Mike is a devout evangelical friend with congestive heart failure. He is a lifelong believer, attends church regularly, leads a weekly Bible study, and visits shut-ins. Mike's pastor recently preached a sermon in which he claimed, "If you don't have a "personal relationship with Jesus Christ," then you're not saved." Mike took exception to that because (1) he doesn't think he has a discernible personal relationship with Christ and (2) he questions whether that phrase is even biblically sound. For example, Mormons and Muslims challenge skeptics to ask God or Allah whether the Book of Mormon or the Quran is God's Word and promise that the truth of these works will be directly confirmed in their spirits. Evangelicals dismiss such "confirmations" as deluded subjective experience warped by wishful thinking, but then don't ask why Mormons and Muslims might not level the same charge against their own claims of verification from the witness of the Holy Spirit. Mike is well aware of verses like John 14:23, Rev. 3:20, and Colossians 1:19, but thinks such verses express faith conviction and doctrine, but not necessarily a discernibly valid experience of a "personal relationship" with Christ.
Sometimes there seems to be nothing human or "personal" about divine action or inaction. A Christian father is killed in a car accident of dies of a horrible illness, leaving young children without adequate financial support. God's ways often seem inhuman as judged by normal human sensibilities about how a loving heavenly or human father should act. If God's ways and thoughts are inhuman, how can we have a personal relationship with Christ?
"My thoughts your thoughts, nor are my ways your ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts (Isaiah 55:8-9)."
Despite such quibbles, I believe I have a personal relationship with Christ. But I wonder about the best way to biblically defend the need for such a relationship for devout godly Christians like Mike. How would you answer?
Sometimes there seems to be nothing human or "personal" about divine action or inaction. A Christian father is killed in a car accident of dies of a horrible illness, leaving young children without adequate financial support. God's ways often seem inhuman as judged by normal human sensibilities about how a loving heavenly or human father should act. If God's ways and thoughts are inhuman, how can we have a personal relationship with Christ?
"My thoughts your thoughts, nor are my ways your ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts (Isaiah 55:8-9)."
Despite such quibbles, I believe I have a personal relationship with Christ. But I wonder about the best way to biblically defend the need for such a relationship for devout godly Christians like Mike. How would you answer?