Consider This:
We can know a great deal ABOUT someone
without really KNOWING them.
How do we come to “know” what we know about God?
Usually, we think of “knowing” as acquired information: the facts, processes and words describing the things in our lives. For example, we “know” …
Our email address and phone number.
That 2+2=4.
What day of the week it will be tomorrow.
This is RATIONAL knowledge. It’s usually informational, and it fits well into sequence, order and analysis. It’s concrete and well-defined, giving us certainty and clarity. Rational knowledge “checks a box” in our thinking, providing a sense of closure and arrival. It also has practical utility: We can use it to accomplish what we have in mind.
Rational knowledge is like
the hiking map.
A second—and very different—way of “knowing” is INTUITIVE knowledge. It’s deep and resonant. For example, we “know” …
Our dog thinks we’re the most important human in the world.
How small we are after staring at an amazing sunset or experiencing the awe of seeing the Grand Canyon for the first time.
We’re in love—and whether (or not) we are being loved.
THAT we know intuitively is evident, but HOW we know intuitively is not. Intuitive knowledge often has an experiential component, but it’s more than just having an experience. We can’t easily put this knowledge into words—and often it’s paradoxical or open to interpretation. It has a timeless, infinite quality—like it hasn’t yet “arrived” … and it doesn’t really want to.
Intuitive knowledge is like
the hiking experience.
Interestingly, rational and intuitive knowledge align closely with how our brains work. The right hemisphere tends to see things broadly, contextually and relationally, while the left hemisphere tends to see details, categories and explanations.
Meaning: God designed us so that we’d practice both ways of knowing. The question is, in our thinking habits:
Are we knowing
the way God designed us to?
Knowing in the New Testament
We can see this intuitive/rational distinction in two Greek words used in the New Testament: eidō (pronounced EYE-doh) and ginōskō (gi-NOH-skoh).1
Eidō reflects rational thinking: consciously recognizing, acknowledging or possessing clear understanding. For example:
“We do not know what we ought to pray for” (Rom. 8.26) — The Spirit intercedes for us when we don’t have specific knowledge to voice in prayer.
“Keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come.” (Mt. 24.42) — Only the Father explicitly knows the exact day of Jesus’ return.
“When you did not know God, you were slaves to those who by nature are not gods” (Gal. 4.8) — Before coming to faith, the Galatians had no clear knowledge of God.
Conversely, ginōskō reflects intuitive thinking: knowing through experience in ways that can’t be explained or contained. For example:
“I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me” (Jn. 10.14) — Jesus’ flock has spent intimate relational time with him through a variety of circumstances, and has come to trust him.
“We have come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God” (Jn. 6.69) — Peter’s knowledge of Jesus’ identity was based on his eye-witness relationship with him and his ministry.
“I want to know Christ—the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings …” (Phil. 3.10) — Paul desired more than cognitive information about Jesus, he wanted the fullest and most intimate relationship with him.
Substitute Knowledge
The great danger facing the church is that we substitute rational knowledge (eidō) for intuitive knowledge (ginōskō). In other words,
We think that knowing ABOUT God
is the same as KNOWING God.
And while we might rationally deny we believe this, our behavior and thinking habits indicate otherwise. Like our society as a whole, we have unknowingly fallen into the trap of leaning more on rational understanding than intuitive.
Consider how our rational knowledge about God …
Is clear, organized, defined and certain.
Is so highly accessible and consumable.
Is available on demand, at the time, place and manner of our choosing.
It’s easy to embrace the mindset that God can be … described.
It’s convenient to worship a God
we’ve reduced to what we can define.
When we do worship this definable God, we make rational knowledge the focus of our attention. We create frameworks to relate to God.
This is where it starts getting wonky.
Down the Rabbit Hole We Go
Our rationally-based frameworks become real and tangible—trustworthy. We assume that because they are God-oriented, trusting them is equivalent to trusting God himself. We start leaning on them when we could (and should) be trusting God (see Prov. 3.5-6).
We look for resources that align with our frameworks. We listen to the influencers that support the priorities of our frameworks—creating an echo chamber of sorts built from our framework.
As if that weren’t dangerous enough, we develop a sense of control over our frameworks. We dictate their boundaries and scope. We determine how to apply the knowledge we gain. We start measuring ourselves (and each other) by how well we apply our rational knowledge.
Ultimately, we expect God to operate within our frameworks—rather than us operating within his.
The digression is subtle. What we intended as a tool to help us understand God becomes the lens through which we see him.
Instead of God shaping our understanding,
our understanding shapes God.
The biblical description of this rabbit-hole of thinking—putting our trust in the God-things we control—is, soberingly, idolatry. It’s our own golden calf:
“These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.”
(Exod. 32.4)
Just to be clear: Having rational frameworks that explain God isn’t the problem. After all, some frameworks are necessary to live an obedient life of faith.
The problem comes when we don’t know how to use them according to how God designed us to know.
God’s Design for Knowing
In short, this comes down to two foundational principles:
We need both intuitive and rational knowledge.
Intuitive knowledge provides the context and meaning for rational knowledge.
Imagine hiking in an area you’ve never been before. Rational knowledge is like your hiking map, and intuitive knowledge is like the activity of hiking.
The map orients you to the terrain, hills, trees and meadows. It keeps you from getting lost or overwhelmed. But the map can only represent reality; it’s not the reality itself. It can’t provide what the interaction with can.
At the same time, hiking without orientation in unfamiliar surroundings can be exasperating. The trail you’re walking on can give some insight on where to go, but it can’t provide the definition the map does.
Knowing rationally and intuitively are both necessary, but they’re necessary in different and opposing ways:
Intuitive Knowledge is our who and why
—
Rational Knowledge is our what, where, when and how
Knowing Intuitively connects us with a reality beyond ourselves
—
Knowing Rationally gives us agency within that reality
Intuitive Knowledge “sees the forest,” the coherent ecosystem
—
Rational Knowledge “sees the tree,” apart from its ecosystem context
They function as a dyad, each relying on the other to achieve fullness of their knowledge potential—and each is incomplete without the other.
Intuitive knowledge connects us to the reality beyond ourselves (including God and other people). Not just knowing about this reality, but actually knowing it.2 This includes comprehending that we are known by someone outside ourselves—an experience so vital that without it we can’t flourish and may not even survive.3
Rational knowledge connects us to living in our reality. It makes our intuitive knowledge tangible and executable. It allows us to interact with and influence our environment and the relationships in it.4
So …
Without rational knowledge, intuitive knowledge is nonsensically mysterious.
It lacks organization, correlation and application.Without intuitive knowledge, rational knowledge is lifelessly void of meaning.
It’s colorless and flat. It’s fragmented … it won’t integrate into a coherent whole.
God uses both—but HOW he uses both is important to grasp. As a general principle, knowledge about God comes initially intuitively (and unconsciously), and is then rationally (consciously) refined, clarified, specified and grasped.5
This makes the sequence of our thinking habits significant:
Seek God, relate to him, trust and know him first intuitively, then …
Let that experience become the compass, the unifying factor, the lens for building rational knowledge about him.
The Either-Or Trap
As I’ve talked about knowing intuitively and rationally, the responses I get reveal a tendency to see this topic from a binary perspective. In other words,
instead of thinking
intuitive “AND” rational knowledge,
we think
intuitive “VERSES” rational knowledge.
We struggle to see them as integrated, and so move toward prioritizing one over the other. I frequently hear some version of responses like:
“I hear what you’re saying about intuitive thinking, but we have to maintain the authority and truth of God’s word.”
Or from the other perspective:
“Yes! We just need to let go and let God.”
This polarization reflects what might be our biggest hurdle: Trusting in an integrated approach to knowing. Knowing intuitively and knowing rationally are in no way exclusive of each other—no more than the Jesus is exclusive of the Father or the Spirit is exclusive of Jesus.
That either-or tension you may be sensing is an indication of how far Western thinking patterns have drifted over the hundreds of years of its existence … and how it’s impacted the way the church “knows” God.
So What?
Perhaps the best place to begin is to move into a season where we dedicate ourselves to the practice of hearing God. I have two things I would offer as starting points.
First is a previous article (and the follow-up articles) on hearing God. Here’s a link to it:
Second, I’ve created content for an interactive, 3-session, online group cohort that walks through reorienting our thinking and establishing the new habits around hearing God as a life practice and discipline. Please DM me to learn more.
Peace be with you …
Agree? Disagree?
I’m eager to know your thoughts and
kick this content around with you.
Leave a comment or message me to discuss.
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Footnotes
Eidō and ginōskō aren’t the only two options. Interestingly, I’ve discovered 65 different Greek words that capture the many nuances of “knowing,” either rationally, intuitively, or both.
This is a major theme in God’s relationship with his people. As a sample of this theme, consider Job 28.28: “The fear of the Lord—that is wisdom.” Intimate ginōskō knowledge of God IS wisdom, the foundation for effective living.
This is a far-reaching and practical reality. Evidence includes the landmark 1945 study on infants who were withheld from experiencing consistent, affectionate human interaction, as well as more recent attachment studies on the emotional disorders stemming from unhealthy and inconsistent interaction with primary caregivers in the first few years of life. See René A. Spitz, “Hospitalism: An Inquiry into the Genesis of Psychiatric Conditions in Early Childhood,” The Psychoanalytic Study of the Child 1 (1945), and Allan Schore, The Right Brain and the Origin of Human Nature. United States: W. W. Norton, 2025. See also Hartmut Rosa, Resonance: A Sociology of Our Relationship to the World. United Kingdom: Polity Press, 2019.
Intuitive truth will never contradict the rational truth we get from the Scriptures. Intuitive truth is the implicit knowledge that the Scriptures then explicitly define and organize.
Explaining this claim would take more time and focus away from the main point of this article. But it is straightforward to do so, using both biblical sources and neurological and physiological studies of how our brains function. I’m happy to walk through these, if there is interest or concern.