Experiential or experimental theology addresses how a Christian experiences the truth of Christian doctrine in his life. The term experimental comes from the Latin experimentum, meaning “trial.” It is derived from the verb experior, meaning “to try, prove, or put to the test.” That same verb can also mean “to find or know by experience,” thus leading to the word experiential, meaning knowledge gained by experiment. John Calvin used experiential and experimental interchangeably, since both words in theology indicate the need for measuring experienced knowledge against the touchstone of Scripture.
By experiential or experimental theology, we mean Christ-centered theology which stresses that for salvation, sinners must by faith have a personal, experiential (that is, experienced) Spirit-worked knowledge of Christ, and, by extension, of all the great truths of Scripture. Thus we must emphasize, as the Puritans did, that the Holy Spirit causes the objective truths about Christ and His work to be experienced in the heart and life of sinners.
For example, our lost state and condition by nature due to our tragic fall in Adam, our dire need for Jesus Christ who merits and applies salvation by His Spirit, and our responsibility to repent and believe the gospel of God’s freely offered salvation in Jesus Christ all must be known and experienced in our lives. Experiential theology stresses that the Holy Spirit blesses man-abasing, Christ-centered theology that makes room for Christ within the soul; believers will then yearn to live wholly for His glory out of gratitude for His great salvation. John 17:3 says, “And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.” The gospel truth of sovereign grace that abases us to the lowest and exalts Christ to the highest in our salvation must be proclaimed and experienced.
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The one thing that really matters is this: to have a religion that will bring us safe at last to the new heavens and the new earth. To have that “little that a righteous man has,” to have faith that is lodged in Jesus Christ even if our trust seems as fine as a spider’s thread. To believe in your heart and to say with your mouth, “I know my Redeemer lives.”

Read the words of the Apostles to the early church: “We will devote ourselves to prayer and the ministry of the word” (Acts 6:4). This Apostolic commitment gave the church of the new covenant the priorities of a twofold vocation: it was to be characterized by prayer to the Father in the name of His Son and by the preaching of the Bible. Let me seek to open up something fresh about both of these marks.
Praying
Recently, I began to read a book that I found interesting in its concept, purpose, and accomplishment. A woman named Berenice Aguilera discovered a copy of John Calvin’s commentaries and realized that the original transcriber of his sermons—more than four hundred years ago in St. Peters, Geneva—also transcribed and printed his closing prayers. These brief living intercessions are printed in most of Calvin’s books of sermons. Berenice was so moved in reading them that she proceeded to gather them together, and she seems to have published them herself in England—because there is no name of a publisher to be found anywhere in a 255-page book that she has titled Praying through the Prophets. Publishing the book herself would have required not only cash but a strong conviction that there was something very valuable in listening to John Calvin speaking to God after he had spoken to the people in his congregation. This one book contains more than three thousand prayers of the Genevan Reformer at the close of each of his sermons on the Major and Minor Prophets from Jeremiah to Malachi.
I initially dipped into these prayers and found them refreshing. In daily readings, I am in the latter chapters of the prophet Jeremiah and Lamentations, so I have begun, at the end of the verses apportioned for each day, to read the prayers of Calvin on that chapter. These latter chapters of Jeremiah contain both a relentless declaration of the forthcoming destruction of mighty Babylon and also words of encouragement to the Lord’s people in captivity there. Let me give an example of a portion of Jeremiah as he seeks to encourage the people of God in their long exile from Jerusalem, and then the prayer of John Calvin when he finished preaching on them:
“You who have escaped from the sword, go, do not stand still! Remember the LORD from far away, and let Jerusalem come into your mind: ‘We are put to shame, for we have heard reproach; dishonor has covered our face, for foreigners have come into the holy places of the LORD’s house.’ Therefore, behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will execute judgment upon her images, and through all her land the wounded shall groan. Though Babylon should mount up to heaven, and though she should fortify her strong height, yet destroyers would come from me against her, declares the LORD.” (Jer. 51:50–53)
This is the prayer of John Calvin after he has preached on these verses:
Grant, Almighty God, that when you hide at this day your face from us, that the miserable despair that is ours may not overwhelm our faith, nor obscure our view of your goodness and grace, but that in the thickest darkness your power may ever appear to us, which can raise us above the world, so that we may courageously fight to the end and never doubt that you will at length be the defender of the church which now seems to be oppressed, until we shall enjoy our perfect happiness in heaven, through Christ our Lord. Amen.
What simplicity, theocentricity (God-centeredness), humility, and submissive yearning that expresses the oneness of the redeemed. That spirit is what we long to experience when we are hearing public prayer. Christians meet at the mercy seat. When we all bow there in the presence of our Lord in prayer, we are never closer together. There are Christians who will refuse to read anything that was written by John Calvin. They are missing so much. He was a man of prayer. You will never understand or appreciate the Genevan Reformer or realize his impact in the world until you grasp how there was a part of his life lived at the throne of grace. I often heard Ernest Reisinger say, “It is a sin to preach and not to pray.”
When one visits the Martyn Lloyd-Jones Trust website, one discovers that five examples of the congregational praying of Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones are recorded there. They are most moving, comprehensive, and deeply reverent as spoken by one addressing the almighty Creator of the cosmos through what His Son Jesus Christ has achieved. The first recorded prayer was prayed on the opening Sunday of a new year, and so it is the longest—fifteen minutes and thirty-eight seconds. The others average between ten and eleven minutes, but all are so gripping and relevant that the last thing one thinks of is their length. Little wonder people looking back sometimes said that when they went to Westminster Chapel for the first time, it was the praying of the Doctor that moved them more than the preaching. Only a man who knows the Scriptures, prays privately, and who walks in the Spirit could pray for that length, gripping and lifting a congregation of 1,400 into the presence of the Holy One. John Owen said, “If the word does not dwell with power in us then it will not pass with power from us.”
There are also four different versions of some of the pulpit prayers of Charles Haddon Spurgeon, prayed on Sunday mornings in the Metropolitan Tabernacle. The most accessible is published by the Banner of Truth. It has been said about Spurgeon’s praying:
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Let us resolve to abandon the naysaying and hand-wringing and instead embrace the radiant joy and bold witness that defined the apostolic company. No matter the opposition, no matter the changing winds of cultural hostility, we can remain steadfast in our Gospel labor – for it is a labor that will not fail until Christ is worshiped among every tribe and tongue. The future belongs to the overcomers, so let us take our stand with them, unwavering in our hopeful service until that day when every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord!

Sorry Not Sorry
If modern evangelicalism were a basketball team, we could be compared to the 2023-2024 Detroit Pistons. In the former days, circa the late 1980s, the Pistons were a dominant team, winning back-to-back titles, pulverizing almost everyone that stood in their path, and becoming a team that was well acquainted with victory. Yet, regardless of such a glorious past, the current iteration of the Detroit Pistons is both laughable and pathetic. Instead of the courage and physicality that defined Isaiah Thomas or the killer instinct of Bill Lamphere, this year’s Pistons were weak, they were cowardly, and they did everything within their power to tank their season. By tanking a season, I mean they believed that if they could lose enough games, a hero would get drafted in the next NBA draft, and that hero would come and rescue them. I can think of no better comparison to modern-day evanjellyfish Christianity.
Although having a past and a legacy littered with tremendous victories, infinitely more glorious than the 1980s Pistons, much of today’s evangelical Church has become toothless, passive, and seemingly content to simply tread water while awaiting a Deliverer to come and rescue us from our own impotence and incompetence. Rather than boldly advancing the Gospel with the fervor and tenacity that defined giants of the faith like Martin Luther, John Calvin, or the Puritans, many modern evangelicals have adopted an attitude of spiritual pacifism, more concerned with tanking our legacy than with building a dynasty that will last forever. And in the same way, no one admires a dejected team with a penchant for losing; no one admires a pathetic Christian religion with a loser’s mentality. This is one area where the Church of Jesus Christ needs desperately to repent.
Now, by repentance, I am not just talking about individual Christians who believe everything is going to hell in a handbasket and have adopted a posture of trembling ostriches within their culture. Sure, they need to repent and grow a spine. But, I lay the majority of the blame, instead, at the feet of pastors and seminaries, who preach such rank eschatological escapism that the laborers have left the fields. I blame pastors and seminaries who publish books, put on conferences, and teach sermon series peddling such an inglorious and hopeless message about how we lose down here that the Church of Jesus Christ can no longer conceptualize what victory is. And as a result, we have become a demoralized church, a defeated church, an impotent church, and a timid church. Precisely none of the things Christ died to make us, we have shamefully become. And, as said before, it is high time we wake up, get up, and get back into the fight.
And that message is precisely what we have been communicating in this series called A Practical Postmillennialism. We have been trying to discover what God says about the end times, what role we have to play in those times, and what that role will require of us as we go and serve our King. If you have followed along, you will know that the Bible’s first book tells us everything we need to know about how God made the world. He made the world so that it would be filled with worshippers. He made the world where humans would rule and extend His dominion. And He made a world where godly men and women would populate every square inch of this planet with discipled worshiping Christians. This is the paradigm for how God created the world in Genesis 1:28, and it is the plan God refuses to abandon after sin enters the world. Instead of scrapping His plan to spread His victory over every square inch of earth’s dirt, He repeats it, restates it, and reinvigorates it by making astounding promises to Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Judah. God promises that Noah’s family will fill the world with worshippers one day (Genesis 9:1). He promises that Abraham’s family will bring God’s covenantal blessings to every family on earth (Genesis 12:3). He promises that Isaac’s family will bless all the nations (Genesis 26:4). He promises that Jacob will have kings and nations who rule in allegiance to Yahweh coming from his own loins (Genesis 35:11). And He promises that from the line of Judah, the King of kings would come, and bring the wayward nations into obedience to Him.
This means nothing less than God’s plans to win the entire world to Himself so that no more pagan religions exist, murder is eliminated, infant mortality is eradicated, and the whole world is filled with Christians who worship their King. If you think the future of the world is pluralistic, you have a flawed view of what God is doing. The future, my dear friends, is Christian. The future is about the bright hope of Jesus bringing His Kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. The widespread proliferation of pagans with secular philosophies and institutions will fade, will wither, and will give way to the universal empire of Jesus Christ. Far from a loser theology, we have a theology of dominion and victory in the one with the name above all names!
So with that, I have been trying to take down the loser gospel of dispensationalism, of premillennialism, of some ammillennials, and of the lion’s share of evangelicalism. Instead, I would like to see an eschatology of victory, which is the eschatology of Christian history, retake root in this land. I would like to see Christianity become that glorious champion of Christ, who will storm the gates of hell with water guns, and will take their beatings with joy for the name of Christ, and will see the Kingdom growing and pushing back the enemy in our lifetime. I want to see the Church become what it has been in the past and stop pooping her pants every time our culture acts like pagans.
With that in mind, today’s episode will examine the Book of Acts and show how it not only proves Postmillennialism but also gives us the attitude adjustment we need to stop losing and start winning, working, warring, building, and extending His dominion.
So, with that, let us begin!
The Loser Mentality and the Book of Acts
If you want to know what Jesus wanted His Kingdom to look like or how He envisioned us to think, act, or labor in this world, you would be hard-pressed to find a better example than the first-century Church. These are the men who knew Jesus face to face. They are the ones who heard His sermons, wrestled with His parables, and watched as He gave one discourse after another on the nature of the Kingdom throughout His three and a half years of ministry. They also had off-the-record conversations, campfire discussions, and other forms of communication not recorded in Scripture. They had the unique privilege of asking Jesus questions that we do not get to ask, and as a result, they got a unique glimpse into Jesus’ vision for the Kingdom of God and what His Church was to be about and to accomplish. Thus, when we look at how the first-century Church behaved, we can actually intuit much about the theology of the Kingdom.
For instance, if the early Church believed in the same way as John MacArthur, that the Church loses down here, we should expect to see the early Church losing. We should expect to hear a bit of pessimism in their vernacular. And we should expect to read a fair amount of hedging on just how much success could be possible in order to maintain our status as losers. And if you think that is harsh, I would remind you that we are English speakers. People who win are winners. People who fight are fighters. People who lose are losers. People who lie are liars. This is not very controversial English. It is only controversial because we do not want to reckon with the implications of our embraced theology. When we say the Church loses down here, we are saying she is the loser down here. Whether we like that or not or have the integrity to admit it, that is precisely what we are saying. And, I, for one, am totally unwilling to speak in such ways about the bride of Christ (whether directly by the words coming out of my face or indirectly through what I believe about her in my mind). I would rather overestimate how much she will accomplish with Christ as her bridegroom than stand before the King of Glory one day and explain why I filled my time with bashing and doubting His bride. If there were ever a husband I would not want to face after slandering His beloved wife, Christ Jesus would rank supreme.
Now, back to the point… The Church we see in Acts does not act like losers, does not think like losers, does not moan and whine like losers, and does not expect to become losers. From the earliest moments of the book all the way to the very end, we see a group of people who expect to win, expect that the Kingdom of God will rapidly advance, and are overjoyed when God begins doing that in their lifetime. So, with that, I would like us to look at a few examples in this book to see how their expectation was nothing short of victory. I would invite anyone interested to see this book with new eyes to continue with me as we open it.
When Do the Last Days Begin?
The end times are not a future period we look forward to – they began 2,000 years ago with the incarnation of Christ. This is because the Bible divides time into two categories. The former times (which are the times of the law and the prophets, temples and tabernacles, priesthoods and sacrifices, etc.) and the latter times or end times (which is the period of Christ and His Spirit-indwelled Church). And guess what? The New Testament makes this abundantly plain for anyone with eyes to see. For instance, the author of Revelation, when talking about the inauguration of the end times says: these events “must soon take place” (Revelation 1:1) and that the “time” for the changing of the ages is not long away in the distant future but “is near” (Revelation 1:3). Jesus warns He will return in judgment “quickly” against apostate Israel (Revelation 22:7,12,20; Matthew 24:34), which is why James declares that the Judge who will pronounce judgment on the Jews is standing “right at the door” (James 5:9). This is why the author of Hebrews so clearly differentiates an era that is passing away (Hebrews 9:26) and a more perfect era (the end times) which has now come in Christ (Hebrews 9:26). He even tells us that in the old times God spoke to His people through the law and the prophets, but “now in these last days God has spoken to us by His Son” (Hebrews 1:2). Since God has incontrovertibly put away the Old Covenant types and shadows and has spoken to us through His beloved Child it is painfully apparent that we are living in the last days. We are not waiting for the end to start – we have been living squarely in the long-promised eschaton for two millennia!
Now, as clear as that is, not everyone agrees. Many modern evangelicals seem to conveniently overlook these things and insist that we are living in “the age of the church” and still waiting for the end times to begin. Not only have they invented a new age in which the Bible does not even countenance, but they have also ignored the clear teaching of the New Testament, which forcefully disproves their assumption. Perhaps most shocking is how they arrogantly dismiss Jesus’ own words that the Kingdom arrived in His incarnation (Luke 17:21) and would be entrusted to His people, the Church, to bear its Kingdom fruit (Matthew 21:43). They ignore the prophecies of Zechariah how this coming Prophet, Priest, and King will establish God’s Kingdom on earth (Zechariah 1-7), which began when He rode into the city of Jerusalem on a donkey and set up His empire (Zechariah 9:9). They’ve become deaf to the words of Christ, who said that the Kingdom was near to the first century people listening to Him (Mark 1:15), that it was already at hand two thousand years ago (Matthew 4:17), and was being inaugurated as Christ ascended to the ancient of Days (Daniel 7:13-14) and sat upon His rightful throne to reign (Matthew 28:18) with all authority (Matthew 28:18). The clarity in all of this is astounding and even more astounding at how readily it is ignored.
These blind guides not only fail to see this generally, but they fail to see this, particularly in the book of Acts, which screams that a new era of history, the last days (or end times), has already begun! For instance, according to the apostle Peter in Acts chapter 2, the last days began at Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit was poured out on all flesh. As the crowds watched the rushing wind of the Spirit descend upon the early Church, Peter reminded them that all of this was prophesied in the book of Joel, who not only prophesied this event would occur but said it would mark the arrival of God’s end-time Kingdom! (Acts 2:17-21). So, just in case you missed that, according to Peter and Joel, the pouring out of the Spirit is the definitive evidence that the end times have already begun.
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