God is the Seeker

“And he made from one man every nation of mankind
to live on all the face of the earth, having determined
allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place,
that they should seek God, in the hope that they might
feel their way toward him and find him.”
[Acts 17:26-27, ESV]

As it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one;
no one understands; no one seeks for God.
[Romans 3:10-11, ESV]

Who is the seeker in the relationship between God and man? Acts 17 seems to suggest that all men are capable of seeking God, but Romans 3:11 clearly states that no one seeks God.

Whenever we see a lack of harmony between two passages of Scripture we always interpret the less understandable passage in light of the more understandable passages. Or, to say it another way, we interpret the implicit in light of the explicit.

In this instance, Romans 3:11 where Paul is quoting Psalm 14 is very clear: “No one seeks God…” This refers to all humanity apart from faith in Christ.

In the Old Testament as well as the New Testament, whenever God calls people to “seek Him with all their heart,” it is always given to people who have already received His revelation and have a knowledge of the God who calls them to seek Him.

In other words, Israel already knew enough about God to know what it meant to return to Him and “seek” Him. In James 4:8, God exhorts drifting Christians to “draw near to God, and He will draw near to you.”

In contrast, God never tells pagan nations (who have never received His word or a knowledge of who He is) to seek Him; God presents Himself in both the OT and the NT as the ultimate “Seeker” who seeks and saves the lost (John 4:23). He does this according to His own good pleasure.

In Acts 17:26-27 Luke is saying that men have no excuse for not knowing about God because He has revealed Himself in man’s conscience and in the physical world. Apart from the gift of faith all men seek is a god of their own making.

This is why so many lost people are in false religions and cults. Their seeking is not for the one true God, but for a false idea of a god based on their own opinions of what “god” should be.

God’s providential activity as creator, ruler, giver, and controller should move men to seek Him in a natural sense. Reason itself should send them from the greatest effect (the universe) back to the first cause—God.

But so often, they are blind to nature’s witness because they are blind to God. In all that He has done in creating and sustaining the universe, God has revealed Himself to mankind.

Such self-disclosure should encourage men to search for Him and find Him. The natural revelation of God in the human conscience (Rom. 2:14–15) and the physical world leaves all men without excuse (Rom. 1:18ff.), since He is not far from each one of us.

Even those who never heard the gospel are still accountable to God for failing to live up to natural revelation. Had they done so, God would have brought them the special revelation (Scripture) they needed to be saved.

This has been historically documented by countless Christian missionaries who have been sent to lost people groups who were simply responding to the natural revelation they had with obedience.

God brings them the gospel through obedient Christians who preach the Word and spread the gospel around the world. All Christians must obediently spread God’s Word that the lost may be brought to faith in Christ.

With joy in the Seeker,
Pastor Kevin