The Experience of Christ

[Cal]

Originally Posted by OBW

So why do we have to do so and what does it do for us?

What it does is makes the point that there is a difference between thinking about God and actually having an encounter with him. Frankly I don't think your point about the word "experience" not being used in the Bible really carries much weight. The idea is implied time and again.

Taste and see that the Lord is good implies experience.
Knowing God implies experience.
Fellowship with God implies experience.
Knowing the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings implies experience.
Being filled with all the fullness of God implies experience.
And how can you be one with God without experiencing it eventually?

There are many other examples which we shouldn't have to make. Common sense implies that if you have a personal relationship with God you are going to have experiences with him and of him. That's what happens in relationships.

The reason we need to emphasize experience is because we tend to settle for theory. We settle for God at a distance. Whether we use the term encounter, contact, actuality, reality, intimacy, God moment, experience or something else, the point is worth making. I don't see the value in downplaying it in a general fashion.

Why you feel the need to make a big deal out of this word doesn't add up to me. The only thing I can figure is you don't like "experience" because the LCM used it. But that's not a good enough reason to mount opposition to something.

C.S. Lewis said that love seeks the object of its love, and should not be called mercenary for doing so. If you love Christ, you seek encounters with Christ. The Lord does not begrudge this. He didn't in Mary, even after Martha complained about Mary's lack of "fruit." Neither should you.

I used to read conservative magazines until I realized a lot of these dyed-in-the-wool conservatives take their theory too far. I recall one making a big stink about the fact that people filled their houses with family photographs. He thought he had some kind of principle to uphold, but to me he was just making a point to make a point. I recall William F. Buckley himself coming on a talk show commenting about a blind sailor who had sailed a great distance in a boat by himself. Buckley felt to make the point that this sailor could not have as rich an experience as a sighted sailor because of the lack of visual input. He sounded like a jerk.

Both of these guys got so caught up in their brilliant ideas that they failed (1) to apply common sense and (2) to look around and see if anyone else was reacting positively to them in any way, shape or form. When you do that you end up looking like, what was that word you used?

I won't use it. But I will say, "Martha, Martha."

[aron]

Originally Posted by Igzy

Taste and see that the Lord is good implies experience.
Knowing God implies experience.
Fellowship with God implies experience.
Knowing the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings implies experience.
Being filled with all the fullness of God implies experience.
And how can you be one with God without experiencing it eventually?

"Be doers of the word and not merely hearers" implies experience. But what is it to "do" the word? Obey. Not attend meetings and shout slogans, which may or may not be related to the word.

But in today's post-modern, relativistic world it isn't easy to know whether I love, whether I have compassion, whether I have patience and kindness and generosity. I'm good at talking about it...

Ultimately I am left with "seek and you will find." I seek the experience. By God's mercy I may find it.

[Cal]

Originally Posted by aron

"Be doers of the word and not merely hearers" implies experience. But what is it to "do" the word? Obey. Not attend meetings and shout slogans, which may or may not be related to the word.

But in today's post-modern, relativistic world it isn't easy to know whether I love, whether I have compassion, whether I have patience and kindness and generosity. I'm good at talking about it...

Ultimately I am left with "seek and you will find." I seek the experience. By God's mercy I may find it.

I don't think you can truly know what to "do" without the experiencing the Spirit's enlightenment in the first place. I see too many doers of the word operating under their own interpretation. Yes, seeking is important and finding is important. Both in their genuine manifestation are experiences of Christ.

Obviously the LCM distorted experience to the point of error. But that's not a good reason to have a problem with experience itself or with the idea that we need to have it, anymore than the fact that some fraternity guy killed himself by trying to drink 10 gallons of water in 10 minutes should make us hesitant to drink water.

Experience is a general word. So is know. It's even more general than experience. But the Bible uses it. Know can mean know information (Gk. oida) or denote personal involvement (Gk. ginosko). The Hebrew word for "to know" is (surprise!) yada. It implies personal knowledge. When it says "Adam knew his wife" it wasn't talking about him knowing something he read about her. It was talking about a very intimate experience of her.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by aron

"Be doers of the word and not merely hearers" implies experience. But what is it to "do" the word? Obey. Not attend meetings and shout slogans, which may or may not be related to the word.

LSM definitely crossed the line when they condemned the GLA young people for visiting old folks homes and the like, condemning as "dead works" what the Bible would call "good works." Lee and LSM messed with all our heads on this one. They condemned what the Spirit directed others to do in serving others. They only saw "good" in that which built up their little empire. Thus, screaming in meetings all day long was "good," but loving your neighbor could not be an "experience" of God.

Originally Posted by Igzy

Obviously the LCM distorted experience to the point of error. But that's not a good reason to have a problem with experience itself or with the idea that we need to have it, anymore than the fact that some fraternity guy killed himself by trying to drink 10 gallons of water in 10 minutes should make us hesitant to drink water.

Some might say, "Can the church meet too much?" or might say, "Can we experience the Lord too much?" It all depends.

The problem with LSM is that they redefined and distorted what the "experience" of God was to the point of error. Shouting can easily become vain babbling, but no one dares to address this when they are bubbling forth ministry-approved slogans. They frown upon any leading of the Lord which does not build up their program, and in this regard, they are anti-Christ because they are against the anointing of the Spirit in the individual children of God. Elders, churches, and saints must all align with LSM or their "experiences" are invalidated by the ministry.

[aron]

Originally Posted by Igzy

I see too many doers of the word operating under their own interpretation.

I was not there, on the holy mountain with Peter and John and James.

2 Peter 1:17-19 "For when He received honor and glory from God the Father, such an utterance as this was made to Him by the Majestic Glory, "This is My beloved Son with whom I am well-pleased "-- and we ourselves heard this utterance made from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain. So we have the prophetic word made more sure, to which you do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star arises in your hearts.…"

John 1:14 "And we saw his glory, the glory of the only begotten son of the Father..."

No, I was not there. But I have the record. I have the truth. And in that truth I'm invited to behold glory, of which nothing is equal. All works that matter flow out of that vision. And nothing else.

Originally Posted by Igzy

Obviously the LCM distorted experience to the point of error. But that's not a good reason to have a problem with experience itself or with the idea that we need to have it...

But there's reason to have a problem with charismatic experiences that are at best tangenitally (i.e. tenuously, barely) related to the word of God. Like letting a chicken run through a room where water is boiling, and then calling it chicken soup; aahhh, not really. But thanks anyway.

[Cal]

Originally Posted by aron

No, I was not there. But I have the record. I have the truth. And in that truth I'm invited to behold glory, of which nothing is equal. All works that matter flow out of that vision. And nothing else.

YOU have the written word. Praise God. But you cannot interpret it without experiencing HIM as the Spirit of truth.

But there's reason to have a problem with charismatic experiences that are at best tangenitally (i.e. tenuously, barely) related to the word of God. Like letting a chicken run through a room where water is boiling, and then calling it chicken soup; aahhh, not really. But thanks anyway.

Those are the exception. And the exception is not the rule. Rather, the exception proves the rule. Which means we still need to experience the Spirit. BTW, the Spirit is a Person, not a force that cooks chickens. Experiencing God's Power means experiencing his Person--his character, his likes and dislikes. Keep that in mind and you'll do fine.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Igzy

YOU have the written word. Praise God. But you cannot interpret it without experiencing HIM as the Spirit of truth.

This is a defining scripture for all proper experience: "But when He, the Spirit of reality, comes He will guide you into all the reality." John 16.13

Originally Posted by Igzy

Those are the exception. And the exception is not the rule. Rather, the exception proves the rule.

Interesting. Can you say more. Never mind the chickens.

[Cal]

Originally Posted by Ohio

This is a defining scripture for all proper experience: "But when He, the Spirit of reality, comes He will guide you into all the reality." John 16.13

I agree.

Interesting. Can you say more. Never mind the chickens.

The fact that the exception is called an exception shows there is a rule it is an exception to. People argue about exceptions as if their existence trumps the rule. But they actually establish it. For example, if I say all swans are white and you respond that 1% are not, you've just said that 99% of the time I'm right. I'll take that any day.

People who are always pointing out exceptions are the same people who play the lottery. Overall, what is possible is not as important as what is likely. The more someone tends to make a big deal about exceptions the more you are dealing with a theoretician and not a pragmatist.

[aron]

Originally Posted by Igzy

YOU have the written word. Praise God. But you cannot interpret it without experiencing HIM as the Spirit of truth.

Probably we're arguing past each other. Because I wouldn't put "but" to start the last sentence; rather I'd put "and" to start it.

I've gradually decided over the past year or so that the entire corpus of the NT was largely an attempt to convince its readers that Jesus the Nazarene was the promised Messiah of scriptures, "scriptures" being what we'd call the OT. The law, the prophets, the psalms, Jesus' disciples felt, all pointed to the coming Savior who would redeem Israel and rule the world. Now, some of those scriptures are gone -- "Out of his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water" was cited, but from what text? The Book of Enoch was part of NT discourse, but was lost. However the bulk of the work was carefully preserved. And we can see that the NT writers felt that the work, as a whole, pointed to the coming Savior of the world.

Isaiah 9:7 "Of the greatness of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the LORD Almighty will accomplish this."

To a people chafing under Roman rule, after centuries of Greeks, Babylonians, Assyrians, and whatnot, this promise loomed large. All those OT references sprinkled through the NT were presenting their readers with the foundation for understanding who Jesus was, according to the promises of God. I've recently covered, on another thread, Peter's speech in Acts 2 and Paul's speech in Acts 13, both of whom it must be stressed were aimed at not merely Jews but "God-fearing people".

Yet 2,000 years later we assume the validity of the NT argument, and skim past the references. It has gotten so bad that we, a bunch of otherwise intelligent people, spent years under an expositor like WL who'd bring out all sorts of pictures from the "types and shadows" of the OT, and essentially ignore the incarnated Word, Jesus Christ. Instead we got all sorts of things: we got "ChristAndTheChurch" and "God'sEconomy" and "TheProcessedTriuneGod" etc. And, tellingly, WL gave us messages telling us the the OT was "natural" and "fallen" where WL couldn't line it up with his "NT economy". That we could disregard the word of God at our profit. And we sat there and took it.

Now, my point is this: any spirit that confesses Jesus Christ from the Bible (both OT and NT) is to be at least considered, and any spirit that comes into the Assembly of Jesus' Name (i.e. "the church") and begins to push other things from the word of God is to be examined very, very skeptically. This is where we have to "prove the spirits" that come among us. When our attention begins to be diverted to arguments over God's trinity, over the structure of the assembly, over dispensation, and over the experiences of hand-waving and shouting as "the Spirit", I fear we've lost our way.

This is where I lumped the LC in with the Charismatic movement, which gets the assembled audience all in an agitated state: shouting, chanting, arm waving, "declaring" and so forth. But shouting what? Yes, "Jesus is Lord" among other things. But that's the problem. We think we are experiencing The Spirit of Christ but we are experiencing "Christ plus", we are experiencing the spirit of other things... some additive spirit has come in. So we can presumably "experience Christ" while we eat toast, while our actual living, and our assembly resembles the Christ presented in the Bible hardly at all.

Where is the love? The humility? The exhortations to good works? The charity toward those who cannot repay us in this age? The receiving of one another? And so forth. Yes we "experience the Spirit". But what spirit?

Originally Posted by Igzy

Those are the exception. And the exception is not the rule. Rather, the exception proves the rule. Which means we still need to experience the Spirit. BTW, the Spirit is a Person, not a force that cooks chickens. Experiencing God's Power means experiencing his Person--his character, his likes and dislikes. Keep that in mind and you'll do fine.

I am reacting to what I saw, and was under for a time. Am I seeking the kingdom? Only partly. Partly I am reacting to a situation. Was Moses seeking God's glory? Or was he seeking a lost sheep? Was Nathaniel seeking the Messiah or was he snoozing under a fig tree? Our seeking is leavened by our situation and our predispositions. Ultimately the Word is the living sword that cuts one from the other. Otherwise we may find ourselves beguiled by some seducing spirit. In WL's case the seeking seems to have been some combination of mercantilism and a need for control. In my case I'm not sure. Stay tuned. But I know that the Word shows us the way, even if I can hardly see it. Really I "feel" it. It's like the StarWarsian "force". I know it's there.

And maybe that is your "Spirit". That's why I said we're probably saying the same thing. But really all I can say for sure is to stay tuned.

[Cal]

Originally Posted by aron

Probably we're arguing past each other.

It happens. We all come from different angles. I guess that's why Paul said arriving at the unity of the faith was a matter in the future.

[OBW]

Originally Posted by Igzy

The reason we need to emphasize experience is because we tend to settle for theory. We settle for God at a distance. Whether we use the term encounter, contact, actuality, reality, intimacy, God moment, experience or something else, the point is worth making. I don't see the value in downplaying it in a general fashion.

You are fighting a point that I did not make. I did not say there is no experience. But everything you have listed is something different from the others. Knowing may imply experience. But it may also imply knowing.

And two of your lines were related to "God," not specifically Christ. I don't want to get into a "Jesus is God but God is not necessarily Jesus" debate here, but we are referring to a generic statement that is/was too often used as an overlay, even a mask, on top of experiences.

It is all experience. But the truth of the experience is discrete, not generic or stew.

Complain about why you think I am bringing this up. If you don't want to discuss it, don't. My "experience" in the LCM was that "experience of Christ" was mostly "spiritual" stuff. It was stuff that happened in the meetings. It was stuff that happened in morning watch. And it was my experience because it was what almost everyone talked about when they used the word experience. But even then, so often it was phrased in such a way that the "what" of the experience was fairly hidden. It was too often something with an ethereal kind of implication. Something that they couldn't describe in real terms, therefore something out of reach.

I believe it was the morphing the potential for real experiences into something relatively undefined that allowed us to reject so many actual experiences as being "of Christ." It allowed some to scoff at going to old-folks homes as low, or not even on the chart. It allowed a leading brother to brag about turning away a homeless person from the church property because helping the needy was not the purpose of the church.

And experience is either something real and tangible, or it is not really experience.

You list several things and say that they imply experience. And some of them clearly do. And the others could. But they don't say it. We do. And we don't say "experience X" we say "experience Christ." It is something we learned in the LCM. It is part of our (past) culture. Why are we still anxious to use terms to elevate beyond what something actually is with describable importance and effect into something that we think is important and sounds high and lofty, and in the process lose what we actually gained.

We gain whatever we gain through the things we experience and learn. And our experiences are not all in church or our quiet time. In fact, probably the most important ones are during the day when we are not even engaged in any kind of "spiritual" activity. What I mean is that one of the most prominent signs of a Christian should be a changed life. The lame walk, the blind see, the angry become calm, the speeders slow down, and so on. If we are unable to arrive at any of these things without pointing to some recent "fill up" of the tank, then maybe our lives really haven't changed.

I know this is a tightrope to walk. We require the setting of the mind on the Spirit to walk according to the Spirit and fulfill the righteousness of the law. Yet if we are not out there walking, there is nothing happening. There is no actual change in life.

And maybe the real proof that we are actually operating "in Christ" is when we arrive at the destination and we really aren't angry at all those jerks on the road. And aren't having to repent for the past 10, 15, 20 or so minutes of driving. When our lives are actually changed rather than when we have to have something constantly reminding us to fight against our nature to live in the old way. Some might argue that it is then being done without Christ. I disagree. The only way that could be done is with Christ.

"For me to live is Christ," while not fully explained, could mean that the way I now live is Christ. It is as he would live. I do what he would do. My life has changed. How would you determine if this is true? Not by figuring out what kind of quiet time Paul had. Or whether he "prophesied" forcefully in the meeting. But by observing his life. Not by declaring that he had a lot of "experiences of Christ." If that is all he had was declarations that he had experienced Christ, then where is the example? How were we to follow the one who said to follow him as an example just as he was following?

Originally Posted by Igzy

Why you feel the need to make a big deal out of this word doesn't add up to me. The only thing I can figure is you don't like "experience" because the LCM used it. But that's not a good enough reason to mount opposition to something.

Pretty presumptuous. I am not taking on this subject because the LCM used it. I am taking it on because my experience (yes, experience) is that the term in question was a mask. It made real Christian experience into a foggy thing that seemed sometimes unachievable. And yes, in the LCM it was also the means for expunging a lot of the real experiences that we should be able to declare are "of Christ."

And I also believe that the substitution of unspecific but high-sounding terms is an excellent way to lead people where they might not otherwise want to go. Not just for the LCM, but for others. Turning this vague thing into something solid will help more people. And I cannot see how it will hurt anyone. Are you for that? Or are you happy to live in a world of vague terminology rather than true experience?

Originally Posted by Igzy

I used to read conservative magazines . . . He sounded like a jerk.

Both of these guys got so caught up in their brilliant ideas that they failed (1) to apply common sense and (2) to look around and see if anyone else was reacting positively to them in any way, shape or form.

I will readily agree with you about a lot of the guys writing and broadcasting the conservative stuff. They mostly sound like jerks. There are occasions of brilliance, but it is not often.

But as poorly as they do it, and whether you like their ideas or not, their goal is not to have everyone stand and cheer. It is to suggest something that they think is being missed. I don't want to be among them in the way that they are.

But there is something about suggesting that someone is just an @$$ and should shut up because you don't care about what they say. That is really not much better than many of those conservative writers and broadcasters who would love to never hear the voice of (fill in the name of your favorite liberal voice) again.

But just because you, one of the more brilliant on this forum, are not responding positively is not evidence that I should just let it go. Virtually all of us, including the brilliant among us, have groused about what has been said in some thread on some issue and then later could be heard drumming the same thing. Why? Because people who were unpopular simply shut up and went away? No. Because despite our initial disagreement, we took the time to actually look into what they were saying. Maybe not in a concerted manner. But over time we saw something we had not seen before. And it changed our thinking. And without a change in thinking, we are not going to change in any other way.

I want more than your knee-jerk reaction to the idea. That is how we got here in the first place. If you don't want to actually engage in the discussion, then don't.

[Cal]

I understand your point, OBW. And I appreciate your patience with me. I just disagree with your conclusion, that's all. I think it's the wrong reaction.

That is, I disagree that it is talking about experiencing Christ (rather than talking about experiencing righteousness, grace, faithfulness, or whatever) that leads to the trouble. What led to the trouble in the LCM was saying we should experience Christ in oneness, devotion to the Lord's Recovery, faithfulness to the ministry, building the church (actually questionable things), while concertedly de-emphasizing other things that we should have experienced Christ in (e.g. freedom to follow our consciences, liberty, etc.)

The problem in the LCM wasn't in focusing on experiencing Christ. It was in the warped results we were taught that experiencing Christ would produce. Many LCMers (Jane, Ohio and many others) experience of Christ led them to have a problem in their consciences about how things were going there, and they were slapped down for it. So it wasn't the experience of Christ that hurt them.

If you generally experience Christ, yet leave the door open for him to lead you in any specific way he wants to (from the Word and other Christians), I think it is hard to go wrong. There is nothing wrong with saying I want to experience Jesus, because you never know quite what you are going to get at any moment. You have to be on your toes. You might be trying to experience the Lord as being quite grave and the Lord might be saying he wants you to be a little lighthearted. As long as it doesn't violate the Word, who are we to argue?

It's my belief that we would have had few problems if we would have done the same things we did (meeting and practicing more or less the same) while leaving the door wide open for the Lord to lead us directly from the Word, rather than from Witness Lee. Because the Lord would have been able to correct us.

There was a reason the Lord so filled the LCM in the early days. It was because he was prepared to use us and bless us. We started out on a pretty good track. We had a (nominal anyway) belief in ultimate authority of the Word and respect for the leading that could come from any member of the Body. But Witness Lee and his cronies hijacked all of that and short-circuited it.

So I just disagree with you that talking generally about experiencing Christ is not good. You put forth a theory that it is, but you haven't really proved the connection between generalizing experience and error. I guess if you stop reading the Word and receiving fellowship and just focus on "experience" there could be issues. But as long as you have them both to balance your experience I think you'll be okay. What happened in the LCM is we actually left the Word and fellowship. We flocked to Witness Lee and his advice and turned our back on 99% of the fellowship of the Body of Christ. No wonder our "experience" got warped.

I think most people can generalize talking about experiencing Christ without falling off the deep end. There is always going to be exceptions to the rule. But as I said, the exception proves the rule.

That's just my opinion.