Gnostic versus Mystic

Thoughts re: Gnosticism versus Mysticism

While both the gnostic and the mystic may embrace a heavenly experience, the gnostic rejects the immanence of God in this realm as impossible and inappropriate. They try to escape this realm because it's very materiality is unclean or illusory (and historically
rejected the incarnation for that reason).

But while I am not a gnostic, I am unapologetically a mystic. That is, I believe in direct interactive fellowship with God both in the heavenly realm (beholding him and approaching him boldly as a beloved child) AND in the earthly realm ("Lo, I am with you always.") He is Lord of heaven and earth and is utterly immanent in our daily lives. I take Jesus' promise, "I will be with you and in you" very literally and seriously.

What has made the presence of Christ real to me -- a constant, conscious awareness of his "withness" -- is the opening of the eyes of my heart to behold him. Peter, quoting David in Ps. 2 said, "I saw the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken." He goes on to speak of how he has been filled with joy in the Lord's presence. 'Presence' is good, but the word translated is more specific: lit. "face". So too with 2 Cor. 3-4 where we get this idea of hearts unveiled, "beholding the glory of God... in the face of Jesus Christ." Modernism would reduce this to an idea, a concept, a notion. The mystic (esp. the Apostle John and his lineage) would say, "No, we really mean it. Our hearts truly see him." This is what made their fellowship with Christ so real ... and how it has become so for me as well. This is not the esoteric, elitist experience of the gnostic, but rather, the promised inheritance of all of God's children.

Discernment then means continually saturating oneself with the Jesus of the Gospels to ensure that the Jesus I behold in my heart or the Jesus I encounter in the streets in the poor are in alignment with the true Lord Jesus of Nazareth. And this is such a joy because then life in the Word, in prayer, in worship -- or in the grocery store or the nursery are all full of the fellowship of 1 John 1!

I thought I'd offer some little quotes by Symeon the New Theologian. (942-1022) By way of background, Father George Mahoney says, "The battle of two opposing views of theology centered around St. Symeon and his mystical apophatic approach of the experiencing of God immanently present to the individual, as opposed to the 'head trip' scholastic theology as represented by Stephen of Nicodemia, the official court of theologian in Constantinople. Stephen represented the abstract, philosophical type of theologizing while Symeon strove to restore theology to its pristine mystical tendency as a wisdom infused by the Holy Spirit." N.B.: the problem with the scholastics was not their love of scholarship, but rather, that they opted for a mediated knowledge of God that denied direct experience. Symeon on the other hand spoke, esp. in the Philokelia (the Eastern Church's favorite theological collection) and in his discourses of his experience of seeing the glorified and risen Jesus:

"[A Christian is] the person who has come to see with the eyes of the spirit and who has beheld the true and quenchless light."

"The person who has not consciously invested his intelligence and intellect with the image of our Lord Jesus Christ, the heavenly one, man and God, is still but flesh and blood."

"Most men believe in the resurrection of Christ, but very few have a clear vision of it. Those who have no vision thereof cannot even adore Christ Jesus [!!] as the Holy One and as Lord... That most sacred formula which is daily on our lips does not say, 'Having believed in Christ's resurrection,' but, 'Having beheld Christ's resurrection, let us worship the Holy One, the Lord Jesus, who alone is without sin.' How then does the Holy Spirit urge us to say, 'Having beheld Christ's resurrection,' which we have not seen, as though we had seen it, when Christ has risen once for all a thousand years ago, and even then without anybody's seeing it? Surely Holy Scripture does not wish us to lie? Far from it! Rather, it urges us to speak the truth, that the resurrection of Christ takes place in each of us who believes, and that not once, but every hour, so to speak, when Christ the Master arises in us, resplendent in array and flashing with the lightnings of incorruptible deity. For the light-bringing coming of the Spirit shows forth to us, as in early morning, the Master's resurrection, or, rather, it grants us to see the Risen One Himself. ... Those to whom Christ has given light as He has risen, to them He has appeared spiritually, He has been shown to their spiritual eyes. When this happens to us through the Spirit He raises us up from the dead and gives us life. He grants us to see Him, who is immortal and indestructible. More than that, He grants clearly to know Him who raises us up and glorifies us with Himself, as the divine Scripture testifies."

Symeon, as an apophatic theologian, tends to emphasize the transcendence of God to the nth degree, speaking more in terms of knowing God by what he is NOT. Apophatic theologians are careful to not make absolute statements about what he IS because that would be too categorical and could put God in the box of our intellectual capacities. However, I would say that we CAN say something of who God is by virtue of the incarnate and resurrected Christ. So without reservation we say, "God is exactly like Jesus. All the glory of the divine godhead has been poured into Christ as eternal living image/icon. And we DO know this God as we know Jesus and we know this Jesus as we behold him."

Further, I'd say as we behold him with spiritual eyes in the heavenlies, our material eyes are invested with spiritual vision to behold him in the HIV baby, the autistic child, 'the homeless, penniless Jesus the Son' (to quote Jason Upton).

Judging versus Judging

"Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. " Matt. 7:1-2

"Do not put out the Spirit's fire; do not treat prophecies with contempt. Test everything. Hold on to the good. Avoid every kind of evil. " 1 Thess. 5:19-22

"The spiritual man makes judgments about all things, but he himself is not subject to any man's judgment." 1 Cor. 2:15

"For it is time for judgment to begin with the family of God." 1 Pet. 4:17

I've been thinking a lot lately about how we must learn to walk in greater discernment these days without stepping into condemnation. Discernment and condemnation are really two types of judging; one is commanded, one is forbidden. Personally, I always tend to come back to "the measure with which you judge will be used on you." I know I want to be loved with tender mercy and a good dose of truth.

More specifically, I think this is what I want for myself and for the ministries where I serve:

1. Personally, I want those who love me (a good prerequisite for judging) to be very very tender, kind, loving, merciful, long-suffering and even careful with my heart. And I want them to be ruthlessly truthful with my ego and its selfish, self-seeking, self-centered, self-aggrandizing, self-debasing, self-sabotaging ways.

2. Corporately, I want those who love us to be equally tender, kind, loving, merciful and long-suffering with the people involved in our ministry and with the authentic revelation that we carry. But I want them to be ruthlessly truthful in sifting through the wood, hay and stubble of any part of our fellowship that represents a system built on sand, engages in spiritual abuse, or binds and blinds us from God's kingdom in any way.

With this in mind, these are the days to examine ourselves and the whole realm of Christendom, resisting the powerful urge to quench the Holy Spirit by condemning the fallen, by being cynical rather than open, or by rejecting the authentic ministries that always come via vessels of clay.

At the same time, we say an emphatic NO to any aspects of our Christian cultural systems that measure a movement's 'anointing' according to the drawing power of the masses, or to the charisma of its leaders, or to the glam of sensational ministries. We ought to resist every measure of spiritual success through typical capitalist criteria: e.g. size of crowds, increase in growth, structural power, dollar figures, etc.

There is a new openness to correction across the whole prophetic movement right now. We dare not squander it by scapegoating individual leaders who are struggling as if the system that built their pedestals were just fine.

This begs a broader and important question: what are the marks of a revival? What is revival? What are the fruits of a revival? Are revivals something Jesus taught us to pursue?

I've been really pondering Jesus' vision of the kingdom and his response to questions about that in Luke 17: "The kingdom will not come with signs you can observe. You will not be able to say 'here it is' or 'there it is'. The kingdom is within/among you." It is as if Christ foresaw revival theology as a poor alternative to his kingdom theology and was trying to warn us, right?

Jesus' mustard seed parables make the kingdom out to come as grassroots movements that emerge from below like seeds spread in fields of humble hearts. By contrast, even the healthiest looking revivals are more like centers where you go to get a bite of magic bread that someone brings back from heaven, hoping you can bypass character growth and the riggers of a discipleship journey in favor of a fix. We call this shortcut an 'impartation.'

Now large meetings where Christ is preached, the sick are healed and the oppressed are set free are not necessarily the problem. Jesus had such meetings. And often a pilgrimage does the heart good. But the issue is the mindset of the crowds who come seeking ... what? A miracle drug to fast-track discipleship or provide a periodic liver-shiver ... unto what? Or conversely, there are the promises of the marketeers. "Fly here and get the power; receive the experience and take it home." I.e. the kingdom is over there and is observable with signs (the very opposite of Jesus' own words).

This needs more thought.

The God Who Speaks -- Aug. 2008

Dear God-seeker,

Lately, a couple of friends each left me with a principle of discernment that suggested some important questions that we might present to the Father. I thought you might find them helpful too.

First, there is a principle of faith. It suggests that when God speaks, it will usually be a call to faith--a call either to greater or deeper trust in some aspect of who God is (e.g. greater trust in his faithfulness or his care for us, etc.) OR a call to follow God outside the boundaries of my personal comfort zone. This is challenging since our natural tendency is self-protection ... but the voice of God calls us beyond ourselves so that He can offer us as gifts to this world. Will we follow?

Two questions follow this principle:

1. God, what is it about you that you want me to believe in a deeper way? And why?
2. God, is there some kingdom territory beyond my comfort zone where you want me to follow you? Another way to ask this could be, "If you could offer me as a gift to the world, what would that look like?"

Second, there is a principle of fellowship. 1 John draws a direct connection between truly walking in the light, fellowship with Christ AND walking in fellowship with each other. Check this out:

"3 We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. 5 ...God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. 6 If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin."

I believe this goes further than simply saying, "No lone-ranger prophets." Sometimes sincere seekers expend a lot of time, energy, travel and money to pursue a prophetic message from the "big guns" regardless of any relationship with them. Perhaps we feel validated by those words we receive from famous or popular or powerful ministers. Question: How's that working for us?

What I am getting at is that EVEN IF the prophets we follow are genuine, credible, accurate and specific--I mean TRUE prophets--there is a real issue of fellowship when it comes to how much authority we give them in our lives. What we hear from them can be very encouraging and comforting and confirming. But it ought NOT be our daily bread. The biblical norm is that walking in the light of revelation happens in community fellowship.

By following this principle, we refrain from setting the Christian celebrities on pedestals that we will later kick out from under them in our frustration or disillusionment when things don't go our way.

This principle is especially true when it comes to words of correction, discipline and rebuke. I've learned the hard way that the words that come as a blow ought to come from a friend. If I know they love me and watch my back, then the sword of the Lord can penetrate my heart without abusing it.

This leads to our third question:

3. Lord, where and with whom is my fellowship solid enough that I can receive both words of direction and words of correction? I.e. Where would you have me walk in the light of fellowship?

Blessings all!

Brad