“She’s (he’s) gone over to the experiential side.”

I’ve been accustomed to that terminology since my first Bible doctrine class at 27 years old. The language might be dated for many of you but you get the gist. My teacher (in the presence of the Lord now) whom I loved and whose passion lit a fire in my own bones often used the delineation. Something was either “Scriptural” or “experiential” and ne’er the two could meet. It made perfect sense to me.

For a little while.

I’ve never lost my esteem for my teacher. I could get tears in my eyes just thinking about him. He taught under a powerful unction of the Holy Spirit and with a love for the Bible that I had never seen. I suppose some 90 percent of what he taught me I still believe with all my heart. No one made a deeper investment in my love for the Word of God.

But I’ll share with you the teaching in that first Bible doctrine class that I couldn’t accept for long. I couldn’t accept that a believer must fall cleanly into one category or the other: the Scriptural or the experiential. Of course, that’s why I had critics counting me among the experiential crowd 15 years ago but I’ll be forthright with you. The criticism, no matter how mean-spirited it got, was worth enduring because I was not about to let somebody convince me that Scripture and experience were always mutually exclusive. I wanted them both. I wanted to thrill to the Word of God with everything in me AND I wanted to experience the presence of Christ as palpably as He’d permit me.

I would not deny for a moment that there are people in the wide stretch of Christendom who rely strictly on experience and rarely if ever open their Bibles. I also have no doubt that many study their Bibles but never have what they’d qualify as an “experiential” encounter with the Holy Spirit. But there is another category and it is chock full of people who have devoted their entire lives to the study of Scripture and could also testify to rich experiential encounters with Christ. They are not the either-or’s. They have known both.

They are people who would not dream of giving their experience the same weight as the Scriptures. They know full well that it doesn’t mean everything. But must it mean nothing??

Does the Word of God itself not validate experiencing the presence of God?

Every time the living words of Scripture seem to leap off the page into the reality of our present challenge, are we not experiencing God?

Every time our pastors or teachers bring a word that causes the blood to flow hot through our veins –  in the terminology of 1 Thessalonians 1:5 “in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction” – are we not experiencing God?

Every time we are overwhelmed with fresh conviction and we experience true repentance, are we not experiencing God?

In those moments when we’re brokenhearted and bewildered and we suddenly feel embraced by His love and assured of our chosenness, are we not experiencing God?

In our worship when we feel moved inside with the sense that His thick presence around us in that place is a greater reality than anything we can see or touch, are we not experiencing God?

When, after striving and seeking and praying, we suddenly know with astounding clarity what God wants us to do in a situation or relationship, are we not experiencing God?

When we have encounters with people that only God could have ordained and had appointed conversations that become pivotal to our callings, are we not experiencing God?

Was the Holy Spirit Himself not given to us so that we could continue to experience the presence of Jesus on this earth??

And do we not keep our Bibles wide open and study them all our lives and every day so that we can even recognize what could be a valid Holy Spirit experience?

No story I’ve ever told publicly has gotten me in more trouble than the one that occurred in an airport many years ago when I felt a profuse stirring of the Holy Spirit to go over to an old man in a wheelchair and brush his tangled, matted hair. Nothing has thrown me into the “experiential” category with my critics more than that story. But here’s the ironic part: I had my Bible wide open in my lap actively memorizing John 1 at the exact moment the Holy Spirit moved on me to stand up and walk over to that man. In fact, I was nearly annoyed by the inconvenience of having to get up and go serve somebody while I was busy with my memory work. They weren’t two separate things. They were happening simultaneously.

Despite the discouragement that being stereotyped can bring, if I thought I’d “experienced” God for the last time, I’d be ready to pack up this whole earthly existence and go home. I live to experience God – in my Bible study, my worship, my restoration, my personal revival, in the laughter of my family that has endured against all odds, in the burst of color in an autumn sunset, in a praise song blaring from the speakers in my car, in church service after church service, in the love I still feel for one man after 36 years, and in a walk all by myself in the country.

I write these words to you today who have devoted your lives to the study of God’s inspired Word and make it your daily bread. You don’t have to choose between the Scriptural and the “experiential.” You can have a devout study life and esteem the Bible more than any other tangible possession on this earth and you can also validly experience the presence and palpable activity of the Holy Spirit. You don’t need human permission to do so. You have the Bible’s permission.

Don’t let anybody take that right from you.

Hey, Dear Sisters! Well, surely after all these years I don’t have to tell you that you are my go-to group and all-time favorite resource for surveys or insights into various Scriptural concepts.  God started pressing a topic on my heart about a week and a half ago out of the blue during my quiet time and, since then, I have been all over both Testaments searching every spot where it rears up its head. Now I’d love to add some layers of examples and insights from life experience on top of it. The topic is accusation and it ultimately centers on the enemy as our accuser but I feel like God is leading me to gain some understanding of ways it weaves itself into our human relationships.

If you’d like to help wrap some human skin around an anatomy of accusation, so to speak, I would love to hear your responses to any or all of the 3 questions below. Your really honest answers would help me so much. At the same time, please don’t share anything that would be injurious to another person or that you’d mind being read in the newspaper of a small town because that’s roughly the population of readers we have on this blog. This is not the spot to whisper a secret and I write those words with a grin. I want this to be a candid place and a safe place all at the same time if possible. So, here are the questions:

1. In the course of your adult life, have you ever been painfully accused of something by another person (as opposed to being accused by Satan himself)? If your answer is yes, was the accusation a twisting/distorting of the facts or was it completely fabricated out of thin air? I’m looking into how often the most painful accusations are distortions or perversions of the truth (making them more believable and frustratingly less refutable) versus an outright lie with utterly no tie to the truth.

2. In the course of your adult life, have you ever accused someone else of something? If your answer is yes (and for most of us in a candid mood, it will be), did you turn out to be 100% right? (By all means, say so if you did. I’m just trying to look at the concept from several different perspectives.) Whether or not you were wrong, right, or partially right, do you have any regrets about making the accusation? If so, what are they and why?

3. In your opinion (and without the benefit of a dictionary), what is the difference between confrontation and accusation?

I am so grateful for your insight! You are welcome to leave your comment anonymously if you’d feel more comfortable answering candidly but, again, just make sure you don’t use someone’s name derogatorily or make his/her identity obvious in a negative light. You need not copy and paste the question you’ve chosen to answer but please do identify your response by number: 1, 2, or 3. Limit your answers to brief paragraphs because I’d really like to read as many as possible.

You are wonderful! Thank you so much! Pray for me as I continue to listen to God and see how He means for me to serve women in Bible study through this difficult topic. A heap of love to every single one of you!

Hey, my dear loved ones!

I believe God has placed something on my heart for us to do here in our community for the next several vital days on our nation’s calendar. It will take place in two parts.

Part One: Today and for the next twenty-four hours in comments to this post, those who are willing are going to comprise prayers drawn from Scripture for our new president and the nation he will lead. These Scriptures incorporated into prayers don’t have to be limited to the ones we’re most accustomed to seeing for leaders. By all means, look at those but also consider a Bible-full of precepts that speak to character and integrity and the many qualities that comprise a great leader.  See how the Holy Spirit might lay them on your heart and turn them into intercession. Also consider Scriptures that speak to issues like protection from harm for our president and for our nation and wholeness of heart.

If you need a launching point for your thoughts, think about how you’d want people to pray for your husband if he were elected president tomorrow. Go from there. Make it any length from a few sentences to a meaty paragraph but not long. Remember what Jesus said about those wanting to be heard for their many words in prayer. Keep it succinct and sincere. This is really important and you’ll see the reasons why during Part Two. The comments to this post will be limited entirely to prayers. Please add no other words or comments or even greetings or replies to one another on this one. Let’s just do the thing that really makes the difference. Refrain from signing your name to the bottom of it because you’re going to see in Part Two that others will be using it. Just sign off with an “Amen” or similar benediction but do indeed list any references for the verses your prayers were based on.

The most important discipline of this process is writing our prayers before we know who our president will be. Needless to say, other petitions specific to the man who is elected will be vital throughout his presidency but for this public format and for this 24-hour period of time, we’re going to write our prayers without knowing who it will be. I think (and hope!) we will find this approach very effective and helpful in our focus and prayer-direction throughout Part Two. Oftentimes, heightened emotion and opinion cloud focus, clarity, and wisdom in our prayer lives, especially with so much at stake. It’s hard to pray according to the Holy Spirit when our flesh is inflamed. Remember at the end of all of this, our God is sovereign and at no time does He lose control.

Your prayer will need to take this basic skeletal form:

Address God the way you feel led (Dear Father in Heaven or Creator of Heaven and Earth or Sovereign Lord, etc.)

Write the petition for our new president and for our nation.

Conclude it “In Jesus’ Name, Amen” or with something of similar intent and assigned authority.

List all Scripture references that your prayers were drawn from or based on. (Just the locations. You do not need to write them all the way out.)

Part Two: 24-hours or so after this post opens for comment, it will be closed. In other words, by mid-morning Tuesday, November 6th (Election Day) there will be no further way to leave additional comments but you will have full access to all of those already written. (Comments that come in after work hours this evening will all be posted before the 24-hour closure so don’t worry. If you write a prayer before the 24 hours is up, it will get posted when Lindsee is able to complete all moderations. It takes a while.)

After the election results are in, here’s what I’m suggesting. This is the time we get to reap the harvest sown in Part One.  Come back to this post and start voicing a number of these prayers that resonate most with you. More importantly perhaps, consider voicing the ones that may be harder for you but you know they are godly, sound, and Scriptural. If you’re less sure about some of them, look up the Scripture references the intercessor listed and see if the context gives you any insight or direction. You can use this as a resource for your prayers not only in this 48-hour period but in days to come. Consider praying several of them per day until you work your way through them. That’s what I’m going to shoot for. I’m hoping to print them out and stick them in my prayer journal and voice several at a time over the weeks to come until I’ve agreed in prayer with practically all of them.

I’m not remotely suggesting this is the only way to pray for the next few days and in the weeks to come. It’s just one way but I really do believe this is the approach God placed upon my heart for our blog community. I’m looking so forward to harvesting some of this fruit in the coming days and there is no doubt in my mind that it will help direct my petitions and cause me to intercede for things I would have overlooked. I am continually inspired in my prayer life by the powerful prayers of others. Aren’t you? Let’s do this, Sisters. I think blessing awaits us and, far more importantly, awaits our new president.

I love you so dearly, ladies. My word, we’ve been around long enough to spend our second election together. I pray with all my heart that God will be pleased with this community and will use it to encourage and edify the Body of Christ in a way only He can empower or explain. He is so worthy of our trust and He is well able and willing to respond to earnest prayers that align with His will and come to Him through the glorious, saving Name of His Son.

Before I sign off, all three Moore-Jones-Fitzpatrick girls could use your prayers! We are all headed to the other side of the world and to two different locations. Later today Melissa and I will board a plane for Greece for a dual-purpose trip over the next 7 days. (Voted early) As guests of Nick and Christine Caine, we will have the privilege of seeing some of the work of the A21 Campaign (Abolishing Injustice in the 21st Century) from a much closer angle and attend (and serve at) a conference there. I love nothing better than seeing what God is doing around this globe. God is using this time on the Kingdom calendar to expose horrendous injustices – particularly in the areas of human trafficking – that need to be fought by the Body of Christ. (See Isaiah 58!)

Melissa and I are also beginning a new Bible study journey together and, with the help of a guide, will be doing research in some very strategic places involved in the series. You will not waste a prayer on us! Pray for God to show us great and mighty things that we do not know (Jeremiah 33:3) and bless us with powerful encounters and insights and help us to serve people effectively and affectionately there amid such cultural differences. We are certain they will be a blessing of God to us but we want so much to also be a blessing of God to them. THEN, Amanda follows right behind us two days later (on Wednesday) heading to India for a very important mission trip with the organization “As Our Own.” Even in our very different destinations, all three of us will be serving in areas where human trafficking is appallingly prevalent and believers are being mobilized slowly but surely to cry out and labor for its end.

So! As usual, you won’t waste a prayer on the Moore-Jones-Fitzpatrick women and our families. (But don’t write them into your comment. Laughing. Don’t let me, your very own blog mama, get you off course with our purpose today! Only prayers for the president in your comments please.) Thank you so much, dearly loved ones.

Though I will be far from home, I’ve already prepared some blog posts for you in advance (look for one on Thursday) and Lindsee will be also be holding down the fort. So, have no fear, Siestaville! The city doors will stay wide open here throughout! Watch for the three of us on Twitter if you want to keep up with some things we’re experiencing in real time. (@bethmooreLPM, @AmandaMoJo, @MissFitz77)

You are dearly loved and prioritized here, Sweet Things. Now START WRITING PRAYERS!