Known by God
by Brian Rosner
Just a brief note to say…
Brian Rosner’s Known by God: A Biblical Theology of Personal Identity is personally enriching, biblically robust, theologically sound, and especially accessible to a wide range of readers. Whereas J. I. Packer’s classic Knowing God is a top-down approach, Rosner’s new release is a bottom-up approach showing the significance of knowing ourselves in relation to God. I would rate it right up there with Packer’s work as an invaluable resource, as it fills a gap not always observed. As Rosner opines:
No one would deny the centrality of knowing God to biblical theology. Yet few treatments of the doctrines of God and salvation acknowledge that, as with every relationship, the knowledge of God has two sides: believers know God and are also known by him. Whereas knowing God is the focus of countless academic and popular books and articles, being known by God has been barely noticed.
Rosner’s book makes a considerable contribution at correcting this imbalance in the published literature and readers will readily find it helpful both academically as well as pastorally.
See also my remarks on his shorter work along the same lines.