We will soon have a large range of BOOKS of AW Tozer, all are free to view online.

For now there are just the two following titles:
I Call it Heresy!
The Pursuit of God

But first, an introduction to the man we lovingly know as Tozer who left such a legacy for us all.

"I consider Dr. Tozer the most remarkable man of God that I have known personally. In my opinion, his greatest gifts were prophetic insight regarding biblical truth and the nature and state of the evangelical church of his generation. He was respected highly even by those that considered him severe and aloof but to those who knew him, he was gracious and kind. I believe he was a lonely man, as many great men of God have been."

William F. Bryan
Minister, The Christian and
Missionary Alliance

FORTUNATE IS THE PERSON WHO, when going through a dry period spiritually, has a Tozer book at hand. The commentator who made that: observation may have had in mind The Pursuit of God or The Knowledge of the Holy, A.W. Tozer’s acknowledged spiritual classics. Or he may have been thinking of any one of the nearly forty other books either written by Tozer or created posthumously from his recorded messages. Although A.W. Tozer died in 1963, his spiritual legacy continues to satiate those thirsty for the deep things of God.

Many familiar with the writings of A.W. Tozer know little about the man behind the books. Even during his lifetime most respected him but few understood him. By disposition and design, he walked alone, preferring God’s fellowship to people’s. His relentless pursuit of God - though not without price - accounted for his spiritual strength and resulted in the sustained popularity of his books.

Aiden Wilson Tozer was born April 21, 1897, in La Jose (now Newburg), a tiny farming community in the hills of western Pennsylvania. His mother named him for the storekeeper husband of a close friend from girlhood. He did not like his given names, preferring the initials, "A.W." In later life he preferred just Tozer.

In 1919, five years after his conversion, and without formal theological training, Tozer began forty four years of ministry with The Christian and Missionary Alliance. For thirty one of those years he gained prominence as pastor of Southside Alliance Church in Chicago, serving there from 1928 to 1959. He ministered as a pastor, author, editor, Bible conference speaker, denominational leader and, was to many, a reliable spiritual mentor.

Many regarded him, even during his lifetime, as a twentieth - century prophet. Discerning that modern Christianity was sailing through dense fog, he pointed out the rocks on which it could flounder if it continued its course. When other voices were but empty echoes, his proved to be the voice of God. His spiritual intuition enabled him to scent error, name it for what it was and reject it - all in one decisive act. He could tear to pieces in a few short sentences the faulty arguments of others.

Whether writing or speaking, Tozer always ministered to those hungry for God. He majored on the issues of paramount spiritual importance avoiding religious nonsense and trivia. People went away from his ministry with the haunting sense of just having been in the immediate presence of God.

Looming large in Tozer’s public ministry was his editorship of The Alliance Weekly, the official publication of The Christian and Missionary Alliance. In 1958, The Alliance Weekly became The Alliance Witness, which in turn became Alliance Life in 1987. Under Tozer’s leadership, the magazine’s circulation doubled. Alliance Life, more than any one thing, established Tozer as a spokesman for the Alliance and to the evangelical church at large.

As a man prays

Tozer’s real strength came from his prayer life. He often commented, "As a man prays, so is he." His entire ministry of preaching and writing flowed out of fervent prayer. What he discovered in prayer soon found expression in sermons, articles, editorials and finally in books.

A lively imagination and eloquent descriptive powers gave force and vividness to what Tozer said. He spent hours meticulously preparing sermons that were majestic and profound. He learned to use crisp, precise, climactic sentences. He did not have a strong voice, but his message penetrated the soul. People never forgot what he said.

The discriminating care with which he wrote his books established Tozer as a classic devotional writer. Diligent labor paid off in a style and strength of expression that continually attracted readers.

During the mature years, 1951 - 1959, WMBI - the Moody Bible Institute radio station in Chicago - broadcast a weekly program, "Talks From a Pastor’s Study," originating in Tozer s study at Southside Alliance. As a result, Tozer frequently received invitations to speak at Chicago - area Bible colleges, a ministry of special delight to him.

Throughout his ministry, Tozer issued a persistent call for evangelicals to return to the authentic, biblical positions that characterized the church when it was most faithful to Christ and His Word. Whether analyzing a text or explaining a Bible truth, he always sought to help listeners make the necessary decisions in their spiritual pilgrimages.

A major concern of Tozers was the lack of spirituality among professing Christians of his day. He zeroed in on its primary cause. "I am convinced," he wrote, "that the dearth of great saints in this day is due at least in part to our unwillingness to give sufficient time to the cultivation of the knowledge of God." Speaking about the frenzied pace set by religious leaders leaving no room for unhurried reflection and meditation, he cautioned, "Our religious activities should be ordered in such a way as to leave plenty of time for the cultivation of the fruits of solitude and silence."

While his messages were profound and sober, Tozer’s keen sense of humor added a clever, yet sharp, touch. Contemporaries likened his humor to Will Rogers’s honest homespun wit. Frequently it harked back to the Pennsylvania farm of his youth. Not a storyteller, he used the turn of a phrase, a grotesque simile or a satirical observation to get his point across effectively. Much of his humor was audience - dependent for its effect. Therefore, those who read Tozer will find little of it in his books.

Practice the presence of God

In daily life Tozer’s sense of God enveloped him in reverence and adoration. His preoccupation was to practice the presence of God - to borrow a phrase popularized by mystic Brother Lawrence whom Tozer delighted to read. Reflecting on his relationship with God, Tozer once wrote, "I have found God to be cordial and generous and in every way easy to live with." To him, the love and grace of Jesus Christ was a recurring astonishment.

It is not possible to understand Tozer’s life and ministry apart from his pursuit of God. "Labor that does not spring out of worship," he once wrote, "is futile and can only be wood, hay and stubble in the day that shall try every man’s work."

Tozer’s carefully hammered out convictions about worship dominated everything about him and his ministry. "Worship," he wrote, "is to feel in your heart and express in some appropriate manner a humbling but delightful sense of admiring awe, astonished wonder and overpowering love in the presence of that most ancient Mystery, that Majesty which philosophers call the First Cause but which we call Our Father in Heaven." This gave impetus to his entire life.

Tozer’s hunger for God led him to study the Christian mystics. Their knowledge of God and absorbing love for Him profoundly attracted Tozer. They were spirits kindred to his own. "These people know God," he would say, "and I want to know what they know about God and how they came to know it." He so identified with their struggles and triumphs that people began referring to him, also, as a mystic, a designation to which he never objected.

Tozer’s list of these "friends of God" grew with the years, and nothing delighted him more than to uncover a long forgotten devotional writer. He eagerly introduced these newly discovered mystics to his friends, bringing many of them into public awareness.

Not a perfect man, Tozer had his warts. A reclusive disposition, coupled with the demands of a too - heavy schedule, left little time for his wife, Ada, and his family. As a pastor he had little time or inclination for the individual nurture of his people, relegating those matters to others. Never deliberately nasty or venomous, he occasionally had to apologize to someone he hurt when he popped their balloons of pretense and pomposity.

Tozer remained faithful to His Lord to the very end. Toward the end of his ministry he enlisted his church’s prayers for a personal struggle. "Pray for me, he requested, "in the light of the pressures of our times. Pray that I will be willing to let my Christian experience and Christian standards cost me something right down to the last gasp!"

TOZER - GRAMS

I like a pipe organ in a church, especially where the preacher is a modernist. I enjoy counting the pipes and trying to guess which palm the console is hidden behind while the preacher distills his learned doubts over the congregation.

Samuel Boggs, late head of the Gideons, was a great lay preacher. He used to preach a thought - provoking sermon called, "Unknown Disciples." What a glorious company they were, those heroes and heroines of the Bible, whose deeds were recorded but whose names were not given!

There is another book kept by the One who never slumbers nor forgets, and in that book the anonymous great have their names as well as their deeds recorded. After all, a deed without a name is better than a name without a deed.

It is a dangerous and costly practice to consult men every time we reach a dark spot in the Scriptures. We do not overlook the importance of the gift of teaching to the Church, but we do warn against the habit of taking by blind faith the opinions of men - even good men. A few minutes of earnest prayer will often give more light than hours of reading the commentaries. The best rule is: Go to God first about the meaning of any text. Then consult the teachers. They may have found a grain of wheat you had overlooked.

PRAYER

Lord, I would trust Thee completely; I would be altogether Thine; I would exalt Thee above all. I desire that I may feel no sense of possessing anything outside of Thee. I want constantly to be aware of Thy overshadowing Presence and to hear Thy speaking Voice. I long to live in restful sincerity of heart. I want to live so fully in the Spirit that all my thought may be as sweet incense ascending to Thee and every part of my life may be an act of worship. Therefore I pray in the word of Thy great servant of old, "I beseech Thee so for to cleanse the intent of mine heart with the unspeakable gift of Thy grace, that I may perfectly love Thee and worthily praise Thee." And all this I confidently believe Thou wilt grant me through the merits of Jesus Christ Thy Son. Amen.

"The Sacrament of Living"
The Pursuit of God