A.W. TOZER (1897-1963) ON "TRUTH MUST BE LIVED"
For a long time I have believed that truth, to be understood, must be lived; that Bible doctrine is wholly ineffective until it has been digested and assimilated by the total life. . . . Truth in the Scriptures is more than a fact. A fact may be detached, impersonal, cold and totally disassociated from life. Truth, on the other hand, is warm, living and spiritual. A theological fact may be held in the mind for a lifetime without it having any positive effect upon the moral character; but truth is creative, saving, transforming, and it always changes the one who receives it into a humbler and holier man.
At what point, then, does a theological fact become for the one who holds it a life-giving truth? At the point where obedience begins. When faith gains the consent of the will to make an irrevocable committal to Christ as Lord, truth begins its saving, illuminating work; and not a moment before. . . .
The dead church holds to the shell of truth without surrendering the will to it, while the church that wills to do God's will is immediately blessed with a visitation of spiritual powers. . . . Truth cannot aid us until we become participators in it. We only possess what we experience.
A.W. Tozer, THAT INCREDIBLE CHRISTIAN (Harrisburg, PA: Christian Publications, 1964), 92-94.