Pursuing God for His Guidance

Oct 11, 2025 psadmin

After so many half-hearted attempts to know God's will for my life, I decided to begin a careful study of A.W. Tozer's book The Pursuit of God. I had purchased the eBook version for my phone and tablet Bible app over a year ago, but hadn't spent much time in it.

After reading eight of the ten chapters, and not remembering most of what I read (something I tend to do with just about any book I read), I started again. But with a slightly different approach. The version of the book that I'd purchased included a Study Guide for use in both personal and group studies of the book. And so I started again with chapter 1, reading it carefully, highlighting passages that were more significant to me. And since I have a tendency to let my mind wander while I'm reading, whenever I noticed that I didn't remember what I'd just read ... I read it again, making sure I knew exactly what Tozer was saying. After finishing a chapter, I would read it again. Some chapters I read three times in order to absorb all that was said.

The first chapter of The Pursuit of God set the mindset for the rest of the book in a simple but profound statement:

"We pursue God because, and only because, He has first put an urge within us that spurs us to that pursuit."
 
I believe that, because God put the urge to pursue a close relationship with Him in my heart, it follows that He wants me to seek His will for my life!
 
But before I can effectively seek His will, I must draw closer to Him, learn to hear Him as well as speak to Him. Ergo, to converse with Him.
 
The unbeliever will probably not have an accurate concept of what it means to hear God speaking to him. We have to suppose of course that it's entirely possible for Him to speak to any one of us in an audible voice. But I believe that, more common for the modern day believer, we will hear Him speak in a quiet voice, possibly with thoughts that we don't initiate ourselves. 
 
I'm sure the great theologians of our time can phrase it much better. But I'll work on that, since I'm the editor of this page :-). 
 
And so for the past several weeks I've been truly studying A.W. Tozer's book The Pursuit of God. And as I mentioned to a friend, it's my opinion that every believer should read this book. The Christian Church would be literally transformed if we did!