WHEN TRADITION BECOMES A PRISON (PART III)

“When Experience Replaces Scripture”

By Akin Ojumu

There is a scourge afflicting the contemporary Church that is every bit as dangerous as biblical illiteracy. It is the unholy fascination with power, manifestations, encounters, revelations, and supernatural experiences.

For many Church folks, subjective mystical experiences now carry greater practical authority than the written Word of God.

Dreams. Visions. Trances. Angelic visitations. Trips to heaven. Conversations with Jesus. Tea with God. Out-of-body experiences. Secret revelations. Mystical encounters. All these have been elevated above Scripture.

These stories are recounted with breathtaking confidence and received with astonishing credulity. And whenever the experience collides with Scripture, Scripture is too often forced to yield.

In the battle between experience and Scripture. Experience wins, all the time.

That is the peril.

Christianity is quietly being transformed from a faith grounded in objective divine revelation into a religion governed by subjective spiritual experience. Believers are no longer anchored primarily in what God has already revealed in Scripture. They are busy chasing something new – something otherworldly.

The next encounter. The next manifestation. The next revelation. The next supernatural sensation. The next spectacular testimony. The next trip to heaven. The next angelic visitation. The next levitation. The next teleportation.

And in this intoxicating pursuit of the extraordinary, something infinitely more precious is gradually pushed into the background:

Christ Himself.

The obsession with supernatural phenomena has now eclipsed simple devotion to Jesus Christ and His Gospel in the modern Church.

Fabulous stories about people drinking tea with God, touring heaven, conversing casually with angels, visiting celestial council chambers, receiving private revelations, or being transported into mysterious spiritual dimensions excite Church audiences more than the historic apostolic testimony concerning the incarnation, life, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ.

Think about the absurdity of that.

God has already given us the testimony of men who actually walked with Jesus. Men who heard Him teach. Men who watched Him perform miracles. Men who ate with Him. Men who traveled with Him. Men who saw Him arrested. Men who witnessed His crucifixion. Men who encountered Him alive after His resurrection. Men who watched Him ascend into heaven.

Their testimony has been preserved for us in Holy Scripture. Yet, apparently, that is not exciting enough.

People would rather hear Brother So-and-So describe the furniture he supposedly saw in Heaven. They would rather hear Apostle Somebody recount the private conversation he claims to have had with Jesus. They would rather hear Prophet Whoever explain what an angel allegedly whispered into his ear.

Under the illusion that God is not static – whatever that even means – the inspired testimony of the actual Apostles is displaced by the unverifiable adventures of religious scoundrels.

And therein lies the tragedy.

For all their piety, passion, noise, fasting, shouting, conferences, conventions, prayer mountains, deliverance programs, prophetic gatherings, all-night vigils, and supernatural encounters, far too many contemporary Church folks demonstrate remarkably little regard for God’s written Word.

They may be rich in experiences but impoverished in Scripture. They may be fluent in the vocabulary of manifestations, yet unable to accurately explain the Gospel. They may recount dreams for hours but cannot interpret a biblical passage in its context. They may claim repeated journeys into the supernatural realm while remaining strangers to the most elementary doctrines of the Christian faith. 

They lack the biblical foundations necessary to anchor their faith securely in the harbor of God’s truth.

Scripture could hardly be clearer about the relationship between Christ and His sheep:

John 10:27

“My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.”

Christ’s sheep hear their Shepherd. And the Shepherd has not left His Church dependent upon the unverifiable private revelations of religious celebrities.

We have the revelation God has given. We have the prophetic Word made more sure. We have the apostolic testimony. We have the Holy Scripture.

No one can credibly profess allegiance to Christ while persistently rejecting, manipulating, twisting, or subordinating the Scriptures that testify concerning Him.

You cannot claim to love the God of the Bible while despising what the Bible actually says. You cannot claim submission to Christ while refusing correction from His Word. You cannot claim devotion to truth while stubbornly clinging to doctrines Scripture demonstrates to be false.

And you certainly cannot claim spiritual maturity while treating sound biblical interpretation as though it were an inconvenience.

The consequences are not trivial. The distortion of Scripture is spiritually destructive.

Peter issued a sobering warning:

2 Peter 3:14–16

“Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by Him without spot or blemish, and at peace. And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures.”

Notice Peter’s words:

“To their own destruction.”

Twisting Scripture is not a harmless theological hobby. False interpretation has consequences. False doctrine has consequences. Misusing God’s Word has consequences.

Those who distort Scripture—whether to advance personal agendas, justify mystical practices, protect denominational traditions, preserve ministerial empires, defend charismatic celebrities, or propagate false doctrine—place both themselves and those who listen to them in grave spiritual danger.

It is eternally dangerous to remain willfully ignorant concerning the Word of God.

The remedy for the malady of biblical illiteracy is not mysterious.

Open the Bible. Study it. Read it carefully. Read it repeatedly. Read it in context. Ask what the author meant. Ask what the original audience would have understood. Pay attention to grammar. Pay attention to history. Pay attention to literary context. Then test everything against the text. 

Test your traditions against Scripture. Test your denomination against Scripture. Test your pastor against Scripture. Test your General Overseer against Scripture. Test your favorite preacher against Scripture. Test your experiences against Scripture. Test your dreams against Scripture. Test your visions against Scripture. Test your revelations against Scripture.

Test everything. And when Scripture proves you wrong, have enough humility to admit that you are wrong. Abandon the error. Change your mind. Submit to the truth.

There is no virtue in being consistently wrong. There is nothing spiritual about defending a lie merely because you have believed it for a very long time. There is nothing noble about inheriting an error from previous generations and refusing to surrender it.

Longevity does not transform falsehood into truth. Popularity does not transform error into truth. Tradition does not transform error into truth. Experience does not transform error into truth. And sincerity certainly does not transform error into truth.

Truth does not bow before tradition. Scripture does not submit to your experience. The Word of God does not bend to accommodate your favorite preacher. And the Bible is under absolutely no obligation to agree with what you have always believed.

When tradition contradicts Scripture, tradition must go. When experience contradicts Scripture, experience must go. 

When your denomination contradicts Scripture, your denomination is wrong. When your pastor contradicts Scripture, your pastor is wrong. When your favorite preacher contradicts Scripture, your favorite preacher is wrong.

The final authority is not your Church. It is not your denomination. It is not your General Overseer. It is not your “apostle.” It is not your “prophet.” It is not your tradition. It is not your experience. It is not your dream. It is not your vision. It is not your revelation.

The final authority is the Word of God.