September, 2024, MCC Chicago prison
Reading Knowing God (prison, purpose, and being fathered by the truth)
Knowing God by J.I. Packer isn’t a light read. It’s thick, dense, full of theology and weighty truth. Honestly, if I had picked it up during a different season of life, I might have skimmed it or given up less than halfway through.
But I didn’t read this book during an easy season—I read it in prison.
And because of that, the words hit different. I didn’t just read it. I needed it.
The book unpacks the core truths of who God is—not who we imagine Him to be, or what religion sometimes waters Him down to—but the actual character of God as revealed in Scripture. It centers on five basic truths that, if you really let them sink in, can totally rewire how you see yourself, your past, and your purpose:
God has spoken to us and makes us wise to his salvation, through His Word.
God is Lord and King over His (this) world.
God is savior. He is severing love through Jesus, and rescues believers from their sins.
God is triune. All three work together for salvation. The Father purposes redemption, the Son secures it, and the Spirit applies it.
Godliness means responding to God’s revelation in trust and obedience, faith and worship, prayer and praise, submission and service.
I’d heard those words before in church, but they hadn’t always made the 18-inch drop from my head to my heart (it is a much longer distance for me most of the time). I believed in God—but I didn’t really know Him. I didn’t trust Him. I didn’t understand Him. And truthfully, I didn’t think He really wanted anything to do with someone like me.
But this book shook that up.
It showed me that I was made to know God. Not just fear Him or try to earn His approval, but to walk with Him. To be fathered by Him. That’s the language Packer uses, and it struck me because I’ve tried to be my own father for a long time. Tried to be tough, self-reliant, in control, untouchable.
And it didn’t work. It left me tired. Empty. Fake. And eventually, locked up—physically and spiritually.
What Knowing God helped me realize is that I was never meant to carry the weight of my own life on my shoulders. That true freedom doesn’t come from proving myself—but from belonging to a Father who already knows everything about me and still chooses to love me.
Packer digs deep into the meaning of Jesus’ sacrifice, and for the first time, it really hit me just how personal it is. That Jesus didn’t just die for “the world.” He died for me.
For my lies. For my pride. For my selfishness and shame and failures.
That wasn’t just a theological idea anymore—it became my lifeline.
Because if Jesus gave His life to save me, then my life still matters.
If God chose me, then I’m not too far gone.
And if I’m now called a child of God, then I can stop acting like an orphan.
God’s wisdom isn’t always what I want to hear—especially when life hurts, or when consequences are real, or when prayers go unanswered. But it’s so much better than my own. His ways are higher. His thoughts are deeper. And this book helped me stop trying to “figure God out” and start trusting that He’s good—even when I don’t get the full picture yet.
I came to prison thinking I would lose everything. But through Knowing God, I realized I was finally in a place where I could find the one thing that actually matters. Not just information about God. But an actual relationship with Him. Father to son. And that changes everything.
I’m not the man I was. And I’m not yet who I’m becoming.
But I’m being fathered, finally.
And I’m learning, day by day, to know God—and let Him know me back.
