To most people God is an inference, not a reality. He is a deduction from evidence which they consider adequate; but He remains personally unknown to the individual. “He must be,” they say, “therefore we believe He is.” Others do not go even so far as this; they know of Him only by hearsay. They have never bothered to think the matter out for themselves, but have heard about Him from others, and have put belief in Him into the back of their minds along with the various odds and ends that make up their total creed. . . . These notions about God are many and varied, but they who hold them have one thing in common: they do not know God in personal experience. The possibility of intimate acquaintance with Him has not entered their minds. . . . Christians, to be sure, go further than this, at least in theory. . . . This is admitted, I say, in theory, but for millions of Christians, nevertheless, God is no more real that He is to the non-Christian. They go through life trying to love an ideal and be loyal to a mere principle.

– A. W. Tozer

1897 – 1963