Love

Mysticism, Part 1

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I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows. And I know that this man was caught up into paradise—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows— and he heard things that cannot be told, which man may not utter. On behalf of this man I will boast, but on my own behalf I will not boast, except of my weaknesses.
—2 Corinthians 12:2-5

Why is it that so many in the Christian Church, especially in the West, live to throw the baby out with the bathwater?

I see this tendency especially from those petrified that God will come along and shake up His Church by doing something they would classify as “weird.” Detail from 'The Resurrection' by Matthias GrünewaldI think that if you took those folks and put them into every biblical scene featuring the miraculous, they’d be quaking with fear with their hands over their eyes. They’d be the ones frozen stiff before the parted Red Sea screaming, “No! You can’t make me go through there!”

So these poor saints live to attack anything that threatens to undo their dusty religiosity. Unfortunately, in too many cases, that “anything” just happens to be God.

Now I perfectly understand the need to filter out heretical and false manifestations, but that’s why the Lord gave us discernment. Blanket condemnation of all such experiences, instinctive in these fearful saints, fails the discernment test. Nowhere in the Scriptures will you find “One bad apple ruins the whole bunch.” (If that were true, I suspect all our churches would be ruined!)

Instead, the Holy Spirit empowers our discernment. The Bible provides some basis for making distinctions between wrong and right, while the Spirit fills in the particulars. This is life in the Spirit, and it requires us to know His voice when He speaks to us in our day to day existence.

This brings us to today’s tossed baby, Christian mysticism.

I don’t know about the baby-tossers, but I can’t read the Bible and not see the mystical. As noted in the passage that starts this post, the Apostle Paul himself thought nothing of mystical experiences, such as being caught up in a heavenly realm where inexpressible realities can be glimpsed. Paul goes so far as to boast about the man who experienced this (likely Paul, as most commentators note).

The prophet Isaiah had a vision of God, the Holy One’s train filling the temple. He saw angels and they symbolically purged his sin with a touch of coal to the lips. Ezekiel glimpsed his famous wheel within a wheel. John fell prostrate before an angelic messenger who delivered a vision of the end of all things. Jacob’s ladder. Abraham entertaining three visitors. The inner sanctum of disciples witnessing Jesus’s transfiguration.

The Bible overflows with the mystical. So how is mysticism bad?

Some would claim that all these things vanished with the death of the Apostle John. That mystical experiences do not happen today.

Tell that to the Irish, though.

Last weekend, we celebrated St. Patrick’s Day. One could argue that no evangelist exceeded Patrick, for 120,000 conversions are directly tied to his ministry in the Emerald Isle. But to what did Patrick attribute his burning desire to evangelize the Irish?

From a classically mystical source: a dream.

Patrick, ensconced in England, had a dream one night of Irish druids begging him to come preach the Gospel to them. He wasn’t reading the Scriptures for this revelation. He wasn’t down on his knees praying. He dreamed it.

The Bible says this:

But Peter, standing with the eleven, lifted up his voice and addressed them: “Men of Judea and all who dwell in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and give ear to my words. For these people are not drunk, as you suppose, since it is only the third hour of the day. But this is what was uttered through the prophet Joel: “‘And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams; even on my male servants and female servants in those days I will pour out my Spirit, and they shall prophesy.
—Acts 2:14-18

Now as far as I can tell, we’re still in the last days. I think most of us would agree on this. So how is it NOT still true that God will speak to us through dreams and visions? I find it impossible for anyone to argue against the validity of dreams and visions for revelation. Consider what the 120,000 saved through Patrick’s ministry think about mystical revelation through dreams.

A.W. Tozer, one of Evangelicalism’s greatest prophets, had no qualms with the mystical. Even the most casual readings of his many books and sermons reveals Tozer’s heart that we Christians should pursue a mystical intimacy with God that defies earthly definitions. Tozer was known for his keen understanding of the writings of noted medieval mystics such as Julian of Norwich (who many of Tozer’s good friends referred to jokingly as his “girlfriend”), Teresa of Àvila, Meister Eckhart, and others. Tozer recommend that we Evangelicals read mystic literature such as The Cloud of Unknowing and The Dark Night of the Soul. Why? To cultivate a depth of intimacy with God that transcended the casual dabbling in Him afflicting so many of us time-burdened Evangelicals, to scry the secrets of the saints who have gone before us.

Because I hold Tozer in high regard, I’ve read many of those mystics and their writings. I’ve found them fascinating. But more than this, I found they relayed understandings of God I did not possess. Those mystics have been to the mountain of God, so they offer a valuable map, a treasured insight. Their talk of rapturous union with God should inspire us, not drive us to doubt the reality that we human beings can approach the Divine and know Him intimately! Sometimes I wonder if some of us merely wish to keep others from that deep intimacy for no other reason than we have not experienced it ourselves; our jealousy drives us to deny others the joy those few have found.

Many Protestants revere the Reformation, but they balk at anything that came before that. What a loss! As we stroll back in time to the Medieval era and Dark Ages, when some of the noted mystics lived, the less confident many of the mystic-bashers become, as if no big “c” Church existed at all during those times. That’s foolishness, though, and for some to act as if nothing can be learned from the Christians of those days, many of whom would be branded mystics by today’s Evangelicals, is nothing more than jealous pride.

Mysticism’s core ideal that knowledge of God and His ways can’t be explained in perfectly rational terms didn’t bother those Christians of that era. But it bothers those who live on the other side of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment.

If anything, the modern antagonism toward Christian mysticism has little of its basis in Scripture’s and the Holy Spirit’s illumination, and far more in the rationalism and anti-supernaturalism wrought by modernism (as ushered in by the Renaissance and the Enlightenment). Oddly enough, the real damage to Christianity came not from mysticism as practiced pre-Reformation, but from this post-Reformation upheaval in philosophy. Odder still, the stepchildren of the god-denying Enlightenment are those very Christians who oppose supernaturalism (especially as it pertains to the charismata), who endorse a sort of sanctified scientific rationalism that turns the tables and declares Christians being caught up into the third heaven not only not possible, but part of a damnable plot to subvert Christianity!

Who is the real wolf in sheep’s clothing? The mystics or the scientific rationalists? I would contend the latter far better fit the bill.

And so we’ve paid dearly within Christianity because of anti-mystic crusading. The rationalists have shoved the awesome God into a small box convenient enough to be understood. Miracles? Nah. Dreams and visions as guidance? No way. Only superstitious fools would embrace such nonsense.

Worse, any revival in mysticism within the Church is disingenuously labeled Gnosticism by the critics. But those who toss around the Gnosticism label do so haphazardly and with little regard for the truth.

Gnosticism is anti-matter, which Christian mysticism is not. As a result, Gnosticism denies the incarnation of Christ, which Christian mysticism certainly does not. Gnosticism holds to a dualistic worldview, which Christian mysticism does not . Gnosticism believes that secret knowledge necessary to salvation is held by a select few, and only a select few who seek that knowledge get it. Christian mysticism holds that deeper knowledge of God is the desire of all those filled by the Holy Spirit, but this knowledge is open to all and can be grasped by any who come to the Lord.

To stress that latter point, would anyone reading this doubt for one second that a great Christian who has sought the Lord through years of prayer would know more about God and His ways than the new convert? Does that righteous old saint (who may at some point in life have been swept up into the ecstasy of the third heaven by the Spirit) possess a deeper knowledge? Would anyone seriously label him a Gnostic? Or the third-heaven-visiting Paul for that matter?

No, in most cases the Gnosticism label is a fraudulent scare tactic.

This is not to say that all mysticism tagged “Christian” is. In the second part of this examination of mysticism, we’ll examine the criticism leveled against modern practices of mysticism and see in what cases the accusations against it should be heeded.

The Invisible

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Detail from Salvation Army ad campaign posterShe dutifully drags her mop across the tile floor of the Taco Bell, head down, absorbed in her work. Once finished, she locates a clean towelette and wipes down each table, taking care to avoid spilling anything on the pristine floor.

While my son and I eat, I study her. She’s working every time we stop in, infrequent though our visits may be. I think she’s about thirty, but I may be wrong. Folks with Down Syndrome don’t always look their age.

In the county seat near us, at a McDonalds, she has a counterpart in a young man, also with Down, who also mops the floors of that restaurant and tends the tables. Both the Taco Bell and McDonalds maintain a level of cleanliness unmatched in other fast food restaurants thanks to two hard workers who will never be like the people they serve.

Each time I have the opportunity, I make certain I thank them for keeping the restaurants so neat and clean. I hope next time to remember to ask them their names. Something in me always forgets to ask. Something ingrained. Something that hates to be exposed.

In my observations, the one thing that grips me each time I encounter these two isn’t so much about them, but the people around them. The restaurant patrons don’t look their way, don’t greet them, don’t interact with them in any way. I don’t see the other restaurant employees talking with them, either. For all intents, the two Down Syndrome cleaners don’t exist.

But someone cares for them, I know. The woman carries a cell phone, to my surprise, and she once talked with someone while taking her break. Parents? Guardian? I know the fear of every parent of a Down child, that one day death will come too soon (as many parents of Down children gave birth to them in their older years), then who will look after their special child?

I don’t know the spiritual state of people born without all the faculties we possess. I confess I don’t know how to witness to someone who might not grasp the finer points of sin and redemption. I worked with Down kids in my years in camping ministry, but always felt helpless when it came to knowing how to address their spiritual needs. In the end, I decided that love might be the best I can give them. So in the case of the cleaners, that’s what I try to offer—a smile and a word of thanks.

People don’t have to be afflicted with a genetic disorder to become invisible to us. American society is such that when someone yells, “Hey! Look at me!” we look. In many cases, we can’t tear our eyes off the attention junkies. In our staring at those enjoying their fifteen minutes of fame, we miss those who blend into the background, living, breathing people Christ died to save.

Ann sold high-tech electronics. Her bright smile and smart attention to fashion gave her a twinkle I didn’t find in the other reps who came into our store. When she talked with customers and other sales staff, you could tell she genuinely cared. Her job wasn’t just to sell gizmoes, but meet the needs of others. Her “ministry” consisted of helping other people take charge of their lives.

Little things set Ann apart. On Halloween, she came into the store in an elaborate costume I could tell she’d made herself. Perfect makeup, including prosthetics, and a wig that blended seamlessly completed the look. Dressing up like that meant something to her, the attention to detail telling others how much she enjoyed her work.

In her thirties and divorced, Ann hung around some days longer than her job entailed. I suspect she didn’t have much to go home to, just an apartment or small house filled with echoes. That never sat well with me. She had a lot to offer, but she was still invisible.

When the cuts came at her company, I knew I wouldn’t be seeing her again, and I never did. People like her don’t get noticed. They work hard. They care more than most. But the world doesn’t exalt people like her. And it never will.

We live in an era of the invisible. Despite all the boasting of empowerment, despite laws forged to ensure equality, I can’t help but feel we’re minting more invisible people than ever before.

The illegal immigrant. The single dad. The shy kid in class. The homeless. The old lady in the nursing home whose only crime is she got too slow for the rest of the world. The guy who put in ten good years in the office only to one day clean out his desk against his will and vanish into the ether.

We take people made in the Imago Dei and stick them in front of a computer in a vast array of cubicles and this becomes their life for half a day. And when The Big Cheese phones in from his yacht the day after the stock tanks, someone like Ann finds herself looking for another job at yet another company that could care less that she sewed her own costume for Halloween just to give a thrill to the kids who came in with dad to some podunk electronics store.

In the not-so-distant past, companies used to have Personnel departments. Now they have Human Resource departments. From Person to Resource. I don’t know about you, but I prefer to be a person rather than a resource. When I hear a term like “human resource,” I can’t help but think Soylent Green.

Former GE honcho Jack Welch, who seemed to make a career out of being as visible as possible, did a great Darwinian disservice to employees everywhere by reducing even the impersonal human resource into human capital, like so many $20 bills (used to light his cigars after a fine day of downsizing what used to be known as people, I guess). Folks like Jack render people invisible with a snap of their fingers and a drag on their Cuban.

But corporate bigwigs aren’t the only ones who can’t see. Ordinary Joes like us do it, too. You won’t confuse Taco Bell or McDonalds with Le Bernardin or The French Laundry, but even in a fast food joint, we all too easily look right through someone with an 80 IQ and no means.

Jesus said this:

“The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son, and sent his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast, but they would not come. Again he sent other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, See, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding feast.’ But they paid no attention and went off, one to his farm, another to his business, while the rest seized his servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them. The king was angry, and he sent his troops and destroyed those murderers and burned their city. Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding feast is ready, but those invited were not worthy. Go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find.’ And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good. So the wedding hall was filled with guests.”
—Matthew 22:2-10

We’re surrounded by invisible people, but God calls us to go out into the highways and byways, to look hard for them, to find them wherever they might be found.

You see, as Christians, you and I are invisible, too. We’re invisible because we died at the cross, so we no longer live, but the very visible Christ lives in us (if we’re living for Him). So we’re uniquely geared to understand the invisible of the world. And the Lord would have us perpetually seek them out.

The invisible might be the Down Syndrome mop-wielder or she might be the salesperson who caught a couple bad breaks. The Holy Spirit will let us know just who’s invisible if we depend on Him to show us. He wants to show us. We just need to be listening to Him.

Because in His eyes, no one is invisible.

{Image: Detail from an ad campaign poster for the Salvation Army. Other posters can be seen here.}

Kingdoms and Bitterness

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Ben Witherington discusses what he sees as the Christian response to bitterness over at his eponymous blog. He notes the distressing tone of cynicism and bitterness in the lives of young people today, feelings Ben did not witness in his own generation, even though both generations have endured similar reasons for becoming bitter.

Ben says the key to resolving this bitterness is to forgive the individuals who have wronged us.

Unfortunately, he’s missing the real reason why this younger generation is bitter.

If I were bitter because my neighbor shot my dog, poisoned my well, and plundered my fields, I would be angry at a flesh-and-blood person. I can see him. I can have a relationship with him. I can forgive him.

But if I were bitter because the government shot my dog, poisoned my well, and plundered my fields, there’s no individual flesh-and-blood cause for my anger. I can’t see the government system. I can’t have a relationship with a system. How do I forgive a nebulous entity that is neither him nor her—and may even include me?

The forgiveness fix Witherington advocates works fine for dealing with interrelational bitterness. But the bitterness he sees in today’s young people doesn’t have its roots in a teacher that unjustly slapped wrists or a love interest who done wrong. The bitterness in today’s youth comes from being mugged by systems and seeing no way to respond.

Consider a well-known system currently on display in the theaters. Slavery epitomizes a system that grinds up people and mangles everything it leaves in its wake. We get a good feel for this in the movie Amazing Grace. Did the Africans subjected to that monstrous system become bitter? Who could they forgive? It wasn’t individuals that enslaved them, but a system.

While forgiveness is always called for when dealing with any wrong, even those perpetuated by a system (in as much as it is possible, especially toward the most guilty individuals within the system), the proper Christian response is to bring the Kingdom of God against the system, against the kingdom of darkness (or even murky grayness) it represents. Too many of us fail to see that systems that break people’s spirits get their power from demonic sources, and we Christians must wrestle against them.

This is exactly what William Wilburforce did. He brought the entirety of his faith in Christ against that unholy kingdom/system of slavery and vanquished it. He understood that systems must be assaulted in ways that individuals can’t be.

As Christians, we forgive individuals, but we pull down ungodly systems.

Our society today runs entirely on systems in a way that it did not just forty years ago. Even our churches have become systemized. Some paleoconservatives have deemed this shift “The Managerial Society,” and it’s a form of socialism like the kind we Americans used to routinely mock in the old Soviet Union. Nearly every encounter we have in daily life within the US today has a system lurking behind it. Those systems explain why we have no great men in government now, only systems. Great men and women stand up against political injustice, but systems toe the system line, even if it’s bad for the whole the system operates within.

Young people today are bitter and cynical because they’ve grown up within these systems and they can’t see any way to transcend them.

Sadly, the one group designed to beat the system, the Church, can’t seem to get off its duff and do what Christ charged it with: tear down strongholds. Take a wrecking ball to it!The glaring error I see within the Church, even in those churches that understand strongholds, is the failure to acknowledge that they go far beyond individuals. We may talk about strongholds in a person’s life, but do we ever talk about strongholds in the entire culture? Not very often!

How does the Church go about performing this duty?

Ford will close the transmission plant near where I live. Thousands of longtime autoworkers will see their only hope for work in this region go up in smoke. I suspect a lot of folks will be bitter. They’ve put in years, and now what? What does a 52-year old autoworker do when he’s one of two thousand let go in a town of about ten thousand? Who does he forgive for his bitterness? Is there a face he can envision when he attempts to bestow forgiveness?

Too many Christians would ask him to do just that. But that’s not the Christian response. The Christian response looks deeper and broader. On a macro level, it asks questions about the way our economic system works and what it does to create these bitter people. Then it finds solutions to ending the cycle that churns up workers and later buries them. On a micro level, it stands beside the autoworker in its midst and makes it our singleminded obsession to help him find good work, keep his home, and take care of his most basic needs, be they material, physical, or spiritual.

That’s bringing the Kingdom into a system, opposing the cycle that breeds bitter people. And we’re simply not doing that. We’re asking people not to be bitter, but we stand on the sidelines and let the system grind ’em to pieces.

When the Roman system tossed aside the sick, Christians fought the system and took care of them. Later, the Roman system fell, in large part, because the Kingdom of God toppled it. Throughout history, Christians have been at the root of bringing down unholy systems and kingdoms–and not just because they forgave, but because they understood that the light shines in the darkness and the darkness cannot overcome it.

It is easy to tell bitter people to forgive. It is far harder to roll up our sleeves (all the while remembering our Kingdom cannot be vanquished) and fight systems that breed bitter, broken people. That first answer consists of words, the second of blood, sweat, and the strong right arm of our triumphant God.