Thirty-five years ago, the first edition of J. I. Packer’s Knowing God was published. Being only seven years old at the time, I didn’t read it. In the past few years, since being irresistibly drawn to Reformed theology, I’ve read enough quotes from this book to make actually reading it seem redundant. Nevertheless, I finally obtained a copy earlier this year, and yesterday I cracked it open for the first time.

Packer begins Chapter One, The Study of God, quoting Charles Spurgeon on the the supremacy of the study of God over all other pursuits.

It has been said by someone that “the proper study of mankind is man.” I will not oppose the idea, but I believe it is equally true that the proper study of God’s elect is God; the proper study of a Christian is the Godhead. The highest science, the loftiest speculation, the mightiest philosophy, which can ever engage the attention of a child of God, is the name, the nature, the person, the work, the doings, and the existence of the great God whom he calls his Father.

—Charles Spurgeon, quoted in J. I. Packer, Knowing God (InterVarsity Press, 1993), 17.