Great fireplace . . . no fire!

Walter Unger

In my article on "Balanced Spirituality" (MBH, Dec. 8, 1995), I cautioned against building the fireplace of one's theology around the fire of one's experience. The proper order, I suggested, was that we devote ourselves to sound biblical teaching as the fireplace out of which authentic Christian experience would come and by which it would be safeguarded.

A number of people objected to my prioritizing--fireplace first, then fire. They even suggested that my insistence on a theology of Christian experience and my concern for hermeneutics would only smother their fire--asphyxiation, as it were, by too much theology. One pastor said, "I sure had a great fireplace, but no fire!"

Hunger for God

There is a growing hunger among believers today to experience God, no doubt a reflection of increased interest in various forms of spirituality in society at large. Neale Walsch's best seller Conversations With God echoes this hunger to hear from God and have a spiritual encounter. For evangelical Christians, Henry Blackaby's Experiencing God (along with a study guide and The Experiencing God Bible) is speaking to this need.

The renewed emphasis on worship through song and sacred dance, even in traditional churches, testifies to the desire for the subjective. Some non-charismatic churches are experiencing an emergence of spiritual gifts such as tongues, prophecy and healing.

We notice in our work with college students that they long for the experiential. They don't simply want to learn about God; they yearn to feel His presence. And they are right. We are to love the Lord our God with all our heart and soul and mind and strength. Christianity renews the mind, moves the emotions and activates the will to obey divine precepts.

Experience is vital to a growing Christian, and there is no common formula for this. Believers will experience Christian truth in different ways, depending on their temperament and their knowledge of Scripture, but, most importantly, on their level of obedience. Our Lord promised "Whoever has My commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves Me. He who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I too will love him and show Myself to him" (John 14:21).

The emphasis of Scripture

The Scriptures teach that believers should be far more concerned about obedience than warm feelings, about the ethical than the ecstatic, and about holiness than happiness. When the emphasis is primarily on me, my feelings and my well-being, I will have made Christianity into another form of self-indulgence. This is very popular, but it is not biblical.

We must beware of measuring the power and presence of God in a believer's life by the occurrence of the dramatic. The most reliable evidence of God's presence in a Christian is obedience and a holy life.

It is possible to have a fascination, a fixation, even an addiction to signs, wonders and ecstatic experiences without these producing greater depth of spirituality or long-term obedience. The history of Israel in the Old Testament amply shows that God's miraculous intervention on behalf of His people did not produce greater faith and long-term obedience. Yet, whenever there was a crisis, the people looked to God for more miraculous signs. Philip Yancey observes that signs may only addict us to signs, not to God. And Assemblies of God leader Donald Gee warns against an unhealthy fascination with the ecstatic to the point that we want the extraordinary and the exceptional to be made the frequent and the habitual. The Scriptures, not experience, are "a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path".

In the New Testament, the description of the Christian life is not very dramatic. Images such as growing, being built up, serving and walking appear many times. Paul uses the term "walk" 30 times in describing the normal Christian life.

Jesus characterized the true believer in very nondramatic, service-oriented terms. Giving a cup of cold water, caring for the sick and visiting prisoners are the marks of the ones who inherit the Kingdom (Matthew 25:34-36). Contrast this with the judgement day scenario Jesus describes in Matthew 7. On that day, many who called Him Lord and experienced the dramatic and seemingly miraculous will be rejected. Why? Because their words ("Lord, Lord") and their works (prophesying, driving out demons, performing miracles) were not accompanied by a walk of obedience (they did not do the will of the Father, vv. 21-23).

Must our fireplace remain empty--a monument of theological erudition but empty of power? Certainly not. Every believer may experience and rightly expect the following from within the fireplace of God's Word:
* a growing sense of Christ's love for us personally and a warming of our hearts with love for Him;
* currents of joy that run deeper than the surface swirls of emotional highs;
* comfort in trials, fortitude to endure bodily weakness and disability, and perseverance to continue on in difficult tasks;
* patience in sharing Christ's love.

For two years, my wife and I shared our friendship and love with our neighbour, who had liver cancer. A few weeks before the end, he came to faith.

We can all experience power to work and witness and serve in the name of Christ, even if in a quiet and steady manner. When my late father-in-law, in his 90s, visited us for the last time, he became bed-ridden and extremely ill. It was my task to enter a shower with him and bathe him. I experienced God in that lowly act of service as surely as when I stood before hundreds of people and proclaimed God's Word.

Our Lord discloses Himself to us in the pathway of lowly service (John 14:21, NEB).

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