God Loves… Himself

“What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us” (A. W. Tozer).

This is a shattering statement that should bring all men a view of reality for many reasons. While there is a context to this statement, and we will try to discuss it in later blogs, this statement should be reflected on as it stands. What do people really think is the most important thing about them? It might be their physical condition or perhaps even their hair. It might be their education or their financial worth. It might be how they think that others view them. It could be some form of stature in front of a certain group of people. There are many things that people view as the most important thing about them. But how often are we confronted with statements like this?

The context of this statement by Tozer tells us that he thinks this is true of the Church and of the individual. The reason that this statement is true, according to Tozer, is that we always live in accordance with our view of God. Now, if the most important thing about us is what comes into our minds when we think about God, we need to be careful to instruct our minds and hearts from Scripture as to the truth of the character and glory of God. The reason for his statement, I think, is that the Greatest Commandment is to love God with all of our being. If we are wrong about the character of God, then we are not loving God at all but loving something that we have dreamed up ourselves. That, clearly, is idolatry in the heart and mind of individuals and of churches.

If spiritual things are more important than anything else, then the character of God is the most important aspect of spiritual things. But, one might argue, “Paul preached nothing but Christ.” Perhaps, but what is meant by that? Paul did not preach Christ as to His human nature and nothing else. Jesus Christ came as the outshining of the glory of the Father (Heb 1:3) and was the very tabernacle of the glory of God in human flesh (John 1:14-18). Jesus Christ came to reveal God and His glory (John 1:18). If Christ is not preached in such a way where the glory of God is shining through Him, then Christ has not been truly preached. It is in Christ that the light of the knowledge of the glory of God is seen (II Cor 4:4-6). So there is nothing contradictory about preaching nothing but Christ and saying that the glory of God is the most important thing. We cannot have a true knowledge of God unless we see Him through the lenses of Jesus Christ. The zenith of His glory will only come through and be clearly seen in one way and that is through Christ.

We can also see an underlying issue in Tozer’s statement. All that man does is really an outworking of what goes on in the heart and mind. All that man is and does is a reflection of what he thinks about. All that man does is a reflection of how he sees God. Man is either suppressing the truth of God or he is loving God. Man is either loving a true God or he is loving a false idea of God. But whatever man does he is always reflecting his idea of God in one way or the other. Man will always live out in life what he loves the most in his heart. In some way, then, what man thinks of God (of god) in his heart is the most important and basic thought that goes on in man whether it is a denial of God, a love for an idol, or a denial of God. Man is always reacting to or living out his thoughts of God.

It is utterly vital, therefore, for men to be trained in the truth concerning God and His glory. If man is always going to be living in some way as a result of his thoughts for God, then man must have correct thoughts of God in order to live and love in the way he should. Man is to love God with all of his heart, mind, soul, and strength. All other things matter little in comparison to what man thinks within himself about God. Each moment man is thinking of God according to the truth of man is an idolater. Each moment man is either loving the true God or some idolatrous notion of Him. Each moment man is aiming at his greatest love and if it is not the true God, then man is not in obedience to the Great Command. Whether one agrees or not that the most important thing about a person is the thoughts that come into his mind when the thinks of God, surely it is obvious that nothing is more important.

“The only way to recoup our spiritual losses is to go back to the cause of them and make such corrections as the truth warrants. 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” (A. W. Tozer).

“Now therefore, I pray You, if I have found favor in Your sight, let me know Your ways that I may know You, so that I may find favor in Your sight. Consider too, that this nation is Your people.” 14 And He said, “My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest.” 15 Then he said to Him, “If Your presence does not go with us, do not lead us up from here. 16 “For how then can it be known that I have found favor in Your sight, I and Your people? Is it not by Your going with us, so that we, I and Your people, may be distinguished from all the other people who are upon the face of the earth?” 17 The LORD said to Moses, “I will also do this thing of which you have spoken; for you have found favor in My sight and I have known you by name.” 18 Then Moses said, “I pray You, show me Your glory!” (Exodus 33:13-18).

When the LORD answered Moses and agreed to do what Moses wanted, the terminal desire of the heart of Moses is put on display. Moses prayed and wanted to see the glory of God. We can assume from the fact that God answered the prayer of Moses that Moses really meant this above all things. This is exactly what the Church must learn to do. All night prayer meetings accomplish nothing other than make people sleepy if the hearts of the people do not desire God for God’s sake. Short prayers from burning hearts for God’s glory are far more effective than long prayers with cold hearts or warm hearts for things other than God.

How did God answer the prayer of Moses? It is very curious how God answered this prayer and it is totally unlike what the Church in America can begin to comprehend. “And He said, ‘I Myself will make all My goodness pass before you, and will proclaim the name of the LORD before you; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show compassion on whom I will show compassion'” (Exodus 33:19). Here is the glory of God that was shown to Moses. God opened the eyes of Moses and displayed before Him that He was sovereign. Could it be that this is why so many do not really desire the glory of God in our day? When people desire God, they must desire Him as He really is and not as they imagine Him to be. The very glory of grace is that it is free and sovereign. Man cannot earn it in any way but simply be emptied of self and causes in self of merit in order to receive grace as free and sovereign. Most men hate this teaching in reality as doctrine and still others who hold it as doctrine hate it in practice.

What must the Church do to rediscover the glory of God? It must be like Moses who was ready to see the glory of God no matter what it entailed. Until the Church is ready to humble itself and deny self it will not see the glory of the one and only God who is perfectly and beautifully sovereign. Man wants to be in control of his life and of his eternal destiny. Man wants to use God for his own purposes and have an Omnipotent Being in a box ready to help him when he has a need. But that is not the sovereign God of Holy Writ. God will be gracious to whom He will be gracious. He does not respond to every prayer or every need. He responds as He wants to respond and in His own time. The very term “grace” demands that we understand that there are no causes in man to cause God to show grace. If grace is grace in reality and not just a concept, then it is sovereign.

As we face the facts of what the glory of God really is, it is readily visible of why the Church in America is not ready to see the glory of God. The Church is too full of itself, too full of confidence in its own power, too caught up with its own activity, and too enamored with the idol of free will. Until the Church is brought in humility and self-denial to seek the glory of God in truth and for His own sake, it will not rediscover the majesty of God. It is sad that when people seek God and His glory they are really seeking the god that they want to act for them. We must tear our hearts and cry out to God to tear the pride from those hearts so that we would be on our faces and ready to see Him as He really is. The sovereign God is the God that men will not honor as God (Rom 1:21). We can give lip service and so all sorts of religious activities, but until our hearts are ravished with God as God we are not going to rediscover the majesty of God. God is sovereign and He is free and utterly glorious to be gracious to whom he will be gracious. There is no shame in believing and loving that, it is simply how God has revealed Himself. Until the Church is ready to be like Moses and bow before God as God, it will be caught up with the activities of religion and the love of itself. But the majesty of God will not be there.

“The only way to recoup our spiritual losses is to go back to the cause of them and make such corrections as the truth warrants. 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” (A. W. Tozer).

“Now therefore, I pray You, if I have found favor in Your sight, let me know Your ways that I may know You, so that I may find favor in Your sight. Consider too, that this nation is Your people.” 14 And He said, “My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest.” 15 Then he said to Him, “If Your presence does not go with us, do not lead us up from here. 16 “For how then can it be known that I have found favor in Your sight, I and Your people? Is it not by Your going with us, so that we, I and Your people, may be distinguished from all the other people who are upon the face of the earth?” 17 The LORD said to Moses, “I will also do this thing of which you have spoken; for you have found favor in My sight and I have known you by name.” 18 Then Moses said, “I pray You, show me Your glory!” (Exodus 33:13-18).

In verse 13 we see Moses as a model for the Church. Moses wants to find the favor of God in order that he may know the ways of God. He wants to know the ways of God in order that he might know God. He wants to know God in order to know the ways of God. This is certainly a circle of desiring and knowing God. Notice that Moses did not want to know God or the ways of God for other reasons. He wanted to know God for the sake of knowing God and he wanted God for God’s sake instead of God for other reasons. The Church must learn to seek God simply to know and be in His presence rather than seek God for the blessings of nickels and noses.

Let us reflect on the concept of causation for a moment. Whenever a moral agent decides to do something, that agent has desire, intents, and motives. There may be many compound desires (plural desires that join), but there is one central desire that is the greatest desire of all. We will call that a “terminal desire” or motive. It is that for which other desires or motives are done. The other desires and motives we will call “instrumental desires.” In other words, the instrumental desires are the desires that are used to carry out what is needed for the terminal desire. For example, I may desire to find my keys. But I don’t want to find my keys just because I love to hold my keys. I want to find my keys in order that I may get in my car and drive to town. But I may not want to drive to town just to drive to town; I want to drive to town in order to go to the grocery store. But then again I may not want to go to the grocery store just to look at all the food; I want to buy food in order to eat. This could go deeper, but I hope that the point is clear. The terminal desire is to eat (though it could be to stay alive) and all the other desires and actions are simply instruments to do the deepest desire of the moment.

Well, you might say, “what a useless exercise that was.” Perhaps, but I think this can be used to make a very pertinent point. What is the terminal desire of the Church? Does the Church desire God and His glory as its terminal desire and so use all things for that end or does it try to use God as an instrumental desire and use Him to do what it really wants? Moses wanted God as a terminal desire. He did not desire to use God to obtain things that he wanted. I am afraid that in the Church there are many who try to use God in order to make churches larger and more successful. In that case, the very act of “doing church” is idolatry because all that is being done is not loving God but other things.

As we reflect on why the Church should want to rediscover the majesty of God, this can open up idolatrous hearts within all of us. Do we really desire the glory of God just because we love Him and His glory? Are we sure that we don’t want to use God in order to be more popular or more honored in certain circles? Is it any wonder that God will not come to a church that does not have Him as its chief love? Isn’t this part of what happened to the churches in Revelation? One had left its first love and others were lukewarm. What is leaving a first love for God if it is not trying to use God as an instrumental desire? What is being lukewarm for Christ but not having God as the terminal desire and motive in all things? I am not sure that it is possible to think of the Church in terms of terminal versus instrumental desires without realizing that the Church does not seek the majesty of God simply out of love for God. This is true in conservative circles as well. Idolatry can live quite nicely and gain strength within orthodox churches as well as liberal ones. The real issue is whether God is sought out of love for Himself or He is sought to help us do what we want. If we seek Him for what we want, then we are our own terminal desire. We are then idolaters and God will not visit us. We must repent and cry for hearts to love Him for Himself.

“The only way to recoup our spiritual losses is to go back to the cause of them and make such corrections as the truth warrants. 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” (A. W. Tozer).

“Now therefore, I pray You, if I have found favor in Your sight, let me know Your ways that I may know You, so that I may find favor in Your sight. Consider too, that this nation is Your people.” 14 And He said, “My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest.” 15 Then he said to Him, “If Your presence does not go with us, do not lead us up from here. 16 “For how then can it be known that I have found favor in Your sight, I and Your people? Is it not by Your going with us, so that we, I and Your people, may be distinguished from all the other people who are upon the face of the earth?” 17 The LORD said to Moses, “I will also do this thing of which you have spoken; for you have found favor in My sight and I have known you by name.” 18 Then Moses said, “I pray You, show me Your glory!” (Exodus 33:13-18).

Exodus 33 shows us how to seek God. Moses desired the glory of God above all things. He also saw no point in going on if God did not go with them. Such the Church should learn. There is no point in doing church if God is not there. Each church is to be the gathered people of God who are each in one sense the temple of the Spirit and as a corporate body are being made into a dwelling place of God. What is the local church if God is not there? The very life, power, and reason of the church is gone. The majesty of God cannot be replaced by anything and the only reason the church should meet is to seek the glory of God to be manifested in and among them. The Church is a useless enterprise apart from the glory and majesty of God.

The Church must learn from Moses to seek God before it tries to go anywhere or do anything. It must seek to learn the ways of God in order that it may know God better. It must learn to cry from the heart like Moses for God to show it His glory. It must begin to seek God in such a way that it will begin to desire His presence before it will do anything. The Church in our day must learn that the rediscovery of the majesty of God is utterly vital. It must seek that if it is to do anything in the world of any value at all. What does the Church think it is doing when it does so much and yet has no sense of the majesty and presence of God?

What are the distinguishing signs of the Church? What is it that separates the Church from a social club of perhaps a philanthropic group? As Moses noted in verse 16, it is God’s being with His people that distinguishes them from all other peoples on the face of the earth. The Church must wake up to this truth! The Church is nothing but a social club or a group of people carrying out benevolent causes without the presence of the majesty of God. We have gotten so used to doing church without God that it appears normal. This is one reason the statistics show that the people in the Church live pretty much the same as those outside of it. Why is that? Because Scripture teaches that only God being with a people in His glory distinguishes one group of people from another. Isn’t that also true in the New Testament? Jesus Christ came and was the glory of God in human flesh. People who have Christ have His Spirit and they are different people who love their enemies and are known by their love for one another.

Unless the Church begins to seek to rediscover the majesty of God and to have His presence with it, the Church will continue its descent into the world. But since the Church is to be the salt and light of the world, the world will also slide into the ways of the pit. When will the Church wake up and see that all the user friendly ways of the world are hostility toward God? When will the Church wake up and understand that unless God is with it all of its efforts are useless in real terms? How our hearts should burn within us as we get a glimpse of what the Church has left behind in order to make gains in numbers and prestige.

Our hearts should ache within us when we see that the activities going on within the Church are really an attempt to fill the void of the absence of the majesty of God. The Church is crumbling from within because the pillars of the majesty of God are not there to sustain the truth of what the Church is. Eternal life is to know God (John 17:3) and yet the Church has virtually forgotten that fact. Instead, the Church thinks that God’s time is consumed with helping people. So the Church now thinks that God is simply all about people and their so-called needs. In focusing on people instead of God, people are led astray from the waters of eternal life which is knowing Him.

“The only way to recoup our spiritual losses is to go back to the cause of them and make such corrections as the truth warrants. 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” (A. W. Tozer).

People and churches are either seeking themselves or they are seeking God. Our own honor is a very tempting morsel that is dangled in front of us on a continual basis. But one cannot follow Christ and self. One cannot seek the glory of God and the rediscovery of the majesty of God and seek self at the same time. It takes self-denial to follow Christ and seek God. The denial of self is not what it is normally thought; it is the very denial of self as the center and core of all that I do. Christ has set out in the clearest of terms that men must deny themselves if they are going to follow Him. The Church, therefore, consists of those who deny self and only those who deny self. When the Church (visible) is seen to be lovers of self and follow after the ways and honor of self, it has clearly lost the vision of following Christ. When the Church is greedy for money and prestige in the world while it is fighting and quarreling within itself, we can know that it has lost sight of the majesty of the living God.

“Now large crowds were going along with Him; and He turned and said to them, 26 “If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple. 27 “Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.
28 “For which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it? 29 “Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who observe it begin to ridicule him, 30 saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’ 31 “Or what king, when he sets out to meet another king in battle, will not first sit down and consider whether he is strong enough with ten thousand men to encounter the one coming against him with twenty thousand? 32 “Or else, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. 33 “So then, none of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions.” (Luke 14:25-33).

We must notice from this passage that large crowds were going along with Jesus. Instead of tickling their ears and treating them as the center of the universe, He turned to them and gave out some very strong teaching. Why did Jesus do this? Didn’t He know that these people could make or break His ministry? Didn’t He know that the money purse was getting low and He needed these people to support Him? Didn’t He know that we are to speak easy with people and not run them off? Didn’t He know that He had a product to sell and that these people were the consumers and He needed to package His product better? Instead of all that nonsense, Jesus knew what it took to be a disciple of His. He knew that an easy message would not turn these people from following self to be a real disciple of His, so He told them the truth. Jesus taught and preached what was good for the souls of the listeners and not necessarily what they wanted to hear.

Jesus told these people to count the cost. He told them what it would take to be a true follower of His. A person must be prepared to hate the dearest people in his life and even his own life if he is going to be a disciple. Surely, some might say, Jesus did not mean that literally. But Jesus was very clear in that a person cannot be His disciple if he does not do those things. He did not say that it would be hard, but that a person cannot be His disciple if he will not do this. He went on to say that if a person is not willing to take up his cross and follow Him that he “cannot be My disciple.” Jesus then tells the huge crowds to count the cost. Then, speaking directly to the crowd, “none of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions.” What would Jesus say to the masses in the mega-churches today? Would He have the same message that got the people there in the first place? It seems to me that giving up all of one’s possessions is the opposite of the prosperity message so prevalent today. It seems that hating your life is the opposite of the message to love yourself that is heard so much today.

If the Church is to rediscover the majesty of God today, it must learn the message of Jesus Christ. No one has seen the majesty of God who is still enthralled with self. The message of self-denial must ring out in the churches in this land or men will seek the world and religion out of self-love. If the Church continues to preach and teach its self-centered and ear tickling messages, it will continue on without the majesty of God. But if the Church desires God in His majesty to be present, then it must begin to see itself and its selfishness with abhorrence. Self-denial is an absolute must since God’s majesty is not seen when man is caught up with his own majesty and self-worth.

“The only way to recoup our spiritual losses is to go back to the cause of them and make such corrections as the truth warrants. 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” (A. W. Tozer).

“You younger men, likewise, be subject to your elders; and all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, for GOD IS OPPOSED TO THE PROUD, BUT GIVES GRACE TO THE HUMBLE. (I Peter 5:5).
God is opposed to the proud regardless of whether they are the religious people or not. This text is in the context of the local church. Peter does not distinguish between those who God opposes and those He gives grace to other than pride and humility. It could be said that God opposes the proud especially if they claim to be the Church. No matter the religious talk of denominational leaders and of religious leaders as a whole, if they are proud then God is opposed to them. God is also opposed to individuals in the churches if they are proud as well. The term “opposed” actually comes from a word that speaks of a military alignment. God aligns Himself against the proud and He will bring them down. If the Church is proud, He will bring it down. God will not allow anyone to have His glory and that is true with religious people as well.

The Church in the United States is proud and is reaping the consequences of that. God is opposed to the Church and it will never have true success apart from God. True enough many have large numbers of people and of finances, but God gives those things to His enemies too. Large numbers and large budgets are not necessarily a sign of the favor of God at all. The sign of God’s favor is when He gives His people Himself and that entails a discovery of His majesty. A corresponding truth along with His majesty is seen in their humility toward God. It is when God humbles a people in truth and in the heart that He gives them grace. We must not understand grace apart from God Himself, but instead we should think of grace as the giving of God Himself. A person who is truly proud is a person who is not walking with the sense of the majesty of God. When God withdraws Himself from a people, He takes the sense and the presence of His majesty with Him. That leaves people in darkness and is a turning them over to themselves.

When God humbles a people by giving them a sight and sense of His majesty, those people are then ready to receive grace. God does not give the proud true grace, they don’t want it and wouldn’t see it anyway. So God prepares a people for grace by giving them the grace of humility. The humble receive grace and desire to share in the life and glory of God simply to enjoy Him and declare His praises and excellencies. The proud want to be religious and to be engaged in religious activities simply out of a desire of benefit for self. A people who want to sing to God and hear His Word preached for selfish purposes is clearly a people that has been turned over to pride and hard hearts. Romans 1:18-32 shows God’s pattern in turning people over to sin. Now, while we must be careful, there is a clear pattern that is applicable to the modern Church. In v. 18 we see that the wrath of God is poured out because men suppress the truth in unrighteousness. The Church in America is certainly suppressing the truth. In v. 21 they did not honor Him as God. The Church in America is certainly not honoring God. In vv. 22-23 we see that men professing to be wise became fools and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for other things. The Church in America has certainly exchanged the glory of God for entertainment and outward success which is really idolatry.

As we look at these things, we have not really left the discussion of recouping our spiritual losses. It is out of pride that the Church does not honor God as God. It is from pride that the Church will not have God as God. It is from pride that the Church suppresses the truth because they want to please men and get them in the door. It is from pride that the Church desires to be entertained with music and tickled ears rather than to worship in music and to hear the Word of God preached to the heart. Is it any wonder that God has opposed the Church in the past and continues to oppose the Church today? What pride the Church in America had displayed in its idolatrous practices of trying to be like the world instead of God. The Church must begin to humble itself or God will turn His back completely on the Church and leave it to its own devices. The Church has chosen its own practices and ways rather than to bow to the glory of God and plead for Him to visit it again. How we must humble ourselves and turn from all that we do that does not exalt Him and is not a way of seeking His majesty in the Church. We must be humbled to the point of repentance from the heart if He is to return in His majesty. May He be pleased to do so.

“The only way to recoup our spiritual losses is to go back to the cause of them and make such corrections as the truth warrants. 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” (A. W. Tozer).

The Southern Kingdom of Judea was in spiritual decline in the days of Isaiah. Then King Uzziah died and the nation was in turmoil. God decided to prepare a man who would preach His word in an uncompromising fashion. What did He do? He gave Isaiah a sight or vision of His holiness and glory. This is exactly what ministers need in order to be properly prepared to preach the Word of God and this is what the Church needs in order to be declaring the excellencies of God as it was created to do. The Church as a whole must seek the glory of God in order for the decline in the knowledge of the holy to be reversed. But can it do that in its own strength? No, that is why it is a desperate need for it to understand its downward slide and begin crying out to God to give it the heart to seek Him.

“In the year of King Uzziah’s death I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of His robe filling the temple. 2 Seraphim stood above Him, each having six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one called out to another and said, “Holy, Holy, Holy, is the LORD of hosts, The whole earth is full of His glory.” 4 And the foundations of the thresholds trembled at the voice of him who called out, while the temple was filling with smoke. 5 Then I said, “Woe is me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I live among a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts” (Isa 6:1-5).

Whether Isaiah saw a vision or was in some way transported to a temple in heaven is not clear. However, the real issue is that Isaiah saw the holiness and glory of God that completely changed the way he viewed reality. This, I think, in some way is what people need to see if they are going to rediscover the majesty of God. Isaiah saw the Lord sitting on His throne. While the Lord may not send visions like this to His people in these days, He can open man’s spiritual eyes and give man a sight of Himself. “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God” (Mat 5:8). One must be born from above to even see the kingdom of God (John 3:3), so in those souls that have spiritual sight God can give them a sight and taste of His glory. Ephesians 3:16-21 describes one way that God does this, so this is something that can happen in the modern day.

Isaiah saw the Seraphim singing holy is the LORD and that the whole earth is full of His glory. To see the Lord on His throne is to see His holiness and His glory. In fact, in some way the holiness of God is the love He has for His own name and to set Himself apart from all other purposes to glorify His name in all things. For Isaiah to see the holiness of God was for him to understand and see that the glory of God shone throughout the whole earth and not just Judah. The beauty of the character and nature of God shines in all that there is and all that happens. If man has eyes to see and the spiritual strength to exercise those eyes, he can see God’s glory in and through all things. The Church must wake up to the fact that God’s holiness is so majestic that it is shining in all places. What the Church must do is humble itself before God in order to be humbled so that it may begin to seek Him in truth. The Church must realize as it goes into the world that it is simply pointing out the glory of God that already shines in all places.

Isaiah also saw himself. God opened his eyes so that he saw his righteousness in the light of majesty and holiness. This is probably the foundation of Isaiah 64:6 where Isaiah wrote that even our acts of righteousness are as filthy rags. Let us be blunt. The real term in that text is menstrual cloth. The issue of blood made a person ceremonially unclean and apart from God. Isaiah is telling us that our very best works that come from us are as menstrual cloths that make us unclean in the sight of God. God does not want our menstrual cloths, He wants a true righteousness that only comes from Him and is worked in and through humble hearts that see His glory. One sign within the Church that the majesty of God is beginning to return is when members of the churches begin to see and feel the weight and heinousness of sin. When people begin to cry out about the uncleanness of their hearts and see themselves as dirty in His sight, this is a sign that God is moving. It is true that one can fake this or have it in an intellectual way, yet when God begins to move His people who see His glory clearly loathe themselves for their sin (Ezekiel 20:43; 36:31). Indeed, the return of the holiness and majesty of God can be painful and costly. I fear that there are but few today who want to pay the price of pain in the heart to seek His return.

“The only way to recoup our spiritual losses is to go back to the cause of them and make such corrections as the truth warrants. 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” (A. W. Tozer).

II Chronicles 7:14 is used a lot for people who write on seeking revival. While I am not arguing against that at all, the context is still very much in line with a nation that is under the judgment of God and is a prescription of how to seek the face of God. Since the Church is now “A CHOSEN RACE, A royal PRIESTHOOD, A HOLY NATION, A PEOPLE FOR God’s OWN POSSESSION” (I Peter 2:9), certainly this can and should be applied to the Church and the churches. This does not negate revival at all since revival is in one sense simply the power of God and His glory coming among His people. “And My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land” (II Chronicles 7:14). First, we must notice that it is the people of God who are to humble themselves. Certainly it is the Church that is to be considered the people of God now. So it is the real Church, those who are born from above, who are to seek the face of God.

Second, the text tells us that the people of God should humble themselves. The very first thing that people who are seeking a rediscovery of the majesty of God and His face are to do is to humble themselves. Wow, that sounds like a different approach than the modern self-esteem movement within the Church. To seek God, then, the issue at hand is to humble self instead of exalt self in order to seek God. The order that the text gives is that God’s people are to humble themselves and pray in order to seek His face. If this is a chronological or logical order then humility is necessary to pray which is obviously necessary to seek the face of God. But here we see what God does in the souls of people that He is working in. He humbles them. Now we should not think that humility is like a magic pill which a person swallows in order to obtain whatever he desires. Humility is the work of God in the soul of man which is the life of Christ in man. Humility is not something that can be worked up by man at his own power and desire; it has to come from Christ working Himself in a person through the work of the Spirit.

But, it is said, man is told to humble himself. The Scripture does not tell us that we must wait for God to do the work. This is true, but we must make a careful distinction at this point. In one sense man does humble himself in that he must give up his efforts of trying to humble himself. “Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS” (Mat 11:29). It is when man goes to Christ that man learns what meekness (gentleness) and humility are. The very life of humility is something divine and so it is the life of Christ in the believer that works humility. So man must humble himself in one sense in order to submit to the workings of God in the soul to bring the life of Christ to man which includes humility. We can look at humility, then, as having two aspects. One is man humbling himself in order for the second aspect of humility to happen which only happens when God works it in the soul.

We can look at the nature of pride and understand that only the hand of God can cast pride out and make the soul humble. Pride is the exalting of self and is really the god-self. The proud man wants to do all things for his own honor, even serve God. Some people are very proud of how they serve God. Who alone can soften proud hearts and cast the nature of the devil which is pride out? Can man in his pride cast pride out? No, man cannot. Pride must be cast out by God’s opening the eyes of man to reality. Pride will not be cast out by anything but the work of God in opening man’s eyes to see His glory and man as a creature and therefore utter dependence. This goes on even more when man sees just how sinful he really is in the eyes of a holy, holy, holy God.

There is no seeking of the face of God apart from humility because man’s pride can never take him into the presence of the one and only God who hates pride. The Church, therefore, is a stench in the nostrils of God to the degree that She is proud of who She is and what She does. No pride is brought into the presence of God since He will not give or share His glory with another. God will not come down to the Church as long as it serves itself and anything else other than Him. God will not come to the Church and give it a sense of reality in the sense of His majesty until it gives up trying to serve Him in its own wisdom and power. The Church can do many religion things and activities in pride, but it will not rediscover the majesty of God until it humbles itself and is humbled.

“The only way to recoup our spiritual losses is to go back to the cause of them and make such corrections as the truth warrants. 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” (A. W. Tozer). In this one statement Tozer diagnoses the trouble and prescribes the cure for the ills of the Church in his day. In my opinion, as a true diagnosis and a true prescription of Scripture, it is also true for today. The Church will never really be the Church no matter what it does apart from this prescription. There is no power in the Church and no real obedience in the Church apart from the rediscovery (or discovery to begin with) of the majesty and glory of God. Until that happens, men will go to a building and do something but it will not be proclaiming the excellencies of God which is the purpose of the Church. Even if they try to proclaim His excellencies, yet without a sense of His majesty it is empty.

The Church must repent of its methodologies that are not consistent with a God-centered practice (idolatry) and return to God just as the Israelites needed to repent of its idolatries and return to God. Worship is not just a part of the service where singing with a religious content occurs, but true worship is from the inner man and is a loving adoration of God. It is not enough just to sing about religious subjects and perhaps with great feeling, because one can have great feeling about heresy if the tune is catchy enough. People can worship themselves in the time of singing as they sing about how much God loves them and are really thinking only of themselves. People can worship themselves as they “get into” the song and really be into the tune and just be enjoying the feelings. There can be blatant idolatry during the “worship time” if a low view of God is being worshipped. Worship is not just a time for singing; it can be a time of horrible idolatry as well. This can happen within orthodox circles as well.

Worship is really the adoration of the heart. But we must be careful and remember that the adoration in the heart must be for God. We must be even more careful and realize that we must have the truth of God to have worship. Lastly, we must know that it must be the truth of God and the adoration of His majesty in the heart for there to be true worship (John 4:22-24; Heb 12:28-29; Isa 66: 1-5). Unless the Church as a whole and the individual churches return to this biblical idea of worship, the Church will continue to regress. The Church must begin to seek God as the cure for its ills, but even more it must do this if it loves God in reality. The Church might be so drunk with its success in other areas that it does not want God to come along and “ruin” it. What would happen if churches lost many of their members? They would think that something was wrong with the pastor. But what has happened now that God is no longer in our churches? We are carrying on quite nicely without Him, or so we think. This is simply a sign that we are so hardened in heart that we have not noticed the absence of God and wouldn’t know how to act if He visited us. Remember how people treated Christ when He came and visited His own (John 1:1-11).

As Tozer points out, “A rediscovery of the majesty of God will go a long way toward curing them” (the troubles of the Church). Now this sounds like a simple answer. All we have to do is for the Church to rediscover the majesty of God and all our troubles will be over. It is not quite that simple. The real ills of the Church will begin to be cured, but there would be a lot of trouble in the process. Traditions, practices, and ways of thinking about God would have to be thrown out of the window when they are seen to be as salt that has lost its saltiness. The rediscovery of the majesty of God as the root issue is the only real answer for the Church, but this has ramifications for everything in the Church. Many will not like it.

While there are probably simple books out there on how to rediscover God, there is no simple or easy way to do this. The rediscovery of the majesty of God will cost the Church and all the people who try it everything. As Scripture sets out in II Chronicles 7:14, there is a path to seeking the face of God. It begins with humility and includes true repentance. As Isaiah 6 shows us, to see God in His glory is to see our sin and to respond with a “woe is me.” We can also look at I Peter 5:5 which shows us that God is opposed to the proud and gives grace to the humble. We can look at Luke 9 and 14 which describe what self-denial is needed to follow Christ. Exodus 33:13-18 opens up a way of crying out to God to see His glory. If all these are elements of what the Church needs to do, then it is easily seen that there is no easy way to rediscover God. Compounding the issue for those who want things to be easy is that God is sovereign and these things are at His good pleasure. We will try to deal with these issues in future blogs.

This loss of the concept of majesty has come just when the forces of religion are making dramatic gains and the churches are more prosperous than at any time within the past several hundred years. But the alarming thing is that our gains are mostly external and our losses are wholly internal; and since it is the quality of our religion that is affected by internal conditions, it may be that our supposed gains are but losses spread over a wider field (A.W. Tozer The Knowledge of the Holy)

We want to continue our look at some statements by Tozer and reflect on them as they apply today. Tozer’s statements are powerful and even insulting if we take them seriously and apply them to where they need to be applied. Even more importantly, Tozer seems to have the same idea as God.

Thus says the LORD, “Heaven is My throne and the earth is My footstool. Where then is a house you could build for Me? And where is a place that I may rest? For My hand made all these things, Thus all these things came into being,” declares the LORD. “But to this one I will look, To him who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at My word. But he who kills an ox is like one who slays a man; He who sacrifices a lamb is like the one who breaks a dog’s neck; He who offers a grain offering is like one who offers swine’s blood; He who burns incense is like the one who blesses an idol. As they have chosen their own ways, And their soul delights in their abominations.” (Isa 66:1-3).

The above text shows what God desires in a heart and what He thinks of heartless worship. We see in v. 1 that the Israelites wanted to please God by building Him a temple. If you think about it, that is laughable. God is infinite and as such fills the universe. The Temple cannot possibly be a place that benefits Him. As YAHWEH, the self-existent One, there is no way that man who receives all benefit from God can benefit God in any way. The Temple was for the sake of man, not God. The same thing is true of worship in certain ways. God does not command men to worship Him because it benefits Him in any way, but because that is how His glory is manifested and that is how man shares in the glory of God. What does man think He is doing in building buildings and building all sorts of ways to worship God? As it says at the end of v. 3, “As they have chosen their own ways, And their soul delights in their abominations.” In choosing his own way in the worship of God, the souls of men are delighting in their abominations and not the worship of God.

As we can see in the first part of v. 3, the Israelites were doing the worship that was commanded. They sacrificed the right animals and offered the grain offerings and incense. However, it does not appear that their hearts were right before God. When the heart is not right before God, even commanded forms of worship are abominations to Him. As to the modern day, people can build the nicest of buildings and that be the house of the filthiest of hearts. The people in those buildings can be doing those things that appear to be great works of service and so many things, but all of it can still be nothing but abominations to God. They may be making great sacrifices and be very conservative people, but they can still be an abomination to God because of the soul and what it delights in.

V. 2 tells us what God’s true delight is in worship. As compared with the souls of men choosing their own ways and delighting in their own abominations, we see that God loves the humble, the contrite of spirit, and those who tremble at His word. Or as David put it in Psa 51, “For You do not delight in sacrifice, otherwise I would give it; You are not pleased with burnt offering. 17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; A broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise.” God does not want people offering animals and things that they can give apart from themselves, He wants the heart. He demands that the heart be humbled before Him which is taking the place that creatures should take before their Creator. There is no worship apart from a humble heart and there is no humility apart from the majesty and glory of God being recognized and bowed to. There is no worship unless the creature sees its sin and is therefore contrite or bruised inwardly because of the sin. There is also no worship apart from the trembling of the humbled and contrite creature in hearing and listening to the words of God. If that is quality religion, then the Church in America is truly in trouble. We must humble ourselves and seek the face of God or the downgrade will continue. With much show and outward appearances, true religion is about lost.