Bible or Experience?
For Christians, the final authority on what is true is the Bible. Whenever Christians have accepted the Bible as the final authority for faith and practice, Christianity has prospered. However, when the Bible is not accepted as the final authority for faith and practice, false doctrines and ungodly practices have corrupted the Church. For example, the Roman Catholic Church taught that church tradition and the Bible were both equally authoritative. The Protestant Reformation brought the church back to accepting the Bible as its final authority. Charismatism is unwittingly promoting experience and the Bible as equal authorities for the church and undermining the Bible as the Christian's final authority. The type of Christianity that we will have depends largely on whether we accept the Bible as our final authority or not. This is a vital issue because "if the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?" (PSA 11:3). "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path" (PSA 119.105). Though Peter saw the transfigured Christ (MAT 17:1-8) he based his faith-on the "more sure word of prophecy" (2PE 1: 16-2 1). Paul also had a great spiritual experience (ACT 9:3-18) but he based his teaching on the Scriptures (ACT 17:2).
The two basic ways to discover God:
a) Objective - The biblical way to discover God is to know Him through His revelation of Himself in His Word. Man begins by reading (or hearing) the Word, understands its truths, considers them, receives them into his heart and then responds to them. His faith is based on a "sure word of prophecy (2PE1:19) which cannot change (MAT5:18) and not on his changeable feelings, men's shifting opinions, or fallible church traditions. Men are expected to respond rationally to God's objective truth in His Word (ISA 1: 18 "let us reason," COL 3.10 "renewed in knowledge," PHI 4:8 "think on these things").
b) Subjective - The pagan way to discover God is to find him through men's feelings, experiences, thoughts or traditions about God. In most pagan religions there is little emphasis on doctrine and most worship is non-rational and experiential. To obtain a religious experience different methods are used, eg. impressive architecture, miracles, emotional music, dance, drugs, sex, occult. These stimulate the natural-senses-of sight, sound, smell and touch but decrease the powers of rational thinking. The stimulation of the senses gives a sense of well-being which is often attributed to God's presence - when in fact it might be due to the impressive sight, emotional music or even Satan. For example, a pagan seeking God might attempt to find Him near a holy mountain, and Satan obliges with a supernatural phenomenon, eg. a strange sound from the mountain. The pagan is impressed by the experience and assumes that God is indeed in that mountain.
Why is experience important to Charismatics?
a) Pentecostalism was founded on an experience - Agnes Ozman asked for and received the baptism of the Holy Spirit and began to speak in tongues. Based on her experience (and not because of a clear teaching from God's word) others in the church sought a similar experience, and the Pentecostal church was born. Subsequently, Bible verses were sought to support this practice.
b) Charismatics begin their Christian life by seeking the experience of speaking in "tongues" - This leads them to believe that the Christian life is a series of experiences. They often ask "Have you had the experience of speaking in tongues?" "Have you seen such-and-such faith-healer?" They usually develop a greater and greater appetite for more exciting experiences.
What else has contributed to this emphasis on experiential Christianity?
a) Hedonism- The "god" of hedonism is pleasure. Its philosophy is to seek pleasure by experiencing the greatest feelings - with the use of music, alcohol, drugs and occult if necessary. Truth is unimportant, feelings are more important. Truth is what you feel, God is what you feel He is. If it then it must be good.
b) Humanism - Man is the center of the universe, not God. Even in church, man is the reason for worship, not God. The worship must be pleasing to man and he must be the focus, not God. Therefore, everybody wants to be a "somebody" in the church. He must be free to say what he likes and do what he likes. Nobody has the right to stop him or criticise him. If you don't like it - so what? Everybody wants to be a "somebody" and have his own special experience.
How do Charismatics interpret the Bible?
Charismatics desire to harmonize the Bible with their experiences. This usually leads to great and irreconcilable tension. Therefore, to reconcile the differences between their experiences and the Bible, they say "That is what the Bible speaks to you but that is not what it speaks to me" or "That is your interpretation but that's not the way I interpret it." They believe that the same passage of Scripture may mean different things to different people. While we all acknowledge that we may draw different applications from the same passage of Scripture, we agree that the meaning of a passage is the same to all Christians. For example, when a passage teaches that we "can do all things through Christ" (PHI 4:13), one may claim this promise to overcome sin in his life, while another may repent that he did not utilize this power.
How should the Bible be interpreted?
"The infallible rule of interpretation of Scripture is the Scripture itself and therefore, when there is a question about the true and full sense of any Scripture, it must be searched and known by other places that speak more clearly" (Westminster Confession of Faith 1.9). This method of interpreting Scripture is called the analogy of Scripture. Since the Bible is the only absolutely complete and infallible book (2TI 3:16, REV 22:8,19) it is its own authority and commentary.
a) Scripture interprets Scripture - Often the interpretation of a passage of Scripture is clearly given by another passage of Scripture. For example, the prophecy of Isaiah in ISA 7:14 is said to be fulfilled in Christ's birth (MAT 1:22). In such a case there is no question about what the prophecy means and no one should create new meanings other that what has been clearly given by God.
b) Interpreting Scripture in context - Context is that part of the text that leads up to and follows the passage. When we take a text out of its context it is easy to make a pretext! For example, one of the proof-texts of the Romanist doctrine of purgatory is 1CO 3:15 "but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire..." However, when the context is read (from verse 12) it is clearly referring to the high standards of God for judging our work for Him. The "fire" refers to the goldsmith's furnace which not a fire that is used for punishment.
c) Scripture does not contradict Scripture - MAR 16:16 reads "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved." It seems to contradict the numerous verses that teach that salvation is by faith alone (eg. JOH 3:16, ROM 3:28, EPH 2:8,9). A single text that appears to go against many other passages of Scripture must be interpreted in the light of the majority, and the obscure text must be read in the light of the clear.
d) The Apostles were infallible in the preaching, writing of Scriptures and administration of the churches - The Apostles were used by God to be our guides. Failure to understand their role might lead us conclude that they were wrong in those areas of their ministry which seem contradictory. "Power-evangelists" teach that Paul failed in Athens because he merely preached the gospel without performing miracles. This led him to change his method of evangelism to that of "signs and wonders" when he was in Corinth, which brought success. The text used to support this is 1CO 2:4 where Paul said "And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power." Besides being wrong in thinking that Paul the Apostle committed mistakes in his ministry, we know that Paul clearly states that the preaching of the Gospel is "the power of God' (I CO 1: 18,21,24).
The Holy Spirit and the Bible:
Charismatics often claim that since they have the Holy Spirit they do not need to study the Bible. They forget that it was the Holy Spirit who wrote the Bible through humans (2TI 3:16, 2PE 1: 2 1). The Word of God is called the sword of the Spirit (EPH 6:17). The Holy Spirit is called the Spirit of truth (JOH 15:26). Jesus said "Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth" (JOH 16:13). Jesus also said "Thy Word is truth" (JOH 17:17). In other words, the Holy Spirit guides us to the truth through His Word, not apart from the Word. The Holy Spirit gives us understanding as we read His truth which He has written for us.
Christians and experience:
Christians should experience continuous joy (PHI 4: 1) because of Whom God is and of what He has done for us, this joy continues because it is based on the truths that are revealed in the unchanging word of God and not on circumstances and fleeting experiences. Though experiences and emotions are important parts of Christian life, they must never be the basis for establishing truth. For Christians, joy is the product of truth but truth is not the product of experience.