We have so much theology, but in the end what do we actually know about Him? Is theology the path God has given us to know Him?
Wow! That's a loaded double question.
First, let's define theology:
Definition of theology (from websters)
1
: the study of religious faith, practice, and experience especially
: the study of God and of God's relation to the world
2a
: a
theological theory or system (like: Thomist theology a theology of atonement)
b
: a distinctive body of theological opinion (like: Catholic theology)
Personally, I think definition #1 and definition #2a are important to the individual believer. Our beliefs about God should be consistent and therefore fit within each other. When we find an inconsistency, it should lead us to investigate what we are falsely believing that isn't true.
For instance, I didn't believe God woke people up (being born again) until He did it to me. My belief system was such that I couldn't have chosen to genuinely believe that God did that, because I had bought the lies I had been told that all born again people were crazy. So, my theology stood in the way of me being a faithful witness to others--and actually my theology then kept me from being a faithful witness to anyone, because I was taught that faith was private and not to be shared in that same "church". But, my mainline church wouldn't have led anyone to Him anyway--it was completely non-intrusive and that is what I and those around me wanted. He was only an add-on like fire or flood insurance, just in case their was a God and hell was really true. But, we were more like a club than a church, except for the name on the door saying "church".
Even as late as 4 years into my walk with the Lord, I still believed the lie that healing evangelists were frauds and that healing and other gifts (like tongues) were not for today. Because I was dating, God used a woman to get me to go to listen to Randy Clark speak. I never would have gone. She asked me multiple times to just go to one service. I said "Okay, I will go, but we aren't giving any money and after this service we don't go any more." It is funny and sad at the same time to admit that I was so obnoxiously against it, because I had been so ingrained with a lie. But that night God broke that lie, not by touching me. But by healing a woman born deaf and mute who was now 30 years old and had been in that same church for 19 years--as testified by the repenting pastor who acknowledged he didn't even want to bring Randy in because he didn't believe healing was for today based on someone he loved not getting healed when he prayed.
At that point I was in seminary. I was blown away. I said: "God, if you do this, I want to do this. We can argue about theology all day long--as I do with my unbelieving professors--but when they see Your power at work, it changes people." And, yet, since then, I have seen that even miracles right in front of them or even done to them don't change some people's theology. Sometimes, people are more attached to their theology than they are to God. So when put in the same position as I was, they choose to believe the lies to maintain fellowship with an unbelieving church.
My point in all this is what we think about God (our theology) should be ever evolving as we are taken from glory to glory (experience). I have shown theology as keeping us from Truth; but it can also be proven, through Scripture and experience, that sound theology will keep us from departing to deception. We can be over-willing to let our experience drive our theology to the extent that we end up outside the faith, participating in witchcraft and other ungodly things. There have been men used powerfully by God who mistook God's use of them to mean something it didn't and they ended up shipwrecked! We can also let our lack of experience drive our theology, so that because "we don't get something when we asked, it must not be for today" logic rules too much of the professing church. We can be over-willing to let our (false) theology drive our experience where we reject something that is happening right in front of our eyes and actually say it is of the devil (and what a tragedy that would be, based on what Jesus said about blaspheming the Holy Spirit). Or we can be over-willing to let our theology change based on ungodly experience or wrong personal perception about our experience. An example is that some "teachers" who warn everyone to be careful who you let lay hands on you. They say they had an experience where someone laid hands on them and then they felt lust or other thoughts. So, they decided that somehow they were made into the scapegoat with the laying on of hands. That is just not Scriptural in the New Testament and it breeds distrust and lack of love in the body of Christ. The caution in Scripture is to "be careful who you lay hands on" (for ministry appointment purposes), if one reads the rest of the chapter of that epistle.
So theology about God is important, as is experience with God. You can't have one or the other, only. You need both to come alive in you. But, what I can agree with is that theology without experience is worthless. If I had to choose one over the other, I'll take experience with God over theology about God any and every day.