This is another installment in a series that has been adapted from my 11-part CD teaching series on A. W. Tozer’s spiritual classic, The Pursuit of God.

First Things First

Before God created mankind on the earth, he created a world of very useful and pleasant things for our sustenance and for our delight. These pleasant things were meant to be external to us, beneficial for us, and governed by us. But they were never meant to dominate us. Tozer writes, “In the deep heart of man was a shrine where none but God was worthy to come. Within him was God; without, a thousand gifts which God had showered upon him. But the problem began when as a result of our sin God was forced out of his central shrine and these created things were permitted to inhabit that deep and most holy of holy places.”

As people began to pursue the things from God over God himself, the peace that existed inside and between men and women was absent. As Thomas Merton so relevantly states, “We are not at peace with one another because we are not at peace with ourselves. And we are not at peace with ourselves because we are not at peace with God.” Once sin severed the bond between God and us, the break extended all the way down the entire length of the created chain: broken souls, broken hearts, broken minds, broken bodies, broken relationships, and broken trust with the rest of creation.

And so, apart from peace with the living God, no one has any hope of regaining peace within, or peace between, or peace beyond. About this loss of peace, Tozer writes, “There is within the human heart a tough fibrous root of fallen life whose nature is to possess, always to possess. It covets things with a deep and fierce passion. The pronouns ‘my’ and ‘mine’ look innocent enough in print but their constant and universal use is significant.” Those innocent looking pronouns reveal how deep and expansive our disease really is. We rudely ask God to vacate his rightful place in our hearts, in order to make room for all of the loot we amass. And then we wonder where the peace on earth went?

That’s why the great commandments are ordered as to a first and a second one: The first is “To love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind;” and the second is “To love your neighbor as yourself.” The vertical relationship with God is to be the first priority, but it cannot and should not be separated from the second priority. Our primary focus is to become God-centered, having peace with him through the blood of Jesus Christ. And then, having been reconnected to our source of life, our souls now possess the power to become other-centered, able to make peace with each other.

• Memorize the Thomas Merton statement: “We are not at peace with one another because we are not at peace with ourselves. And we are not at peace with ourselves because we are not at peace with God.”