. While the name of God is secret and His essential nature incomprehensible, He in condescending love has by revelation declared certain things to be true of Himself. These we call His attributes.

God is:

1. Self Existent

God has no origin and it is precisely this concept of no-origin which distinguishes that which is God from whatever is not God. When we try to focus our thought upon One who is pure uncreated being we may see nothing at all, for He dwelleth in light that no man can approach unto. Only by faith and love are we able to glimpse Him as He passes by our shelter in the cleft of the rock. The Self Existence of GodLord of all being! Thou alone canst affirm I AM THAT I AM; yet we who are made in Thine image may each one repeat "I am," so confessing that we derive from Thee and that our words are but an echo of Thine own. We acknowledge Thee to be the great Original of which we through Thy goodness are grateful if imperfect copies. We worship Thee, O Father Everlasting. Amen.

2. Self Sufficient

All life is a gift from God. The life of God, conversely, is not a gift from another. God is the One who contains all, who gives all that is given, but who Himself can receive nothing that He has not first given.Again we must reverse the familiar flow of our thoughts and try to understand that which is unique, that which stands alone as being true in this situation and nowhere else. To God alone nothing is necessary. The Self-Sufficiency of GodTeach us, O God, that nothing is necessary to Thee. Were anything necessary to Thee that thing would be the measure of Thine imperfection: and how could we worship one who is imperfect? If nothing is necessary to Thee, then no one is necessary, and if no one, then not we. Thou dost seek us though Thou does not need us. We seek Thee because we need Thee, for in Thee we live and move and have our being. Amen.

3. Eternal

Time marks the beginning of created existence and because God never began to exist it can have no application to Him. God lives in an everlasting now. He has no past and no future. God dwells in eternity but time dwells in God. Imagine a sheet of paper infinitely extended. That would be eternity. Then on that paper draw a short line to represent time. As the line begins and ends on that infinite expanse, so time began in God and will end in Him. This is why God can say "I am God…and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning." He sees the end and the beginning in one view. The Eternity of GodThis day our hearts approve with gladness what our reason can never fully comprehend, even Thine eternity, O Ancient of Days. Art Thou not from everlasting, O Lord, my God, mine Holy One? We worship Thee, the Father Everlasting, whose years shall have no end; and Thee, the love-begotten Son whose goings forth have been ever of old; we also acknowledge and adore Thee, Eternal Spirit, who before the foundation of the world didst live and love in coequal glory with the Father and the Son. Enlarge and purify the mansions of our souls that they may be fit habitations for Thy Spirit, who dost prefer before all temples the upright heart and pure. Amen.

4. Infinite

Of all that can be thought or said about God, His infinitude is the most difficult to grasp. Infinitude means limitlessness and it is obviously impossible for a limited mind to grasp the Unlimited. For God is greater than mind itself. His greatness cannot be conceived. Our loftiest utterances will be trivialities in comparison with Him. When we say God is infinite we mean that He knows no bounds. Whatever God is and all that God is, He is without limit. He is measureless. How completely satisfying to turn from our limitations to a God who has none. His mercy is infinite too and His love is measureless and boundless and because He is infinite that love can enfold the whole created world in itself and have room for ten thousand times ten thousand worlds beside. God's InfinitudeOur Heavenly Father: Let us see Thy glory, if it must be from the shelter of the cleft rock and from beneath the protection of Thy covering hand. Whatever the cost to us in loss of friends or goods or length of days let us know Thee as Thou art, that we may adore Thee as we should. Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

5. Immutable

To say that God is immutable is to say that He never differs from Himself. God cannot change for the better or worse, since He is perfectly holy. All that God is He has always been, and all that He has been and is He will ever be. In Him men of faith find at last eternal permanence. The Immutability of GodO Christ our Lord, Thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations. AS conies to their rock, so have we run to Thee for safety; as birds from their wanderings, so have we flown to Thee for peace. Chance and change are busy in our little world of nature and men, but in Thee we find no variableness nor shadow of turning. We rest in Thee without fear or doubt and face our tomorrows without anxiety. Amen.

6. Omniscient

God possesses perfect knowledge and therefore has no need to learn. God has never learned and cannot learn. God perfectly knows Himself and being the source and author of all things He knows all that can be known. He knows instantly with a fullness of perfection that includes every possible item of knowledge concerning everything that exists or could have existed anywhere in the universe at any time. God knows all instantly and effortlessly. Whatever may befall us, God knows and cares as no one else can. The Divine OmniscienceLord, Thou knowest all things; Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising and art acquainted with all my ways. I can inform Thee of nothing and it is vain to try to hide anything from Thee. In the light of Thy perfect knowledge I would be as artless as a little child. Help me to put away all care, for Thou knowest the way that I take and when Thou hast tried me I shall come forth as gold. Amen.

7. Wise

Declaring God as wise means vastly more than it says or can say. The idea of God as infinitely wise is at the root of all truth. Wisdom, among other things, is the ability to devise perfect ends and to achieve those ends by the most perfect means. It sees the end from the beginning, seeing everything in focus, each in proper relation to all, and is thus able to work toward predestined goals with flawless precision. All God's acts are done in perfect wisdom, first for His own glory, and then for the highest good of the greatest number for the longest time. And all His acts are as pure as they are wise, and as good as they are wise and pure. Not only could His acts not be better done; a better way to do them could not be imagined. It is vitally important that we hold the truth of God's infinite wisdom as a tenet of our creed and we must by the exercise of faith and by prayer bring it into the practical world of our day by day experience, believing actively that our Heavenly Father constantly spreads around us providential circumstances that work for our present good and our everlasting well being. The Wisdom of GodThou, O Christ, who wert tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin, make us strong to overcome the desire to be wise and to be reputed wise by others as ignorant as ourselves. We turn from our wisdom as well as from our folly and flee to Thee, the wisdom of God and the power of God. Amen.

8. Omnipotent

Omnipotence means having all power (Almighty). God possesses what no creature can: an incomprehensible abundance of power. Being the Creator and source of all the power there is, God is of necessity equal to all the power there is and this is to say again that He is omnipotent. God has delegated power to His creatures but being self-sufficient He gives but He does not give away. All that He gives remains His own and returns to Him again. Forever He must remain what He has forever been, the Lord God omnipotent. The Omnipotence of GodOur Heavenly Father, we have heard Thee say, "I am the Almighty God; walk before me, and be thou perfect." But unless Thou dost enable us by the exceeding greatness of Thy power how can we who are by nature weak and sinful walk in a perfect way? Grant that we may learn to lay hold on the working of the mighty power which wrought in Christ when Thou didst raise Him from the dead and set Him at Thine own right hand in the heavenly places. Amen.

9. Transcendent

When we speak of God as transcendent we mean that He is exalted far above the created universe, so far above that human thought cannot imagine it. We must never compare the being of God with any other. We must grant Him transcendence, forever standing apart, in light unapproachable. He is as high above an archangel as above a caterpillar, for the gulf that separates the archangel from the caterpillar is finite, while the gulf between God and the archangel is infinite. Both being created, the archangel and caterpillar belong in the category of that which is not God and are separated from God by infinitude itself. We console ourselves with the knowledge that it is God Himself who puts it in our hearts to seek Him and makes it possible in some measure to know Him, and He is pleased with even the feeblest effort to make Him known. The Divine TranscendenceO Lord our Lord, there is none like Thee in heaven above or in the earth beneath. Thine is the greatness and the dignity and the majesty. All that is in the heaven and the earth is Thine; Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever, O God, and Thou art exalted as head over all. Amen.

10. Omnipresent

God is everywhere here, close to everything, next to everyone. God is at once far off and near. In Him men move and live and have their being. There can be no limit to His presence. He is omnipresent. In His infinitude He surrounds the finite creation and contains it. God is our environment as the sea is to the fish and the air to the bird. God's OmnipresenceOur Father, we know that Thou art present with us, but our knowledge is but a figure and shadow of truth and has little of the spiritual savor and inward sweetness such knowledge should afford. This is for us a great loss and the cause of much weakness of heart. Help us to make at once such amendment of life as is necessary before we can experience the true meaning of the words "In thy presence is fullness of joy." Amen.

11.Faithful

God's immutability presupposes His faithfulness. If He is unchanging it follows that He could not be unfaithful, since that would require Him to change. Upon God's faithfulness rests our whole hope of future blessedness. Only as He is faithful will His covenants stand and His promises by honored. Only as we have complete assurance that He is faithful may we live in peace and look forward with assurance to the life to come. The Faithfulness of GodIt is a good thing to give thanks unto Thee and to sing praises unto Thy name, O Most High, to show forth Thy loving kindness in the morning and Thy faithfulness every night. As Thy Son while on earth was loyal to Thee, His Heavenly Father, so now in heaven He is faithful to us, His earthly brethren; and in this knowledge we press on with every confident hope for all the years and centuries yet to come. Amen.

12. Good

The goodness of God is that which disposes Him to be kind, cordial, benevolent, and full of good will toward men. He is tenderhearted and of quick sympathy, and His unfailing attitude toward all moral beings is open, frank, and friendly. By His nature He is inclined to bestow blessedness and He takes holy pleasure in the happiness of His people. God created us because He felt good in His heart and He redeemed us for the same reason. The unmerited, spontaneous goodness of God is back of all and underneath all His acts. The greatness of God rouses fear within us, but His goodness encourages us not to be afraid of Him. To fear and not be afraid - that is the paradox of faith. The Goodness of GodDo good in Thy good pleasure unto us, O Lord. Act toward us not as we deserve but as it becomes Thee, being the God Thou art. So shall we have nothing to fear in this world or in that which is to come. Amen.

13. Just

In the inspired Scriptures justice and righteousness are scarcely to be distinguished from each other. The same word in the original becomes in English justice or righteousness. Justice embodies the idea of moral equity. Iniquity is the exact opposite. Judgment is the application of equity to moral situations. Justice, when used of God, is a name we give to the way God is. When God acts justly He is simply acting like Himself in a given situation. The message of justice discharged and mercy operative is more than a pleasant theological theory; it announces a fact made necessary by our deep human need. Because of our sin we are all under sentence of death. But when the penitent sinner casts himself upon Christ for salvation, the moral situation is reversed. Justice confronts the changed situation and pronounces the believing man just. The vague and tenuous hope that God is too kind to punish the ungodly has become a deadly opiate for the consciences of millions. As responsible moral beings we dare not so trifle with our eternal future. The Justice of GodOur Father, we love Thee for Thy justice. We acknowledge that Thy judgments are true and righteous altogether. Thy justice upholds the order of the universe and guarantees the safety of all who put their trust in Thee. We live because Thou art just - and merciful. Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, righteous in all Thy ways and holy in all They works. Amen.

14. Merciful

Mercy is an attribute of God, an infinite and inexhaustible energy within the divine nature which disposes God to be actively compassionate. God is merciful as well as just. Thus He did in antediluvian times; thus when Christ walked among men; thus He is doing today and will continue always to do for no other reason than that He is God. Divine mercy is not a temporary mood but an attribute of God's eternal being. Mercy never began to be, but from eternity was; so it will never cease to be. Nothing that has occurred or will occur in heaven or earth or hell can change the tender mercies of our God. Forever His mercy stands, a boundless, overwhelming immensity of divine pity and compassion. As judgment is God's justice confronting moral inequity, so mercy is the goodness of God confronting human suffering and guilt. Were there no guilt in the world, no pain and not tears, God would yet be infinitely merciful. The Mercy Of GodHoly Father, Thy wisdom excites our admiration, Thy power fills us with fear. Thy omnipresence turns every spot of earth into holy ground; but how shall we thank Thee enough for Thy mercy which comes down to the lowest part of our need to give us beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, and for the spirit of heaviness a garment of praise? We bless and magnify Thy mercy, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

15. Graceful

In God mercy and grace are one; but as they reach us they are seen as two, related but not identical. As mercy is God's goodness confronting human misery and guilt, so grace is His goodness directed toward human debt and demerit. It is by His infinite and eternal grace that God imputes merit where none previously existed and declares no debt to be where one had been before. Grace is the good pleasure of God that inclines Him to bestow benefits upon the undeserving. It is a self-existent principle inherent in the divine nature. We benefit eternally by God's being just what He is. The Grace of GodGod of all grace, whose thoughts toward us are ever thoughts of peace and not of evil, give us hearts to believe that we are accepted in the Beloved; and give us minds to admire that perfection of moral wisdom which found a way to preserve the integrity of heaven and yet receive us there. We are astonished and marvel that one so holy and dread should invite us into Thy banqueting house and cause love to be the banner over us. We cannot express the gratitude we feel, but look Thou on our hearts and read it there. Amen.

16. Loving

The words "God is love" mean that love is an essential attribute of God. Love is something true of God, but it is not God. From God's other known attributes we may learn much about His love. It had no beginning and can have no end, it has no limit; it is the core of all spotless purity; it is incomprehensibly vast and bottomless. We do not know and we may never know what love is, but we can know how it manifests itself. It shows itself as good will. Love wills the good of all and never wills harm or evil to any. To know that love is of God and to enter into the secret place leaning upon the arm of the Beloved - this and only this can cast out fear. God is love and God is sovereign. His love disposes Him to desire our everlasting welfare and His sovereignty enables Him to secure it. God's love tells us that He is friendly. Love considers nothing its own but gives all freely to the object of its affection. Acts of self-sacrifice are common to love. Love also takes pleasure in its object. God enjoys His creation. It is of the nature of love that it cannot lie inactive. It is active, creative and gracious. Love must ever give to its own, whatever the cost. The love of God is one of the great realities of the universe, a pillar upon which the hope of the world rests. But it is a personal, intimate thing too. He loves us all with a mighty love that has no beginning and can have no end. The Love of GodOur Father which art in heaven, we Thy children are often troubled in mind, hearing within us at once the affirmations of faith and the accusations of conscience. We are sure that there is in us nothing that could attract the love of One as holy and as just as Thou art. Yet Thou hast declared Thine unchanging love for us in Christ Jesus. If nothing in us can win Thy love, nothing in the universe can prevent Thee from loving us. Thy love is uncaused and undeserved. Thou art Thyself the reason for the love wherewith we are loved. Help us to believe the intensity, the eternity of the love that has found us. Then love will cast out fear; and our troubled hearts will be at peace, trusting not in what we are but in what Thou hast declared Thyself to be. Amen.

17. Holy

Holy is the way God is. To be holy He does not conform to a standard. He is that standard. He is absolutely holy with an infinite, incomprehensible fullness of purity that is incapable of being other than it is. Because He is holy, His attributes are holy; that is, whatever we think of as belonging to God must be thought of as holy. God is holy and He has made holiness the moral condition necessary to the health of His universe. So whatever is holy is healthy; evil is a moral sickness that must end ultimately in death. To preserve His creation God must destroy whatever would destroy it. The holiness of God, the wrath of God, and the health of the creation are inseparably united. God's wrath is His utter intolerance of whatever degrades and destroys. We must hide our unholiness in the wounds of Christ as Moses hid himself in the cleft of the rock while the glory of God passed by. 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. By faith and obedience, 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. The Holiness of GodGlory be to God on high. We praise Thee, we bless Thee, we worship Thee, for Thy great glory. Lord, I uttered that I understood not; things too wonderful for me which I knew not. I heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth Thee and I abhor myself in dust and ashes. O Lord, I will lay my hand upon my mouth. Once have I spoken, yea, twice, but I will proceed no further. But while I was musing the fire burned. Lord, I must speak of Thee, lest by my silence I offend against the generation of Thy children. Behold, Thou has chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, and the weak things of the world to confound the mighty. O Lord, forsake me not. Let me show forth Thy strength unto this generation and Thy power to everyone that is to come. Raise up prophets and seers in Thy Church who shall magnify Thy glory and through Tine almighty Spirit restore to Thy people the knowledge of the holy. Amen.

18. Sovereign

God's sovereignty is the attribute by which He rules His entire creation, and to be sovereign God must be all-knowing, all-powerful and absolutely free. No one and no thing can hinder Him or compel Him or stop Him. He is able to do as He pleases always, everywhere, forever. He is the first, He is the last and beside Him there is no God. We know that God will fulfill every promise made to the prophets. God is moving with infinite wisdom and perfect precision of action. No one can dissuade Him from His purposes. Nothing can turn Him aside from His plans. The Sovereignty of GodWho wouldst not fear Thee, O Lord God of Hosts, most high and most terrible? For Thou art Lord alone. Thou has made heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth and all things that are therein, and in Thy hand is the soul of every living thing. Though sittest king upon the flood; yea, Thou sittest king forever. Thou art a great king over all the earth. Thou art clothed with strength; honor and majesty are before Thee. Amen.

To have a correct understanding of the attributes it is necessary that we see them all as one. Any one of God's attributes is affirmed of another. We see, for instance that if God is self-existent He must be also self-sufficient; and if He has power He, being infinite, must have all power. If He possesses knowledge, His infinitude assures us that He possesses all knowledge. All of God's acts are consistent with all of His attributes. No attribute contradicts any other, but all harmonize and blend into each other in the infinite abyss of the Godhead. God's being is unitary; it is not composed of a number of parts working harmoniously, but simply one. There is nothing in His justice which forbids the exercise of His mercy. God is never at cross-purposes with Himself. No attribute of God is in conflict with another. God's compassion flows out of His goodness, and goodness without justice is not goodness. God spares us because He is good, but He could not be good if He were not just. We do God more honor by believing what He has said about Himself and having the courage to come boldly to the throne of grace than by hiding in self-conscious humility among the trees of the garden.

Is there some secret we may learn? Acquaint thyself with God. To regain her lost power the Church must see heaven opened and have a transforming vision of God. The God we must learn to know is the Majesty in the heavens, God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, the only wise God our Saviour. Knowledge of such a Being cannot be gained by study alone. To know God must be given to us. And this knowledge is difficult because there are conditions to be met and the obstinate nature of fallen man does not take kindly to them.

First, we must forsake our sins. A holy God cannot be known by men of confirmed evil lives. We must love righteousness, think of the Lord with a good heart and in simplicity of heart seek him. "Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God."

Second there must be an utter committal of the whole life to Christ in faith.

Third there must be a reckoning of ourselves to having died unto sin and to be alive unto God in Christ Jesus, followed by a throwing open of the entire personality to the inflow of the Holy Spirit.Then we must practice whatever self-discipline is required to walk in the Spirit and trample under our feet the lusts of the flesh.

Fourth we must boldly repudiate the cheap values of the fallen world and become completely detached in spirit from everything that unbelieving men set their hearts upon.

Fifth we must practice the art of long and loving meditation upon the majesty of God.

Sixth, as the knowledge of God becomes more wonderful, greater service to our fellow men will become for us imperative.

The more perfectly we know God the more we will feel the desire to translate the new found knowledge into deeds of mercy toward suffering humanity. The God who gave all to us will continue to give all through us as we come to know Him better. Any intensified knowledge of God will soon begin to affect those around us in the Christian community. This we can best do by keeping the majesty of God in full focus in all our public services. Lord and extol continually the greatness of His dignity and power. And remember there is a glorified Man on the right hand of the Majesty in heaven faithfully representing us there. We are left for season among men; let us faithfully represent Him here.