Intimate Knowledge of God
by Fr. Gus Carter
4/25/05

The ultimate question for each human being is, "Why do I exist?" The old catechism answered the question, "Why did God make you?" "God made me to know him, to love him, to serve him in this life and to be happy with him forever in the next. " We begin our relationship with God by learning about our Creator. It has proven to be difficult to know God only from what the Lord has made. So the Father sent his Son to live among us to teach us what God is like in human terms. In today's Gospel Jesus said, "Whoever has seen me, has seen the Father." The supreme and surest way to know God is through Jesus Christ.

The spiritual masters of the Church have always insisted that we do not want just to know about Jesus. We want to know him personally in the Biblical sense that to know someone is to experience that person. St. Ignatius began his Spiritual Exercises by saying, "It is not much knowledge that fills and satisfies the soul but the intimate understanding and relish of the truth. We come to intimate knowledge of God by experiencing the person of Jesus, by experiencing his humanity in the Gospel.

At this time in the liturgical year of the Church we have been reading passages taken from John's Last Supper Discourse. To know God from this part of the Gospel we must attune ourselves not only to what Jesus says but to the atmosphere he creates in these solemn moments at the end of his life. Jesus knew of the fears of his disciples at this time. He is aware of how upset they will be at his death. His words and actions are full of tenderness and concern for these men he loved.

Jesus began the Last Supper by washing his disciples feet. We must not just observe the washing, we must ask ourselves, "What does all of this mean? What would Jesus be feeling at this time?" How would we feel in such circumstances? It helps us to realize that it was slaves who performed the washing of guests feet at a banquet. No wonder the disciples were surprised. Can we imagine the great love and humility behind Jesus washing the feet of those whom he loved dearly. We reflect on our own feelings as we, in our minds, watch the Son of God clean the dusty feet of mere humans. Here we can experience the humility of God, the divine tenderness, the compassion of the Lord who wants us to realize his love for us. These the are kinds of times in prayer when we come to an intimate understanding of the truth about God. The One who sees Jesus sees the Father.

We can imagine the feelings of Jesus when he says to Philip, "I have been with you for so long. Do you still not know me?" How often are parents discouraged by their children not learning lessons the parents have been trying to teach. Parents can compare their experience to that of Jesus. When Jesus first sent his disciples to preach, they came back enthused from the experience. We can feel Jesus' happiness for them as we are glad for the happy experiences of our friends. Matthew wrote that Jesus had" pity on the crowd for they were like sheep without a shepherd." Our own experiences of compassion for others helps us feel the compassion of Jesus.

Actually, even in Old Testament times Scripture asks us to tune into our own experience as a way of understanding God. The prophet Isaiah, speaking in the name of the Lord, said, "Can a mother forget the child of her womb. But even if she forgets you, I will never forget you." The Lord is portrayed as the groom of Israel. Spouses, reflecting on the best aspects of their married love, can come to some understanding of how God loves them.

St. Teresa of Avila said that one of the ways she prayed was to tune into her own feelings and then be with Jesus when he had similar experiences. When Teresa was discouraged, she remembered Jesus' agony in the garden. How burdensome it would be to carry the weight of human sin. On beautiful springs days she might remember Jesus joy in his resurrection. When people obstructed the good she wanted to do, she recalled the nasty attitude of many Pharisees towards Jesus during his lifetime.

Someone might say, "How do I know how Jesus would feel?" That is one of the benefits of praying with the Gospel. As in any friendship, the more time we spend with a person, the more we understand their reactions to situations. Through our experience of Jesus, we come to an intimate knowledge of our God. The great Jewish mystic, Abraham Heschel, said in his study of the prophets, "They knew God so well that even their emotions reflected God's attitude towards people." Jesus offers us that kind of knowledge of Almighty God.