Johan Geyser and The “Mosaiek” Seat of Moses
Johan Geyser and The “Mosaiek” Seat of Moses
In 1926 a unique stone seat was found near the southern wall of the Chorazin synagogue. Since then it has been called the “Chair of Moses.” The Chair of Moses is a special seat that is used in some synagogues, even today, on certain occasions, usually located near the most important wall, that which faces Jerusalem. (BAR 13:05 (Sep/Oct 1987).
The photo on the left is of a replica of the Chair (or Seat) of Moses. The original is displayed in the Israel Museum, Jerusalem.
Jesus once said:
“The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, so do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do. For they preach, but do not practice. (Matthew 23:2-3)
I was pleasantly surprised when I listened to one of Johan Geyser’s most recent sermons on the Mosaiek Church’s podcast page. It formed part of a series on Psalms which he entitled “Psalms as Companion: Psalm 1 – Happiness.” Hadn’t I been familiar with the Mosaic Church’s tomfooleries and dabbling in all kinds of mystical spiritual practices (Centering Prayer, Contemplative Prayer, Listening Prayer, Lectio Divina, Silence, Labyrinths, Retreats, Meditation et al) I would have thought that he truly is a man of God who boldly proclaims the unadulterated Word of God.
Fortunately, Paul’s warning in 2 Corinthians 11:14-15 that the devil masquerades as an angel of light and that even his servants skilfully manage to portray themselves as ministers of righteousness, quickly brought me to my senses.
The Murky Waters gushing forth from the “Mosaïek” Seat of Moses
One of the things that struck me the most in Johan Geyser’s sermon was his use of a metaphor which, he says, he got from Oom Willem. He probably refers to Oom Willem Nicol, a leading South African proponent and teacher of the practice of solitude and silence (forms of meditation) who candidly admits in his book “Voice in the Silence,” page 97, that demons can speak to you whilst you are in a state of altered consciousness. Oom Willem’s word of warning echoes that of the illustrious Nobel Prize Winner, Sir John Eccles, who said the brain is “A machine that a ghost can operate.”
When you are not in control of your mind (soul and spirit), then something else from outside of you may take over and whisper all kinds of lies into your mind. This is precisely what happens with those who believe they can rid their cluttered and hurried minds from stress induced thoughts through meditation, and steer it into a state of peaceful serenity and sheer nothingness. They open themselves to demonic entities who are always keen and ready to infuse their abominable doctrines into the minds of their unsuspecting victims, especially those who have no qualms with dangerous mystical practices.
Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons, . . . (1 Timothy 4:1)
Johan Geyser says this of Oom Willem’s metaphor:
Oom Willem has the most beautiful metaphor . . . He says it is like a wild farm. There was a large source, a fountain and this fountain had many branches. You could drink water in every little branch, but, he said, you must be careful.
You cannot drink too much water or pump out too much water there because it becomes murky. He says you must go to the main source of the water. He says, so it is with life.
There are many pleasant things in life and the Lord gives it all to us to enjoy. But listen up, don’t expect too much. Do not try to pump too much water out of your car; don’t try too pump too much water out of your marriage; don’ try to pump too much water out of your home; don’t try to pump too much water out of your position.
But that which you are actually looking for to quench your thirst lies in the main source that supplies all the other things; go and drink there.
In layman’s terms it simply means that the traditional ways of practicing your Christian religion – Bible study, attending church, verbal praying reading your Bible etc. – are no longer efficient and sufficient. You need something more and that something more is MEDITATION. Thomas Keating writes:
Centering Prayer is a method of silent prayer that prepares us to receive the gift of contemplative prayer, prayer in which we experience God’s presence within us, closer than breathing, closer than thinking, closer than consciousness itself. This method of prayer is both a relationship with God and a discipline to foster that relationship.
Centering Prayer is not meant to replace other kinds of prayer. Rather, it adds depth of meaning to all prayer and facilitates the movement from more active modes of prayer – verbal, mental or affective prayer – into a receptive prayer of resting in God. Centering Prayer emphasizes prayer as a personal relationship with God and as a movement beyond conversation with Christ to communion with Him.
The source of Centering Prayer, as in all methods leading to contemplative prayer, is the Indwelling Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The focus of Centering Prayer is the deepening of our relationship with the living Christ. The effects of Centering Prayer are ecclesial, as the prayer tends to build communities of faith and bond the members together in mutual friendship and love.
The question we need to ask ourselves is: What gives prayer its meaning? What makes it worthwhile to pray? Is it the method and technique or particular way in which you pray or is it the One to whom you direct your prayers that gives meaning and substance to your prayers? Let’s briefly consider these two options to see which of these is the more feasible. The apostle James tells us that the fervent prayer of a righteous man has great power. To illustrate he recalls the prophet Elijah who prayed that it might not rain and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. Then he prayed again and the heaven gave rain and the earth bore its fruit (James 5:16-18).
Was it Elijah’s prayer that stopped it from raining or was it the God with whom the prayer of the righteous availeth much that made the rain to stay away? Or could it have been Elijah’s prayers that were so powerful because he repeated a single word or a passage from Scripture as a mantra until he reached the deepest sense of silence known as the Cloud of Unknowing? Voila! It must indeed have been what Elijah experienced when he realized that the only way to truly “know” God is to abandon all his preconceived notions and beliefs or “knowledge” about God and to be courageous enough to surrender his mind and ego to the realm of “unknowingness,” at which point, he began to glimpse the true nature of God. It must have been at this particular point when it stopped raining on earth.
Perhaps Jesus could have avoided his agonizing moments in the Garden of Gethsemane if He’d but known the mystical path to enter into and enjoy his Father’s presence in stead of uttering a verbal prayer like “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.” At any rate, how could we have known what He had prayed on that terrible day if he hadn’t verbally uttered those words? Silent contemplative prayer would have been of no use to Him then as it is for those who practice it now.
The words “method” and “technique” suggest that man needs to do something in order to achieve something. Needless to say, it immediately shifts the focus away from God to man and makes man the centre of everything to be achieved in prayer, i.e. to experience God’s presence within you and to foster a relationship with Him, as Thomas Keating says.
When God commanded Moses to build an altar (the place and means He chose for man to enter into his presence in the Old Testament) He forbade him to hew the stone.
And if thou wilt make me an altar of stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stone: for if thou lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it. Neither shalt thou go up by steps unto mine altar, that thy nakedness be not discovered thereon. (Exodus 20:25-26)
The simple command proves that anything and everything man offers to God in an effort to appease and please Him is worthless. The best thing to be said of any method or technique man applies to enter into the presence of God and to foster a relationship with him is that it is polluted. In fact, the Bible describes it in terms of filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6). Before anyone of you would like to cast the “but-that’s-in-the-Old-Testament-argument” at me, should read the following passages again:
It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life. (John 6:63)
For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not. (Romans 7:18)
God and God alone has provided a way for man to enter into his presence and to foster a relationship with Him -the blood of his Son, Jesus Christ (Hebrews 9:22; Hebrews 10:17-20).
Anything and everything man offers to achieve what God has already achieved in and through his Son is idolatry and that’s precisely what the contemplative spiritual scene is – filthy, polluted idolatry of the worst kind. It ventures to replace what God has put in place for all eternity.
The main Source of pure, clean, unpolluted living fountain water, in the spiritual sense of the word, is obviously God Himself.
Be appalled, O heavens, at this; be shocked, be utterly desolate, declares the LORD, for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water. (Jeremiah 2:12-13).
Johan Geyser may be correct when he says that the excessive indulgence in material possessions and social position may cause you to eventually drink from a muddied and murky stream of water. Jesus said: “it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but what comes out of the mouth; this defiles a person.” (Matthew 15:11). It is not necessarily material possessions – things that are needful for one’s daily existence – that defile you but the things that proceed out of your heart, especially those things pastors preach and believe to be from God whilst they actually come directly from Satan and his demons. In these instances they are not God’s spokesman but Satan’s lackeys (1 Timothy 4:1).
Public Statements that come from the “Mosaiek” Seat of Moses
Some of Johan Geyser’s and his fellow pastors’ public statements (among them Trevor Hudson) are intensely biblical. Hadn’t they been so deeply, biblically correct in some ways, they couldn’t have deceived so many people. As little as one per cent of error carried on the back of 99% of truth is enough to cause havoc in peoples’ minds and ultimately keep them in bondage to the doctrines of demons.
For instance: To illustrate that the Bible is not an end in itself and not a book to be read and studied like any other religious book, but that its specific purpose is to lead you to Christ, Johan Geyser quoted Jesus’ words in John 5:39 and 40:
You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.
Well done, Johan. You boldly articulated the most essential prerequisite for salvation, and that is, to come to Jesus (Matthew 11:28-29). Paul restated this truth when he wrote: ” For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” (Romans 10:13).
The question is: How do you come to Jesus? What must you do to come to Him for your salvation? Can anyone come to Him through meditative practices such as Contemplative Prayer, Centering Prayer, Lectio Divina, Solitude and Silence, Vispasana meditation or any other meditative techniques?
Firstly, it can only happen through prayer (Romans 10:13). Prayer is the only means available to man to come to a God he cannot see. Secondly, only those who humble themselves and realize that they are lost sinners and desperately in need of a Saviour, will come to Jesus Christ for their salvation (Matthew 9:12 and 13).
Both – prayer and the realization and acknowledgment that you are lost and on your way to hell if you don’t have Christ (1 John 5:12) – are cognitive experiences while the mind is fully conscious and in tact and not in an altered state of consciousness where everything fades into a cloud of unknowing. Contemplative gurus like Thomas Keating and Cynthia Bourgeault contradict the biblical concept of prayer to promulgate a practice called centering prayer. The following video with Cynthia Bourgeault, gives us some good insights into what centering prayer is and how it should be practiced. Notice, she says:
Essentially, as many of you know, about the ninety seventies Christianity began to move in and get a piece of the action by developing methods of meditation. And in the nineteen seventies all of a sudden we had two methods of meditation available; meditation as would actually be understood, you know, in the general parlance of the world, with Eastern standpoints. Christian meditation and Centering prayer, both developed by Christian monks of considerable seniority in their respective monasteries offering parallel pads to let Christians actually sit down on prayer stools and mats and get into meditation. Christian meditation follows a very Classic route. It’s mantric meditation and it was actually taught to its founder, Father John Maine, by a Pakistani Hindu and is passed on in that way, follows just saying a mantra repeatedly.
The name most associated with centreing prayer is Father Thomas Keating who was one of four monks at a Trappist Monastery near Boston that developed this practice based a little bit on a practice of a fourteenth century Christian mystical classic called the Cloud of Unknowing and then put in, what Thomas Keating likes to call, an updated format with a little help from their friends, Buddhists and the TM Community who helped do things that were untraditional in Christianity.
Hopefully you can see that meditation, including Centering and Contemplative Prayer and all its various offshoots are counterproductive to redemption. A lost sinner can only absorb the Holy Spirit’s conviction of sin, righteousness and judgement into his mind when his mind is fully functional and in tact and not in altered states of consciousness induced by meditation. This is the reason why it is so extremely difficult to convince those who are into all kinds of contemplative spiritualties that they are sinning against the most holy God who said: “and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you” (2 Corinthians 6:17).
Johan Geyser seems to be aware of the imperative to be of sober mind on your spiritual journey. He quotes passages like Romans 12:2 and 2 Corinthians 10:5 with gusto. Indeed, both these passages confirm that a sober, vigilant, alert and watchful mind is of the utmost importance in salvation. If clear-mindedness is so important in salvation, then surely clear-headedness on the journey of sanctification is equally important and also necessary to keep the door closed to demonic entities, by disallowing the mind to become dull and inactive through meditative practices.
There are several passages in Scripture that command us to be sober, alert and watchful, among them 1 Thessalonians 5:6-8; 1 Timothy 3:4; 1 Timothy 3:11; Titus 2:3; Titus 2:6; Titus 2:11-12; 1 Peter 1:13; 1Peter 4:7; 1 Peter 5:8. These passages are ample proof that it is very dangerous to allow your mind to slip away from your control and to be taken over by another entity while you are indulging in practices such as hypnosis and meditation.
The Holy Spirit never takes over or dulls the mind in order to control it apart from the saint’s God-given free-will. He enlightens the mind with the truth in God’s Word so that the saint may learn how to willingly use his mind in harmony with God’s revealed will. Hence, we are taught that saints have the mind of Christ, meaning that they are spiritually mature enough to judge (discern) all things in accordance with God’s Word.
Emergent and RCC mystics may immediately protest that meditation enhances enlightenment and awareness and that it is beneficial for one’s health and spiritual well-being. Are they deceived? They must be, because many ex-Hindus who have been delivered from the bondage to Eastern mysticism and its various practices and are now Christians, tell us that meditation is demonic.
Isn’t it odd? Some Hindu and Eastern mystics who’d been involved in all kinds of demonic meditative practices and are now true followers of Jesus Christ admit that they’d been deceived by Satan. Adversely, many so-called followers of Christ in the Western world refuse to admit that they are involved in the very same demoniac meditative practices and are blindly following Satan into his abyss of contemplative practices. No wonder the Bible says that iniquity is a mystery (2 Thessalonians 2:7).
Rabindranath R. Maharaj, an ex-Hindu and Christian writes:
Nothing was more important than our daily transcendental meditation, the heart of Yoga, which Krishna advocated as the surest way to eternal Bliss. But it could also be dangerous.
Frightening psychic experiences awaited the unwary meditator, similar to a bad trip on drugs. Demons described in the Vedas had been known to take possession of some Yogis. Kundalini power, said to be coiled like a serpent at the base of the spine, could produce ecstatic experiences when released in deep meditation – or, if not properly controlled, it could do great mental and even bodily harm.
The line between ecstasy and horror was very fine. For that reason we initiates were closely supervised by the Brahmacharya and his assistant. During the daily meditation I began to have visions of psychedelic colors, to hear unearthly music, and to visit exotic planets where the gods conversed with me, encouraging me to attain even higher states of consciousness.
Sometimes in my trance I encountered the same horrible demonic creatures that are depicted by the images in Hindu, Buddhist, Shinto, and other religious temples. It was a frightful experience, but the Brahmacharya explained that it was normal and urged me to pursue the quest for Self-realization. At times I experienced a sense of mystical unity with the universe. I was the universe, Lord of all, omnipotent, omnipresent.
My instructors were excited at this. I was obviously a chosen vessel, destined for early success in the search for union with Brahman. The Forces that had guided my father were now guiding me’ (Rabindranath R. Maharaj, “Death of a Guru,” pages. 56-57). (Emphasis added)
Johan Geyser admits and is quick to set at ease the minds of his congregants when he says that Christian meditation (Hindus say there is no such thing as Christian meditation; it is and remains Eastern meditation in Christian guise) is not salvation as other religions and philosophies claim it to be. “God is the One who saves,” he so rightly says. Nonetheless, and this is where error creeps in by stealth, He adds that meditation, like the Bible, is merely a gracious gift of God enabling you to come to Him and to rest in his presence in solitude and silence. He says:
The last important thing is: it is a relationship. And we shouldn’t misunderstand this. When the Psalmist says “blessed is the person whose delight is in the law of the LORD; and meditates on it day and night,” it does not mean that we should have a good Bible knowledge and that knowledge is going to transform us – information equals transformation. Or that meditation is the path to salvation and that meditation is going to redeem us. The one is a focus on “what” (the content, the Bible) or, the second thing, on the technique. the method, the “how,”- meditation that was seen as a from of prayer in the early church. These are things that are being practiced these days. This is when the means to an end becomes the end in itself. So, you find it. . . . Magical powers are ascribed to the Bible and meditation. . . So the Bible has magical powers. If you say you must just quote a passage from Scripture . . . it’s the Word of God. Jesus speaks to he Pharisees and says to them: “[Ye] Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me. And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life” (John 5:39-40).
The irony is that the ones occupying the “Mosaiek” seat of Moses and who admonish you not to use the Bible as a magical tool, are in fact utilizing the Bible in mystical and magical ways. Although Johan Geyser exhorts his church members to regard Lectio Divina (a form of meditation) merely as the means to an end and not as the end itself, the end result of Lectio Divina is always the same – an alleged peaceful, relaxing and silent resting in the presence of God.
Thomas Keating wrote:
First of all, we need to distinguish Lectio Divina from Bible study, which is very useful at another time and provides a solid conceptual background for the practice of Lectio Divina.
Secondly, Lectio Divina is not the same as reading the scriptures for the purpose of private edification, encouragement, or getting acquainted with the many-sided aspects of revelation, and especially with Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Word of God. Lectio Divina is rather a way or formula for furthering these objectives. (Thomas Lessing comments: This is a direct, wilful and deliberate denial that a cognisant comprehension of the Word of God is the only way God provided to draw lost sinners to Himself [Rom 10:17]. If faith is the only requirement for the salvation of lost souls, it follows that they ought to understand the things they hear preached from the Word of God in order to respond to it and be saved. Lectio Divina cannot further these objectives).
Paul writes, “Know you not that your bodies are the temples of God and that the Spirit of God dwells within you?” (1 Cor.3:16). Suppose you were struck by that question as you are reading a section of your scripture reading for the day, say a dozen or so verses, and you felt nudged to let your attention linger over those words to savour them. The early monks read scripture aloud so they were actually listening to it. They would then choose a phrase, or a sentence at the most, that impressed them. They would sit with that sentence or phrase without thinking of stages or following some predetermined schema, but just listening, repeating slowly the same short text over and over again. (Thomas comments: This, once more, is a direct, wilful and deliberate attack on God’s Word and Jesus Christ who said: “But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.” [Matthew 6:7]). This receptive disposition enabled the Holy Spirit to expand their capacity to listen. As they listened, they might perceive a new depth to the text or an expanding meaning. (Thomas comments: To go beyond the simple meaning of passages or verses in Scripture is the bedrock of Gnosticism because a mystic understanding of those passages allegedly bring you into the presence of Gods). A particular insight might also be singularly appropriate for them in their particular life situation or for the events of the coming day. According to scripture, the Spirit speaks to us every day. “If today you hear his voice, harden not your heart” (Psalm 95). The monks listened not so much to understand the text, not to conceptualize or analyse it, but just to hear it. And to hear it without any preconceived purpose of what they were going to do with it. (Thomas comments: No wonder the Bible frequently says “Who has ears, let him hear.” The word [akouo] means to understand, comprehend, recognize, cognize something you observe and take in with your ears. Listening with conceptualizing the things you ears is mysticism in its extreme).
This is already a deep form of receptivity. (Thomas comments: The Collins dictionary defines “receptivity” as –
- able to apprehend quickly
- tending to receive new ideas or suggestions favourably
- able to hold or receive
Any normal thinking person will tell you that the mind must be in tact and not befuddled by a “cloud of unknowing” [surrendering your mind and ego to the realm of “unknowingness,” at which point, you begin to glimpse the true nature of God] to be able to apprehend something quickly. And yet, as you will see in the next paragraph, Thomas Keating says you need time to learn how to practice the contemplative kind of receptivity which is the very opposite of the normal meaning of “receptivity” i.e. the ability to apprehend quickly [no extra time is needed] and the ability to hold fast to (“apprehend” – to arrest and escort into custody; to perceive or grasp mentally; understand] that which you receive in and through the mind (without your awareness dissipating). If the “cloud of unknowing” [the surrendering of the mind and ego to the realm of “unknowingness” in order to get a glimpse of the true nature of God] is a reality, then Jesus Christ must have lied when He said that “eternal life, is to know God, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom He has sent.” [John 17:3] THROUGH HIS WORD [John 17:17])
Those who practice Lectio Divina in this way are already moving toward the fourth [and final] “moment” of this dynamic process leading to resting in God. (Thomas comments: Whenever the Bible uses the word “rest” or resting” it almost always conveys the meaning of salvation [Matthew 11:28-29]. Although Johan Geyser denies that meditation is the path to salvation and that it redeems us, both he and Thomas Keating deliberately use biblical words that carry the meaning of salvation, redemption and regeneration. It proves that they speak with a forked tongue to keep their listeners and congregants in bondage to the “cloud of unknowing” – away from true repentance and redemption). In response to a new insight, they might be inclined to respond in thanksgiving or with interior movements of love, praise or gratitude. As this listening attitude stabilizes, they might experience moments of contemplative prayer in the strict sense, in which they are just present to God, or quietly engulfed in the divine presence. In this situation, one’s attentiveness to God expands into the sheer awareness of the divine presence. For the moment, we break through the veil of our own ways of thinking. The external word of God in scripture awakens us to the interior Word of God in our inmost being. When that awareness dissipates, we may go back and read more of the text, provided of course, if we have the time.
This monastic way of doing Lectio Divina always begins with prayer to the Holy Spirit. (Thomas comments: The Bible never tells Christians to direct their prayers to the Holy Spirit. Praying to the Holy Spirit is a Roman Catholic practice which is not biblical. In Jesus’ prayer in Matthew 6 He never once addresses the Holy Spirit. His entire prayer is directed to the Father. The reason is this: The Holy Spirit was given to believers as Comforter (Paraclete) to guide them in all truth and to assist them in their prayers of worship and glorification of God he Father and his Son. He always directs our worship and prayers to God the Father and Jesus Christ; never to Himself. Paul says in Ephesians 6:18 “Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, . . .” and not to the Spirit). The four moments along the circumference of the circle are reading in the presence of God, reflecting in the sense of ruminating (not in the sense of discursive meditation), responding with spontaneous prayer, and resting in God beyond thoughts and particular acts of the will.
By “ruminating” I mean sitting with a sentence, phrase or even one word that emerges from the text, allowing the Spirit to expand our listening capacity and to open us to its deeper meaning; in other words, to penetrate the spiritual sense of a scripture passage. This leads to the faith experience of the living Christ and increases the practical love for others that flows from that relationship.
As we repeat the phrase or sentence slowly, over and over, a deeper insight may arise. For example, take the words of Jesus, “I will not call you servants but friends.” All of a sudden, it might dawn on us what it means to be a friend of Christ. Our awareness expands without our having done anything but allow the Spirit to act. It is a heart-to-heart exchange with Christ. We think the text but we do not think about the text. If we are thinking in the sense of reflecting, we are dominating the conversation. That can be done fruitfully some other time. Here it is a question of receiving and resting in Christ’s presence as the source of the word or phrase.
Lectio Divina is a special kind of process, and to benefit fully from its fruits, its integrity has to be respected. The ripe fruit of the regular practice of Lectio Divina is assimilating the word of God and being assimilated by it. It is a movement from conversation to communion. It also enables us to express our deep spiritual experience of union with God in words or symbols that are appropriate. There is thus a movement not only into silence, but from silence to expression.
In the Trinity, the Eternal Word is always emerging from the infinite silence of the Father and always returning. The persons in the Trinity live in each other rather than in themselves. The Father knows himself only in the Son, the Son only in the Father and the Spirit expresses their unity, bringing together into One relationships that are infinitely distinct. The Trinity is the basis for the oneness and diversity that we see expressed throughout creation. In this way of doing Lectio, one is recognizing the presence of the Word of God in all creation and in every occurrence, experiencing what the author of John’s gospel wrote in the prologue, “Without Him was made nothing that has been made.” In contemplative prayer, we are in touch with the source of all creation; hence, we transcend ourselves and our limited worldviews. As a result, we feel at one with other people and enjoy a sense of belonging to the universe. The fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily in Jesus, according to Paul. The Divinity begins to dwell in us bodily in proportion to our capacity to receive it as we grow in union with the Eternal Word. This process needs to be nourished both by the interior silence of contemplative prayer and cultivated by Lectio Divina (in the sense of listening). The awareness of the divine presence will also begin to overflow into ordinary activity. (Emphasis added throughout)
Well, Thomas Keating, you are so deep into integral spirituality with Ken Wilber it comes as no surprise that you are comfortable with the concept of being at-one-ment with other people (of other religions) and the universe.
Trevor Hudson claims that God begins to speak very deeply to the contemplative Christ follower in the second stage of his “R”-analysis which is to reflect (meditate) on a word, a passage or a phrase that stood out for you while reading the Bible. How does his view of how God speaks to you very deeply compare with Paul’s view of how God speaks?
In many separate revelations each of which set forth a portion of the Truth] and in different ways God spoke of old to [our] forefathers in and by the prophets, [But] in the last of these days He has spoken to us in [the person of a] Son, Whom He appointed Heir and lawful Owner of all things, also by and through Whom He created the worlds and the reaches of space and the ages of time [He made, produced, built, operated, and arranged them in order]. (Hebrews 1:1-2)
Trevor Hudson says: If you use his simple technique of Lectio Divina represented in the four R’s (Read, Reflect, Respond and Rest), God will speak very deeply to you and you will find rest in his presence (just wasting one another’s time). God says: I have spoken to you in many ways in the past through my prophets, but now I am speaking to you through my Son who is seated at my right hand. Listen to Him.” Can a simple technique or practice bring you into the holy presence of God or is it God’s Son alone who can bring you into his presence (Hebrews 10:19)?
Thomas Keating exceeds himself to the point where even a Buddhist could write: “I’m a Buddhist but it is nice to hear the truth in different verbiage sometimes. Every approach has its advantages, including the Christian one.” This, my dear friends, is the fruit of mystical practices like Lectio Divina and other meditative practices; it distracts lost sinners and leads them away from the only Saviour, Jesus Christ, into the arms of a false Christ who is only too eager to deceive them into believing that they have entered into the presence of God. Another passage in Scripture they should consider for their Lectio Divina binges, is Matthew 23:13:
“But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in.
Solomon, the wisest among men once wrote: “If one turns away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer is an abomination” (Proverbs 28:9). Now that, I would like to suggest, is a very good passage for occupants of the Mosaiek” seat of Moses in Fairland, Johannesburg to use in their Lectio Divina binges. Johan Geyser in particular, who boldly asserts that “When the Psalmist says ‘blessed is the person whose delight is in the law of the LORD; and meditates on it day and night,’ it does not mean that we should have a good Bible knowledge and that knowledge is going to transform us – information equals transformation” (despite John 8:32 and Hebrews 4:12), could benefit from a Lectio Divina session on this passage ” . . . even his prayer is an abomination.” Imagine Johan sitting in the Buddhist lotus position and repeating over and over: ” . . . even his prayer is an abomination,” ” . . . even his prayer is an abomination,” ” . . . even his prayer is an abomination” and then suddenly finds himself in the holy presence of God. Or are there only certain passages in Scripture the Lectio Divina practitioners ought to use to bring them into the presence of God? May God have mercy on their pitiful souls.
Drinking from the Murky New Age Fountains
Is the Mosaiek Church in Fariland, Johannesburg compatible with the New Age? Click on the links below to see how the Mosaiek Church uses New Agers to disseminate their murky waters.
Mosaiek Kerk and Odyssey Magazine (Odyssey is a South African New Age Magazine launched in July 1977).
