The depth of your knowledge of God is a measure of how much of what there is to know about him is known to you. How detailed is your knowledge of God? Can you describe him with the same level of detail as your earthly father?
It is fairly straightforward to draw a list of God’s character qualities from the scriptures. However, as long as your understanding of the application and interaction of these qualities remains simplistic, being able to list them won’t help you predict how God thinks, feels, or acts. A deeper understanding of what God’s qualities mean is needed to predict his behavior, particularly in how they are practically applied. God is the deepest of all beings.2 A complex being like God cannot be accurately described in simple terms. The simpler your model of God is, the more frequently it will be incorrect.
In order to add detail to your model of God, you have to observe and think about life in higher detail. Low awareness people can be accurately predicted without much consideration of their circumstance because very little of what they do depends on the details of their situation. God’s behavior is optimized across all of reality. He is aware of everything, and accurately predicting what he thinks, feels, and does in a given situation requires knowing a lot about the situation.
The more details with which you fit your model, the more correct that model will be. When thinking, studying, and asking about how God would behave in a given situation, use as much detail as you can. You need to know not just what he would do, think, or feel in general, but in a given situation. You need to know not just what he would do, think, or feel, but what he would not do, think, or feel, and why. For example, when you read that he did a certain thing in the scriptures, ask what about that specific situation made his action the best it could be. Enumerate other options he had and figure out why their long-term net benefit was less than what he chose. Every additional detail you learn in seeking God’s will provides you with a clue to improve your model.
Footnotes
- 1. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away. When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. (1 Corinthians 13:9-12) ↩
- 2. O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out! (Romans 11:33) ↩