All spiritual experiences begin with a certain amount of knowledge, but once we have the knowledge of spiritual experiences, it is easy to consider that we have the experiences themselves. This is especially true for young believers. To have knowledge is one thing, but to have the experiences of life is another. If we hear a person testify with spiritual knowledge, we may think that he has the experiences of the Christian life, the church life, and the Spirit. In the first stage of the Christian life, however, what we mainly have is knowledge. Our knowledge needs to be tested by failures, trials, temptations, and many troubles. The more knowledge the Lord affords us, the more He will put us on the test.
In just one year, a believer can gain much spiritual knowledge. Then he may think that he has everything. He may believe himself to be the most wonderful, advanced, and spiritual believer. What he has, however, may be ninety-five percent knowledge in his intelligence, not experience. According to knowledge, he may seem to have been in the Lord for many years, but in actuality he has little real experience. When the Lord puts such a one on the test, he finds that what he has is nearly all knowledge.
There are many different ways the Lord puts us on the test. One is that at a certain point He withholds His hand from us and lets us fail. After we are saved, the Lord’s hand sustains us, but at a certain point He will withdraw His hand. He will leave us to ourselves, and we will be sure to have a failure. That seems terrible, but in actuality it is not. The Lord is very wise. In this way we see that what we thought we had was not real.
Another way the Lord puts us on the test is to give us trials. The number of ways that the Lord has to give us trials is inexhaustible, including physical matters, family matters, and many others. Moreover, trials often do not come by themselves; one trial follows another. The Lord gives us many trials to test us. Then we are in the “fire” to be “burned,” and in this burning we come to know how much of what we have is merely knowledge in our mentality, and how much is real experience. Then we discover that we have little real experience, perhaps only five percent or even one percent of what we thought we had. Little by little we find that the greater part of what we have is merely knowledge in our mind.
We should be advised and warned to be in fear and trembling and to have no trust in ourselves. If we have any trust in ourselves, it is easy to be tempted. This temptation is another kind of test. Temptation comes to us when we have some trust in ourselves. Because our heart is deceitful, the trust we have in ourselves is often in secret. Sometimes we do not even admit it to ourselves. The only way for the Lord to prove that we have a secret trust in ourselves is to allow temptation to test us. When we are tempted, we realize that we have self-trust and self-confidence. These temptations prove to us that we are not competent, that we are not good enough to trust ourselves, and that we are not good enough to meet the situations. Whenever this kind of temptation comes, we always fail. Even if we try our best, we simply cannot make it because the Lord’s hand is withheld from us in order to allow us to meet the situation alone and prove that we are not competent for anything.
By all these tests we will realize how little we have and that what we mostly have is knowledge in the mind. Then something real will come out of this burning, and we will begin another stage. We will be equipped and further nourished with spiritual knowledge. We will know things in a deeper, fuller way. Then even though we have learned the lesson of the first stage that knowledge is not real experience, we will once again consider that we have much and have become rich. We will once again enter into a dream that we are spiritual and have acquired much. Then in the same principle, the Lord will put us on the test again. This is the process of the Christian experience.
The process of Christian experience can be compared to a potter with his clay. First, the potter paints a design on the clay, making it look beautiful. After being painted, however, the clay must be put into the fire to be burned. The Lord as the Potter always paints us first and then puts us through the fire to be burned. Day after day He operates according to the same principle in order to work something of Himself into us, first by spiritual knowledge and revelation and second by testing. This is the reason that many of the Lord’s children, after hearing a message and gaining some knowledge and revelation, are put into testing. The more we are clear about this process, the more we will be saved from troubles. This will humble us.
Home | First | Prev | Next