Certainty and Knowing God

And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. — Jesus, John 17:3

 

When Bible-believing churches want to convey what they believe, they will include a statement of faith. Some create their own statement, while others will point you to a historical statement of faith like the Second London Confession 1677/89. This Confession consists of 32 chapters that make statements about doctrines, citing multiple Scripture references from which the statements are drawn. Such a document is helpful to clearly express what the church believes.

However, these statements are not found in the Bible. They are created by interpreting various Scripture passages that are found in the Bible. And there is a considerable amount of disagreement amongst Bible-believing congregations and denominations about what is Biblically true. One inescapable conclusion from this level of disagreement is that the Scripture we have been given is not very well suited for the creation of doctrinal statements. At least not doctrinal statements that people who are committed to the authority of Scripture are able to agree on. And this means that we cannot be as certain about Biblical truth on a number of things that we would prefer to be more certain about.

Yet if we believe that Scripture is inspired by God, then it is perfectly suited for His purposes. So while doctrinal statements are useful, and maybe even necessary, they must not be all that important to God, or else He would have provided a Scripture that was better able to produce them. What is important to God? Knowing Him… not just knowing about Him.

Scripture must be perfectly suited for the purpose of knowing God. And knowing God is not the same as knowing doctrinal truths about God or His ways. We can know all about a person without knowing them relationally. Think about how it would feel if someone was determined to know all about you, and you did not have that much of a relationship with them. And what a person thinks they know about you could get in the way of them getting to know you more relationally. And that is because people are much more complex than what can be known about them by reputation.

And that would be even more true of God. What we are able to know about God from our minds pondering about Him and His ways is not going to be as deep or rich or true as what we learn about God by being in a relationship with Him. Scripture, with all of its facets that defy our quest for certainty, must be suited for helping us to have a deeper relationship with God.

And it is significant to note that both Peter and Paul had times in their lives when they were wrong in their certainty about God. Paul, as Saul, was certain that followers of Jesus were blasphemers and enemies of God. Peter was certain that Jesus, as the Christ, was not going to "suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed" (Mt 16:21). It was Peter's certainty about what he thought he knew about the Messiah that caused him to rebuke Jesus. Certainty can get in the way of knowing God.