1 As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. 2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God?
1 O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water.
11 You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.
8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD. 9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.
14 “And these are but the outer fringe of his works; how faint the whisper we hear of him! Who then can understand the thunder of his power?”
15 Then Moses said to him, “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here. 16 How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?” 17 And the LORD said to Moses, “I will do the very thing you have asked, because I am pleased with you and I know you by name.” 18 Then Moses said, “Now show me your glory.” 19 And the LORD said, “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. 20 But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.” 21 Then the LORD said, “There is a place near me where you may stand on a rock. 22 When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by. 23 Then I will remove my hand and you will see my back; but my face must not be seen.”
7 But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8 What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ--the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. 10 I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead. 12 Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 13 Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. 15 All of us who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you. 16 Only let us live up to what we have already attained.
12 “‘Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you,’ declares the LORD.
28 But as for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the Sovereign LORD my refuge; I will tell of all your deeds.
“To know God and love God always produces a longing to know God and love God more. It’s inevitable. For if we really know him in some measure, it implies that he has made himself known to us (Luke 10:21-22; Matthew 16:17). And if we really love him in some measure, it implies that he first loved us (1 John 4:19).” John Bloom
“If you wish to know God, you must know his Word. If you wish to perceive His power, you must see how He works by his Word. If you wish to know His purpose before it comes to pass, you can only discover it by His Word.” C.H. Spurgeon
“For the highest good any of God’s saints will ever experience is to be near God (Psalms 73:28).” John Bloom
“None honors God like the thirst of desire.” Frederick Faber
“You’ll know your heart’s been set aflame by the fire of revival when nothing else matters to you as much as He does – and your love for Him.” Anne Graham Lotz
“I hear some speak or sing about intimacy with God, I sometimes wonder if we grasp what a real experience of intimacy with him is truly like. A dimension of appropriate (biblical) fear often seems lacking. I know the apostle John wrote that ‘perfect love casts out fear’ (1 John 4:18). But fear of condemnation in judgment isn’t the kind of fear I mean. I’m talking about the fear the apostle John experienced when the risen Son of God — the same person on whom John leaned during the Last Supper (John 13:25) — manifested himself to him on Patmos and caused him to ‘[fall] at his feet as though dead’ (Revelation 1:17)....To be intimate with God is to know his mercy, grace, patience, love, faithfulness, and forgiveness, and it is to know God’s severity and wrath against sin with reverent fear.” John Bloom
“This crisis of faith sent grasping hands in search of His loving grip. Wrestling in this wasteland led me to know God in a deeper way. Day by day I came to trust the kind of love that never fails and never leaves. And this same love is yours in Christ too. Even when we’re afraid.” Jolene Underwood
“To encounter the living God is to get a glimpse of the Source of all joy and pleasure (Psalms 16:11), all hope (Romans 15:13), all power (Job 42:1-2; Luke 1:37; Revelation 1:8), and indestructible life (Hebrews 7:16; John 3:16). It is to get a glimpse, in the words of C.S. Lewis, of ‘the place where all the beauty came from’ (Till We Have Faces, 86). And to get such a glimpse, a taste, an apprehension of this magnitude of glory can’t help but leave us longing for more.” John Bloom
“God loves you, and because He loves you, He cares what happens to you. He loves you too much to let you wander aimlessly through life, without meaning or purpose. The Bible says, ‘You will show me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy’ (Psalms 16:11). Covet God’s will for your life more than anything else. To know God’s will – and to do it – is life’s greatest joy.” Billy Graham
“The end of learning is to know God, and out of that knowledge to love Him and imitate Him.” John Milton
“What were we made for? To know God. What aim should we set ourselves in life? To know God. What is the eternal life that Jesus gives? Knowledge of God. What is the best thing in life, bringing more joy, delight, and contentment, than anything else? Knowledge of God. What, of all the states God ever sees man in, gives Him most pleasure? Knowledge of Himself.” J.I. Packer
“Those who know God will be humble. Those who know themselves cannot be proud.” John Trapp
“Jesus wants to do much more with our lives than simply meeting our needs and making us feel better....I am deeply motivated to know God. I want to know Him as He truly is, not through the distorted reflection of those who call themselves by His Name. And I want to make Him known to others as accurately, winsomely, clearly and compellingly as I can.” Anne Graham Lotz
“God is the kindest person in existence, and the most severe. In Christ, he is ‘gentle and lowly’ (Matthew 11:29), and he is ‘the Almighty’ whose wrath is terrifying (Revelation 1:8; 6:15-17). He is ‘a friend of . . . sinners’ (Luke 7:34), but only to ‘those who fear him’ (Psalms 25:14)....His nearness really is our greatest good.” Jon Bloom