Stuff That Matters In Life

The Old Testament is full of rules and rituals that the Israelites are to follow. It seems like a religion of works but it really isn’t.

As finite beings, how can we know an infinite God? God makes himself known by giving us these means or “tools” to know him. The end goal of all that is to know God, and if we know Him, we will love Him. And when we love him, we will do what he wants and it turns out that what he wants is the best thing for us.

This clarifies it for me.

When all is said and done, our hope is not to be a skilled Bible-reader, practiced pray-er, faithful churchman, or visibly mature Christian, but to be the one who “understands and knows me, that I am the Lord” (Jeremiah 9:24).

I can be a very good “faithful churchman” and “visibly mature Christian” quite easily. But that’s not “spiritual growth.” That isn’t the abundant life nor salvation that God offers. Knowing and loving God is the end.

So even though the Christian life is often seen as a list of do’s and don’t’s but it really isn’t like that. Those are only ways through which a sinful, finite person can even hope to know a great and loving God, even just a little.