The Pursuit of God

The following is from A.W. Tozer's The Pursuit of God. Read it with an open heart and discerning spirit; real work can begin through this.

    Self is the opaque veil that hides the Face of God from us. It can be removed only in spiritual
experience, never by mere instruction. We may as well try to instruct leprosy out of our system. There must
be a work of God in destruction before we are free. We must invite the cross to do its deadly work
within us. We must bring our self-sins to the cross for judgment. We must prepare ourselves for an
ordeal of suffering in some measure like that through which our Saviour passed when He suffered
under Pontius Pilate.
    Let us remember: when we talk of the rending of the veil we are speaking in a figure, and the
thought of it is poetical, almost pleasant; but in actuality there is nothing pleasant about it. In human
experience that veil is made of living spiritual tissue; it is composed of the sentient, quivering stuff
of which our whole beings consist, and to touch it is to touch us where we feel pain. To tear it away
is to injure us, to hurt us and make us bleed. To say otherwise is to make the cross no cross and death
no death at all. It is never fun to die. To rip through the dear and tender stuff of which life is made
can never be anything but deeply painful. Yet that is what the cross did to Jesus and it is what the
cross would do to every man to set him free.
    Let us beware of tinkering with our inner life, hoping ourselves to rend the veil. God must do
everything for us. Our part is to yield and trust. We must confess, forsake, repudiate the self-life, and
then reckon it crucified. But we must be careful to distinguish lazy “acceptance” from the real work
of God. We must insist upon the work being done. We dare not rest content with a neat doctrine of
self-crucifixion. That is to imitate Saul and spare the best of the sheep and the oxen.
    Insist that the work be done in very truth and it will be done. The cross is rough, and it is deadly,
but it is effective. It does not keep its victim hanging there forever. There comes a moment when its
work is finished and the suffering victim dies. After that is resurrection glory and power, and the pain
is forgotten for joy that the veil is taken away and we have entered in actual spiritual experience the
Presence of the living God.

Lord, how excellent are Thy ways, and how devious and dark are the ways of man. Show us how to die, that we may rise again to newness of life. Rend the veil of our self-life from the top down as Thou didst rend the veil of the Temple. We would draw near in full assurance of faith. We would dwell with Thee in daily experience here on this earth so that we may be accustomed to the glory when we enter Thy heaven to dwell with Thee there. In Jesus’ name, Amen.