This type of mysterious experience produces the genuine growth in life. The so-called wonderful experiences actually do not help us to grow in life. It is these mysterious experiences of Christ that help us to grow.

The experience of Christ is altogether a mystery, and this experience is unlimited, for it is Christ magnified. Any experience that is not mysterious but is easily understood should be doubted. The genuine experiences cannot be understood; they are mysterious. Suppose someone would say, "I simply do not understand what happened to me yesterday. I can't tell whether or not I loved the Lord. I simply don't know. If I say that I loved the Lord, I will sense an accusation within that I did not love Him. But if I say that I didn't love the Lord, I would be telling a lie. I love the Lord, yet I dare not say that I love Him." This is a real experience. However, suppose someone says, "Praise the Lord! Yesterday, by the Lord's grace, I was very humble." This kind of humility is a performance. But, on the other hand, suppose someone says, "I couldn't tell whether I was humble or not. Maybe I was humble, but it also seemed to me that I was proud." This is a real experience of Christ as humility. This kind of experience of Christ is visible yet invisible, tangible yet intangible. Such an experience is unlimited; it is enduring because it is the magnification of Christ.

If you are certain that what you are experiencing is an experience of Christ, that is not normal, and you should question it. The only thing we can be sure of is our salvation. The more you are assured of salvation, the better. You should be able to say, "Praise the Lord that I have been saved! Heaven may pass away and the earth may be removed, but my salvation cannot be questioned. I have the full assurance of salvation." But the subtle enemy will not easily allow any to have the assurance of salvation. At every opportunity, he raises a question about this and causes doubt. But this doubt is the strongest assurance of salvation. If you have never doubted your salvation, it is an indication that you are probably not saved. Your doubt is the strongest confirmation and assurance that you are saved. Although Satan does not want us to have the assurance of salvation, he may push us to have the false assurance of other things. For example, some may say, "I have the assurance that I am an overcomer. Yesterday I received the assurance that I am among the firstfruit. By the Lord's grace, I am now one of the hundred forty-four thousand" (Rev. 14:1). We need to doubt this type of assurance. Do not have any assurance of your experience, for all experiences of Christ are mysterious. I believe that we all are now experiencing Christ, but in a mysterious way. The church is mysterious because the universal mystery is here. Thus, the church is a mystery within a mystery.

We magnify Christ by the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Although this supply is bountiful, it is not visible. We may not sense that the supply is bountiful; nevertheless, it is bountiful. Christ can never be exhausted. Many of us may feel that we are weak. But this weakness is a mysterious weakness, for actually we are not weak. Some, however, may claim to be strong. But their strength is not real. All the experiences of Christ are a mystery. This is the magnification of Christ.

When you sense that you are experiencing Christ, that may not be real. But when you doubt whether or not you are experiencing Christ, that may be real. The experience of Christ in our Christian life is mysterious. A mystery is something that we cannot understand or explain but that we can simply accept.

In Philippians 2 Paul said that he was ready to be poured out as a drink offering. That was to take place at the end of his race when he was martyred. In Philippians 3 Paul said that he had not yet attained, that he was forgetting the things that were behind and stretching forth to the things ahead to gain the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Thus, at the time of writing the book of Philippians, Paul was still running the race. He did not have the assurance that he had obtained the prize. He had this assurance only at the time he was martyred. In 1 Corinthians 9 Paul said that he was running the race and fighting to subdue his body, lest after preaching to others he himself would be a castaway. First Corinthians was written rather early in his ministry, but Philippians was written close to the time of his martyrdom. If you read the writings of the Apostle Paul, you will see that, on the one hand, he had assurance and that, on the other hand, he did not have assurance. First Corinthians 7 reveals that the experience of Christ is mysterious. In this chapter the Apostle Paul said something by himself (v. 25). But at the end of the chapter he said, "And I think also that I have the Spirit of God."

The experience of Christ is both tangible and intangible, both abstract and concrete. God, Christ, the church life, and our Christian experience are all a mystery. We cannot make this mystery altogether solid, tangible, or visible. It would be foolish for us to try. The more mysterious we are, the better. If we do not have any experience, we shall not have any mysterious questionings about what is happening within us. The more we love Christ, pursue Him, and live by Him, the more we shall doubt whether or not we are actually experiencing Christ. This shows that our Christian life cannot be explained, for it is a mystery. The more mysterious we are, the more experiences of Christ we shall have. The entire matter of experiencing Christ is a mystery.