EXPERIENCE OR REVELATION

     We have received … the spirit which is of God; that we
     might know the things that are freely given to us of
     God.

     — 1 Corinthians 2:12

Reality is Redemption, not my experience of Redemption; but
Redemption has no meaning for me until it speaks the language of my
conscious life. When I am born again, the Spirit of God takes me
right out of myself and my experiences, and identifies me with Jesus
Christ. If I am left with my experiences, my experiences have not
been produced by Redemption. The proof that they are produced by
Redemption is that I am led out of myself all the time, I no longer
pay any attention to my experiences as the ground of Reality, but
only to the Reality which produced the experiences.
My experiences
are not worth anything unless they keep me at the Source, Jesus
Christ.

If you try to dam up the Holy Spirit in you to produce subjective
experiences, you will find that He will burst all bounds and take you
back again to the historic Christ. Never nourish an experience which
has not God as its Source and faith in God as its result. If you do,
your experience is anti-Christian, no matter what visions you may
have had. Is Jesus Christ Lord of your experiences, or do you try to
lord it over Him? Is any experience dearer to you than your Lord? He
must be Lord over you, and you must not pay attention to any
experience over which He is not Lord. There comes a time when God
will make you impatient with your own experience – I do not care what
I experience; I am sure of Him.

Be ruthless with yourself if you are given to talking about the
experiences you have had. Faith that is sure of itself is not faith;
faith that is sure of God is the only faith there is.

On this day...

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