Session 3 · John 17:1-3
Knowing God
Two ways to know God by experience, not only by information
Book reading: Chapter 2: Knowing God (p. 33)
Jesus makes a startling claim about eternal life in John 17:3: "And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." He is praying to the Father (verses 1-2), and the way he describes life is not a list of beliefs or a place to go. It is knowing.
Benner holds that true self-knowledge must begin with knowing God, and that knowing God at the level of the heart is experiential, not only informational. You can know a lot about someone you have never met. Being in a relationship with them is something else. He also says our knowledge of God rests on God's prior and continuing knowing of us. Scripture lines up with that. Paul tells the Galatians that they have come to know God, or rather to be known by God (Galatians 4:9), and John says we love because he first loved us (1 John 4:19). Our knowing is an answer to being known.
Benner recommends two practices. One is meditating on Jesus through the gospels by entering a scene with your imagination, holding an imagined conversation with him, and staying open to your own reactions rather than analyzing the passage. The other is a daily habit of looking back over your day for God's presence.
Here is a sample scene to try, one of our own choosing: Mark 10:46-52. Blind Bartimaeus sits by the road. He calls out, and people tell him to be quiet. He shouts louder. Jesus stops. Read it once. Then read it again slowly and stand somewhere inside it. Are you in the crowd, beside Bartimaeus, or near Jesus? When Jesus asks in verse 51 what he wants him to do, let that question land on you. What rises up? Fear? Embarrassment? Something you hadn't planned to say? Don't grade the reaction. Just notice it.
One guardrail matters. The Gospel text sets the limits. Imagination is a way to slow down and pay attention to what is written, not a way to add new revelation. Keep Jesus's words and actions where Scripture puts them. If an imagined conversation drifts toward something the Bible contradicts, set that part aside. Afterward, go back to the text and check.
The second practice is simpler. Near bedtime, replay your day slowly. Where might God have been present: a kind word, a hard conversation, a moment of beauty, a nudge you ignored? Psalm 139:7-10 says there is nowhere you can go from God's presence. Looking back is a way of agreeing with that.
Neither practice is meant to make you feel something on cue. If your mind wanders or nothing seems to happen, that is okay. Knowing a person takes time.
Key idea
Benner teaches that knowing God is experiential, not only informational, and that our knowing rests on God's prior knowing of us. Two practices help: entering a Gospel scene by imagination (with the text setting the limits) and looking back over your day for God's presence.
Questions to consider
- Benner says our knowledge of God rests on God's prior and continuing knowing of us. How does John 17:3 or Psalm 139:1-6 change the way you hear that?
- Are you more naturally an analyzer of Scripture or an enterer into it? What might you gain by trying the other approach for a few days, while letting the text set the limits?
Journal prompt
After your Gospel scene, write down one reaction you noticed (fear, relief, resistance, joy) without judging it.
Practice
1. Spend ten minutes with Mark 10:46-52: read it, read it again slowly, and place yourself in the scene. 2. Let Jesus's question in verse 51 be addressed to you, and write down your honest reaction in two or three sentences. 3. Tonight, spend five minutes replaying your day and note two places where God may have been present. Repeat the evening look-back for the next three days.