In this second chapter of The Wonderful Works of God, Herman Bavinck explores one of the most profound truths of Christian faith: to know God is to live. This knowledge is not cold information or abstract theology—it is the beating heart of salvation, the purpose for which we were created, and the joy that fills eternity.
From Creation to Consummation: Humanity’s Purpose
The Bible begins with humanity created in God’s image so that we might know, love, and live with Him forever. It ends with the redeemed seeing God face to face in the New Jerusalem. Between these two bookends lies the unfolding story of God revealing Himself—a revelation summarized in the covenant promise: “I will be your God, and you shall be My people.”
This promise finds its fulfillment in Jesus Christ, “Immanuel, God with us.” In Him, God does not simply speak to us—He gives Himself to us. To behold Christ is to behold the fullness of God’s truth and grace.
A Faith That Confesses: “Thou Art Our God”
Bavinck emphasizes that true religion is not a system of concepts but a living confession. The prophets, apostles, and saints of Scripture didn’t analyze God as an idea; they walked with Him as a reality. Their language—calling God a Shepherd, Rock, Refuge, and Father—rose from experience, not speculation.
For them, every blessing in creation pointed beyond itself to God as the fountain of all good. As David declared, “I say to the Lord, ‘You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.’” (Psalm 16:2). This is the cry of every heart awakened by grace: God is not just the giver of good things—He is the Good Himself.
What Kind of Knowledge Is This?
When Jesus prayed, “And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” (John 17:3), He revealed the essence of salvation. Bavinck unpacks this “knowledge” as something categorically different from all other knowledge.
1. Its Origin — Christ Alone Reveals the Father
The knowledge of God begins and ends with Christ. Bavinck insists that it does not arise “by reason of our own insight and judgment,” but is wholly a gift of grace. Christ alone “knew the Father,” for He was with God from the beginning, “lay in His bosom,” and “saw Him face to face.” Because the Son shares the Father’s own nature, attributes, and knowledge, no one else can reveal God as He does.
That is why Bavinck calls Christ both God expressed and God given. He is the living Word who became flesh to “declare the Father to us,” not by philosophy or speculation, but through His words, works, and very person. Jesus never acted apart from the Father’s will; “whoever saw Him saw the Father also.” To know God, then, is not to climb upward by intellect or imagination, but to receive the revelation that has descended to us in the Son of God. As Bavinck says, “Christ has caused us to know the Father.”
2. Its Object — The Infinite, Living God
The second distinction Bavinck draws is about what we come to know. All human knowledge, he writes, “revolves around the creature,” confined to what is visible, measurable, and temporary. Even when we learn something of God from nature, that knowledge is “slight, obscured, mingled with error.” For fallen humanity, the world both reveals and conceals God.
Yet in Christ, the object of our knowledge is not creation but the Creator Himself—“the one, true God.” Here Bavinck’s language becomes reverent and awed: how can man, “whose breath is in his nostrils,” know “the Infinite and Incomprehensible One, who dwells in unapproachable light”? The answer is that we cannot, unless God Himself makes it possible. And this He has done in Christ, who “has seen the Father and declared Him to us.” Thus, the unfathomable God becomes known not by human ascent but by divine condescension. At the cross the ancient faith of Israel shines in full: “Gracious and merciful is the Lord God, longsuffering and abundant in goodness.” In seeing Christ, we behold that very glory.
3. Its Essence — Personal, Not Theoretical
The third mark of this knowledge is its essence—it is not “mere information but a real knowing.” Bavinck contrasts knowing about God with knowing God Himself. One can have descriptions, concepts, even orthodox doctrine, and yet remain untouched by the living reality. Such information, he says, “is an affair of the head only.” Real knowing involves “personal concern and involvement and an activity of the heart.”
This is why Bavinck calls it “the knowledge of faith.” It is not the product of “scientific study and reflection,” but of childlike trust—a faith that is both “a sure knowledge and a firm confidence.” To know God is to love Him; the measure of our knowledge is the measure of our affection. “God is known in proportion to the extent that He is loved,” Bavinck writes. This is not theory but relationship, not abstraction but communion. It is the kind of knowledge Jesus Himself had—born of sight, love, and obedience. When belief, love, and action are one, then we truly know God.
4. Its Effect — Life Eternal
Finally, Bavinck turns to the fruit of this knowledge—its effect. The knowledge of God, he says, “is nothing less than eternal life.” Unlike all other knowledge, which ends in weariness or death, this knowing brings joy and immortality. Human wisdom may deepen experience but cannot overcome mortality; “the life of the scholar and the life of the simple man must both end in death.” But the knowledge of God is different, because its object is the living God Himself.
“If the knowledge of visible things can enrich life,” Bavinck reasons, “how much more will the knowledge of God make for life?” For God is not “a God of the dead but of the living.” In Christ, those who know Him are raised above death and decay, because they are united to the One who is Life itself. This knowledge is not merely a means to an end—it is the eternal life Christ promised: “He that believes on Me, though he were dead, shall live.” Knowing God in Christ is to share already in the joy and blessedness of the world to come.
Theology as Worship
For Bavinck, this truth reshapes our view of theology itself. Theology is not a cold science of words and systems but a living act of worship. True theology, he writes, “speaks out of God, through God, about God”—and always to His glory.
That’s why both the Genevan and Westminster Catechisms begin with the same great question:
What is the chief end of man?
To know God, glorify Him, and enjoy Him forever.
This is not merely the goal of theology—it is the goal of life.