"St Paul promises to those who love God not, as we should expect, that they will know Him, but that they will be known by Him (1 Cor. 8:3). It is a strange promise . Does not God know all things at all times? But it is dreadfully reechoed in another passage of the New Testament. There we are warned that it may happen to anyone of us to appear at last before the face of God and hear only the appalling word, "I never knew you. Depart from Me." In some sense, as dark to the intellect as it is unendurable to the feelings, we can be both banished from the presence of Him who is present everywhere and erased from the knowledge of Him who knows all. We can be left utterly and absolutely outside - repelled, exiled, estranged, finally and unspeakably ignored."
- C. S. Lewis, "The Weight of Glory"
Lewis turns a little dark in this section of reflection on glory. Continuing with the last reading of glory as recognition and a type of fame, receiving commendation of God, he goes deeper into this idea. If we love God then we are known by God. Let's expand that section of 1 Corinthians:
"Those who think they know something do not yet know as they ought to know. But whoever loves God is known by God" - 1 Corinthians 8:2,3 NIV
Now some manuscripts report this as:
"Those who think they have knowledge do not yet know as they ought to know. But whoever loves truly knows."
So there can be a little discrepancy and in some sense the second reading fits a more literal thinking if your framework is the traditional Christian concept of God (all the omnis). But that does not negate the first reading if we stick with the idea from last time that if we love God and we continue in the service God has placed us in then we are known as "good and faithful servants".
Lewis' second line of thought though is chilling... that an omniscient, omnipresent God could say to someone "Depart from me. I never knew you." Today I am not here to debate the characteristics of God (maybe I'll do that in a later post where I brush the dust off a paper I wrote for a graduate class in the philosophy of religion and debate myself on what I thought then verses what I think now), so I am just taking what is clearly stated in Scripture. Lewis is pulling his line from Matthew 7:
"Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?' And then will I declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.'"
- Matthew 7:21 - 23 (ESV)
I think of the list of words that Lewis uses in describing this state the most terrifying is "unspeakably ignored". Those in that state are still there, still able to speak, would be heard, but no response. It's terrible when it happens in human relationships. One of the most hurtful situations is to have someone you think of as a friend to ignore you. I cannot imagine what it would be to ignored by God.
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