Читать книгу The House of God - Rev. John Peter Bodner - Страница 4

Christians speak of “experiential religion.” Especially this phrase is on the lips of pastors.

It means having a more than cerebral acquaintance with Jesus Christ. There is a belief in the Lord that acknowledges truly that He was a Man in space-and-time history, but the devils themselves possess such historical faith, and they tremble. More than such faith is required to have any assurance one is a true disciple of Jesus Christ.

To have any usefulness in the kingdom of God, especially as a servant of the Word of God, and a servant of the Lord of the Word, an experience of conviction of one’s great need and the Lord’s great mercy is essential. But more than that, an awareness of God’s personal dealings with you in testing, in the providences of life, in teaching you lessons to strengthen your faith and deepen your appreciation of His love in Jesus Christ, that love which passes knowledge. All that is needed: growingly so.

To speak and preach helpfully to others, then, your own inner personality, your heart and soul must know the steady and variegated operations of the Word and the Spirit upon your inner man. We are talking of an increasing, growing relationship with a living and loving Person, your Master, Jesus Christ the Son of God, who reigns over the entire universe, so that you cry, “Oh, that I might know Him better! To love and serve Him much better than I have!” These are the longings that manifest true piety.

It is Jonathan Edwards’ sustained emphasis that the heart of true religion is found in the affections. The greatest of all the Commandments is to love the Lord our God with our entire being. The stress is not on man’s mind simply to understand God—though our intellect is to be devoted to the fascinating contemplation of the living God. Supremely, it is an experiential knowledge that we yearn for, not mere “experiential feelings”—that is a mere tautology. Knowledge—yes, let us have knowledge: knowledge of the Bible, knowledge of God as Creator, Sustainer and Judge, knowledge of Jesus Christ in His two natures as God and Man, in His three offices as Prophet, Priest and King, in His three states—eternal, humiliated and exalted. Let us know more of the Holy Spirit as a divine Person, equal to God in power and glory. Let us know the way of redemption accomplished and applied in Christ. We must know all the counsel of God. We must have more than vague feelings about religion, mere notions of what is the one true revealed religion. Knowledge of the true God we must have, but it must be experiential knowledge. Joseph Hart the hymn-writer famously wrote:

Vain is all our best devotion,

If on false foundations built;

True religion’s more than notion,

Something must be known and felt.

Here is the usefulness of the book that lies in your hand. There are fine commentaries on the Pastoral Epistles. Many can be commended and should be studied carefully. These brief chapters are aimed at stirring up our affections by the impact of what the simple text so vividly shows of Paul’s concern for Timothy and for all servants of God. If only we possessed all that we profess, and believed all that we believe!

John Peter Bodner has been a Canadian friend of mine for many years, spending one happy summer with me in Aberystwyth at the end of his studies at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. We share the same alma mater; we love the same truths, we both desire to preach with the Holy Spirit sent down from heaven. I am convinced that the simple devotional reading of this book on First Timothy, its exhortations and hymns, while letting its truths do their own work in our entire personalities, cannot but serve the end of reviving “experimental religion” in all who read it.

There is no greater need than that the doctrines that have been re-discovered in the past decades through the Protestant world should be vitally known, felt, and loved, moving preachers and congregations alike in the service of our great God. May the fruit of the revived Christianity that we pray for be one great end of reading these pages.

Rev. Geoffrey B. Thomas,

Minister, Alfred Place Baptist Church, Aberystwyth,Wales