Dear Grandkids,
J.I. Packer died a few days ago. I’m sure that you have no idea who he is but you should.
For my generation, he was one of the guys that would be included in the Hebrews 11 Hall of Faith if they were accepting new honorees.
It’s fascinating to watch how God can take tragedy and turn it into triumph. This was certainly the case for Packer. When he was 7 years old he suffered a severe head injury in a collision with a bread van, which caused him to not be able to play sports, so he became interested in reading and writing. This proved to be very fortuitous for the Church. In 1973 he wrote a book called Knowing God which is considered one of the most influential books for evangelicals of the 20th century.
It was definitely an influential book in my life. I became a Christian in 1974 and it was one of the first books I read as a growing new believer. I still have that book on my shelf and wanted to share a few quotes that I underlined (this was before highlighters were widely used).
“How can we turn our knowledge about God into knowledge of God? The rule for doing this is simple but demanding. It is that we turn each Truth that we learn about God into matter for meditation before God, leading to prayer and praise to God.”
“Men who know their God are before anything else men who pray, and their first point where their zeal and energy for God’s glory come to expression is in their prayers.”
“Once you become aware that the main business that you are here for is to know God, most of life’s problems fall into place of their own accord.”
“What makes life worthwhile is having a big enough objective, something which catches our imagination and lays hold of our allegiance; and this the Christian has in a way that no other person has. For what higher, more exalted, and more compelling goal can there be than to know God?”
“Knowing God is a relationship calculated to thrill a man’s heart.”
“The incarnation is in itself an unfathomable mystery, but it makes sense of everything else that the New Testament contains.”
Read the book when you get a chance. I have written you a note on the inside cover of my original copy. Find it on my shelf sometime and read it. My hope is that it will be a blessing to you.
Never forget that you are very loved!
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