When somebody asks you, "Do you know God?" How do you answer? Do you answer firmly "Yes"? Or are you a bit hesitant because you wished you would know God better? Or does this question make you uncomfortable (not so much because of the question itself but maybe more so because you sense the pious zeal of the person asking you that question)? In his book Surprised by Christ, Father James Bernstein – he is the priest at St. Paul Antiochian Orthodox Church in Brier, WA – gives a thoughtful and wonderful answer. I quote his view here at length because I believe that we as Lutherans can agree with his view. Where the author writes "Orthodox," you can insert (in your mind) "Lutheran."

"I have often been asked, 'Do you know God?' [When I was still an evangelical Christian] I usually answered, 'Yes, I know Him and am saved.' Now my answer is different, because for the Orthodox knowing someone is a process. So sometimes I respond, 'I am beginning to know God. We Orthodox believe that knowing God and salvation are both a never-ending process.'

"In a sense we can never completely know God, because we are creatures and He is the Creator. This understanding is very Jewish, because we always understood salvation and knowing God as a lifelong process, never as an instantaneous event. Orthodox Christians are taught that the Son of God, Jesus Christ, can and does know the Father completely because He is the Son by nature, the second Person of the Blessed Trinity. In contrast, we only know God by the gift of grace, and only in a limited sense, as He chooses to reveal Himself to us. So on one hand the Orthodox hold that we do not know nor ever will completely and fully know God. On the other hand, we experience God through the Holy Spirit, His constant love, life, power, grace, attributes, light, energies, and actions as He reveals Himself. Forever beyond our experience is God's essence, which we will never know.

"So in a sense we know God, or more accurately are beginning to know God; in another sense we don't know God, nor ever will. This phenomenon is understandable on a human level when we consider our loved ones." Here, Bernstein notes an example the relationship to his wife to illustrate the point by saying, "I know her attributes, looks, speech, and actions, but I also know her at a deeper level as a person. I know something of her very being. How? Through her love for me, her actions, speech, looks, and attributes. Yet there is much about her that I do not know, nor ever will.

"This is helpful in terms of our life in God. We know God because He loves us and has revealed Himself to us, and yet on another level, we don't know Him. This Orthodox attitude helps us to gain humility and explains from a spiritual perspective why Orthodox don't tell people, 'I know God – and you can know Him, too.' Or worse, 'If you don't know God you are going to hell.'

 "The Orthodox reserve exists precisely because we are just beginning to know Him. And it explains why fundamentalist Christians often appear cocky and proud to the Orthodox. It is not because we don't believe that we can have an authentic relationship with, life in, union and communion with Christ, but because the expression 'I know God' is presumptuous, assuming a depth of knowledge forever hidden from us. This expression tends to undermine the sense of mystery and transcendence of God." - (Quote from A. James Bernstein, Surprised by Christ: My Journey from Judaism to Orthodox Christianity, 2008, pages 286-7.)

Even though we cannot fully know God, we are fully known by God. And this should give us some comfort and assurance that every new day, we live in the presence of God. Every new day is therefore like a new beginning with God. There is just one aspect that I wish to add to Father James: this new beginning we can affirm by remembering our Baptism daily, which, in effect, should become a lifelong habit. Because we are marked with the sign of the cross in Baptism we belong to Christ, forever. This is truly good to know. This is a blessing to know.

Yours in Christ Jesus,
Bjoern E. Meinhardt