Like many others, I am happy to have a good, robust
discussion on what the Bible has to say about certain topics. Unlike some, I
can’t use Hebrew and Greek to back up or oppose many points. However, as I have
delved into the world of various online forums, I have to say I struggle with
the definitive way in which some seem to put their point of view about what the
Bible says. Not that I want this blog to be about what truth is and what is not
and how we might read and interpret the Bible. Far from it. What I would like
to propose, though, is that we can know a stack about God without being any
different, fundamentally, to the person who knows nothing about Him.
I don’t think I am by any means the first to suggest
this. Just the other day, I was reading Oswald Chambers’ My Utmost For His Highest, when I came across this:
“When a man fails
in personal Christian experience, it is nearly always because he has never
received anything. The only sign that a man is saved is that he has received
something from Jesus Christ. Our part as workers for God is to open men’s eyes
that they may turn themselves from darkness to light; but that is not
salvation, that is conversion – the effort of a roused human being. I do not
think it is too sweeping to say that the majority of nominal Christians are of
this order; their eyes are opened, but they have received nothing. Conversion
is not regeneration...When a man is born again, he knows that it is because he
has received something as a gift from Almighty God and not because of his own
decision. People register their vows, and sign their pledges, and determine to
go through, but none of this is salvation. Salvation means that we are brought
to a place where we are able to receive something from God on the authority of
Jesus Christ...”
Another
book I read some time back was Your
Kingdom Come, by Daniel Kolenda, where he states,
"A person who
hears the gospel should have an experience that needs an explanation, not just
an explanation of something that is in need of an experience...And the
demonstration of God’s power should be the norm”.
And I guess from this you can see where I
am heading.
A number of years back I came to the
conclusion that if all I have to offer to others from my faith is a “nice
life”, then I really don’t have much to offer. Many people already have that
and don’t need faith in God to get there. I came to the conclusion that evidence
of the power of God in my life had to be the difference.
This topic also takes me back to
conversations with my father in my mid-twenties. It came to a point where I
felt as though every time we got together, he would be telling me about all
these people who had shown that the Christian faith was a fraud or based on
wrong beliefs and lies. One time, I was tired of it, so I (gently) told him
that I felt as though he was constantly trying to persuade me not to believe
what I believed, but the problem was that he would not be able to. I said that
my relationship and experience of God was not something that I could be talked
out of because it was simply that. My experience. I cannot “un-have” that
experience. For some reason this put an end to those sorts of discussions. I
would like to that it was because he realised my faith was not about following
form and tradition but about a real relationship with God.
And so, I come back to where I started. I
know that the history of the Church over the past few hundred years has
included the battle to prove itself equal to “science”, and hence the desire
for “proof”. However, I will come back again and again to the idea that
experience will always trump a good argument – you cannot take my experience
from me. You may choose not to believe I have had that experience (like a
friend whose two broken wrists were miraculously healed just days after they
were shown as broken on x-rays, and were confirmed healed by the second lot of
x-rays – the doctor simply couldn't cope and told my friend to go away), or you may
like to try to provide more “rational” reasoning of what happened, but I know
differently, because it is my experience.
I also realise that experience is subjective
and can be misinterpreted. However, without personal experience, faith is very
dry. And besides, I further believe that God is faithful to His promise to send His
Holy Spirit to teach and guide us in all things (John 14:16, 26 for example)
and also that His sheep know His voice and follow Him (John 10:4). One of the
biggest arguments for theology and doctrine is the fear of people being led
astray, or leading others astray if they don’t have “good” theology and
doctrine. However, I would argue that this is not particularly good theology.
If God has promised His Holy Spirit, do we not trust Him to convict, teach and
guide His people? Or does He only use (imperfect) human agents now?
I have titled this blog “Is God Real?”,
because sometimes I wonder if for some, their theology is way more important
than God to them. If we only ever talk about God in an abstract, theoretical
way, have we actually been impacted and changed by Him? Tell me about the
reality of God in your life and you give me something I cannot argue with.