The Wickedness of Unbelief: Making God a Liar

                                          By A. W. Tozer

            . . .He that believeth not God hath made Him a liar,
             because he believeth not the record that God gave
             of his Son.                                               1 John 5:10

                 True faith must always rest upon what God is, so it is of
             utmost importance that, to the limit of our comprehension,
             we know what He is.

                 The psalmist said: "They that know thy name will put
             their trust in Thee," the name of God being the verbal
             expression of His character, and confidence always rises
             or falls with known character.

                 What the psalmist said was simply that they who
             know God to be the kind of God He is, will put their
             confidence in Him! This is not a special virtue, but the
             normal direction any mind takes when confronted with
             the fact.  We are so made that we trust good character
             and distrust its opposite, and that is why unbelief is so
             intensely wicked!

                 The character of God, then, is the Christian's final
             ground of assurance and the solution of many, if not
             most, of his practical religious problems.

                 Though God dwells in the center of eternal mystery,
             there need be no uncertainty about how He will act in
             any situation covered by His promises. These promises
             are infallible predictions. God will always do what He
             has promised to do when His conditions are met. And
             His warnings are no less predictive: "The ungodly shall
             not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congrega-
             tion of the righteous"  Ps. 1:5.

                 We cultivate our knowledge of God and at the same
             time cultivate our faith. Yet while so doing we look not
             at our faith but at Christ, its author and finisher!

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            Yours in Christ,
             Paul N. F.