The Bible is designed to be an experimental and a practical book. By Octavius Winslow

As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. Psalm 42 verses 1-2

The main value of any scriptural truth to a child of God is the conscious power of that truth in his own soul. The Bible is designed to be an experimental and a practical book. It does not deal with mere academic or theoretical truths. Its teachings were intended by its divine author to address themselves to the judgment, thus finding an inlet to the conscience and the heart, and becoming a leaven of holiness in the soul, diffusing its influence through the affections and desires of the Christian.

We repeat the observation, that any truth is valuable to the Christian, only in proportion to his personal and experimental acquaintance with its nature and effects. A mere religious professor may have an intellectual belief in, and a theoretical reception of, vital and essential truth, and yet be utterly ignorant of its renewing and sanctifying power in his soul.

O that there were more experimental Christianity among us!

O God, You are my God, earnestly I seek You. My soul thirsts for You, my body longs for You, in a dry and weary land where there is no water. Psalm 63 verse 1