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"Take
Heed" Ministries
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Cecil Andrews, PO BOX 13, Ballynahinch, BT24 8AL, Northern Ireland. Telephone/Fax 028 9756 5511. E-MAIL - takeheed@aol.com WEBSITE - http://www.takeheed.net |
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NEWS
FROM THE FRONT
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JUNE 2004
"Be not afraid or dismayed by reason of this great multitude for the battle is not yours but God's" (2nd Chronicles 20v15)
Dear
praying friends,
As there is so much that I want to include in this
newsletter I’m launching straight into our opening article and my prayer is
that all who read this entire newsletter will be much informed and warned.
CECIL ANDREWS
Cecil
Andrews,
Telephone/Fax
028 9756 5511. E-MAIL – takeheed@aol.com
WEB-SITE www.takeheed.net
Alpha’s Road Leads To Rome
There is a well-known saying that ‘All
Roads Lead To Rome’ - in fact that
expression was used by Michael de Semlyen as the title for his excellent
book that exposes the efforts of Rome to utilise the modern ecumenical movement
as a means of bringing ‘separated brethren’ back into the Pope’s flock.
Incidentally this book can still be obtained from us [price £6.50 includes
p&p]. In the March-June 2004 issue of ALPHA NEWS there is a
detailed account of a visit by Nicky Gumbel, his wife Pippa and their son,
Jonny to Rome and in the course of the visit they ‘were presented to the
Pope by Father Raniero Cantalamessa, Preacher to the Papal Household’.
‘Father’ Cantalamessa has featured previously on the front page of ALPHA
NEWS and last year was a guest ‘preacher’ at Holy Trinity Brompton. Not
only did Nicky Gumbel meet the Pope ‘at the end of a General Audience’ but
he also met representatives of ‘The Congregation on the Doctrine of the
Faith’. This ‘Congregation’
is simply the modern title since 1967 of what was previously known as ‘The
Office of The Inquisition’ – the Papal approved organisation charged to
root out and destroy heresy and an honest look at history will tell of how the
blood of many true Christian martyrs bears testimony to its ruthless
efficiency.
Peter De Rosa in his
book ‘Vicars of Christ’ wrote ‘It is clear from this that the aim of
the Inquisition was to defend, not the faith, but the papal system [p 232]…once
a pope like Gregory 1X had initiated the inquisition, pontiffs preferred to
contradict the Gospel [rather] than an “inerrant” predecessor, for that would
bring down the papacy itself [p 245]…An anonymous Catholic once said “It would
be better to be an atheist than believe in the God of the Inquisition” [p 251]’.
The article in ALPHA NEWS
quoted glowing references from Roman Catholic clergy who view ALPHA as a
vital tool in heeding the present Pope’s call for a ‘new evangelisation’ –
The Pope’s ‘new evangelisation’ is aimed at educating and
galvanising Roman Catholics to go out and Romanise and Sacramentalise the
world. In another article I recently wrote this about ALPHA
As long as ALPHA continues to present what I would
describe as an ‘anorexic skeleton’ of Christianity,
The absence of meaningful,
biblical doctrinal content in ALPHA means that we read the
following comments [with some comments by myself added] in this ALPHA
NEWS article –
‘Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, Archbishop
of
‘The Catholic Church in Scotland is being
encouraged to use Alpha by Cardinal Keith O’Brien, Archbishop of St
Andrews and Edinburgh…he said “A priority for me on my appointment was the
‘re-Christianisation [‘re-Catholicisation’] of Scotland’. I see the
Alpha course as an initial tool [no doubt to be built upon by
‘Father’ Cantalamessa’s video series mentioned above] for this programme”.
One Catholic lay-reader, Mrs Mary Hagar
of
Alpha may for Mrs Hagar be ‘bringing into reality the
church that she has always dreamed of’ but in reality Alpha is
helping to up-build ‘the church’ that God specifically warned His people
against in Revelation chapter 17. ALPHA NEWS quotes Nicky Gumbel’s
comments upon his return from
‘It was a
great honour to be presented to Pope John Paul 11, who has done so much to
promote evangelisation around the world [like setting his seal of
approval upon the 1994 ‘Catechism of the Catholic Church’ that teaches every
soul-damning (2 Peter 2:1) Roman Catholic heresy?] We have
been enormously enriched by our interaction with Catholics in many countries.
It is a great privilege to meet inspiring leaders from different parts of
the church – Catholic, Baptist, Salvation Army, Pentecostal, Lutheran,
Methodist, and so many more – and discover that what unites us [ERROR!]
is infinitely greater than what divides us [what divides is ‘gospel
truth’]. As Fr. Raniero Cantalamessa has pointed out, the battle
today is similar to that of the first century [like Paul’s rejection of
the ‘false gospel’ of the Judaisers (see Galatians 1:6-9) whose modern-day
counterpart is found in Roman Catholicism and its ‘gospel’]. The battle
is around the King [Is Nicky Gumbel aware that ‘When the triple crown is placed
on the head of a new pope at his “coronation” ceremony the ritual prescribes
the following declaration by the officiating Cardinal – “Receive the tiara
adorned with three crowns, and know that thou art the Father of Princes and
Kings, ruler of the world”’ (Roman Catholicism by Loraine Boettner p
127)].
Is Jesus a Universal Saviour, or just
one among many? [The ‘Jesus’ of Roman Catholicism is very much a
“Universal Saviour” – in fact he is so “Universal” that according to Rome it is
not even necessary to hear about him or believe on him in order to be saved -
as you can hear by listening to the audio extract by Pastor John MacArthur
posted to our web site. This Roman Catholic ‘Jesus’ is not the Lord Jesus that
Paul wanted the lost to hear about so that they might be saved, for without
hearing about Paul’s Lord Jesus they would not be able to believe and be saved
– see Romans 10: 10-15]. Thus, on
the crucial issue of our day, we can be united [in error] and
proclaim this Jesus to a desperately needy world’.
I said recently in a talk
that I gave on Alpha – ‘it is again my view
that any PASTOR, PREACHER or BIBLE TEACHER who co-operates with Rome rather
than confronting Rome – such a person, and NICKY GUMBEL is one such person,
should not be entrusted with teaching the Word of God for he and they are not,
in Paul’s words to Timothy – “faithful men” [2nd Timothy 2: 1-2]’. This report of Nicky Gumbel’s
visit to
[PART 4] WAS - C S LEWIS - TRULY
‘OUR GREATEST CHRISTIAN WRITER’?
As
stated at the end of part 3 of our studies on the teachings of C S Lewis
we come now in this final part to consider his teachings on REDEMPTION.
One of the most glorious truths at the heart of the ‘Gospel of Christ’
is the message of redemption. It has gripped the hearts of hymn writers
when they penned words like ‘Redeemed how I love to proclaim it, redeemed
by the blood of the lamb’ and ‘There is a redeemer, Jesus, God’s
own Son, precious lamb of God, Messiah, Holy One’.
I
want to consider this matter of redemption from two angles – I want
firstly to look at what C S Lewis believed about what I would call ‘individual
redemption’ and then to look at what C S Lewis believed about what I
would call ‘corporate redemption’.
Before
homing in on these two ‘angles’ let us first establish the clear biblical
meaning of ‘redemption’. In his ‘Dictionary of Theological Terms’,
Alan Cairns wrote ‘the deliverance of God’s elect from a state of
sin into a state of salvation by the means and merit of the ransom paid by
Christ on their behalf’. Mr Cairns went on to quote from John
Owen’s classic ‘Death of Death’ (p 147) – ‘Redemption…is the
delivery of any one from captivity and misery by the intervention “lutrou” of
a price or ransom. That this ransom, or price of our deliverance was the blood
of Christ is evident’.
Through
the sacrificial shedding of His blood on the Cross of Calvary Christ paid a
ransom price to purchase a ‘group of people’ and so release them from
their ‘state of sin’ [condemned] and bring them into a ‘state of
salvation’ [justified]. We learn who this ‘group of people’ are when
we read the words of Paul to the Ephesian Elders in Acts 20:28 – “Take heed
therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock over the which the Holy Ghost
hath made you overseers, to feed the church, which he [Christ] hath
purchased with his own blood”.
‘The Church’ speaks of both ‘individual’
and ‘corporate’ redemption.
Not only do this ‘group of
people’, the ‘individuals’ who ‘corporately’ make up ‘The
Church’, now belong to Christ, but they also enjoy a special benefit
that flows from that ‘blood bought’ Calvary transaction. John
Murray, in his book, ‘Redemption: Accomplished and Applied’ wrote
‘when Paul says that in the beloved “we have redemption through his
blood, the forgiveness of sins” [Ephesians 1:7; Colossians 1:14], it is
quite plain that he conceives the forgiveness of sins as the blessing accrued
from blood redemption…the death of Christ is redemptively efficacious in
reference to sin’.
The question we must consider is
this. To what effective extent has Christ redeemed the ‘individuals’
who ‘corporately’ comprise ‘The Church’? Is ‘individual’
redemption ‘plenary’ or ‘partial’? Is ‘corporate’
redemption effectively limited only to ‘The Church’?
Where ‘individual’ redemption is
considered, the teaching of Scripture is clear. As far as an individual’s “sin”
is concerned there is ‘plenary’ [FULL] forgiveness and not ‘partial’.
Twice in the book of Hebrews God spells out what has been accomplished in the
realm of “forgiveness” as a result
of the redemptive work of Christ, WHO ALONE is “the mediator of the new covenant” (Hebrews 12:24). In Hebrews
When God forgives a true “born again” believer - He forgives
FULLY and that person is no longer under “condemnation”
- which is the position of every unregenerate unbeliever – John 5:24 “verily, verily I say unto you, he that heareth my word and
believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life and shall not come into
condemnation but is passed from death [CONDEMNED] unto life [JUSTIFIED]”
In an
article in the December
2003 Evangelical Times entitled ‘Why Was Jesus Born’? Peter Jeffrey cited the equivalent of a modern-day ‘parable’ when he wrote ‘Christmas
is probably the most expensive time of the year. All those presents…have to be
paid for. When January comes and the credit card bills roll in, the full cost
is seen. We may end up heavily in debt. But wait a moment, ‘Why Jesus Was Born’ is about the cost God was
willing to pay to remove your debt of sin. What if in January your credit
card debt was FULLY paid by someone else…Your sin has run up an enormous
‘debt’…if you turn to Jesus and trust in His death for the forgiveness of your
sin…you will find that Jesus has paid the debt [FULLY] for you. That is why He was born and that is why He died’.
Did C S Lewis teach
that, for a believer, their ‘debt was
FULLY paid by someone else’ - that ‘someone else’ being Jesus Christ and that upon death they would go immediately “to be with Christ which is far better” [Philippians
‘Of course I pray for the dead. The action is so spontaneous, so all but
inevitable, that only the most compulsive theological case against it would
deter men [Cecil’s comment – would “There is therefore no condemnation to those who are
in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1) be a
sufficiently ‘compulsive
theological case against’ praying
for the dead?] And I
hardly know how the rest of my prayers would survive if those for the dead were
forbidden. At our age the majority of those we love best are dead. What sort of
intercourse with God could I have if what I love best were unmentionable to
Him? On the traditional Protestant view, all the dead are damned or saved. If
they are damned, prayer for them is useless. If they are saved, it is equally
useless…To pray for them presupposes that progress and difficulty are still
possible. In fact you are bringing in something like Purgatory. Well, I suppose
I am…I believe in Purgatory…the very etymology [origin] of the
word Purgatory has dropped out of sight. Its pains do not bring us nearer to
God, but make us forget Him. It is a place not of purification but purely of
retributive punishment [a wrong view in the
opinion of C S Lewis]. The right
view returns magnificently in Newman’s Dream. There if I remember rightly, the saved soul, at the very foot
of the throne, begs to be taken away and cleansed. It cannot bear for a moment
longer ‘with its darkness to affront that light’. Religion has reclaimed
Purgatory. Our souls demand Purgatory, don’t they? Would it not break
the heart if God said to us “It is true, my son, that your breath smells and
your rags drip with mud and slime, but we are charitable here and no one will
upbraid you with these things, nor draw away from you. Enter into the joy”? [Cecil’s comment – these sentiments are Biblically true because believers
are “accepted in the beloved”
(Ephesians 1:6) and “the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from
all sin” (1 John 1:7)] Should we not reply “With
submission sir, and if there is no objection, I’d rather be cleaned first”. It may hurt you know –
“Even so, sir”. [Cecil’s comment – Did C S Lewis never
read what Paul wrote to vile sinners who had become believers? - “And such were some of you, but ye are WASHED, but ye
are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the
Spirit of our God” (1 Corinthians 6:11)] I assume that the process of
purification will normally involve suffering…But I don’t think suffering is the
purpose of the purgation. I can well believe that people neither much worse nor
much better than I will suffer less than I or more. No nonsense about merit.
The treatment given will be the one required, whether it hurts little or much.
My favourite image of this comes from the dentist’s chair. I hope that when the
tooth of life is drawn [death] and when I am coming round [entering eternity] a voice will say, “Rinse your
mouth out with this”. This will
be Purgatory. The rinsing may take longer than I can now imagine. The taste of this
may be more fiery and astringent than my present sensibility could endure. But
More and Fisher shall not persuade me that it will be disgusting and
unhallowed’.
These teachings of C S Lewis are
a clear denial of the Biblical teachings of the inspired, revealed extent
to which Christ has redeemed ‘individuals’! But what about the
effective extent of Christ’s ‘corporate’ redemption – is it
effectively limited only to that ‘group of people’, those ‘individuals’,
who ‘corporately’ comprise ‘The Church’.
The Bible teaches that only
Christians, only those “born again” [John 3:5], only those who “by
one Spirit…were all baptised into one body” [1 Corinthians
The Apostle Paul knew and taught
that only those who had “Jesus Christ and Him crucified” [1 Corinthians 2:2]
preached to them and who were “quickened” [brought to
spiritual life] [Ephesians 2:1] and who were
“baptised” [1 Corinthians 12:13] by that “one spirit” were in “the
body, the church” and belonged to Christ for he wrote in Romans 8:9 “If
any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his”. This is why Paul
wrote so passionately of missionary endeavour in Romans 10:13-15 “For
whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they
call on him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in him
of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher. And
how shall they preach except they be sent.” Paul knew that “the gospel
of Christ…is the power of God unto salvation” [Romans
So, the effective extent of
Christ’s ‘corporate’ redemption, according to the Bible, is limited to
those who have “the gospel of Christ” preached to them and who by the
work of the Holy Spirit are subsequently “converted” [Matthew 18:3]. Did
C S Lewis believe and teach that? Again, sadly, the answer is yet
another resounding ‘No’.
On page
173 of ‘Mere Christianity’ C S Lewis wrote –
‘There are
people in other religions who are being led by God’s secret influence to
concentrate on those parts of their religion which are in agreement with
Christianity and who thus belong to Christ without knowing it. For
example, a Buddhist of good will may be led to concentrate more and more on the
Buddhist teaching about mercy and to leave in the background (although he might
still say he believed) the Buddhist teaching on certain other points. Many of
the good Pagans long before Christ’s birth may have been in this
position…Consequently it is not much use trying to make judgments about
Christians and non-Christians in the mass’. [Cecil’s
comment – if this were true then there would be no point in sending
missionaries to ‘merciful Buddhists’ and ‘good Pagans’]
These teachings of C S Lewis are
a clear denial of the Biblical teachings of the inspired, revealed effective extent
of Christ’s ‘corporate’ redemption of ‘The Church’. I think the
simplest overall way to summarise the false teachings of C S Lewis on
these points is to say that he has ‘under-estimated individual
redemption’ and ‘over-estimated corporate redemption’.
When we examine biblically the
teachings of C S Lewis on ‘redemption’ and also consider his
teachings on ‘repentance’ and ‘regeneration’ that we previously
looked at, we must really wonder how it came to be that someone as highly
esteemed in ‘evangelical’ circles as Derick Bingham actually
described C S Lewis as ‘our greatest Christian writer’. Roger
Fay, a Pastor in
MYSTIC MUSINGS of HENRI NOUWEN
A Christian friend who currently
lives in
‘Henri Jozef
Machiel Nouwen was born in the Netherlands in Nijkerk on January 24, 1932…the
family…were pious Catholics…Antoon (Toon), was a priest and later a prominent
monsignor, who influenced his nephew Henri's vocation…Henri was a good student,
energetic and pious. He expressed his desire to become a priest at age 6…Henri
was educated by the Jesuits …He did six years in the major seminary in
Rijsenburg/Driebergen, and was ordained priest for the diocese of Utrecht in
1957 by Archbishop B. Alfrink…Immediately after ordination, Henri requested of
his Bishop and was granted further study at the University of Nijmegen in
Psychology where he spent six years… Henri took two more years of Psychology at
the Menninger Institute in
The following is much of what I
wrote in reply to my friend and for further insights I would certainly
recommend the book that I mention called ‘A Time of Departing’.
As a ministry we do have copies of this book available and further information
on it can be obtained not only from the web site link mentioned in this article
[http://www.lighthousetrails.com/index.html] but also by reading the
article entitled ‘Contemplative Prayer – Don’t Even Think About It’ which can
be found as part of our ‘NEW YEAR 2003 NEWS FROM THE FRONT’ that is also
located on our web site http://www.takeheed.net/news25.htm
In the mid 80's 'healing' was ‘big’ in professing Christendom thanks to
the influence in particular of John Wimber. At that time, as a very new
convert, I attended a meeting in Cooke Centenary Presbyterian Church [
Page 4 - 'The most universal and
most appreciated role of the Christian ministry through the ages has been
teaching. Wherever Christians [Roman Catholics] went to be of service they always
considered teaching as one of their primary tasks [so far so good] because
of their conviction that increasing insight in man and his world is the way
to freedom and new ways of life...they have always read in the Gospel a
call to develop the human potentialities to the fullest through ongoing
education'.
I had written the following comments alongside these words - "The
preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness but unto us who are
saved it is the power of God" [1 Corinthians 1:18] - the Gospel is to
convict man of his sinfulness for "Faith should not stand in the wisdom of
men but in the power of God" [1 Corinthians 2:5]
The problem is that Mr Nouwen [in common with
Roman Catholicism] proclaims a false 'Gospel' for on page
26 we read 'for most people there is absolutely no news in the
sermon...And THE CORE OF THE GOSPEL - "You must love the Lord your
God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind and you must
love your neighbour as yourself" - [telling people what they must do!] has been
repeated so often and persistently that it has lost for the majority of people even the slightest possibility of evoking any
response' [no wonder
because they are not being told the true Gospel of what Christ has done!].
Then on page 27 he writes 'the core message of the
Gospel nonetheless contains a Truth that no one has yet fully made true’. Well,
considering what Mr Nouwen believes to be 'the core of the Gospel'
his statement is totally untrue because of course the Lord Jesus whilst
here on earth 'fully made true' what it is to love God and your
neighbour perfectly.
The influence of his 'Buddhist'
encounters comes through on page 51 where he writes 'Since
the East-West dialogue has become a part of many people's lives, especially the
young, we have become aware of THE FACT that there are two forms of
consciousness: one that says be yourself so you can be creative [sinful?]
and the other that says lose yourself so God can be creative in you. The former
stresses individuality, the latter unification'. I would say the former
stresses 'rebellion' and the latter stresses 'submission' and when he says 'lose
yourself ', in the context, is he referring to some Eastern/Buddhist
'altered state of consciousness' which they would say is necessary for
spiritual enlightenment? If so, in contrast, God's Word says "The peace
of God which passes all understanding shall keep your hearts AND MINDS through
Christ Jesus" [Philippians 4:7]. On page 52 Mr Nouwen wrote 'Jesus lived
thirty years in a simple family. There He became a man who knew who he was [as
a boy of 12 in the
One final example of Mr Nouwen's mixed up
Catholic/Eastern religious philosophy is found on page 105 -'We will
never fully understand the meaning of the sacramental signs of bread and wine [referring to the Mass] when they do not make us
realise that the whole of NATURE is a sacrament pointing to a reality far beyond
itself. The presence of Christ in the Eucharist becomes a "special problem"
only when we have lost our sense of His presence in all that is, grows,
lives and dies'.
This is scripture-contradicting PANTHEISM
[‘God is all’] and PANENTHEISM [‘God is in all’] - [clearly
rejected in the excellent book 'A Time of Departing' - you should
go to our web site www.takeheed.net and click on COOL LINKS and
go to the one 'Beware of Contemplative Prayer' and order this book - it
makes reference quite often to the 'Ragamuffin Gospel' man Brennan
Manning that you are also aware of]. Hope these few thoughts are
of help…
Cecil
Shortly
after writing this article I came across the following endorsement of
Mr
Nouwen’s book ‘Creative Ministry’ that I referred to –
‘My wife, Kay, recommends
this book! In it, Nouwen divides the life of ministry into five categories:
teaching, preaching, pastoral care, organizing, and celebrating’
You may be
wondering who is the husband of ‘Kay’ who recommends this book –
he is RICK WARREN, author of the ‘PURPOSE DRIVEN’ series of books
and Pastor of SADDLEBACK VALLEY COMMUNITY CHURCH. For further
information on the teachings of Mr Warren please refer to the article ‘Is
Sadly, local ‘evangelical’ Pastor/writer, Derick Bingham in his
Belfast Telegraph ‘Thought For The Weekend’ of 28 February 2004
wrote – "As Nouwen wrote, 'He who thinks he has finished is
finished. Those who think they have arrived have lost their way!'"
In the absence of any ‘caveat’ about the non-Christian views
contained in the writings of Henri Nouwen, Mr Bingham could
be construed as appearing to set his seal of approval upon his works and could
unwittingly introduce an undiscerning believer to theological views that are as
out of line with Scripture as are the writings of C S Lewis.
CANON WALTER LEWIS and his ‘SOUND OF SILENCE’
In the Belfast Telegraph of 24 January ‘Thought For
The Weekend’ was written by the liberal/ecumenical
My ears pricked up when I heard an item on
the news recently. There would be a radio broadcast by the BBC Symphony
Orchestra of a musical item described as 'The Sounds of Silence’. It
would last 4 minutes and 33 seconds, and there would be silence throughout.
No instrument would be played. When interviewed, some members of the orchestra
thought a piece of music involving only silence was timely and
refreshing in a world of constant activity and sounds. "We rarely
experience silence in daily life," one of them said. The suggestion
is that the silence of the instruments would allow the people to embrace
the universe of background sounds and noise - of which we are often unaware -
as music. The 1960s 'Sounds of Silence', or 4'33" piece was the
idea of an unconventional American composer, John Cage, who died in 1991. I
mention it because it prompts us to consider that silence
should have a place in our lives. When we are silent, we become more
aware of ourselves and our surroundings. In silence, we can also become more aware of
God. The
great tradition of 'mysticism' in Christianity gives special place to
silence as the way into a direct personal experience of God. Mysticism was
practised by people like the Quaker, George Fox, St Theresa of
Mr Lewis is here advocating that in the ‘silence’
as practised by ‘mystics’ “we can also become more aware of
God” and I
believe he is suggesting that it was this type of ‘mystic
silence’ that
the Lord Jesus Christ engaged in when He withdrew from friends and crowds to be
alone IN PRAYER with His Heavenly Father. I have already recommended the
book ‘A Time Of Departing’ by Ray Yungen in the article on Henri
Nouwen and I want in this article to give a few quotes from Ray
Yungen’s book that vividly illustrate the spiritual dangers of the ‘mystic
silence’ so
favourably recommended by Canon Walter Lewis. On pages 17-18 Ray Yungen
writes –
‘These mystical faculties are the
distinguishing mark of the New Age Movement…An anti-cult Christian writer once
described the New Age Movement as a system of thought when, in fact, it
is more aptly defined as a system of non-thought. Meditation teacher Ann
Wise explained this -
“A man
came to see me once saying that he had meditated for an hour a day every day
for twelve years. Although he enjoyed the time he spent sitting, he felt he was
missing something. From talking to other meditators, he felt that he must have
been doing something wrong because he had none of the experiences that he had
heard others describe. I measured his brainwaves while he was meditating and
discovered that he had spent those twelve years simply thinking”.
This is why New Age style
meditation is commonly referred to as the silence. This is not silence
as being in a quiet place but the silence as in an inner silence or an empty
mind [Canon
Lewis wrote ‘as we remove all distractions’] that opens up the
mystical facilities. “The enemy of meditation is the mind,” wrote one New Age
teacher’. On
page 35 Ray Yungen quoted from the book ‘The
“Do
not reflect on the meaning of the word; thinking and reflecting must cease, as
all mystical writers insist. Simply ‘sound’ the word silently, letting go all
feelings and thoughts”.
Commenting on this quotation Ray Yungen wrote
–
‘Those with some theological training may recognise
this teaching as the historical stream going back centuries to such figures as
Meister Eckart, TERESA OF AVILA, John of the Cross and Julian of
Norwich.
I have included this quote from Ray
Yungen’s book because in his
article Walter
Lewis wrote ‘The great tradition of 'mysticism'
in Christianity gives special place to silence as the way into a direct
personal experience of God. Mysticism was practised by people like the
Quaker, George Fox, ST THERESA OF AVILA and CS Lewis’. On
pages 46-47 of his book, under a section entitled ‘Christian Kundalini’ [‘Kundalini
is a potent power conjured up by Hindu practices that induce an ‘altered state
of consciousness’] Ray Yungen wrote – ‘Many Christians might have great difficulty
accepting the assessment that what is termed Christian mysticism is, in truth,
not really Christian!…To those who are still sceptical I suggest examining the
writings of Philip St Romain who wrote a book about his journey into
contemplative prayer called “Kundalini Energy and Christian Spirituality”. This
title is insightful because Kundalini is a Hindu term for the mystical power or
force that underlies their spirituality…Philip St Romain, a substance abuse
counsellor, and devout Catholic lay minister, began his journey while
practising contemplative prayer or resting in the still point as he
called it…Having rejected mental prayer as “unproductive” he embraced the
prayer form that switches off the mind, creating what he called a “mental
passivity”. What he encountered next underscores my concern with sobering
clarity “Then came the lights! The gold swirls that I had noted on occasion
began to intensify, forming themselves into patterns that both intrigued and
captivated me…There were always four or five of these; as soon as one would
fade, another would appear, even brighter and more intense…They came through
complete passivity and only after I had been in the silence for a while”
After this, St Romain began to sense “wise sayings” coming into his
mind [Canon Lewis wrote ‘we will meet God in the
silence’] and
felt he was “receiving messages from another” [Canon
Lewis wrote ‘In silence, we can also become more aware of God’] The culmination of St
Romain’s mystical excursion was predictable: When you do Christian Yoga or
Christian Zen you end up with Christian Samadhi’. [‘Samahdi’
is defined in the book ‘The Spirit of Hinduism’ (p 276) as
‘a trance; a state of pure consciousness of oneness with god’]. For
Mr Lewis to equate the occasions on which the Lord Jesus Christ withdrew
Himself to meet with His Heavenly Father in prayer – an exercise in which His
mind and mental faculties would have been fully active and not in some state of
‘mental passivity’ as experienced by those involved in what Mr Lewis
refers to as ‘The
great tradition of 'mysticism' in Christianity’ – is to falsely
represent what the Lord Jesus was actually engaged in and to promote the
dangerous ‘Sound
of Silence’
so enthusiastically advocated by Mr Lewis.
This dangerous practice of seeking ‘The Silence’ has been popularised by
mystical groups such as ‘Renovare’ [from a Latin word meaning ‘renewal’]
and doctrinally dangerous books such as ‘Celebration of
Discipline’ by Richard Foster. In closing let me once
again encourage readers who are concerned by these mystical
encroachments into ‘the Christian world’ to obtain a copy of Ray Yungen’s book
‘A Time of Departing’.
PRAYER POINTS
1.
MINISTRY TRIP TO
I shall [DV] be in
2.
MINISTRY VISIT BY ROGER
Roger Oakland, who is President of
“Understand The Times” based in
BOOK RECOMMENDATION
The Mel Gibson movie ‘The Passion of The
Christ’ has caused much debate within and without professing Christendom. A
MOST helpful book has been written by local minister Rev Ian Brown
called ‘What You Need To Know About The Passion Of The Christ’ – copies may be obtained
from us – price £5.00 [this includes p&p].
The hidden ‘agendas’ of CARE and
EVANGELICAL
Recently the ‘front men’ of these
organisations in