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Tozer: ...try to explain holiness



They say that when Leonardo DaVinci painted his famous Last Supper he had little difficulty with any of it except the faces.

Then he painted the faces in without too much trouble except one. He did not feel himself worthy to paint the face of Jesus. He held off and kept holding off, unwilling to approach it but knowing he must. Then in the impulsive carelessness of despair, he just painted it quickly and let it go. “There is no use,” he said. “I can’t paint Him.”

I feel very much the same way about explaining the holiness of God. I think that same sense of despair is on my heart. There isn’t any use for anybody to try to explain holiness. The greatest speakers on this subject can play their oratorical harps, but it sounds tinny and unreal, and when they are through you’ve listened to music but you haven’t seen God.


Tozer, A. W., & Fessenden, D. E. (2003–). The attributes of God: A jouney into the Father’s heart (Vol. 1, pp. 157–158). Camp Hill, PA: WingSpread.

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