“All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right.” (2 Timothy 3:16 NLT)
“I am writing these things to warn you about those who want to lead you astray. But you have received the Holy Spirit and he lives within you, so you don’t need anyone to teach you what is true. For the Spirit teaches you everything you need to know, and what he teaches is true—it is not a lie. So just as he has taught you, remain in fellowship with Christ.” (1 John 2:26-27 NLT)
“And you should imitate me, just as I imitate Christ.” (1 Corinthians 11:1 NLT)
I feel compelled today to talk about something that I’ve talked about before, and that’s “experience.” I want to talk about it again because that’s how we tend to base our opinions, our expectations, our thoughts, and actions. We look around and see what we see, we experience what we experience with our senses, and eventually we just fall into living a life of habits. We flow with subconscious thinking and we just do what we do.
Experience is NOT the best teacher. The most valuable experience is the experience of others. I can learn from what others have gone through. But really the most valuable and greatest teacher is the Holy Spirit and the Word. You can’t go wrong. What I love about the Bible is that it is an inspired history of other peoples experiences that I can use to learn how to live (and how NOT to live).
So often what the Holy Spirit teaches flies in contradiction to what the world shows me. And even at times what I learned through religious teaching.The Holy Spirit guided Word challenges, it corrects, it gives me insights.
Experience can be good, but it can also be oh, so dangerous. SAnd it is definitely NOT the best teacher.
Let’s lean on the Holy Spirit and the Word as we consider…
…Eric’s Life Lesson # 387: Who’s teaching You?