Knowing God.

A good morning with the friends in Coatbridge Baptist Church.  I always enjoy my visits there, as they are such an encouraging group of people and, over the years during which I have been privileged to assist, so many have become personal friends.

This morning, we looked at the difference between knowing about God, and knowing God!  And it's a big difference!  There are many who know a great deal about God, but who have no personal relationship with Him.  And even among those who do have that relationship, many have not worked at deepening, and improving it.

I used, as my illustration this morning, my own marriage, and showed four ways in which I know my wife, and by which we may know God better.  The first of these is that my wife and I entered into a covenant relationship.  Almost 44 years ago, we stood in front of the Rev George B. Duncan and made that special commitment, for life, to one another.  We didn't know each other particularly well at that stage, but we knew enough about one another to be prepared to take that step.  If we wish to know God, we must do the same thing.  Based on what we do know about His love, and grace, and mercy; about His desire that all people be saved; about His wisdom and power; we take the step of commitment that leads us into a covenant relationship with Him.

However, I pointed out that my wife and I also spend time together.  And not just time, but 'quality time'!  If we wish to know God, then we need to do the same.  Not just a rushed 'Quiet Time', with one eye on our Bible, and the other on the clock!  We need to fit our schedules around His, not vice/versa!

We also need to communicate - and to realise that true communication is a two-way affair!  It's not enough or me to do all of the talking, I need to learn to listen to my wife as well and, when I fail to do so, it is usually to my own detriment.  So with God.  If I wish to know Him, I must communicate with Him - reading my Bible; coming before Him in prayer; listening to what He would say to me.  That's something that I can't achieve in a five-minute slot!

Finally, I pointed out that I have borne fruit with my wife.  We have two (now adult) daughters, both of whom we love dearly.  They are the result of the most intimate knowledge of one another that a couple may enjoy.  In my relationship with Father God, I may also bear fruit.  Not the fruit of physical children, of course, but what Paul refers to as "... the fruit of the Spirit [which] is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control;" (Gal 5:22-23).

So, the question is - do you know God; or do you merely know a great deal about Him?  Early in the message, I quoted from J.L.Packer: "A little knowledge of God is worth more than a great deal of knowledge about Him".   It's a thought worth holding.

Do you know Him?!

Marriage - still an honourable institution!

This morning's Today programme, on Radio 4, had an interesting item on marriage. The couple who were "interviewed" have been together for an amazing seventy years (makes my wife's and my forthcoming Ruby Wedding Anniversary seem quite ordinary!). However, getting the 'secret' of such a long marriage out of the Pressmans, was a task beyond even an experienced radio journalist!

For me, the basis of a solid marriage is not only the relationship that the couple have with each other, but the relationship that they have with God. Certainly, in a Christian marriage, the couple enter in to a covenant relationship. This means that God is at the centre; He is the One Who holds the marriage together, even when there are difficulties.

However, a lasting marriage is also hard work. I used to give a book to couples I had married. It was entitled After the Wedding comes the Marriage - an indication that all the glamour of the wedding day may be exactly that; but that marriage isn't all special clothes, a reception, a cake, and a holiday/honeymoon. There is, more for some couples than for others, a 'getting used to each other' phase (I'm working on the old-fashioned, but Christian, basis that the couple haven't been 'living together' for a period prior to the wedding!). Especially for those who have already left the parental home, there is the adjustment of having to share - everything from the bathroom to the television remote control. We may discover habits, and personality quirks that we hadn't noticed even throughout a lengthy period of engagement.

My late dad used to tell me that the first seven years of a marriage were the difficult ones. After that, he would say, you discover that you've already argued over anything worth arguing about - so you just live in peace! I reckon that there was more than a little truth in that piece of 'homespun philosophy'!

However, for the couple who share a living faith in the Lord Jesus, there is that additional 'glue' that helps to see them through the early problems. There will be a clear understanding of the different roles within a marriage - not that one person is 'better', or 'more important' than the other; but that each has his/her complementary part to play. A Christian couple will be aware of the counsel provided through the writings of Paul: "... submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. For wives, this means submit your husbands as to the Lord. For a husband is the head of his wife as Christ is the Head of the church. He is the Saviour of His body, the church. As the church submits to Christ, so you wives should submit to your husbands in everything.

For husbands, this means love your wives, just as Christ loved the church. He gave up His life for her to make her holy and clean, washed by the cleansing of God's word. He did this to present her to Himself as a glorious church without a spot or wrinkle or any other blemish. Instead, she will be holy and without fault. In the same way, husbands ought to love their wives as they love their own bodies. For a man who loves his wife actually shows love for himself. No one hates his own body but feeds and cares for it, just as Christ cares for the church. And we are members of His body.

As the Scriptures say, "A man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one." This is a great mystery, but it is an illustration of the way Christ and the church are one. So again I say, each man must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband." (Eph 5:21-33; NLT)

A friend of mine used to say that a husband who treated his wife in the way that Paul exhorts, would find that she is more than willing to submit to his headship! Maybe that's the real secret of a long and happy marriage!