Many Southern Baptists love The Shack, which is irrefutable evidence of the deep spiritual apostasy that exists in that Convention. I received the following frightful testimony from a pastor who came out of the Convention in 1996:

“Concerning the question about ‘The Shack,’ I have been shocked at the willingness of many of my former SBC friends and acquaintances to receive it as a ‘great’ book. As you know, and have taught, the book presents a picture of ‘God’ that is not biblical. The ready acceptance of this book by the vast majority of those I know, is indicative of a serious lack of discernment. It seems that spiritual discernment is a rapidly dissipating quality today. I have questioned several folk on their acceptance of ‘The Shack’ and its false teaching. Their response has been, ‘But it teaches a good truth about how God loves us.’ This is characteristic of the modern church-growth movement that focuses solely on the ‘love of God,’ and relegates His holiness, righteousness and judgments to the ‘unimportant’” (Marty Wynn, Lighthouse Baptist Church, Columbus, Georgia, e-mail to D. Cloud, May 21, 2011).

Republished July 20, 2011 (first published October 15, 2008) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

The following is excerpted from our book Contemplative Mysticism: A Powerful Ecumenical Bond. $19.95

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The Bible repeatedly warns about the danger of spiritual delusion and exhorts believers to be very careful. Consider the following:

“Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves” (Matthew 7:15).

“And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many” (Matthew 24:4-5).

“For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect” (Matthew 24:24).

“But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him” (2 Corinthians 11:3-4).

Republished July 19, 2011 (first published September 11, 2008) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

The following is excerpted from our book Contemplative Mysticism: A Powerful Ecumenical Bond. $19.95

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Thomas Merton (1915-68), was a Roman Catholic Trappist monk whose writings are influential within Catholicism, the New Age movement, the peace movement, as well as the centering prayer movement that lies at the heart of the emerging church and that is permeating evangelicalism. Richard Foster quotes Merton at least 14 times in his popular book Celebration of Discipline.

Merton was a prolific author. Nearly 70 of his books were published during his lifetime or posthumously. His autobiography, The Seven Storey Mountain, sold 600,000 hardbound copies in its first year and millions of copies since. It has been continually in print since 1948. His books have been translated into at least 29 languages.

Merton was involved with the peace movement during the Vietnam War. He was closely associated with the pacifist anti-Americans Daniel and Philip Berrigan and Dorothy Day. The Thomas Merton Center for Peace and Justice carries on this philosophy.

Merton has been called “the most influential proponent of traditional monasticism in American history” (Ursula King, Christian Mystics, p. 229).

Ray Yungen says:

“What Martin Luther King was to the civil rights movement and what Henry Ford was to the automobile, Thomas Merton is to contemplative prayer. Although this prayer movement existed centuries before he came along, Merton took it out of its monastic setting and made it available to and popular with the masses” (A Time of Departing, p. 58).

June 18, 2009 (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -
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CATHERINE OF SIENA (1347-80) was born Catherine Benincasa, in Siena, Italy. She was declared a saint in 1461 by Pope Pius II and a Doctor of the Church in 1970 by Pope Paul VI. Pope John Paul II declared her one of the patron saints of Europe.

Her body is reserved in the Saint Mary Minerva Church in Rome, while her head is enshrined in the basilica of St. Dominic in Bologna, Italy.

She took a vow of virginity to Christ at age seven and lived in near solitude, refusing her mother’s attempts to encourage her to live a normal childhood. When her mother tried to get her to dress in an attractive manner, she shaved off her hair. When her mother took her to a spa, she scalded her skin by exposing herself to the hottest geothermal vents. Biographer Kathryn Harrison says, “She allowed herself not one mortal pleasure.”

At age 16 she took the black habit of the Dominican Third Order. She claimed to have received her habit personally from Dominic, though he had been dead for a century.

She spent three years in solitary prayer in a little room, nine by three feet, speaking only to her Catholic confessor. She lived long periods of time with no food or water except the wine and wafers of the Mass. She scourged herself three times a day with an iron chain. She allowed herself only one-half hour of sleep every other day on a hard board. She wore a hairshirt and an iron-spiked girdle. “... her self-punishment left her body covered with gaping wounds, which she blithely referred to as her ‘flowers’” (The Way of the Mystics, p. 81).

May 27, 2009 (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

The following is excerpted from the book CONTEMPLATIVE MYSTICISM: A POWERFUL ECUMENICAL BOND, which is available from Way of Life Literature. Contemplative mysticism, which originated with Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox monasticism, is permeating every branch of Christianity today, including the Southern Baptist Convention. In this book we document the fact that Catholic mysticism leads inevitably to a broadminded ecumenical philosophy and to the adoption of heresies. For many, this path has led to interfaith dialogue, Buddhism, Hinduism, universalism, pantheism, panentheism, even goddess theology. One chapter is dedicated to exposing the heresies of Richard Foster: “Evangelicalism’s Mystical Sparkplug.” We describe the major contemplative practices, such as centering prayer, visualizing prayer, Jesus Prayer, Lectio Divina, and the labyrinth. We look at the history of Roman Catholic monasticism, beginning with the Desert Fathers and the Church Fathers, and document the heresies associated with it, such as its sacramental gospel, rejection of the Bible as sole authority, veneration of Mary, purgatory, celibacy, asceticism, allegorical interpretation of Scripture, and moral corruption. We examine the errors of contemplative mysticism, such as downplaying the centrality of the Bible, ignoring the fact that multitudes of professing Christians are not born again, exchanging the God of the Bible for a blind idol, ignoring the Bible’s warnings against associating with heresy and paganism, and downplaying the danger of spiritual delusion.

FRANCIS OF ASSISI (1181-1226) was the founder of the Order of Friars Minor, commonly known as the Franciscans. He was canonized in 1228 by Pope Gregory IX and is the patron saint of animals, merchants, and the environment. Some Catholic churches hold ceremonies honoring animals on “the saint’s feast day,” which is October 4.

Born to the family of a wealthy nobleman, he was named Giovanni di Bernardone by his mother but Francesco by his father. When in his twenties Francis allegedly saw Jesus looking at him through the eyes of a crucifix, telling him to repair a ruined church. Absconding with a load of expensive colored drapery from his father’s shop, he sold it for gold and tried to give it to the church. His father was not pleased, and Francis, after returning the gold, renounced his father and his patrimony. He dedicated himself to celibacy and married “the Lady Poverty.”

Francis founded his religious order on the command of Christ in Matthew 10:9-10, but this is not a command for believers in this present time: Jesus said: “Nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves: for the workman is worthy of his meat. And into whatsoever city or town ye shall enter, enquire who in it is worthy; and there abide till ye go thence.” Francis ignored the fact that this command pertained only to the preaching of the kingdom in Israel. Jesus instructed them, “Go not into the way of the Gentiles ... But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Mat. 10:5-6). They were to preach, “The kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Mat. 10:7). This is not the preaching of the gospel; it is the proclamation that the Jews should repent because their King and Messiah was in their midst! Israel rejected the preaching of the kingdom and Christ turned His attention to making the Sacrifice on Calvary that would provide salvation for all that believe. After He died and rose from the dead, Christ gave a different commandment to the disciples, instructing them to go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature, not just Israelites (Mk. 16:15; Acts 1:8).

HENRI NOUWEN

May 6, 2009 (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

HENRI J.M. NOUWEN (1932-1996) was a Roman Catholic priest who taught at Harvard, Yale, and the University of Notre Dame. Nouwen has had a vast influence within the emerging church and evangelicalism at large through his writings, and he has been an influential voice within the contemplative movement. A Christian Century magazine survey conducted in 2003 found that Nouwen’s writings were a first choice for Catholic and mainline Protestant clergy. Nouwen is promoted by Christian leaders as diverse as Robert Schuller and Rick Warren (who highly recommends Nouwen’s contemplative book In the Name of Jesus).

Nouwen’s biographer said that he “had a homosexual orientation” (Michael Ford, Wounded Prophet, 1999).

Nouwen did not instruct his readers that one must be born again through repentance and personal faith in Jesus Christ in order to commune with God. The book With Open Hands, for example, instructs readers to open themselves up to God and surrender to the flow of life, believing that God loves them unconditionally and is leading them. This is blind faith. Nouwen wrote:

“When we pray, we are standing with our hands open to the world. We know that God will become known to us in the nature around us, in people we meet, and in situations we run into. We trust that the world holds God’s secret within and we expect that secret to be shown to us” (With Open Hands, 2006, p. 47).

January 7, 2009 (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

The following is excerpted from our new book CONTEMPLATIVE MYSTICISM: A POWERFUL ECUMENICAL BOND. Contemplative mysticism, which originated with Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox monasticism, is permeating every branch of Christianity today, including the Southern Baptist Convention. In this book we document the fact that Catholic mysticism leads inevitably to a broadminded ecumenical philosophy and to the adoption of heresies. For many, this path has led to interfaith dialogue, Buddhism, Hinduism, universalism, pantheism, panentheism, even goddess theology. One chapter is dedicated to exposing the heresies of Richard Foster: “Evangelicalism’s Mystical Sparkplug.” We describe the major contemplative practices, such as centering prayer, visualizing prayer, Jesus Prayer, Lectio Divina, and the Labyrinth. We look at the history of Roman Catholic Monasticism, beginning with the Desert Fathers and the Church Fathers, and document the heresies associated with it, such as its sacramental gospel, rejection of the Bible as sole authority, veneration of Mary, purgatory, celibacy, asceticism, allegorical interpretation of Scripture, and moral corruption. We examine the errors of contemplative mysticism, such as downplaying the centrality of the Bible, ignoring the fact that multitudes of professing Christians are not born again, exchanging the God of the Bible for a blind idol, ignoring the Bible’s warnings against associating with heresy and paganism, and downplaying the danger of spiritual delusion. In the Biographical Catalog of Contemplative Mystics we look at the lives and beliefs of 60 of the major figures in the contemplative movement, including Benedict of Nursia, Bernard of Clairvaux, Brother Lawrence, Catherine of Genoa, Catherine of Siena, Dominic, Meister Eckhart, Francis of Assisi, Madame Guyon, Hildegard of Bingen, Ignatius of Loyola, John of the Cross, Julian of Norwich, Thomas Keating, Thomas a Kempis, Brennan Manning, Thomas Merton, Henri Nouwen, Basil Pennington, John Michael Talbot, Teresa of Avila, Teresa of Lisieux, and Dallas Willard. The book contains an extensive index. 482 pages, $19.95

This book can be ordered online, by phone, or by e-mail with a credit card, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org, www.wayoflife.org
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Another example of how the Roman Catholic Church is spreading her tent to encompass pagan religions in these last days is the life of Benedictine monk ALAN RICHARD “BEDE” GRIFFITHS (1906-93), who called himself Swami Dayananda (bliss of compassion).

CONTEMPLATIVE PRACTICES ARE A BRIDGE TO PAGANISM

August 26, 2008 (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

The following is derived from our new book Contemplative Mysticism: A Powerful Ecumenical Bond. This is available from Way of Life Literature. If it is not yet available through the online catalog, it can be ordered by phone or e-mail with a credit card.
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The Catholic contemplative practices (e.g., centering prayer, lectio divina, the Jesus prayer, Breath prayer, visualization prayer) that are flooding into evangelicalism are an interfaith bridge to eastern religions.

Many are openly promoting the integration of pagan practices such as Zen Buddhism and Hindu yoga.

In the book Spiritual Friend (which is highly recommended by the “evangelical” Richard Foster), Tilden Edwards says:

“This mystical stream is THE WESTERN BRIDGE TO FAR EASTERN SPIRITUALITY” (Spiritual Friend, 1980, pp. 18, 19).

Since Eastern “spirituality” is idol worship and the worship of self and thus is communion with devils, what Edwards is unwittingly saying is that contemplative practices are a bridge to demonic realms.

The Roman Catholic contemplative gurus that the evangelicals are following have, in recent decades, developed intimate relationships with pagan mystics.

Jesuit priest Thomas Clarke admits that the Catholic contemplative movement has “BEEN INFLUENCED BY ZEN BUDDHISM, TRANSCENDENTAL MEDITATION, OR OTHER CURRENTS OF EASTERN SPIRITUALITY” (Finding Grace at the Center, pp. 79, 80).

Consider just a few of the many examples we could give.

THOMAS MERTON, the most influential Roman Catholic contemplative of this generation, was “a strong builder of bridges between East and West” (Twentieth-Century Mystics, p. 39). The Yoga Journal makes the following observation:

“Merton had encountered Zen Buddhism, Sufism, Taoism and Vedanta many years prior to his Asian journey. MERTON WAS ABLE TO UNCOVER THE STREAM WHERE THE WISDOM OF EAST AND WEST MERGE AND FLOW TOGETHER, BEYOND DOGMA, IN THE DEPTHS OF INNER EXPERIENCE. ... Merton embraced the spiritual philosophies of the East and integrated this wisdom into (his) own life through direct practice” (Yoga Journal, Jan.-Feb. 1999, quoted from Lighthouse Trails web site).

Merton was a student of Zen master Daisetsu Suzuki and Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh. In fact, he claimed to be both a Buddhist and a Christian. The titles of his books include Zen and the Birds of the Appetite and Mystics and the Zen Masters. He said: “I see no contradiction between Buddhism and Christianity. The future of Zen is in the West. I intend to become as good a Buddhist as I can” (David Steindl-Rast, “Recollection of Thomas Merton’s Last Days in the West,” Monastic Studies, 7:10, 1969, http://www.gratefulness.org/readings/dsr_merton_recol2.htm).

Merton defined mysticism as an experience with wisdom and God beyond words. In a speech to monks of eastern religions in Calcutta in October 1968 he said: “... the deepest level of communication is not communication, but communion. IT IS WORDLESS. IT IS BEYOND WORDS, AND IT IS BEYOND SPEECH, and it is BEYOND CONCEPT” (The Asian Journal of Thomas Merton, 1975 edition, p. 308).

In 1969 Merton took the trip of his dreams, to visit India, Ceylon, Singapore, and Thailand, to experience the places where his beloved eastern religions were born. He said he was “going home.”

In Sri Lanka he visited a Buddhist shrine by the ocean. Approaching the Buddha idols barefoot he was struck with the “great smiles,” their countenance signifying that they were “questioning nothing, knowing everything, rejecting nothing, the peace ... that has seen through every question without trying to discredit anyone or anything--without refutation--without establishing some other argument” (The Asian Journal, p. 233).

This alleged wisdom is a complete denial of the Bible, which teaches us that there is truth and there is error, light and darkness, God and Satan, and they are not one. The apostle John said, “And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness” (1 John 5:19). True wisdom lies in testing all things by God’s infallible Revelation and rejecting that which is false. Proverbs says, “The simple believeth every word: but the prudent man looketh well to his going” (Prov. 14:15).

Merton described his visit to the Buddhas as an experience of great illumination, a vision of “inner clearness.” He said, “I don’t know when in my life I have ever had such a sense of beauty and spiritual validity running together in one aesthetic illumination” (The Asian Journal, p. 235). Actually it was a demonic delusion.

Six days later Merton was electrocuted in a cottage in Bangkok by a faulty fan switch. He was fifty-four years old.

Merton has many disciples in the Roman Catholic Church, including David Steindle-Rast, William Johnston, Henri Nouwen, Philip St. Romain, William Shannon, and James Finley.

Benedictine monk JOHN MAIN, who is a pioneer in the field of contemplative spirituality, studied under a Hindu guru. Main combined Catholic contemplative practices with yoga and in 1975 began founding meditation groups in Catholic monasteries on this principle. These spread outside of the Catholic Church and grew into an ecumenical network called the World Community for Christian Meditation (WCCM). He taught the following method:

“Sit still and upright, close your eyes and repeat your prayer-phrase (mantra). Recite your prayer-phrase and gently listen to it as you say it. DO NOT THINK ABOUT ANYTHING. As thoughts come, simply keep returning to your prayer-phrase. In this way, one places everything aside: INSTEAD OF TALKING TO GOD, ONE IS JUST BEING WITH GOD, allowing God’s presence to fill his heart, thus transforming his inner being” (The Teaching of Dom John Main: How to Meditate, Meditation Group of Saint Patrick’s Basilica, Ottawa, Canada).

THOMAS KEATING is heavily involved in interfaith dialogue and promotes the use of contemplative practices as a tool for creating interfaith unity. He says, “It is important for us to appreciate the values that are present in the genuine teachings of the great religions of the world” (Finding Grace at the Center, 2002, p. 76).

Keating is past president of the Monastic Interreligious Dialogue (MID), which is sponsored by the Benedictine and Cistercian monasteries of North America. Founded in 1977, it is “committed to fostering interreligious and intermonastic dialogue AT THE LEVEL OF SPIRITUAL PRACTICE AND EXPERIENCE.” This means that they are using contemplative practices and yoga as the glue for interfaith unity to help create world peace. MID works in association with the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. Consider one of the objectives of the MID:

“The methods of concentration used in other religious traditions can be useful for removing obstacles to a deep contact with God. THEY CAN GIVE A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE ONENESS OF CHRIST AS EXPRESSED IN THE VARIOUS TRADITIONS and CONTRIBUTE TO THE FORMATION OF A NEW WORLD RELIGIOUS CULTURE. They can also be helpful in the development of certain potencies in the individual, for THERE ARE SOME ZEN-HINDU-SUFI-ETC. DIMENSIONS IN EACH HEART” (Mary L. O’Hara, “Report on Monastic Meeting at Petersham,” MID Bulletin 1, October 1977).

Keating and Richard Foster are involved in the Living Spiritual Teachers Project, a group that associates together Zen Buddhist monks and nuns, universalists, occultists, and New Agers. Members include the Dalai Lama, who claims to be the reincarnation of an advanced spiritual person; Marianne Williamson, promoter of the occultic A Course in Miracles; Marcus Borg, who believes that Jesus was not virgin born and did not rise from the grave; Catholic nun Joan Chittister, who says we must become “in tune with the cosmic voice of God”; Andrew Harvey, who says that men need to “claim their divine humanity”; Matthew Fox, who believes there are many paths to God; Alan Jones, who calls the doctrine of the cross a vile doctrine; and Desmond Tutu, who says “because everybody is a God-carrier, all are brothers and sisters.”

M. BASIL PENNINGTON, a Roman Catholic Trappist monk and co-author of the influential contemplative book Finding Grace at the Center, calls Hindu swamis “our wise friends from the East” and says, “Many Christians who take their prayer life seriously have been greatly helped by Yoga, Zen, TM, and similar practices...” (25th anniversary edition, p. 23).

In his foreword to THOMAS RYAN’S book Disciplines for Christian Living, Henri Nouwen says: “[T]he author shows A WONDERFUL OPENNESS TO THE GIFTS OF BUDDHISM, HINDUISM, AND MOSLEM RELIGION. He discovers their great wisdom for the spiritual life of the Christian and does not hesitate to bring that wisdom home.”

ANTHONY DE MELLO readily admitted to borrowing from Buddhist Zen masters and Hindu gurus. He even taught that God is everything: “Think of the air as of an immense ocean that surrounds you ... an ocean heavily colored with God’s presence and God’s bring. ... While you draw the air into your lungs you are drawing God in” (Sadhana: A Way to God, p. 36).

De Mello suggested chanting the Hindu word “om” (p. 49) and even instructed his students to communicate with inanimate objects:

“Choose some object that you use frequently: a pen, a cup ... Now gently place the object in front of you or on your lap and speak to it. Begin by asking it questions about itself, its life, its origins, its future. And listen while it unfolds to you the secret of its being and of its destiny. Listen while it explains to you what existence means to it. Your object has some hidden wisdom to reveal to you about yourself. Ask for this and listen to what it has to say. There is something that you can give this object. What is it? What does it want from you?” (p. 55).

Paulist priest THOMAS RYAN took a sabbatical in India in 1991 and was initiated in yoga and Buddhist meditation. Today he is a certified teacher of Kripalu yoga. In his book Prayer of Heart and Body: Meditation and Yoga as Christian Spiritual Practice (1995) and his DVD Yoga Prayer (2004) he combines Catholic contemplative practices with Hindu yoga.

All of these are influential voices in the contemplative movement, and those who dabble in the movement will eventually associate with them and with others like them. This the Bible forbids in the strongest terms.

“Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).

SOME OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CONTEMPLATIVE PRIESTS HAVE PURSUED THEIR INTERFAITH VENTURE SO FAR THAT THEY HAVE BECOME HINDU AND ZEN BUDDHIST MONKS. FOLLOWING ARE A FEW EXAMPLES:

JULES MONCHANIN and HENRI LE SAUX, Benedictine priests, founded a Hindu-Christian ashram in India called Shantivanam (Forest of Peace). They took the names of Hindu holy men, with le Saux calling himself Swami Abhishiktananda (bliss of the anointed one). He stayed in Hindu ashrams and learned from Hindu gurus, going barefoot, wearing an orange robe, and practicing vegetarianism. In 1968 le Saux became a hermit in the Himalayas, living there until his death in 1973.

The Shantivanam Ashram was subsequently led by ALAN GRIFFITHS (1906-93). He called himself Swami Dayananda (bliss of compassion). Through his books and lecture tours Griffiths had a large influence in promoting the interfaith philosophy in Roman Catholic monasteries in America, England, Australia, and Germany. He eventually came to believe in the reality of goddess worship.

WAYNE TEASDALE (1945-2004) was a Roman Catholic lay monk whose writings are influential in the contemplative movement. As a student in a Catholic college in Massachusetts, he began visiting St. Joseph’s Abbey near Spencer and came under the direction of Thomas Keating. This led him into an intimate association with pagan religions and the adoption of Hinduism. Teasdale visited Shantivanam Ashram and lived in a nearby Hindu ashram for two years, following in Bede Griffiths’ footsteps. In 1989 he became a “Christian” sanyassa or a Hindu monk. Teasdale was deeply involved in interfaith activities, believing that what the religions hold in common can be the basis for creating a new world, which he called the “Interspiritual Age” -- a “global culture based on common spiritual values.” He believed that mystics of all religions are in touch with the same God. He helped found the Interspiritual Dialogue in Action (ISDnA), one of the many New Age organizations affiliated with the United Nations. (Its NGO sponsor is the National Service Conference of the American Ethical Union.) It is committed “to actively serve in the evolution of human consciousness and global transformation.”

WILLIGIS JAGER, a well-known German Benedictine priest who has published contemplative books in German and English, spent six years studying Zen Buddhism under Yamada Koun Roshi. (Roshi is the title of a Zen master.) In 1981 he was authorized as a Zen teacher and took the name Ko-un Roshi. He moved back to Germany and began teaching Zen at the Munsterschwarzach Abbey, drawing as many as 150 people a day.

In February 2002 he was ordered by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (currently Pope Benedict XVI) to cease all public activities. He was “faulted for playing down the Christian concept of God as a person and for stressing mystical experience above doctrinal truths” (“Two More Scholars Censured by Rome,” National Catholic Reporter, March 1, 2002).

Thus, Ratzinger tried to stem the tide of eastern mysticism that is flooding into the Catholic monastic communities, but he was extremely inconsistent and ultimately ineffectual.

Jager kept quiet for a little while, but soon he was speaking and writing again. In 2003 Liguori Press published Search for the Meaning of Life: Essays and Reflections on the Mystical Experience, and in 2006 Liguori published Mysticism for Modern Times: Conversations with Willigis Jager

Jager denies the creation and fall of man as taught in the Bible. He denies the unique divinity of Christ, as well as His substitutionary atonement and bodily resurrection. He believes that the universe is evolving and that evolving universe is God. He believes that man has reached a major milestone in evolution, that he is entering an era in which his consciousness will be transformed. Jager believes in the divinity of man, that what Christ is every man can become. He believes that all religions point to the same God and promotes interfaith dialogue as the key to unifying mankind.

Jager learned these heretical pagan doctrines from his close association with Zen Buddhism and his mindless mysticism. He says that the aim of Christian prayer is transcendental contemplation in which the practitioner enters a deeper level of consciousness. This requires emptying the mind, which is achieved by focusing on the breathing and repeating a mantra. This “quiets the rational mind,” “empties the mind,” and “frustrates our ordinary discursive thinking” (James Conner, “Contemplative Retreat for Monastics,” Monastic Interreligious Dialogue Bulletin, Oct. 1985).

This is the same practice that is taught in the 14th century Catholic writing The Cloud of Unknowing, which is very influential in modern contemplative circles.

Jager says that as the rational thinking is emptied and transformed, one “seems to lose orientation” and must “go on in blind faith and trust.” He says that there is “nothing to do but surrender” to “THIS PURE BLACKNESS” where “NO IMAGE OR THOUGHT OF GOD REMAINS.”

This is idolatry. To reject the Revelation God has given of Himself and to attempt to find Him beyond this Revelation through blind mysticism is to trade the true and living God for an idol.

THERE IS ALSO AN INTIMATE AND GROWING RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE CATHOLIC CONTEMPLATIVE MOVEMENT AND THE NEW AGE.

The aforementioned Thomas Keating is past president of the Temple of Understanding, a New Age organization founded in 1960 by Juliet Hollister. The mission of this organization is to “create a more just and peaceful world.” The tools for reaching this objective include interfaith education, dialogue, and experiential knowledge (mystical practices).

Shambhala Publications, a publisher that specializes in Occultic, Jungian, New Age, Buddhist, and Hindu writings, also publishes the writings of Catholic mystics, including The Wisdom of the Desert by Thomas Merton, The Writings of Hildegard of Bingen, and The Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence.

Sue Monk Kidd, who believes in the divinity of mankind and considers herself a goddess, was asked to write recommendations to two Catholic contemplative books. She wrote the foreword to the 2006 edition of Henri Nouwen’s With Open Hands and the introduction to the 2007 edition of Thomas Merton’s New Seeds of Contemplation.

New Ager Caroline Myss (pronounced mace) has written a book based on Teresa of Avila’s visions. It is entitled Entering the Castle: Finding the Inner Path to God and Your Soul’s Purpose. Myss says, “For me, the spirit is the vessel of divinity” (“Caroline Myss’ Journey,” Conscious Choice, September 2003).

On April 15, 2008, emerging church leaders Rob Bell and Doug Pagitt joined the Dalai Lama for the New Age Seeds of Compassion InterSpiritual Event in Seattle. It brought together Episcopalians, Roman Catholics, Buddhists, Sikhs, Muslims, and others. The event featured a dialogue on “the themes common to all spiritual traditions.” The Dalai Lama said, “I think everyone, ultimately, deep inside [has] some kind of goodness” (“Emergent Church Leaders’ InterSpirituality,” Christian Post, April 17, 2008).

In his book Velvet Jesus, Bell gives a glowing recommendation of the New Age philosopher Ken Wilber. Bell recommends that his readers sit at Wilber’s feet for three months!

“For a mind-blowing introduction to emergence theory and divine creativity, set aside three months and read Ken Wilber’s A Brief History of Everything” (Velvet Elvis, p. 192).

The aforementioned Catholic contemplative monk Wayne Teasdale conducted a Mystic Heart seminar series with Wilber. In the first seminar in this series Teasdale said, “You are God; I am God; they are God; it is God” (“The Mystic Heart: The Supreme Identity,” http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7652038071112490301&q=ken+Wilber).

Roger Oakland remarks:

“Ken Wilber was raised in a conservative Christian church, but at some point he left that faith and is now a major proponent of Buddhist mysticism. His book that Bell recommends, A Brief History of Everything, is published by Shambhala Publications, named after the term, which in Buddhism means the mystical abode of spirit beings. ... Wilber is perhaps best known for what he calls integral theory. On his website, he has a chart called the Integral Life Practice Matrix, which lists several activities one can practice ‘to authentically exercise all aspects or dimensions of your own being-in-the-world’ Here are a few of these spiritual activities that Wilber promotes: yoga, Zen, centering prayer, kabbalah (Jewish mysticism), TM, tantra (Hindu-based sexuality), and kundalini yoga. ... A Brief History of Everything discusses these practices (in a favorable light) as well. For Rob Bell to say that Wilber’s book is ‘mind-blowing’ and readers should spend three months in it leaves no room for doubt regarding Rob Bell’s spiritual sympathies. What is alarming is that so many Christian venues, such as Christian junior high and high schools, are using Velvet Elvis and the Noomas” (Faith Undone, p. 110).

In Up from Eden: A Transpersonal View of Human Evolution (1981, 2004), Ken Wilber calls the Garden of Eden a fable” and the biblical view of history “amusing” (pp. xix, 3). He describes his “perennial philosophy” as follows:

“... it is true that there is some sort of Infinite, some type of Absolute Godhead, but it cannot properly be conceived as a colossal Being, a great Daddy, or a big Creator set apart from its creations, from things and events and human beings themselves. Rather, it is best conceived (metaphorically) as the ground or suchness or condition of all things and events. It is not a Big Thing set apart from finite things, but rather the reality or suchness or ground of all things. ... the perennial philosophy declares that the absolute is One, Whole, and Undivided” (p. 6).

Wilber says that this perennial philosophy “forms the esoteric core of Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Sufism, AND CHRISTIAN MYSTICISM” (p. 5).

Thus, this New Ager recognizes that Roman Catholic mysticism, which spawned the contemplative movement within Protestantism, has the same esoteric core faith as pagan idolatry!
___________________

This article is derived from our new book Contemplative Mysticism: A Powerful Ecumenical Bond. This is available from Way of Life Literature. If it is not yet available through the online catalog, it can be ordered by phone or e-mail with a credit card.

[Distributed by Way of Life Literature's Fundamental Baptist Information Service, an e-mail listing for Fundamental Baptists and other fundamentalist, Bible-believing Christians. OUR GOAL IN THIS PARTICULAR ASPECT OF OUR MINISTRY IS NOT DEVOTIONAL BUT IS TO PROVIDE INFORMATION TO ASSIST PREACHERS IN THE PROTECTION OF THE CHURCHES IN THIS APOSTATE HOUR. This material is sent only to those who personally subscribe to the list. If somehow you have subscribed unintentionally, following are the instructions for removal. The Fundamental Baptist Information Service mailing list is automated. To SUBSCRIBE or to UNSUBSCRIBE or to CHANGE ADDRESSES or to RE-SUBSCRIBE UNDER A NEW ADDRESS, go to http://www.wayoflife.org/fbis/subscribe.html. If you have any trouble with this, please let us know. And please be patient with us. We do not ignore any unsubscribe request, but we cannot always get to your request immediately as each person involved with maintaining the Way of Life web site does this only on a very part time basis and is busy with many other major activities, such as pastoring and missionary work. We take up a quarterly offering to fund this ministry, and those who use the materials are expected to participate (Galatians 6:6) if they can. Some of the articles are from O Timothy magazine, which is in its 25th year of publication. Way of Life publishes many helpful books. The catalog is located at the web site: http://wayoflife.org/catalog/catalog.htm Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061. 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org. We do not solicit funds from those who do not agree with our preaching and who are not helped by these publications, but from those who are. OFFERINGS can be made at http://www.wayoflife.org/fbns/offering.html. PAYPAL offerings can be made to https://www.paypal.com/xclick/business=dcloud%40wayoflife.org]

BETH MOORE ON THE CONTEMPLATIVE BANDWAGON

August 14, 2008 (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

Beth Moore, a Southern Baptist who is influential with a broad spectrum of evangelical women, is also on the contemplative bandwagon. She joined Richard Foster, Dallas Willard, and other contemplatives on the Be Still DVD, which was published in April 2008 by Fox Home Entertainment. Shortly after it was released she issued a retraction of sorts, but she soon retracted her retraction. In a statement published on May 26, 2008, Moore’s Living Proof Ministries said: “We believe that once you view the Be Still video you will agree that there is no problem with its expression of Truth” (http://www.lighthousetrailsresearch.com/bethmoorestatement.htm).

To the contrary, the very fact that it features Richard Foster and Dallas Willard are serious problems!

Lighthouse Trails issued the following discerning warning:

“In the DVD, there are countless enticements, references and comments that clearly show its affinity with contemplative spirituality. For instance, Richard Foster says that anyone can practice contemplative prayer and become a ‘portable sanctuary’ for God. This panentheistic view of God is very typical for contemplatives. ... The underlying theme of the Be Still DVD is that we cannot truly know God or be intimate with Him without contemplative prayer and the state of silence that it produces. While the DVD is vague and lacking in actual instruction on word or phrase repetition (which lies at the heart of contemplative prayer), it is really quite misleading. What they don’t tell you in the DVD is that this state of stillness or silence is, for the most part, achieved through some method such as mantra-like meditation. THE PURPOSE OF THE DVD, IN ESSENCE, IS NOT TO INSTRUCT YOU IN CONTEMPLATIVE PRAYER BUT RATHER TO MAKE YOU AND YOUR FAMILY HUNGRY FOR IT. The DVD even promises that practicing the silence will heal your family problems. ... THIS PROJECT IS AN INFOMERCIAL FOR CONTEMPLATIVE PRACTICE, and because of the huge advertising campaign that Fox Home Entertainment has launched, contemplative prayer could be potentially introduced into millions of homes around the world.

“[On the DVD Moore says], ‘... if we are not still before Him [God], we will never truly know to the depths of the marrow of our bones that He is God. There’s got to be a stillness.’ ... [But is] it not true that as believers we come to Him by grace, boldly to His throne, and we call Him our friend? No stillness, no mantra, no breath prayer, no rituals. Our personal relationship with Him is based on His faithfulness and His love and His offer that we have access to Him through the blood of Jesus Christ, and not on the basis of entering an altered state of consciousness or state of bliss or ecstasy as some call it” (“Beth Moore Gives Thumbs Up to Be Still DVD,” http://www.lighthousetrailsresearch.com/bethmoorethumbsup.htm).

In her book When Godly People Do Ungodly Things (2002), Moore recommends contemplative Roman Catholics Brother Lawrence and Brennan Manning.

Of Manning she says that his contribution to our generation “may be a gift without parallel” (p. 72) and calls Ragamuffin Gospel “one of the most remarkable books” (p. 290). She does not warn her readers that Manning never gives a clear testimony of salvation or a clear gospel in his writings, that he attends Mass regularly, that he believes it is wrong for churches to require that homosexuals repent before they can be members, that he promotes the use of mantras to create a thoughtless state of silent meditation, that he spent six months in isolation in a cave and spends eight days each year in silent retreat under the direction of a Dominican nun, that he promotes the dangerous practice of visualization, that he quotes very approvingly from New Agers such as Beatrice Bruteau (who says, “We have realized ourselves as the Self that says only I AM ... unlimited, absolute I AM”) and Matthew Fox (who says all religions lead to the same God), and that he believes in universal salvation, that everyone including Hitler will go to heaven. (For documentation see “A Biographical Catalog of Contemplative Mystics” in our new book Contemplative Mysticism: A Powerful Ecumenical Glue.)

If Moore truly wants to disassociate herself from the contemplative movement, that would be a simple matter. Let her issue a statement renouncing Richard Foster and Brennan Manning and their Roman Catholic contemplative friends and unscriptural practices. But don’t hold your breath, dear readers!

In disobedience to 1 Timothy 2:12, Moore teaches a co-ed Sunday School class at First Baptist Church in Houston, Texas. The Scripture says, “But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.” According to this verse, women in the churches are forbidden to do two things. They are forbidden to teach men and they are forbidden to usurp authority over men.

Moore’s meetings are attended by people from “every denomination,” because she “doesn’t get caught up in divisive doctrinal issues” and “steers clear of topics that could widen existing rifts between different streams in the body of Christ” (Charisma magazine, June 2003). This is the popular but unscriptural “positive-only” ecumenical philosophy that is so helpful to the furthering of end time apostasy.

Romans 16:17 and Jude 3 are commandments that are commonly ignored by popular ecumenical speakers, but they will not be ignored at the judgment seat of Christ.

“Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them” (Rom. 16:17).

“Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints” (Jude 3).

[Distributed by Way of Life Literature's Fundamental Baptist Information Service, an e-mail listing for Fundamental Baptists and other fundamentalist, Bible-believing Christians. OUR GOAL IN THIS PARTICULAR ASPECT OF OUR MINISTRY IS NOT DEVOTIONAL BUT IS TO PROVIDE INFORMATION TO ASSIST PREACHERS IN THE PROTECTION OF THE CHURCHES IN THIS APOSTATE HOUR. This material is sent only to those who personally subscribe to the list. If somehow you have subscribed unintentionally, following are the instructions for removal. The Fundamental Baptist Information Service mailing list is automated. To SUBSCRIBE or to UNSUBSCRIBE or to CHANGE ADDRESSES or to RE-SUBSCRIBE UNDER A NEW ADDRESS, go to http://www.wayoflife.org/fbis/subscribe.html. If you have any trouble with this, please let us know. And please be patient with us. We do not ignore any unsubscribe request, but we cannot always get to your request immediately as each person involved with maintaining the Way of Life web site does this only on a very part time basis and is busy with many other major activities, such as pastoring and missionary work. We take up a quarterly offering to fund this ministry, and those who use the materials are expected to participate (Galatians 6:6) if they can. Some of the articles are from O Timothy magazine, which is in its 25th year of publication. Way of Life publishes many helpful books. The catalog is located at the web site: http://wayoflife.org/catalog/catalog.htm Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061. 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org. We do not solicit funds from those who do not agree with our preaching and who are not helped by these publications, but from those who are. OFFERINGS can be made at http://www.wayoflife.org/fbns/offering.html. PAYPAL offerings can be made to https://www.paypal.com/xclick/business=dcloud%40wayoflife.org]

FROM FUNDAMENTALISM TO ECUMENISM: A WARNING ABOUT THE EMERGING CHURCH FROM THE LIFE OF ROBERT WEBBER

July 2, 2008 (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

The following is from the new book we are finishing up entitled What about the Emerging Church?
____________________

Robert Webber (1933-2007) was a professor at Wheaton College for about 30 years and taught at Northern Seminary in Chicago the last seven years of his life.

He is one of the fathers of the contemplative movement and a very influential voice in the emerging church. In his book Common Roots (1978) he argued that the early church era of A.D. 100-500 has “insights which evangelicals need to recover.” Those “insights” include monastic “contemplative spirituality.”

Webber continued this line of thinking in Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail: Why Evangelicals Are Attracted to the Liturgical Church (1985), Ancient-Future Faith: Rethinking Evangelicalism for a Postmodern World (1999), Younger Evangelicals: Facing the Challenges of the New World (2002), and The Divine Embrace: Recovering the Passionate Spiritual Life (2006).

Webber promoted a very broad ecumenism:

“Paradigm thinking sets us free to affirm the whole church in all its previous manifestations. ...This search for a common heritage allows for the emergence of a new understanding of unity and diversity. ... So while we are all Christians, some of us are Roman Catholic Christians, Eastern Orthodox Christians, Reformation Christians, twentieth-century Christians, or some other form of modern or postmodern Christians” (Ancient-Future Faith, pp. 16, 17).

“A goal for evangelicals in the postmodern world is to accept diversity as a historical reality, but to seek unity in the midst of it. This perspective will allow us to see Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant churches as various forms of the one true church...” (Ancient-Future Faith, p. 85).

“We evangelicals need to turn our backs on the old separatist model” (Ancient-Future Faith, p. 86).

“Today evangelicals and Catholics are enjoying spiritual camaraderie that was nonexistent a few years ago. ... Evangelicals in a postmodern world will increasingly feel at home with Catholics, Orthodox, and other Protestant bodies...” (Ancient-Future Faith, p. 87).

“... evangelicals need to go beyond talk about the unity of the church to experience it through an attitude of acceptance of the whole church and an entrance into dialogue with the Orthodox, Catholic, and other Protestant bodies” (Ancient-Future Faith, p. 89).

Before he died Webber organized “A Call to an Ancient Evangelical Future,” an effort to challenge evangelicals “to strengthen their witness through a recovery of the faith articulated by the consensus of the ancient Church and its guardians in the traditions of EASTERN ORTHODOXY, ROMAN CATHOLICISM, the Protestant Reformation and the Evangelical awakenings.”

To arrive at this radical ecumenical position, Webber traveled far from his roots. In the books Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail and The Divine Embrace he described the move away from a strict biblicist position.

Webber grew up in a fundamental Baptist home. His father, who was born in 1900, was involved in the fundamentalist-modernist controversy and was a separatist. He left the liberal American Baptist Convention and joined the Conservative Baptists. Webber’s parents were missionaries in Africa for the first seven years of his life. The family moved back to the States when one of their children became seriously ill and the father pastored the Montgomeryville Baptist Church, located about 25 miles west of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. After high school Webber attended Bob Jones University.

Describing his childhood he says:

“I went to Christian schools and palled around with Christian friends from my youth group. The boundaries of home, church, and school were very tight” (The Divine Embrace, p. 150).

“I was the kid who couldn’t go to the movies, the kid who had to keep Sunday as a holy day (no sports), the kid who had to watch everything I did and said. But I wasn’t just a preacher’s kid. I was also a fundamentalist Baptist. From an early age, it was thoroughly ingrained within me that I was both a fundamentalist and a Baptist. Being Christian wasn’t enough. ... Catholics were pagan. Episcopalianism was a social club. Lutherans had departed from the faith. Presbyterians were formalistic. And Pentecostals were off-center” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 13).

“One central conviction of my parents was that our fundamentalist way was the only faith that stood in continuity with the New Testament. All other viewpoints were distorted at best and some, especially Roman Catholicism, contained no connection with New Testament Christianity whatsoever” (The Divine Embrace, p. 199).

What he was taught about Rome was true. How did he get from there to the point where he considered the Roman Catholic Church a genuine church and the Protestant Reformation “a tragedy”? He describes the steps in his books.

Lack of Clarity about Personal Salvation

One thing that is missing in the biographical account of his youth is a biblical testimony of salvation. Never does he give a biblical, life-changing testimony of being born again and walking with Christ in sweet fellowship through faith in God’s Word. The closest he comes is a description of an event that occurred when he was 13. His father talked to him about the need to be baptized. He did not seek out baptism because he had experienced a born again conversion; rather, his father talked him into it.

“I remember going out on the back porch that night, looking up into the stars, and asking myself whether or not I really believed, whether or not I was willing to take up my cross and follow after Christ. The prospect of my own baptism caused me to choose Christ again in a more intense way, to determine once more to follow him” (pp. 45, 46).

This is a works orientation to salvation. A determination to follow Christ is not the same as acknowledging one’s utter sinfulness and surrendering oneself into His care and trusting Him exclusively as one’s Saviour.

Webber argued that salvation does not have to be a dramatic conversion experience and he admitted that he didn’t have such an experience. He said that repentance “can have a dramatic beginning or can come as a result of a process over time” (The Divine Embrace, p. 149). He saw salvation is a sacramental process that begins at baptism, and this is one reason why he left the Baptist church and joined the Episcopalian and was perfectly comfortable with Roman Catholicism.

Webber described many experiences he had with his students, but he doesn’t give any examples of counseling them about personal salvation. Consider something that happened to him in 1968, during his first year of teaching at Wheaton College. As Webber was giving proofs for the existence of God, a student raised his hand and said that he didn’t believe that God exists and that the proofs didn’t mean anything to him (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 27). When Webber asked the class if anyone else agreed, “several other hands slipped into the air.” What is even more amazing than the fact that several Bible college students were atheists or agnostics was Webber’s response. He asked them what they wanted him to teach and allowed them to guide him in a “search for a more profound and deeper meaning in life” by “tuning into the questions of meaning asked by the artists of our generation.” Pathetically, he even says, “I can’t say we came to adequate conclusions” (p. 28).

What he did not do is question these students’ salvation and try to lead them to Christ, which should have been the very first thing he did.

Once-for-all personal regeneration is absolutely foundational to “experiencing God,” but it is glaring in its absence in Webber’s writings. What we have instead is an emphasis on sacramental terminology.

“... the sacrament ... is a means through which Christ encounters us savingly” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, pp. 50, 51).

“He who saved me at the cross continues to extend his salvation to me through the simple and concrete signs of bread and wine” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 51).

“In the Eucharist I feel both saved again and compelled to live in the Eucharistic way. Both justification and sanctification are communicated to me” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 84).

“Baptism is the spiritual rite of conscious and intentional union with Jesus ... and reception of the Holy Spirit ...” (The Divine Embrace, p. 67).

“When baptism is enacted in faith, the spirit of God performs, ascribes, and accomplishes the very meaning of baptism--a forgiveness of our old identity is made real, and a new identity with Jesus is actualized” (The Divine Embrace, p. 152).

Webber even warns that it is possible to “overstress conversion.” He describes how that in 1983 Jon Braun of the Evangelical Orthodox Church spoke to Webber’s class at Wheaton about his pilgrimage into Orthodoxy.

“He was speaking about his upbringing in a Christian home and the fact that as a young person he had always believed but had had no dramatic experience of salvation. His parents, anxious for him to have a dramatic conversion experience, began to push him toward a decision. ‘This,’ he said soberly, ‘actually pushed me out of the church and made me think for a temporary period of time that I was an unbeliever.’ He then went on to say that placing too much emphasis on a dateable experience of salvation can be dangerous if we do not take into account that many who grow up in Christian homes grow into faith without such an experience” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 76).

Jesus said that salvation is something you are supernaturally born into, not something you grow into. Webber should have encouraged parents who want their children to have a clear new birth experience, but instead he casts aspersion on such a thing and even says that it might be dangerous. To say that “I have always believed” is an unscriptural testimony. You might not know the exact date, but you certainly should know when and where it happened and how that it clearly changed your life (2 Corinthians 5:17). You should be able to testify how that you acknowledged your sin against God and repented of it and put your faith in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is the gospel, and called upon Him for salvation (1 Corinthians 15:1-4; Romans 10:12-13; Acts 20:21). That is the only type of “conversion” that is described in the New Testament.

Webber says that “a dramatic experience of the saving reality of Christ is not to be denied or minimized” (p. 76), but he does deny and minimize it by indicating that there are other ways of salvation such as growing into faith and sacramentalism and by confusing justification with sanctification.

Lack of clarity about personal salvation is a foundational error of the emerging church.

Rejection of Separatism

Webber’s first step to ecumenism was in rejecting the biblical doctrine of separation. He describes how that at Bob Jones University he heard the accusation that “Billy Graham is the greatest tool of the devil in the twentieth century” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 70). They warned that Graham was flirting with modernism and compromising the gospel through cooperative evangelism, which is absolutely true, but Webber rejected that argument in his heart.

He mislabels the call for separation from disobedient compromisers like Graham as “second degree separation.” In fact, it is not second degree but first! The Bible warns God’s people to “mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them” (Romans 16:17). That is exactly what Billy Graham has done throughout his ecumenical career. He has taught a generation of evangelicals to downplay doctrine and to fellowship with heretics, and that is directly contrary to the doctrine that we learned from the apostles. Paul exalted doctrine and taught us to be very strict about it (1 Timothy 1:3) and he condemned heretics in the boldest, plainest manner (e.g., 1 Timothy 1:18-20; 2 Timothy 2:16-18).

Rejection of a Pure Church

Another thing that occurred when Webber was at Bible College was his rejection of the doctrine of a pure church.

“Why, I wondered, were we always so busy defining the perimeters in which truth and a right relationship to God were accurately defined? Was it really possible, I wondered, to have a pure church? The more I thought about this the more I felt that to be truly pure was an impossibility. ... How can anyone except God himself be pure and uncontaminated from false belief, ethical error, and incomplete judgment? For me the so-called concept of the purity of the church was a strait-jacket that made me increasingly uncomfortable” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 71).

His question is answered plainly and simply in Scripture. Paul wrote to the church of Corinth and reproved and corrected them for their sins and errors. He urged them to be pure. He instructed them put the fornicator out of their midst (1 Corinthians 5) and to deal with the false teachers (2 Corinthians 11). Paul said:

“Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us: Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” (1 Corinthians 5:7-8).

It is God’s will that the churches be pure, and even though we don’t live up to this in a perfect manner in this present world, that must always be the goal. We are to continually purge out the old leaven.

The doctrine of a pure church is not a strait-jacket for those who love Christ and want to please Him. Christ addressed seven of the churches in Asia in Revelation 2-3 and He reproved them for their sin and errors and called upon them to repent. He warned that He would reject those that did not repent (Revelation 2:5). This is the standard for the entire church age. It is not the will of Christ that we ever grow complacent about sin and error in the churches.

The doctrine of a pure church is only a strait-jacket to those who want to be careless about doctrine for the sake of pursuing an ecumenical agenda.

Attending the Wrong Schools

Though he was raised in fundamental Baptist doctrine, Webber pursued theological graduate training in non-fundamentalist and non-Baptist schools (Reformed, Lutheran, Episcopal). This is a perfect recipe for going out of the right way. While attending Protestant seminaries he rejected the Baptist faith and became a Protestant. That is not a surprise!

And it was at these seminaries, as we shall see, that Webber was taught about ecumenism and sacramentalism.

It was at these seminaries, too, where he also learned to think and write and speak in a complicated, philosophical manner. He writes far over the head of the ordinary Christian. His books could not help the simple village people in Africa that his parents helped by preaching simple Bible truth. He has complicated the simplicity of the faith (2 Corinthians 11:3). He forgot that God has revealed His truth to babes (Mat. 11:25), that God has chosen to confound the wise of the world through the simple preaching of the cross (1 Corinthians 1:17-29).

Falling in Love with Calvin

First Webber fell in love with John Calvin.

“I was particularly attracted to John Calvin. ... At the Reformed Episcopal Seminary in Philadelphia. I studied under Robert K. Rudolf, a master teacher and a walking encyclopedia of Calvinist theology. By his magnetic personality and his deep devotion to logically consistent truths I was soon drawn into the teaching of John Calvin” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 60).

Calvin came out of Rome, but he clung to many of Rome’s errors, including infant baptism, sacramentalism, the priesthood, church statism, and amillennialism. He did not understand properly the doctrine of salvation or the church or Bible prophecy, among others. Calvin did not have a personal testimony of salvation other than his infant baptism and he was an avowed enemy of Baptists. He imprisoned them and put them to death, burning one of them at the stake. Calvin’s allegorical interpretation of prophecy does away with the imminency of the return of Christ, which is a very important doctrine and has a great impact on Christian living.

To fall in love with Calvin is a definite step away from the simple New Testament Christian faith and church and a definite step toward Rome.

Studying the Church Fathers

Another stepping stone toward ecumenism was the study of the Church Fathers. Many of those who have converted to Rome have testified that the Church Fathers helped them in this venture. In reality, most of the so-called church fathers of the early centuries were tainted with heresies such as sacramentalism, sanctification through ascetism, infant baptism, sacerdotalism (priestcraft), hierarchicalism, inquisitionalism, and Mariolatry. They represent a gradual falling away from the apostolic faith and a preparation for the formation of the Roman Catholic Church. (See the article “Who Are the Church Fathers” at the Way of Life web site.)

Webber said that he stopped looking back on church history in a “judgmental manner” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, pp. 61, 62). That was a great error, because the Bible says we are to “prove all things” (1 Thess. 5:21).

Attending an Ecumenical Prayer Fellowship

Another turning point in Webber’s life occurred in 1965 when he attended an ecumenical prayer community, invited by one of his seminary professors. Benedictine monks formed half of the group. Instead of obeying Romans 16:17 and 1 Corinthians 15:33 and many other Scriptures, Webber agreed to attend. He says, “As time went on my prejudices against the Roman Catholics began to fall by the wayside. I had encountered real people who were deeply committed to Christ and his church” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 64). Dedicated Roman Catholics are obviously real people who are committed to Christ, but what Christ? Rome teaches that the consecrated wafer is Christ. And they are obviously committed to the “church,” but not the church that we see in the Bible.

Over the course of the next two years Webber’s thinking completely changed (The Divine Embrace, pp. 199, 200).

In October 1972, he preached a sermon at Wheaton College entitled “The Tragedy of the Reformation.”

The Mystical Mass

Having become sympathetic to Roman Catholicism, he disobeyed God’s Word to separate from heresy and attended a Catholic Mass where he had a life-changing mystical experience. This occurred at a Catholic retreat center. He said he was “surprised by joy” and “never had an experience like that in my life” and “was surely the richer for it” (Signs and Wonders, 1992, p. 5). At another Mass at St. Michael’s Church in Wheaton, Webber said he experienced “something deeper than anything else I had been through” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 39).

The Mass is at the heart of Rome’s occultic mysticism, and many converts to and sympathizers with Rome have testified that the Mass had a part in breaking down their resistance.

Lou Ann Elwell, counselor of students at Wheaton College, is quoted by Webber as saying, “In the sacrament of the Eucharist I feel close to the Lord, almost like he’s saying, ‘I’m here’” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 43).

David DuPlessis, who was instrumental in breaking down the wall of separation between Pentecostals and Rome, described an experience he had during Mass at the Vatican. He said that his heart broke and he literally wept during the performance of the Mass at a session of the Second Vatican Council. By this mystical experience he was purged entirely from suspicion about Catholic doctrine and thereafter he could readily accept Catholic priests as brothers in Christ without any judgmentalism (A Man Called Mr. Pentecost, pp. 215, 216). It was certainly not the Spirit of Truth that met DuPlessis in the Mass and taught him not to judge doctrine and practice.

Webber developed a craving for sacramentalism. He says: “I felt a need for visible and tangible symbols that I could touch, feel, and experience with my senses. This need is met in the reality of Christ presented to me through the sacraments” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 15).

Instead of being satisfied with faith in God’s Word, Webber wanted signs and symbols. He wanted a physical experience. But the Bible says, “For we walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7). Faith comes by God’s Word (Romans 10:17). It is the “evidence of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1).

Webber joined the Anglican Church, but some of his former students have followed the sacramental path he blazed all the way to Mother Rome.

Contemplative Practices

Another thing that brought Webber into a radical ecumenical philosophy was his involvement with the Catholic contemplative practices, such as centering prayer and the Jesus Prayer. He recommends resting the chin on the chest and gazing at the area of the heart and repeating the Jesus Prayer (“Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner”) “again and again.” He says, “I feel the presence of Christ through this prayer” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 83). Mysticism is an attempt to experience God, and it is never satisfied with a faith walk based on God’s Word. Further, Christ forbade repetitious prayers (Matthew 6:7-8). When we go beyond the Bible and get involved in practices that are forbidden in Scripture, the devil is always ready to meet us in his guise as an angel of light (2 Corinthians 11:14).

Anointing with Oil by a Charismatic Female Preacher

Another turning point for Webber was in 1974 when a charismatic Episcopal deaconess named Leanne Payne anointed him with oil and prayed over him and healed his memories. This occurred when he was deeply troubled over his future church affiliation.

“Starting in my pre-school years through high school, college, and seminary, we prayed through my spiritual journey, asking God for a sense of direction. I began to feel a sense of release from the past. To this day the effects of that prayer are still with me. For the confusion about my spiritual identity was laid to rest, and my feeling of being drawn into the Episcopal church was confirmed. ... For more than an hour Leanne prayed for me as I brought back to mind the wounds I had received by those who attempted to malign my faith pilgrimage and by those who sought to impede my journey into a wider, more inclusive sense of the Christian faith. After prayer, I felt free, even delivered” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, pp. 44, 45, 65).

Observe that he considered himself “wounded” by fundamentalist types who had tried to warn him about the ecumenical, sacramental direction he was going, and this Episcopal deaconess healed him of the “wounds” inflicted by those mean-spirited Biblicists. In fact, it was not wounds that they had given him but treasures. When someone cares enough to reprove us for sin and error, that is a great gift, but he rejected their kindnesses and sought healing from them through an occultic ritual that has no support in Scripture.

There is nothing like the “healing of memories” in the Bible. Christ and the apostles and prophets of the early churches taught nothing about this, and if it were as necessary as its proponents say it is, the Bible would not be silent about it.

Webber describes how that his ecumenical activities broadened his thinking and made him more tolerant and accepting of all the denominations.

Rejecting the Bible as the Sole Authority for Faith and Practice

Eventually Webber came to the place where he was no longer satisfied with the doctrine that the Bible is the sole authority for faith and practice. He was no longer satisfied with a faith walk with Christ based on Scripture. He wanted an experience that went beyond this. He had been led astray through ecumenism and sacramentalism and contemplative spirituality.

The following is a very frightful thing and is a warning for those who are tempted to flirt with ecumenism.

He said that in 1969 he was preparing a sermon for Wheaton College chapel. He decided on a two-part message. The first part would be an evaluation of contemporary culture, and the second would be the biblical answer. In the second part he wanted to answer the question, “What can we tell a world of despairing people?” (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, p. 28). His outline began with the fact that God created the world and that the world, therefore, is meaningful, that God made man in His own image, that man fell away from God, and that Christ came to redeem men from their sins. That is precisely the answer given in the first three chapters of the epistle of Romans, but suddenly Webber became dissatisfied with these foundational Bible truths.

As I continued to redefine the answers, I asked myself, ‘Webber, why don’t these answers do anything for you?’...

The next morning I dragged my tired and weary body, mind, and soul to my office. I sat there at my desk and looked at those yellow, legal-sized pages of notes. ... I said to myself, ‘Webber, you’ve got to be honest about those answers. You can’t preach that with integrity.’

I stretched my arm across the desk, picked up the sermon manuscript and separated the two parts of the sermon. ... Then, in a moment of conviction, I stood to my feet, grabbed the answer part of my sermon in both hands, and vigorously crumpled the papers. Raising my right hand and arm high above my head, I tossed those answers with all my power into the wastebasket. I dropped back into my chair and sobbed for several hours. I had thrown away my answers. I had rid myself of a system in which God was comfortably contained. ... ‘God,’ I cried, ‘where are you? Show yourself to me. Let me know that you are.’ I was met by an awful silence. But it was not an empty silence. It was the silence of mystery--a silence that closed the door on my answers and broke the system in which I had enslaved God. I wept and I wept. ...

The next day I stood before the student body and delivered the first part of my sermon. Then I closed my notebook, looked at them directly, and told them what had happened to me. I told them that the answers don’t work, that what we need is not answers about God, but God himself. And I told them how God was more real to me in his silence than he had been in my textbook answers. My God was no longer the God you could put on the blackboard or the God that was contained in a textbook, but a maverick who breaks the boxes we build for him (Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, pp. 28, 29, 30).

This is one of the saddest, most frightful testimonies I have ever read.

How unwise to say that what we need is not answers about God, but God himself. How can we possibly know God apart from the revelation He has given in Scripture? Anything beyond that is blind mysticism rather than biblical faith. We need sound doctrine based on the Bible, and we need a living walk with God through Christ based on that doctrine. Countless Bible believers have found deep satisfaction and a fruitful spirituality in this. To set the one against the other is heresy.

God has not revealed Himself in silence; He has revealed Himself in the Bible. And the Bible never exhorts us to try to experience God in silence. We are to meditate on His Word day and night (Psalm 1:3). We are to walk in fellowship with Him by praying without ceasing. Christ taught His disciples to pray by saying words, not by sitting in silence. In his epistles Paul described many of his prayers for an example to us, and they were always prayers of words. God is known by His own infallible revelation, and biblical faith is believing that revelation and knowing God through that revelation.

God is not contained in the Bible, but God is revealed in the Bible. God cannot be put on a blackboard, but God’s Word can be written on a blackboard and believed in the heart.

To accept the Bible as the sole authority for faith and practice is not enslavement; it is freedom from deception. It is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.

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