More Than Just Feelings

One of the objections I commonly encounter when talking about experiential Christianity is that it is “all about feelings.” People equate experienced interaction with God with feelings of joy and peace, inner promptings, words of knowledge etc. But this is a serious misunderstanding.

I mentioned in the last posting that experiential Christianity is really about “walking with God.” It differs from theoretical Christianity, or historical Christianity, which is essentially just a thing of the mind. Experiential Christianity is about living with God – interacting with him as we see the characters of the Bible doing so, especially the writers of the Psalms in the Old Testament. Their God was real, personally present, and able to be approached. They experienced God in their lives in response to their prayers. He was “a very present help” to them in their troubles (Ps. 46:1 A.V.).

That kind of spirituality can’t be dismissed as purely emotional or subjective. True, the emotions of people are deeply involved in their daily experiences of life with God. They cry to him in distresses that are real – situations that have rubbed their emotions raw – and their responses to God’s grace and mercy involve profound feelings of joy and gratitude. It would be totally wrong to suggest that living with God is “unemotional.” We were created emotional beings, and our emotions are perfected as we walk with Christ and become more like him.

But it is another thing altogether to suppose that our relationship with God is based on emotion – that is, upon feelings, promptings, and urges that we experience within ourselves. That’s dangerous territory – the realm of mysticism. True, there is a subjective element of the Spirit’s influence in our minds and hearts that registers in us as deeply felt awareness and impression, and we will explore this some other time. But that reality doesn’t mean that our lives are based on our feelings, or our inner impulses.

True experiential spirituality is based on what God reveals of himself in the Bible. It’s an intimate, interpersonal fellowship with him. We relate to him as he has made himself known and in the ways that he has made known. The fact that in the course of that we experience deep feelings (see Psalm 84 for example, and passages such as 1 Thessalonians 1:6 and Romans 14:17), doesn’t mean that experienced spirituality is in itself only a matter of feelings.

Experiential Spirituality

The kind of “living in Christ” patterned by Jesus in his relationship with his Father belongs to the experiential side of Christian spirituality. That is to say, it belongs to the practical, living-out-in-life side of our relationship with God.

Author and theologian J.I. Packer has commented that evangelicals today are “less sure-footed” in this dimension of Christian living than were their forebears. Evangelical Christians have focused on knowledge and doctrine and the Bible, resulting in a strong cognitive or intellectual dimension to their faith. For many, the Christian life is largely a matter of knowing the Bible and applying it to daily life.

That’s all very well and good. But one aspect of the “truth” that evangelicals warmly embrace is the fact that God is a personal being who desires our love, worship and fellowship. The goal of theology is really to know God in this kind of way. To put it another way, the ultimate aim of informed evangelicals is to “walk with God”. And that inevitably brings us into the realm of experiential Christianity – the experience of knowing God in the practicalities of everyday life.

One reason why many are hesitant in this area is the fact that experienced relationship with God brings us into the realm of interaction with him. We call upon God, and he hears us and draws near to us. He is a dynamic and living reality in daily life. That necessarily supposes that he will guide us and comfort us – and yes, even “speak to us.” And it is that in particular that makes many evangelical Christians wary. Such “experiences” of God at work in our lives appear to threaten the sufficiency of Scripture. As evangelicals we firmly believe that the written Scriptures are complete and totally sufficient for every aspect of life and godliness. That to our mind, rules out any possibility of more direct, personal communications between God and us on a daily basis.

I wholeheartedly concur that the Scriptures are complete and sufficient. But in what sense is that true? We confess that they are a complete record of all that God wants to tell us about himself and his redemptive work in Christ. They take us from the beginning of the works of God in creation to their consummation in the new heaven and earth. There is nothing more we need to know about what God has done, is doing, and will do in his redemptive work in Christ. And all we need to know to live in covenant with God as his redeemed people is made plain in the writings of the law, the prophets, the gospels and the epistles. In that sense the Scriptures are finished and totally sufficient. We need nothing else.

But if the Scriptures reveal anything, they reveal that the true and living God is personal and relates to those who are in covenant fellowship with him. The spirituality of the Bible is not an impersonal spirituality of living by doctrines and rules contained in a book. Abraham and David, John and Paul lived in intimate personal fellowship with God. God’s self-disclosure, be it through theophany, vision, dream, prophecy or through the incarnation of his Son, was always to the end that we might know him and respond to him. He has even come to live within us through the Spirit in this new covenant age. By means of his word, the Spirit draws us into and sustains us in living fellowship with the Father and his Son.

That necessarily means that true Christianity is ultimately experiential in character – it involves experienced relationship with God.

Living in Christ in Action

The past few days I've been caught up in effects of the violent storms that have been rocking the south-eastern part of Southland. Farmers in our district have been particularly hard hit with lamb and ewe losses - the lambs from exposure and the ewes from milk fever. Everyone has suffered major losses. 

Pastorally, its been like trying to deal with grief on a large scale. The farmers and their families have been grieving over what has been happening. It's not that they treat their animals as though they were human; they just care for them, and hate to see them suffering and dying.

Venturing out into that world of anguish has been a challenge. The last thing I've wanted to do is to intrude, or to offer trite-sounding (howbeit, biblical) comfort. Frankly its the kind of situation that an introvert like me shrinks from. Nevertheless, it is a moment of great need, and of great opportunity.

Faced with this, I have found myself clinging to Christ with every fibre in my being. How deeply I have depended on him for the right words in a telephone call, the right tone and attitude in a visit. Sure, I've been conscious of my need to act; but I've been even more aware that I need the life of Christ in me and working through me to be able to act in the right way. It's been a very practical test case for the reality and dynamics of living in Christ. And he has proved faithful.

One very specific way I've been conscious of the Lord at work in me relates to gifts of  scorched, chocolate coated almonds! As I prayed for farmers and prepared to visit them, the thought of taking a small gift has come to mind. Usually that's the sort of thing my wife would think of, not me. But, in Nola's absence (she is caring for her aging and ailing mother), the Spirit of the Lord within me has drawn my mind to this way of expressing love and care. At least, that's how I interpret the very distinct impressing of this idea upon my mind. Given that, it's not surprising that in almost every case people have said to me, "Wonderful - they are my favourites!"

That, to me anyway, is what living in Christ is about.