Guarding His Flock Ministries

The impossibility of spiritual life apart from God’s work: a meditation on Ephesians 2:1-10.

“For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, that no one should boast.” Ephesians 2:8-9, NASB 

Many Christians think that salvation is not so much a gift to be received, as a destiny to be earned. Their concept of salvation is that God will pay them in eternity for what they accomplished in time. To them, salvation is achieved, not received. The tragedy of it is that salvation will never come to them by such an arrangement. As the Apostle wrote, “But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace” (Romans 11:6). Charles Spurgeon summarized the issue well when he said, “One might better try to sail the Atlantic in a paper boat than to get to heaven in good works.”

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The “Spiritual Secret” of Greg Boyd.

“If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” 1 John 1:8, KJV

On the cover of Gregory A. Boyd’s recently published book, Present Perfect: Finding God in the Now, this endorsement appears:

“Discover a spiritual secret that is as simple as it is profound. Highly recommended.”

—Brian D. McLaren
author, speaker, and activist [1]

One “spiritual secret” in Boyd’s book may be discovered in a footnote to the second chapter, Finding Home. [2] The secret is: “We no longer have a ‘sinful nature’.” Wow! Assuming the author is writing about Christians, he is asserting they no longer have a sinful nature (i.e., nature equals the essential properties of a thing). In other words, our nature is “perfect now”! Within the Christian’s psyche there no longer resides an inner disposition to sin. Possessing inner immunity against sinning, Christians can conduct their lives in a “present perfect.” As with Roman Catholics Brother Lawrence (c. 1614-1691) and Jean Pierre de Caussade (1675-1751), and the evangelical Frank Laubach (1884-1970), there is no  inner barrier that hinders Christians from contemplating God 24/7. They can sense God’s presence in everything they do throughout every minute of the day, which is what Boyd’s book is all about. [3]
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On music’s native ability to engender “religious” experiences.

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. Colossians 3:16, KJV

Music engenders mystical experiences. This can be discerned from Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera containing the song The Music of the Night. The lyrics read:

Night time sharpens heightens each sensation / Darkness wakes and stirs imagination / Silently the senses abandon their defenses / Helpless to resist the notes I write / For I compose the music of the night / Softly, deftly music shall caress you / Hear it, feel it secretly possess you / Open up your mind let your fantasies unwind in this darkness which you know you cannot fight / the darkness of the music of the night. [1]

Subject to the individual impulses, tastes and delights of consumers and composers, there is much about music that is creative, experiential and ethereal. But as every genre from military marches to love songs indicate, music possesses a mysterious, if not occult, power to sway the soul. The only question for Christian believers becomes, do their musical preferences, acquisitions and experiences hinder or facilitate the Holy Spirit’s work in their souls? (See Ephesians 5:18-19; Colossians 3:16.)
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Matthew 5:8 and the mystic vision of God.

“Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.” Jesus, Matthew 5:8, KJV

If we were to see God, what might deity look like? In a metaphorical borrowing from the imagery of the biblical Tabernacle, The Aquarian Gospel of Jesus the Christ describes both the process for and image of discovering the god within. That gospel advises:

Look deep into the temple of your brain, and you will see it all aglow . . . and you are in the Holiest of All, where rests the Ark of God, whose covering is the Mercy Seat. . . . And then, behold the manna there, the hidden bread of life; and he who eats shall never die. The cherubim have guarded well for every soul this treasure box, and whosoever will may enter in and find his own. [1]

Upon such a visage within, the mystic exclaims, “Eureka! God lives in my brain!” The specter of such a god issues from an assumption that all persons possess an indwelling divinity that is theirs to discover. But because they are unconsciousness of that “presence,” the mass of people go through life ignorant of it. Thus, to realize their higher-self, people need to develop their consciousness of the indwelling Christ by employing certain meditative practices and techniques to purify their souls in order to see God. As one Hindu website explains: “Men and women, in their essential nature, are divine. We do not feel this divinity because of our ignorance.” Then citing Matthew 5:8, the site goes on to say:

The only goal of our lives is to realize this divinity. It is possible to realize the divinity by removing the ignorance, just as Jesus said: ‘Blessed are the pure in heart; for they shall see God’. [2]

Eastern mystics thus claim to follow Jesus’ prescription for finding the god within. By voiding “this-worldly” distractions and attractions from their souls, they believe they will create a spiritual climate in which they will see God. As one Hindu devotee explains, “The meaning of this beatitude is that those whose consciousness is posited at the center of their being (spirit), without there being any ‘thing’ in their awareness but that pure consciousness itself, are ‘seeing’ God.” [3] So, it must be asked, what might the Bible believing Christian think about the use of Matthew 5:8 to endorse such spirituality? Against the backdrop of the rest of the Scriptures, how might we understand Jesus’ words?
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Paul to Timothy: a pastor’s job description.

“I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom; Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.” 2 Timothy 4:1-2, KJV

A standard joke about pastors is that they have the easiest job in the world—they only work an hour a week on Sundays! However, for those inside the ministry, who daily face the emotional, mental and spiritual stress that God’s calling places upon them and their families, it is no joke. There are people to counsel, meetings to attend, hospital calls to make, funerals to conduct, administrative duties to attend, and sermons and Bible studies to prepare. Incessantly, the beat goes on. God’s high calling oft times extracts a high price on those involved in local church ministry, which is why quitting the ministry in these times has become epidemic amongst pastors. In local church ministry, the stay of youth pastors can be measured in months and senior pastors in a few years.

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A study of 1 Thessalonians 5:19.

Do not quench the Spirit; do not despise prophetic utterances. 1 Thessalonians 5:19-20, NASB

In The Bible the work of the Holy Spirit is sometimes likened to fire (See Isaiah 4:4; Revelation 4:5.). On the Day of Pentecost when the Spirit came in His fullness upon the believers who waited, “there came a noise like a violent rushing wind, and it filled the whole house . . . And there appeared to them tongues as of fire . . .” (Acts 2:2-3).

Fire has many uses in life. It provides warmth in the winter. It allows for the preparation of food, or driving an automobile. In fact, fire is essential to life. Without the continual burning of the sun, earth, as we know it, would die a cold death. So when the “tongues as of fire” appeared on the believers that first Pentecost, that event indicated that the sovereign God was infusing into the church new life from above. But having received it from the Holy Spirit, maintenance of that life becomes the responsibility of individual believers and churches. So in his letter to the church at Thessalonica, the Apostle Paul commanded, “Do not quench the Spirit” (1 Thessalonians 5:19).
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Do people really see Jesus today?

“Jesus said to him, ‘Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed’.” John 20:29

Now and then, people claim to have physical sightings of, close encounters with, and mystical visions of Jesus. Once upon a time, evangelist Oral Roberts saw Him.

I felt an overwhelming holy presence all around me. When I opened my eyes, there he stood-some 900 feet tall, looking at me. . . . He stood a full 300 feet taller than the 600-foot-tall City of Faith. There I was face to face with Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God. [1]

Once upon a time, Jesus visited a Texas man in an Oklahoma motel room. “He looked like his picture,” said George Wood, “but when you’re talking to the man for three hours, you forget the details.” [2]

Another person reports her visionary experience.

Hello, My name is __________. I have had encounters with Jesus Christ . . . My first vision was when I woke one day. I looked over at my alarm clock and saw that I still had a minute left before the alarm was set to go off, so I closed my eyes and thought “great, I’ll get one more wink.” Then I felt sort of paralyzed and saw Jesus Christ’s eyes looking at me! They were his eyes only. They were green with a hint of yellow and twice the size of a human’s eyes. . . . I cannot say how long it lasted because it seemed that time had stopped. The next thing I know I opened my eyes and saw that my clock still had one minute left! [3]

These “close encounters” with Jesus Christ raise issues about the present nature and appearance of His body, its current location, and the meaning of His second coming.
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Contemplative prayer and Psalm 62:1.

“Truly my soul waiteth upon God: from him cometh my salvation.” Psalm 62:1, KJV

Supporters of silent waiting in cite such Scriptures as 1 Kings 19:12, Psalm 46:10, and Psalm 62:1 to encourage the practice. Regarding the last mentioned verse, Richard Foster writes:

Contemplative Prayer is the one discipline that can free us from our addiction to words. Progress in intimacy with God means progress toward silence. “For God alone my soul waits in silence,” declares the Psalmist (Ps. 62:1). [1]

But does David’s description of waiting in silence qualify as a proof text for practicing listening prayer?
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Habakkuk 2:20 and contemplative prayer.

“But the Lord is in his holy temple: let all the earth keep silence before him.” Habakkuk 2:20, KJV

“Without a doubt” writes one prayer trainer, “the most difficult step in intercessory prayer is this one–keep silence, be still.” [1] Along with nine other biblical passages, the online adviser cites Habakkuk 2:20 to teach:

It is the mandate of God that we still ourselves before him in order to find his peace and hear his voice. So thus we have as the first and most important step in the believer’s prayer life to still ourselves before the Lord. [2]

The BE STILL DVD also employs the Habakkuk verse to invite viewers to practice contemplative, centering, or listening prayer. [3] But as cited by contemplatives along with Psalm 46:10 (“Be still, and know that I am God“), is this prophetic verse a superficial use of scripture that ignores the verse’s real meaning?
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Benjamin B. Warfield on Contemplative Mysticism

Of all the conceivable forms of enlightenment, the worst is what these people call the Inner Light. Of all horrible religions the most horrible is the worship of the God within. Anyone who knows anybody knows how it would work; anyone who knows anyone from the Higher Thought Center knows how it does work. That Jones should worship the God within him turns out ultimately to mean that Jones shall worship Jones. [1]

“For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are . . . mighty in God for . . . bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ . . .” Paul, 2 Corinthians 10:3-5, NKJV

As endorsed by a glut of books written by its various leaders and authors, the pan-evangelical movement–that “once-upon-a-time” embraced the Reformation principle of sola scriptura, that Scripture alone is sufficient in matters of faith and its practice (2 Timothy 3:16)–is promoting and embracing mystical spirituality. Because parachurch ministries, local church pastors, and spirtitual directors encourage practices of spiritual formation, increasing numbers of devout souls are uncritically engaging the contemplative disciplines. For reason that they desire a closer walk with God, these sincere souls engage in spiritual techniques which they hope will open new doors and vistas of spirituality to them.
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