Snyder James L. - The life of A.W. Tozer : in pursuit of God

2009 James L. Snyder

Published by Bethany House Publishers
11400 Hampshire Avenue South
Bloomington, Minnesota 55438
www.bethanyhouse.com

Bethany House Publishers is a division of
Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan.
www.bakerpublishinggroup.com

Bethany House Publishers edition published 2014

ISBN 978-1-4412-6720-7

Previously published by Regal Books

Ebook edition originally created 2011

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meansfor example, electronic, photocopy, recordingwithout the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.

Other version used is: KJVKing James Version. Authorized King James Version.

Photos courtesy of the Christian & Missionary Alliance archives.

by Gary M. Benedict

by Leonard Ravenhill

In a time when there seems to be no end to the number of books published, most are of little enduring value. However, a book about A. W. Tozer is in a category by itself. No matter how often I read the same words, Tozers message always speaks to my heart in a fresh way.

While some writers serve a niche, a denomination or even a generation, few impact the Kingdom to the extent that Tozer has. His roots and development were within the Alliance family, yet today he belongs to all Christians. Few authors have demonstrated such a profound impact as this man and his writings.

Tozer has a gift to make the complex simple and the simple profound. He holds nothing back as he exhorts and encourages us to walk so as to bring glory to our God and Savior. His communication is simple eloquence spoken from his heart to ours. In his own words, What I believe about God is the most important thing about me.

The Life of A. W. Tozer: In Pursuit of God gives a behind-the-scenes look at the man and his message. We see God at work with hammer and chisel to shape Tozers life into a vessel capable of influencing all who desire to walk with God. No single author has influenced me personally more than A. W. Tozer. I thank God for his influence on my life.

Gary M. Benedict
PRESIDENT, THE CHRISTIAN AND
MISSIONARY ALLIANCE

I am often asked, Was Dr. Tozer the greatest preacher you ever heard? No, but he redeemed the time and hence had an intimacy with God beyond any other man I ever met. He was a modern mystic who had given priority to the lost art of meditation. To enter into Dr. Tozers presence was an awe-inspiring event.

He was not just a prominent author but also an eminent one. His writings still reflect the anointed ability to speak to the present need of mens hearts. He could articulate wisdom in an amazing economy of words. On one occasion he said to me:

I have to account to God not only for what I have done, but for why I did it.

His most memorable words to me: There are occasions when for hours I lay prostrate before God without saying a word of prayer or a word of praiseI just gaze on Him and worship.

I advise every Bible student with whom I have contact by phone or by letter or in person: Buy all the books Dr. A. W. Tozer has written and digest them.

To know Dr. Tozer was a great blessing. To pray with him was to be in the Holy Place!

Leonard Ravenhill
EVANGELIST (19071994)

Anyone who picks up the biographers pen enters into sacred territory. Chronicling the life of a person demands the strictest of discipline. To take a persons life in your hand and present it to the public carries with it a great deal of responsibility for the simple reason that many peoples ideas and conclusions about the subject will be made because of your efforts. To lead the reader to a wrong conclusion is the unpardonable sin of the biographer.

Of all writers, the Christian biographer should be the most truthful, and present to the best of his ability the fundamental facts of a persons life. Unfortunately, the public, including the Christian public, has developed an appetite for celebrity. More often than not, a biography is simply celebrity propaganda. And this is true even in the Christian realm.

The Christian reading public is just as interested in celebrities as the secular world. There is not a large audience for a biography of just a good person. A person has to be great for his biography to be read by a large readership. Even more important, if that person is a celebrity, according to the definition propagated by the secular world, the book will sell.

The biographer is tempted to turn his subject into some kind of a celebrity in order to gain a readership. But to try to turn A. W. Tozer into a Christian celebrity would surely invoke the wrath of that holy man of God, not to mention promote a total misunderstanding of the man. The biographer has the awesome responsibility to understand the subject of his biographical muse, present him as accurately as possible and not violate the subjects integrity.

Understanding the man gives depth to appreciating his ministry. To separate the man from his ministry is to create an apparition, and consequently misconstrue his ministry. To be truthful about all of this, the man defines the ministry, not the other way around. It is not the ministry that makes the man. Out of his relationship with God flows a ministry under the control of the Holy Spirit. Dr. Tozer once made this observation: Work that does not flow from worship is not spiritual work. He was emphatic that everything we do must flow out of our worship of God.

To understand the continued and far-reaching ministry of Dr. A. W. Tozer, we need to understand who he was, including his relationship with God.

During his lifetime, Dr. A. W. Tozer spoke often to Christian writers groups on a variety of subjects related to the art and craft of writing. Because Tozer was a recognized biographer himself, he often was invited to speak on the subject of writing Christian biography. Tozer wrote the biographies of Dr. A. B. Simpson and Reverend Robert A. Jaffrey (missionary to China); both were influential leaders in the Christian and Missionary Alliance, of which Tozer was a member.

It would be great to have an audio copy of his talks on writing Christian biography, but I have yet to discover any. What I do have are the notes he used for these talks. The biographer has to take what he can find and use it to the best advantage possible.