Being Led by the Spirit and the Word

We read in Genesis 22 that the Lord told Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac. Abraham was obviously distressed and confused at this request - but he was sure it was God. Abraham went along with it and sure enough, God revealed to Him that He was just testing him. What was the test? Obeying the inward witness. It was not a test of knowing scripture and obeying the rules therein.

Now, if Abraham would have had a Bible to hand - he could have argued with the Lord and quoted scripture, such as Exodus 20:13 which says, "You shall not murder". If Abraham had a Bible, he could have used it to doubt he was even hearing from God. Abraham could have argued that God would never tell him to do something that was expressly forbidden by scripture.

The point I'm making here is that the Word of God ought to be the means by which we come into the New Covenant, having contrasted it with the Old. We can still refer to scripture in order to know who we are in Christ. But it is futile to always be checking everything you do against scripture all of the time. Scripture is open to interpretation and manipulation. Churches use scripture to control people and impose rules on their congregation. Questioning a lead of the Holy Spirit against the Bible is exhaustive and confusing; it leads to Christians doubting themselves and God and lacking the confidence to do what they're called to do.

For years, Christians have been told to not trust their feelings, that their feelings are bad and misleading. But the Bible does say that we are children of God and that we are led by the Holy Spirit. But what the church has done is to lay down rules (or what is calls “principles”) with a view of providing a safety net for believers. But this leaves people confused because they are taught to deny what their heart is telling them – because they cannot always make it line-up with their interpretation of the Bible. It is little wonder that Paul calls the law “the ministry of death”. Feelings can be misleading, I’m not denying that, but there must come a time when believers start to follow guidance from within their heart.

The more a person embraces the message of grace, the freer they are from rules and restrictions and the more they are attentive to the leading of the spirit. I believe it is harmful to resist going with what your heart tells you is right – goodness knows what would have happened if Abraham would have resisted God when He told him to sacrifice His son Isaac. I remember a catchphrase in the church during the nineties, “Bring your Isaacs to the altar.” If Christians are so pre-occupied with scouring the Bible for verses of scripture to back-up what their heart tells them is right – their Isaacs won’t end-up anywhere near the altar!

Darin Hufford of the Free Believers Network calls this approach of always referring to scripture as Back-up Verse Theology.