If you struggle with the notion of "God," you are not alone. While most believe he exists, very few claim to have encountered him, let alone engage him.

Even so called "born again"* Christians and theologians. For most, the notion of God is what can be gained by reading the Bible. God, you see, is contained in a Book, a good book. To have actual contact with, to experience the hard-core reality of the Creator-God, you've got to read that book. You'll find him in there. You don't have the book . . . you can't experience God, you can't know him, you can't feel him or emotionally connect with him.

Really?

For many it seems, the book is "The Great Connector." Without it, you may as well give up. According to them, without the book, you can never know God.

I guess it's a good thing no one told the "early" believers that. For the first 1,400 years after the crucifixion of Jesus, no one but monks and Roman Catholic scholars could read the Bible, and very few of them did so. This is true because of one compelling reason: There were no Bibles. Printing, if already invented by the Chinese, had not produced any Bibles. What Bibles there were, were hand-copied from one to the other. Ever sit down and try to hand-copy a Bible?

So where am I going with this?

Let me enlighten you. God is real, and God is larger than a book. God is larger than THE Book! Have you heard of this Christian motto: "The Bible, the whole Bible, and nothing but the Bible!" I suppose this is good motto as far as it goes. But wouldn't a better one be : "Jesus, all of Jesus, and nothing but Jesus?" God is larger and more meaningful than the meaning and intent of the words written in the book. But how can I say, "God is real" apart from the content the Bible gives us?

I can tell you in the same way that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob could tell you. I can tell you in the same way that Job could tell you. I can tell you in the same way that Samuel, David and Solomon could tell you. I can tell you in the same way that Isaiah, Jeremiah and Daniel could tell you. I can tell you In the same way that Matthew, Mark, Luke and John could tell you. I can tell you in the same way Peter or Paul could tell you. In other words, I can tell you because I have engaged him in real-time experience. I have seen him who invisible through the tangible cement that is faith.

I can tell you in these ways because I have experienced him.

I may not have walked on water with Jesus, but I have walked with him. I walk with him every day, every hour of my life. He is as close to me as my wife and children. Closer. He knows my thoughts better and more intimately. I know him better than I know them. He knows me better than they know me. And to know Jesus, is to know the Creator-God. To know Jesus, is to know the Father. And if I have seen, heard, or otherwise encountered Jesus, I have encountered, I have engaged the Father. I have engaged the Spirit that is God.

Although I have met God in the Bible, what I know of God is not confined to the Bible. The Bible is replete with information about God. And it is more than just "information." The information contained in the Bible is acute and powerful, sharper than anything that cuts, slicing between the soul and the spirit, between the "joints and the marrow," discerning our thoughts and intents. But even more important, even more substantive, even more real is that what I know of God, I know by personal encounter. I know by personal, empirical experience.

And if you cannot say what I have just said, let me tell you categorically, you can know him in this way, too. You can know him at least as well, probably better than I know him. He is waiting for you to know him. He is eager for you to know him, if you do not, or if you are not satisfied with how well you know him. God, in the person of his beloved Son, Jesus, is not just for those men aforementioned. Nor is he just for me. God is for any and all who would seek him, any and all who wish to know him or know him better, any and all who wish to soar with him through life, instead of stumble alone through pain.

So come with me. Come with me and we can experience him together. I am no different than you, but if you don't know him, and you want to know him, I can lead you to him. This I know I can do, because I know him, and I want with all my heart for you to know him, too. This is what I live for. This is why I exist!

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*The term, "Born again," has become so commonplace in religious parlance, as to become pedestrian and inane. That is unfortunate because its seminal import embraces the reality of spiritual rebirth, which is wholly and completely an operation of God. Such a person has been "regenerated" by the Spirit of God. Understood in this way, it is anything but pedestrian and inane. It holds endemic in itself, the greatest meaning on earth.