Knowing Jesus Christ in reality or as mere head knowledge?
The following is taken from out of a youth group lesson that I did. This is an analogy comparing knowing Jesus to experiencing the Grand Canyon.
Let’s say that we are looking to experience the Grand Canyon. We have a large 
picture of the Grand Canyon hanging in our house. We already know about it and have an idea of what it looks like. Seeing this picture helps give us a desire to go visit the Grand Canyon. At this point, have we experienced the Grand Canyon? We certainly have not.
In time, this desire to visit the Grand Canyon fades. Imagine that we have taken that picture down and tucked it away somewhere. Over time we forget some of our knowledge about the Grand Canyon. Over time the picture becomes damaged. Years later somebody brings to our memory the greatness of the Grand Canyon. Our desire to see and experience it is rekindled. We find our old cherished picture. We look to fix and clean it back up again. Then we hang it back up on the wall. We decide to read up on it again. You know more of the Grand Canyon now than you did before. This is still not experiencing the Grand Canyon. You are just in a better position to be motivated enough to finally go there. There is now a danger of being fooled into thinking that you are in position of being good enough with experiencing the Grand Canyon.
Actually experiencing the Grand Canyon means being there in person. It is feeling the soil and the vegetation. Seeing the sunlight seemingly change the colors of the canyon as it traverses the sky. Going out on a hike to be there in the canyon is experiencing the Grand Canyon. All the reading and picture viewing fails to compete to what it is like to truly experience the Grand Canyon. Your understanding/knowing the Grand Canyon is now different. In a sense, you have been joined to the Grand Canyon.
So, how is this an analogy for something Christian? Being a Christian is about knowing Jesus Christ the Lord in a real and experiential way. Simply knowing of Jesus Christ is not enough. Trusting facts is not it. Knowing and trusting the proper facts are simply a necessary prerequisite. Too many people today teach as if that is the finish line to becoming a Christian. It is not.
I’ve heard many people talk as if they are a Christian simply because they’ve known about Christianity, and believed it to be true, for their whole life. Some others claim to have “fallen away from the faith” for a time. After living a knowingly sinful life for a while they returned to going to Church. They have stopped blatantly living in sins. They’ll read the Bible some and pray. According to them, they have been a Christian this whole time. They have no testimony for being joined to the Lord Jesus Christ. You ask them what it was like when they were born-again and they are confused. These people will often times go through cycles of “falling away” and then “coming back to the faith”.
In a lovely turn of events, I met a guy who does a great job of helping to illustrate this. Before typing the last paragraph, I was forced to take a break. My family and I had to go to a group thing of bringing some care packages to a local retirement home and playing games with residents. I met a man there who not too long ago became a Christian. He had testimony for what it is like to experience the Life of Jesus. He was speaking about how amazing it was to have “all things become new”. Just like the Bible says in: 2 Corinthians 5:17. He could talk about sanctification. He knew the difference of the Holy Spirit convicting of sin vs merely having a conscious. He knew what it was like to grow into greater submission to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. He knew what it was like to grow from religion into genuine Christianity. What lovely conversation that we had! No doubt the timing of it was God ordained.
Anything short of experiencing the Grand Canyon is short of actually experiencing it. In the same way that it would be different to know about the Grand Canyon vs experiencing it; you have to come to know Jesus Christ in an experiential way. Do you know this difference? Do you know what it is like to grow in Sanctification? Are you growing in submission to the Lord Jesus Christ? Does this question confuse you? Did you experience nothing when you “became a Christian”? Is your Christian life like a yo-yo? Anything short of experiencing Jesus Christ within is short of experiencing Jesus Christ within. Anything short of experiencing Jesus Christ within is short of experiencing genuine Christianity.