May 14
31
An experimental Christian?
(Winslow, “This God is Our God”)
The religion of the true believer is experimental;
it is the religion of the heart. He has no dealings
with an unknown, imaginary God.
He does not know God from the hearing of the ear,
or from the reading of books, or from the religious
conversation of others merely; but He knows Him
from personal acquaintance, from heartfelt
experience, from close and constant dealings.
There has been a manifestation of God in Christ to his
soul, and with Job he can say, “I have heard of You
by the hearing of the ear; but now my eye sees You.”
And with the converted Samaritans, “We no longer
believe just because of what you said; now we have
heard for ourselves, and we know that this man
really is the Savior of the world.” John 4:42
Oh to be a true, an experimental Christian!
The religion of the ear, or of the eye, or of the
imagination, or of the intellect, will not, and
cannot bring the soul to heaven!
The abodes of endless woe are peopled with
souls who went down to its regions of despair
with no better religion than this!
Oh, give me…
the humility of the publican,
the trembling faith of the diseased woman,
the flowing tears of the penitent Magdalene,
the last petition of the dying thief,
rather than the most intellectual religion or
the most gorgeous ceremonial that the mind
ever invented, or the eye ever beheld.