1221 经验或神启示的真理？
我们所领受的，并不是世上的灵，乃是从神来的灵，叫我们能知道神开恩赐给我们的事。《哥林多前书2:12》
我的经历并未使救赎成真——救赎就是真实。救赎对我来说并没有真正的意义，直到它通过我有意识的生活实现出来。当我重生时，神的灵会带我超越自我和我的经历，让我与耶稣基督联合。如果我只剩下个人的经历，我就只剩下不是由救赎所产生的东西。但救赎所产生的经历，通过引导我超越自己，证明了它们的真实性，直到我不再关注经历，以经历为现实的基础。反之，我看到只有现实本身才产生这些经历。我的经历毫无价值，除非它们保持我与真理之神的源头连结，就是与耶稣基督连结。
如果你试图抑制你内在的圣灵，渴望要获得更多内在属灵的经历，你将发现祂会打破束缚，再次把你带回历史的基督面前。永远不要支持没有神作为其源头、没有信靠神作为其结果的经历。若然，无论你有过什么样的异象或见识，你的经历就是敌基督的。耶稣基督是你经历的主吗？或你把你的经历置于祂之上？什么经历比你的主更珍贵呢？你必须让祂成为你的主，不理会任何不以祂为主的经历。这样，总会有那么一天，神会让你对自己的经历感到不耐烦，你能真诚地说，「我不在乎我经历了什么——我对祂充满信心！」
如果你习惯于谈论你有的经历，你要无情并严厉要求你自己。基于经验的信心不是信心；基于神启示真理的信心才是唯一的信心。
来自章伯斯的智慧
自然地说，没有什么比衰败更能让我们迅速丧失信心了——身体美丽的衰退、自然生命的衰退、友谊的衰退、关系的衰退，所有这些都使人心灰意冷；但保罗说，当我们信靠耶稣基督时，这些事情就不会令我们沮丧，光明会透过它们而来。《帮助之地》
1221 Experience or God’s Revealed Truth?
We have received…the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. —1 Corinthians 2:12
My experience is not what makes redemption real— redemption is reality. Redemption has no real meaning for me until it is worked out through my conscious life. When I am born again, the Spirit of God takes me beyond myself and my experiences, and identifies me with Jesus Christ. If I am left only with my personal experiences, I am left with something not produced by redemption. But experiences produced by redemption prove themselves by leading me beyond myself, to the point of no longer paying any attention to experiences as the basis of reality. Instead, I see that only the reality itself produced the experiences. My experiences are not worth anything unless they keep me at the Source of truth— Jesus Christ.
If you try to hold back the Holy Spirit within you, with the desire of producing more inner spiritual experiences, you will find that He will break the hold and take you again to the historic Christ. Never support an experience which does not have God as its Source and faith in God as its result. If you do, your experience is anti-Christian, no matter what visions or insights you may have had. Is Jesus Christ Lord of your experiences, or do you place your experiences above Him? Is any experience dearer to you than your Lord? You must allow Him to be Lord over you, and pay no attention to any experience over which He is not Lord. Then there will come a time when God will make you impatient with your own experience, and you can truthfully say, “I do not care what I experience— I am sure of Him!”
Be relentless and hard on yourself if you are in the habit of talking about the experiences you have had. Faith based on experience is not faith; faith based on God’s revealed truth is the only faith there is.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
There is nothing, naturally speaking, that makes us lose heart quicker than decay—the decay of bodily beauty, of natural life, of friendship, of associations, all these things make a man lose heart; but Paul says when we are trusting in Jesus Christ these things do not find us discouraged, light comes through them. 《The Place of Help》