Experiences

“Experience is a good teacher, but often she charges too much in tuition.” S.M. Lockridge (1913-2000), Pastor, Calvary Baptist Church, San Diego, California.

One of the things that baffles me is that we human beings (including myself) do not learn from others and do not believe as fact what we are told. Generations before us have stubbed their toes on the same mistakes, yet the majority of human beings ignore the sage wisdom of prior generations and learn the same things by making the same mistakes. If we could only somehow figure out how to build on the knowledge and mistakes of prior generations, the human race might actually find some improvement among itself.

I have a concrete example for you that involves myself. There is no sense in picking on others when I can demonstrate my own ignorance. When I was a freshman or sophomore in high school, I was riding in the car with my uncle. We stopped at a roadside stand, where he got out and I stayed in the car. As he was exiting the car, he told me not to put the window down because it will not go back up. Well, what do you think I did after he got out of the car? When I discovered by experience that what he told me was true, I thought he would be wroth with me. I tried and tried to get the window back up, without success. When he returned to the car, I immediately knew he was frustrated, but then he started laughing and said, “You are a Ritter, I should have known better. You had to find out for yourself. I probably would have done the same thing.”

I have come to the conclusion that there are some things in life we have to find out on our own. One of those experiences is salvation. We can fill our minds with all the knowledge there is to learn about Christ, His death, resurrection and the new life He offers, yet until we admit we are sinners, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and confess our sins, we will not truly experience salvation.

This actually may shed some light on why the human race is so slow to adopt and build on the experiences of prior generations. We do not truly feel the full cost or benefit of the experiences because those experiences are not ours. All we have from prior generations is head knowledge.

Another experience that we must have is the baptism of the Holy Spirit. It is available to all who would receive it, and it is a prerequisite to having the full power of God at work in the world through our lives.

There are also some experiences that should not be learned all over again. If I were to tell my children that if they jumped out of a tree from 20 feet up they would have broken bones, they would probably believe me. Some experiences are treated differently, and a level of faith is applied to someone else’s prior experience, faith that what we are told is true and should not be tried again as if no one had warned us of the danger. But how do we know when to trust by faith and when to embark on our own journey? Every time you enter someone’s home and they offer you a chair, do you ask how the host knows if the chair will hold your weight? Do you examine the chair or maybe even test it before putting your full weight on it? Most of us would not go to such lengths and would feel embarrassed if we were with someone who would turn the chair upside down and thoroughly inspect it.

Alcohol and narcotics are two other experiences we should not have to learn for ourselves. This is a point we can interject into the second half of S.M. Lockridge’s quote. A young adult man who gets drunk on alcohol and has an accident with another vehicle while driving himself home has learned from experience but paid too much in tuition for that experience. Again, I ask the question of why it is so difficult for the human race to learn from and build on the experiences of prior generations.

It is my belief that without the salvation and transformation Jesus Christ offers it is not possible for us to take all of the experiences of our ancestors and pick-up where they left off. If it were within our grasp, then the human race would have the capability of one day becoming perfect or near perfect. It is unfortunate and disappointing that some among us must go through difficult experiences, yet such difficulty is often the way to Christ.

When we allow Christ to save us and to thoroughly transform us, then and only then will we be able to avoid the difficult experiences sin often causes in our lives and to see the purpose behind difficult experiences God allows us to encounter. And this is where I believe Christians of today will be most surprised in the hereafter. Three times in the New Testament of the Bible our faith is referred to as more precious than gold, which must be refined by fire to reach its full purity. This includes Revelation 3:18 where Christ Himself is speaking. A comfortable faith is not a productive or a pure faith. Christ is seeking only those who have been purified by the most difficult experiences to reside with Him in heaven.

Faith is what takes us from a head full of knowledge to a heart full of experience that can be used by God in His Kingdom. Without such faith, our experiences are just difficult and have no other redeeming value.