God: Knowing God
In Psalm 113:5-6, the psalmist asks: “Who is like the Lord our God, who is seated on high, who looks far down on the heavens and the earth?”
People still are asking that question. Who is this God like? Is there any comparison? Online bookstores offer seemingly countless books about how to know God. Some are from a Christian perspective, some from quasi-Christian, some from non-Christian perspectives. Some say that they will give readers secret knowledge concerning God.
Many people are seeking to know God or at least to connect with some sort of “higher power.” That should not surprise us, since God created humans in his image, giving us a “spiritual appetite.” Philosopher Blaise Pascal is credited with saying that within each person there is a “God-shaped hole looking to be filled.”[1]
We hope that seekers receive clear direction from the Christian churches. Sadly, that is not always the case. No one knows everything, and no one knows God completely. We are not able to fully understand everything there is to know about God. Paul put it this way: “O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” (Romans 11:33). The Contemporary English Version puts it this way: “Who can measure the wealth and wisdom and knowledge of God? Who can understand his decisions or explain what he does?”
God lives in “unapproachable light” (1 Timothy 6:16), but he has not left us completely in the dark. He has approached us, come to us. Note Jesus’ statement in Matthew 11:27: “All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.”
No one can know God unless God reveals himself – and he has chosen to reveal himself through Jesus.[2]
The Old Testament speaks of the Shekinah glory of God, which was in the innermost part of the Tabernacle, behind the veil.[3] No one was allowed behind that veil except the high priest, and then only on one day a year. For most people, God remained hidden behind the veil. God sent his Son to “pull back the veil” and reveal who he is through his Son.
Most people start with some idea of what God is like, and when they learn something about God, they try to fit it into the picture that they already have. Things that don’t fit within their framework are ignored or rejected as figures of speech. Only Jesus has perfect and complete knowledge of God, and he shares that knowledge with us. We need to let him create in us a new picture, a new outline of what God is like.
Through the life and ministry of Jesus, we get the best look at what God is like. Jesus is one with the Father and the Holy Spirit. As the Son of God, Jesus brings “insider knowledge” about God. Jesus is God’s self-revelation here on earth. In Jesus, God has come to us in person, meeting us face-to-face so that we may know what he’s really like.
Jesus shared himself and what he knew with his disciples, whom he called his friends. He told them to go into the world and make that knowledge known.
But this knowledge is not a list of facts—it is a relationship. Knowledge of God comes in the context of other people telling us about Jesus. Relationships help us learn more about God. Jesus said that the clearest sign that would point others to him would be the love that his followers have for each other—a love reflecting God’s own love for all people. “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35).
What is a “relationship” with God?
What do humans want to know about God? Perhaps the best question is, “Who are you?” Moses asked the question when he saw a flame that never died, a bush burning but never burning up. God replied, “I AM WHO I AM” (Exodus 3:14). Like that flame, he never dies; he is self-perpetuating, self-existing eternally.
God declares himself to us in creation (Psalm 19:1). He has interacted with the human family ever since he made us. Sometimes he speaks through thunder, quaking or fire, and sometimes he speaks in a whisper (Exodus 20:18; 1 Kings 19:11-12). God reveals information about himself in the Bible both directly and in inspired reports of how people responded to him. God also reveals himself through Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit.
But we want to know more than who God is, don’t we? We want to know why he made us. We want to know what he wants us to do. We want to know how he affects us. We want to know what he has in store for us. We want to know not just about him — we want to know him. What is our relationship with God now? What should it be? And what will our relationship be in the future?
God made us in his image (Genesis 1:26-27). The Bible reveals a far more profound future than we can now imagine. Hebrews 2:7 tells us that we were made “for a little while lower than the angels.” Yet God has crowned us with “glory and honor” and put everything under our rule. “God left nothing outside their control. As it is, we do not yet see everything in subjection” (verse 8). We don’t see this yet, but this is what God has planned for us.
God has prepared a wonderful future for us. But something stands in the way. We cannot yet be trusted with that kind of power – we cannot be trusted to use it for good, rather than selfishly. Humans make mistakes, sometimes without knowing it, sometimes knowing quite well that we are hurting other people. We do not feel that God would want to live with us; we fear what he might say about what we’ve done. We feel alienated, cut off from God.
But the gap that we feel has been bridged. Jesus came to us knowing quite well what we are like, and he wants us to be with him anyway. Jesus tasted death for us so that he might bring “many children to glory” (Hebrews 2:9-10). Revelation 21:7 says that God wants us to be with him in a family relationship. Because of what he has done for us, and what he is doing for us now, Jesus is “not ashamed to call [us] brothers and sisters” (Hebrews 2:10-11).
So what should we be doing now?
In Acts 2:38, Peter tells new believers to repent and to be baptized. In the ritual of baptism, we picture the death of the old self and a new start in life, fresh and clean, connected to Christ.
Those who trust in Christ are led by the Spirit (Galatians 3:2-5). As he opens our minds to understand the good news of salvation, we change the way we’ve been thinking. We turn away from selfish ways; we want the way of God’s love and know that we can life it only if God is living in us.
In faith, we enter a new relationship with God. We stop thinking God is angry at us and start realizing that he loves us. We are given a new life in Christ through the Holy Spirit, through God’s grace and mercy and what Jesus has done for us. The relationship is continued by the Holy Spirit living in us, leading us and changing us as we respond to his lead.
What happens then? We “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18) for the rest of our lives. That’s part of the relationship. We continue learning who God is, what he’s like, and we are brought closer to the image of Christ.
Awesome inheritance
[God] has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who are being protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. (1 Peter 1:3-5)
In the resurrection, we will be given a “spiritual body” that will never die (1 Corinthians 15:44, 54). “Just as we have borne the image of the one of dust [Adam],” says verse 49, “we will also bear the image of the one of heaven [Jesus].” As “children of the resurrection,” we will never die (Luke 20:36).
Eternal life is a good thing, but only if life itself is good. When God’s kingdom comes in its fullness, there will be no more crying or tears (Revelation 21:4). There will be no more sin. Not only will our bodies be transformed, our minds will be as well. We will be in God’s image in the most important way.
Could anything be more wonderful than what the Bible says about God and our relationship with him, a relationship that can begin right now? We will “be like him [Jesus], for we will see him as he is” (1 John 3:2). Revelation 21:3 says that, after Christ returns, “the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them and be their God.”
We will be united with God in holiness, love, perfection, righteousness and spirit. As his immortal children, we will be the family of God in its fullest sense, sharing complete fellowship with him in perfect and everlasting joy. What a marvelous and inspiring message of hope and eternal salvation God has for us!
[1] Pascal wrote: “What else does this craving, and this helplessness, proclaim but that there was once in man a true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace? This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words by God himself” (Pensées, X.148, page 75 in the 1972 Penguin edition).
[2] The word reveal comes from the Greek word apokalypto, meaning to take off the cover—to disclose or reveal. It is the opposite of kalypto, which means to cover up or hide.
[3] Shekinah is a Hebrew word meaning dwelling or presence.
Author: Joseph Tkach; edited by Michael Morrison 2026
