I was struggling to prioritise spending time with God while at uni and someone I do theology training with told me to buy a daily devotional. She said it was easier to wake up to than diving straight into Kings, which is what we were reading at the time. It seemed like a good option for ‘0 days’ where I had like 5 minutes before rushing out somewhere, or for reading on the bus. But I’m incredible sceptical and I think I expected most daily devotionals to be dry and lifeless. I knew Tozer had a daily devotional. I knew the name, I had read his ‘Knowledge of the Holy’ and that kind of inspiring seemed the kind of thing I wanted a burst of in the morning. I think this book might have changed my life (not to be too awfully dramatic), so it was a good choice.
I have gone on to buy this book for others (big shout out for AbeBooks!) and recommend it to everyone I talk to. The reason it’s so excellent and my main appeal to you to read it is that it persuades you that spending time with Jesus is the most beautiful and worthwhile thing you could be doing with your time and gives you practical tips on how to do that. I have often thought that it is a book that is like drinking salt water. It quenches your thirst for beholding Jesus in a way that leaves you just entirely thirsty to behold Jesus more.
In both charismatic and non-charismatic churches we become content with a very small amount of personal experience of God. Very few of us consistently strive after personal communion with the Holy Spirit, even less of us see it. Yet Tozer’s book makes it feel simple and lovely to spend time with God, to seek his heart, to experience his love, to learn his voice. I feel that Tozer is something of a Christian mystic, in the sense that he sees spiritual experience as a very real part of reality and he encourages us that there is so much more for us that just an intellectual experience of Christianity, or even just intellectual and emotional! His emphasis on cultivating friendship with God, on training our spiritual eyes and ears is so helpful.
Tozer has a great grasp on scripture and he is entirely no-nonsense.
Conclusion? Read it! Read it back to back – I’m currently on my second time round and it’s just as excellent and challenging this time round.
Warning? Tozer’s style is simple and down-to-earth for his time, but it’s an old book and the language hasn’t been updated and so if you aren’t used to reading non-modern books then you’re going to find this to be difficult. My encouragement is to power through and you eventually get used to it, and the language is very beautiful! But this could also stand as an encouragement to anyone looking for a fun project, to rewrite this book as an abridged version in more modern language!
Thoughts for those writing on similar topics:
I don’t know that I have much to say here, other than that cultivating the spiritual life is a topic we need so much more literature on! I would love to read other books that are similarly practical and similarly encourage me to pursue intimacy with God in the day to day. Books that give me a big view of what my relationship with God can and should look like.
Here’s a goodreads link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/210660.The_Pursuit_of_God