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Outreaches to Cuba Bring Gospel and Aid Relief
Over the past summer, John Crowder brought a small, select crew back to Cuba to equip local believers in the supernatural message of grace - a radical shift for the existing church culture! Passionately worshipping under tarps and exposed to the elements, the church gathered on rooftops in both rain and heat, as the team unpacked the good news in an atmosphere of joy unspeakable. Two months later, when Hurricane Irma devastated the island nation, our hearts jumped at the opportunity to make a difference. With thousands of homes damaged or destroyed, we are currently raising support for another trip to the island to bring tangible assistance to our local friends and believers. To contribute to this mission, please visit www.paypal.me/johncrowder and mention “Cuba” on your donation.
Crowder Books Translated into More Languages
We are excited to announce that the Portuguese translation of Mystical Union (União Mística) is now available on Kindle, iBook and other digital formats. A Spanish, Russian and Nepali version of the book are currently underway, and the French translation can be found at www. publicationsbuissonardent.com Cosmos Reborn is also now available in Russian (as is Lily Crowder’s Grace for the Contemplative Parent); contact Ilmar Meldre for information: ilmarmeldre@gmail.com In addition, a revised German edition of Mystical Union as well as Cosmos Reborn are both in the works for a future release date. Keep an eye on our website for an upcoming section of international language links.
News
Cana New Wine Seminary Kicks off a New Year
Intern in the Danger Zone: Seven Stan Countries
John Crowder rarely hosts internships, but there is currently a window of opportunity to venture into the danger zone with him like never before. John is bringing a few bold interns into the predominantly Muslim nations of Pakistan, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan - the seven “stan” countries. This will be a “mission” oriented internship, but unlike our other mission trips, this one is not open for small children or a larger team. There will be a level of risk involved (in case you are not aware, Afghanistan is currently a war zone). But this is a rare opportunity to rub shoulders, have personal time with John and travel together more than two weeks to seven countries. The trip is in February 2019 - there is more than ample time to plan. But internships fill up quickly as space is limited. Early registration recommended to hold a spot. Visit www.thenewmystics.com/stan
If you have ever considered studying theology, but don’t want to filter through all the lifeless, religious dogma — consider becoming an online student of Cana New Wine Seminary and study at your own pace. It is last call for the Fall 2017 course, which begins Nov. 1. After that, prospective students must wait another year to join. Cana is the world’s first drunken seminary. Our vision is to release the word of grace in an atmosphere of joy unspeakable! Teachers include John & Lily Crowder, Dr. C. Baxter Kruger, Matt Spinks, Francois Du Toit, Dr. Eric Wilding, Rod Williams and more. The full course runs two years. Watch only one session per week for an easy pace. But heavy drinkers can double up and choose to do a double course load - watching two sessions per week, and finish the entire two year course in only one year’s time! Check it out at: www.cana.co
Join us on a Mission to Nepal and Kashmir India If you’ve ever dreamed of visiting either the jungle or the Himalayas and you have a heart for missions, we have just the perfect combo trip where you can join us! John Crowder and Matt Spinks are teaming to reach two nations in just one incredible mission trip in 2018. Come with us as we host an explosive supernatural grace event in the exotic northern Indian region of Kashmir. Then have a day in Kathmandu before we next visit the jungle lowlands of Nepal for a mass miracle evangelism crusade. In our spare time, we plan to include a rhino and elephant safari. There’s a ton packed into this trip, but best of all is the divine atmosphere of Gospel glory! Trip is in March 2018, see full story on page 15. No climbing required. Details at www.thenewmystics.com/trek
Theology and Scotch: Islay Gentlemen’s Retreat
Conversation. Worship. Whiskey … If you are a gentleman who appreciates theology and fine scotch, we are hosting a small, exclusive retreat to the Island of Islay, Scotland in August 2018. John Crowder and Dr. C. Baxter Kruger, together with worship leader Godfrey Birtill will spend three days of personal interaction, theological discussion and worship together, along with tours to the local distilleries of Lagavulin and Laphraoig in the remote home of Scotland’s greatest single malts. Space is extremely limited and thus reflected in the premium registration fee. Cost is £300 and does not including lodging or airfare. This trip is strictly limited to the first 20 registrants.
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News
Your Paradise Getaway: Hawaii Marriage Retreat Miracles in Armenia, Russia, Mongolia, Hungary
Returning from a whirlwind summer mission across the former Soviet Bloc and beyond, John Crowder and a group of interns preached the gospel across the nations of Hungary, Armenia, Mongolia and two locations in Russia taking the Siberian Railroad. There were many notable miracles - in one meeting alone four people had their eyesight miraculously restored, and there were some incredible supernatural weight loss miracles (something we often see in our events) in addition to countless other healings. Moreover, a clear message of the finished work of the cross was articulated in regions desperate to know straight grace! John’s only other internship opportunity is in February 2019 as he travels to the seven “stan” countries of Pakistan, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. For more info, see the news blurb on page 3 or visit www.thenewmystics.com/stan
Team Brings Gospel, Feeds the Poor in India
Since our last issue of The Ecstatic, Sons of Thunder brought a team of 30 to India for a miracle evangelism campaign and feeding outreaches to the poorest of the poor who live in the garbage dumps. We held a pastor’s event aimed at equipping leaders in the gospel of grace and visited our children’s home for orphans in Mumbai. See full photo spread on page 14. If you missed our last India adventure, it is not to late to join our next upcoming trip (our only mission currently open to applicants) as we go to the northern Indian province of Kashmir together with the nation of Nepal - both in one trip in March 2018. See the story on page 15 for details, or visit www.thenewmystics.com/trek to find out more. You can also help us financially with our regular India mission support at: www.paypal.me/johncrowder
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Religion tells us that marriage will be difficult - that it requires lots of work and we should expect the worst. But a Gospel perspective should effortlessly revolutionize our expectancies and supernaturally rekindle a ravenous desire for our spouse. Take time to pull aside and invest in your relationship! If you are looking for a fresh way to prioritize your marriage, then book a babysitter. Pull away from the daily stress of life and career to venture to Maui with John and Lily Crowder. Together with Rick and Melissa Wood, we are hosting a special getaway for couples February 15-17, 2018. Despite what religion tells you, the honeymoon really can last forever. Get a fresh grace perspective! Find all the details at: www.thenewmystics.com/retreat
Philippines Dumps, Crusades & China Outreach
Sons of Thunder is bringing a fully packed team for a mission trip to Hong Kong and Philippines in December. We will be holding meetings in Hong Kong with outreach to the red light districts. Then we make our inaugural visit to our new children’s home for orphans in the Philippines (See story page 13 ). We will visit the poorest of the poor in the garbage dumps and host miracle evangelism outreaches. This team is now full at 30 people, and we cannot take more folks with us. However, it is not too late to join our next upcoming trip that is open to applicants to Kashmir India and Nepal next March 2018. See the story on page 15 for details, or visit www.thenewmystics.com/trek to find out more. Also a big thanks to our partners who help us with our missions! You can still help us financially with our Philippines mission support at: www.paypal.me/johncrowder
From the Publisher ... Here in this current dose of The Ecstatic we plunge into one of our most cherished of topics: divine union. Readers will appreciate the unique ways in which we explore it. I have written an original, extensive article on the subject of pneumatology – the “theology of Holy Spirit.” But it is grounded first and foremost in a union with God that is found in the incarnation. Usually, talk of Holy Spirit baptism or infilling is divorced from Christology, the person of Christ, in whom our humanity is fully and permanently united with deity. In addition, we have also included a rich article from our dear friend Dr. C Baxter Kruger, along this same resounding theme of union. Kruger’s solid approach offers a Trinitarian basis to our oneness with God as established in the oneness of the Triune God. Also in this issue Some big developments are in the works here at Sons of Thunder as construction on our new children’s home for orphans in the Philippines is in full swing. Catch the complete article, as well as our most recent mission trip report from India. Also discover how you can join us to participate in the next mission adventure currently open to applicants as we embark to both Nepal and Kashmir India in March 2018. Next year, I will be in semi-sabbatical mode, taking a lighter travel schedule than usual. So be sure to check out the limited spread of events on our itinerary on page 12, and help spread the word about them. Part of “Sabbath rest” for next year includes two special retreat type events: our marriage getaway for couples in Hawaii, and an exclusive gentlemen’s retreat in Islay Scotland, replete with distillery tours, theology and worship with myself, Baxter Kruger and Godfrey Birtill. For a few brave souls, I am planning an extensive mission internship where we’ll visit the seven “stan” nations: Afghanistan, Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan. Not for the faint of heart! Be sure to also check out our resource materials including books and audio found at www.johncrowder.net Don’t miss the updated, improved model of our Joypod MP3 player which is loaded with every one of my full-length audio teachings from our digital download store found nowhere else online (as well as our two audiobooks: Mystical Union and my latest work, Money. Sex. Beer. God.) Stay Subscribed to The Ecstatic Some select US addresses receive a print copy of the magazine, but we now host a digital version online for readers around the globe. Be sure you visit our homepage at www.TheNewMystics.Com/Ecstatic and enter your email address to join our free newslist – this will ensure you receive each issue to your inbox twice a year, together with our regular free Jesus Trip teaching videos. You can also view the magazine on our free iPhone and Android “New Mystics” apps.
Contents 2 6 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
News: The Latest from Sons of Thunder Spirit on all Flesh Meditations of the Mystics Find the Party: Sons of Thunder Itinerary Philippines Orphanage Construction India Mission Trip Update & Photos Join the Team to Kashmir and Nepal Subjective Experience of Objective Reality A Note on Union with Christ by Dr. Kruger
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We value your support to keep the magazine and ministry running. Your generous contributions make the publication available to all and enable us to spread Good News to the ends of the globe What we’re all about We at Sons of Thunder produce The Ecstatic as a way to bring a cohesive voice to the growing interest in authentic, mystical Christianity – but a mysticism rooted in the grace message of Christ’s cross – not in human attempt at spiritual disciplines or mental ascent. In a practical sense, The Ecstatic serves as an information gateway to the ministry of John & Lily Crowder. But moreover, it is a first fruit in publishing toward bridging several important themes that are converging at the moment: finished work theology, the miraculous, divine satisfaction and daily human existence in the divine life. All of these concepts are intrinsically woven together. A new, reformed Christ-centered mysticism is on the rise. It is bridging many streams. Relevant is its cultural approach. Radical is its charismatic fervor. Reformative is its theology of grace. These are guiding values of this publication and our own lives. It is a theological journal whose frequency is joy unspeakable.
Fully Satisfied … John Crowder Founder, Sons of Thunder Publications the ecstatic is published bi-annually Copyright © 2017 Sons of Thunder Ministries & Publications, All rights reserved. Email: info@thenewmystics.org Phone: 1-877-343-3245 Address: P.O. Box 40, Marylhurst, OR 97036
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Spirit on all Flesh
Who Has the Holy Ghost and Can We Have More?
Understanding Spirit Baptism in View of Incarnation & Divine Union by John Crowder Here is a common question we often receive in reference to the finished work of the cross: is there a “second work” of the baptism of the Spirit? The answer forces the idea that some Christians could have the Spirit while others do not. But for those who are realizing that our union with God is finished thanks to the work of Christ, the question of a secondary baptism or “infilling” of the Spirit is a puzzling one. Furthermore, another question next arises as to whether or not one can get more of Holy Spirit. Does He progressively come in degrees? If you had something to do with obtaining God in the first place, then the impetus would logically be forever upon you to capture more of Him. The idea of whether one can get more of God is prevalent throughout every denomination, whether or not it is explicitly stated in each camp’s doctrine. I will argue that any human attempt to get God is the very definition of religion itself and is the chief enemy of the Gospel (the Gospel is not to be confused with “religion” which is outright divination: religion is any humanistic endeavor to climb toward God – a practice that is invalidated by the Gospel, wherein Christ has stepped down and given us all of Himself). The answer to this question of “do we get more of the Spirit,” I will argue, depends upon the causative force behind the Spirit’s advent (Does He come due to our humanistic efforts, or because of Christ alone?). And finally, undoubtedly the most scandalous question of all (which few dare to ask): is it possible that the Spirit of God really was poured out on all flesh? The concept that all of humanity has been somehow mystically endowed with God’s Spirit is a sharp challenge to the theological grid of most Christians. Many
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will stop reading the article right here. It’s too foreign a concept for them. The majority of Christendom has viewed the Gospel transactionally – whereas one enters the club and “gets God” only upon conversion after saying a magic prayer, drumming up enough faith or collecting enough repentance points to merit a visit from the Paraclete. They have compartmentalized and partitioned God off to the elect. They cling to precious proof texted verses that suggest the Spirit is only for Christians, while ignoring a plethora of other scriptures. I will address all three questions in this article: Does the Spirit come as a second work? Can you get more of the Spirit? How could the Spirit possibly be upon all humanity? But pulling back the lens a bit, it all becomes quite clear and simple when we drop our non-Christocentric understanding of Holy Spirit and turn our eyes back to the person and work of Jesus (to whom Holy Spirit is constantly pointing you). All men were vicariously included in the humanity of the Last Adam. In His incarnation, the human race was fully plunged into the divine. Christ did not merely die as a man, but as humanity. Because of your mystical union with Christ, God in all His completeness has made full residency in you. Whether you know it or not. Whether you feel it or not. Whether you even believe it or not. Belief is not the magic formula that makes it happen. The facts are the facts, whether you believe them or not. But an inclusive statement like that radically challenges our notions of “who” is actually united to Christ and therefore the recipients of His Spirit.
A Second or Third Work? Let’s slow this back down to our first question: does Holy Spirit come as a “second work” after conversion (and of course, by this reasoning, coming only upon certain Christians)? This is an important topic, because many people feel insecure, condemned or lacking as if they do not have the Spirit or do not have “enough” of the Spirit. Indeed, many feel like second class Christians. Of course, their feelings do not dictate the facts. But a lot of needless confusion in this arena has led believers to feel incomplete and unaware of the vast treasures deposited within them. Wesleyan and early Pentecostals broke the Godhead into different parts that came at different times (the second blessing, etc.), but the church never did that historically. Today, the common idea of baptism of the Spirit is where the Holy Spirit comes to live in us. But rest assured the Trinity travels in a pack. It is ridiculous to think you get Jesus one day, then if you grunt enough you can get Holy Spirit … and if you’re a really good boy, you might eventually get a visit from your Father as well. Maybe you felt condemned by some Pentecostal preacher who told you that unless you babble in tongues, the Spirit of God doesn’t dwell within you. There is an unfortunate lack of pneumatology in the church (a theology of Holy Spirit). So allow me to give you a quick history lesson. Wesleyans (early Methodists) during the holiness movement suggested that after conversion, there was a second work called sanctification in which a Christian experienced God in such a way in which
they no longer sinned. Sanctification was rightly considered a “gift,” but it was considered separate from initial conversion. By the time Pentecostalism began at the turn of the 20th century, folks were itching for yet another experience – and thus was popularized the idea of a “third work” which they deemed the baptism or infilling of the Holy Spirit. Again, separate from conversion. Of course this was still not enough for some Pentecostals. There even emerged a branch called the Fire Baptized Holiness Church that advocated for seven baptisms! They made up different ones like the baptism of fire, dynamite, lyddite, chrysolite, oxidite, etc. (their imagination eventually dwindled down to naming the baptisms after minerals). What is Baptizmo? A lot of our confusion over this topic of a second or third blessing has to do with misunderstanding the word “baptism” itself - which was simply Greek for immersion, flooding or dunking. During the times of the earliest translations of the English Bible, there was much controversy surrounding the radical reformation, which largely included the Anabaptists. Fullimmersion baptism was the main pet doctrine of the Anabaptists (ahem … their name means re-baptism. They were clearly into full body dunking. They said your sprinkling as an infant didn’t count. But that’s another topic we don’t have time for today). The problem is, not all Anabaptists were nice. Many of them burned and pillaged churches and convents, raped nuns – the list goes on. In order to avoid controversy by associating with the Anabaptists, English Bible translators decided not to use the word “dunk” for the Greek word baptizmo. Rather than translate “dunk” ... instead they just left the Greek word “baptizmo” untranslated. Voila! A new word is introduced to the English language. So instead of John the Dunker, we get John the Baptist. So the “baptism” of the Spirit is not a separate thing where first you only had Jesus, and now you get the Spirit. It just means to get dunked, immersed or have your senses tangibly “filled” or flooded with the Spirit Whom you had all along. After all, He is the “Spirit of Jesus.” You were never without Him. You don’t get the Spirit in this baptism experience – rather baptism is being experientially flooded by the one who was al-
ready within! The balloon expands and blows up, but deluge your mind, will, emotions and physical senses. it’s all from the inside out. In addition, as we give ourselves over to Holy Spirit, we are likewise empowered. Inpouring vs. Outpouring You have the Fullness We were looking for an inpouring but what He gave us was an outpouring – that out of our bellies would flow The biblical term “trance” freaks out a lot of evangelirivers of living water! cals and charismatics alike, but charismatics in particular experience them all the time under different God is not “out there” and baptism was not Him “com- terminology. Spirit baptism is the exact same experiing in.” No more than Jesus was magically “jumping ence as a trance (Acts 10:10, Acts 22:17, Rev. 1:10). inside you” at conversion. Baptism is about drinking John G. Lake explains a trance this way, “Now what from the well that is already in you. Flooding you from is a trance? A trance is the Spirit taking predominance that inner spring - from the inside out. Of course I am over the mind and body, and for the time being the not invalidating anyone’s experience here. If at some control of the individual is by the Spirit; but our igpoint you felt the tangible “splat” of God and fell over norance of the operations of God is such that even on the floor (perhaps even some time after becoming ministers of religion have been known to say it is the a Christian), well that’s great! So did I. I am very pro- devil.” Parenthetically, the Spirit does not always toss experience, and we see countless miracles, healings our mind and senses out the window. Often He sharpand even unusual signs and wonders. For decades ens them! I have been an avid proponent for spiritual gifts, etc. Therefore, I am not negating your experience of “be- But often we have wrongly confused our first ecstatic ing baptized” in the Spirit. I am just offering a better, experience with Spirit touching us (falling over, etc.) as being the first time we obtained the Spirit. No it was “You don’t get the Spirit in this bap- just the first lucid experience of the One you already had thanks to Christ. The day you got “baptized in the tism experience – rather baptism is Spirit” because you fell over and talked in tongues being experientially flooded by the was not really the day Holy Spirit first entered you. It was the day you first woke up to the one Who’s been one who was already within!” here all along, and you just started actively drinking of Christ-centered theological perspective on what hap- His fountain of bliss pened. The Spirit didn’t “enter” you – it was merely the first time you gave over your senses to Him. The Colossians 2:10 says, “By your union with Christ you Greek biblical word for “trance” is ekstasis (lit. “stand- are filled with the Godhead.” That means you already ing outside yourself”), wherein the mind, will, emo- have the Spirit ... you even have the Father in you too! tions and physical body get veritably “hijacked” by a So “infilling” is not a second work or a third work. You lucid sense of God’s presence that – for anyone who are full of the Godhead and it is not your fault. You has experienced it – is more real and solid than the could not fit one more drop of God inside of you. world around them. On the one hand, charismatics rightly validate spiriBut these experiences: trances, encounters – what- tual gifts and Holy Spirit experience. However, their ever you want to call them (filling, baptism, slain in stream is plagued with what I call “charismatic voo the Spirit, etc.) have nothing to do with an external doo” – an attempt to get more of the Spirit. This is the God moving inward. He was never separate from you. Galatian bewitchment of turning to rules and regulaThese interactions all have to do with coming into tions to try and get more of what they already have an awareness by faith of the God who was always (through prayer, fasting, programs, etc.). Holy Spirit here, holding together the very fabric of your being. does not come in portions; He comes in person. He Whether we call it baptism, filling, immersion, drink- is not the force from Star Wars. He is a person of the ing, soaking, trances, ecstasies, rapture, contempla- Godhead. And you have Him. Please just call yourself tion or whatever – it is all terminology related to the a Buddhist and stop confusing everyone by calling rivers of living water gushing from our inmost being to Continued on page 8
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yourself a Christian if you still think of God as the force the floor! Often, they jump right back up, straighten who comes progressively in higher degrees. their tie and carry on with a fleshly religious existence of striving. Holy Spirit is not something you get in a I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did once off transaction. He’s a Person you are called into you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or continual relation with to drink in, breathe in and enjoy. by believing what you heard? (Gal. 3:2) Moreover, other charismatics misconstrue the conWhat had the Galatians heard? The good news that cept of continual filling to think we are progressively they had it all thanks to Jesus! Instead of trying to get getting more of God. But the subjective experience what we don’t have, what if we realized we already of filling is all rooted in the objective reality that we alhave it and start to enjoy it? It is our very attempt to ready have His fullness! I’m continually drinking from reaccomplish what Christ has done by procuring His a bottomless barrel that is already mine. I lack nothSpirit all over again that blinds us to the fact He is ing. Otherwise, if it is up to you to “press in” for God’s already here. fullness, how long is that going to take you? We end up reversing the formula and negating the gospel if How arrogant to think we could get the Holy Spirit of we get this “filling” principle backward. We are drinkGod into someone! Only the life, death and resurrec- ing from a union we have. Not getting “closer” to a tion of Jesus was capable of pulling that off. In fact, God to Whom we are already fully united. we are united to His presence thanks to His very being in the incarnation. As the God-Man, He exists in Our entire question of “do you have the Spirit” is a His very person as our union with Him. This is the very radically misdirected one from the start. It is an unmystery of the Gospel! evangelized question. The question should be, “Are we drinking from the Spirit we already have thanks Be Continually Filled
“...the subjective experience of filling
In terms of permanent residence, we have the Spirit thanks to our union with Christ. In the sense of fill- is all rooted in the objective reality ings, floodings, baptisms or trances – whatever you want to call them – this experiential “drinking” of the that we already have His fullness!” Spirit is not a one, two, three or seven-time work. It is a lifestyle! to Christ?” Lest we forget He has always been here. We should not be chasing “more” of something we Stop getting drunk with wine, which leads to wild don’t already have. Instead, we should be feasting living, but keep on being filled with the Spirit “more” on the One we do already have in His entirety. (Eph. 5:18, ISV) This continual infilling is what is meant by the practice of the presence of God. Not that you are acquiring The Christian life is about a continual enjoyment – a Him, but are learning to flow in an awareness of Him, daily dunking – a relationship! We are called to a life- wherein we learn to walk in the Spirit by grace. style of experiencing the One we already have. It is an abiding relationship - He remains in you. Those early What About Impartation? Pentecostals were right in itching for more experience. Our desire for experience is not the horrible evil Let us also address the principle of impartation. Anyof which evangelicals accuse their charismatic broth- one familiar with impartation knows it is very real. Just ers. That thirst for pleasure just cannot be divorced do not get mixed up into thinking you first “got” the from its true source: Christ and His finished work – for Spirit in the laying on of hands. Yes, He did smack only there is it slated and fulfilled. The early Pentecos- you in that experience! But when someone prays for tals just did not have the reformed foundation to real- impartation, they are not giving you something you ize the full and complete habitation that was already don’t already have. Impartation is about a stirring up theirs to be continually enjoyed. and activation of something that is already within and available to you. We all have the fullness, but we are Today, many Pentecostals fall over once, start tongue also an interdependent body. We leak onto one antalking and then figure, “Well, now I’ve got the Spirit other! So when we pray for one another, we can stir and can move on.” Do everyone a favor and stay on up things and awaken gifts, etc. to manifest. The guys
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Paul chatted to in Acts 19 had believed in Jesus but said, “We didn’t know there was a Holy Spirit?” When He laid hands on them, they received impartation from Paul; yet that impartation was merely stirring up by faith something that was already objectively latent within them. They just didn’t know. I firmly believe in the laying on of hands and practice it regularly. You see the concept of a tangible transferable anointing throughout scripture: Moses laying his hands on Joshua; Isaac touching Jacob; Paul laying hands on new converts; Jesus blowing on His disciples. There was even a tangible transferable glory on inanimate objects like handkerchiefs and napkins that touched Paul’s body that were used to heal the sick. Elisha’s dead bones still had such a presence of God on them that another man was raised from the dead when he touched them. There is healing on the hem of Jesus’s robe. What are often referred to as mantles or anointings these are areas where someone may be activated in faith for some particular divine function or gift – as the early church fathers called it, the “energies of God” may literally transfer to activate someone, helping them to operate in that which you are already moving in. It’s not magic but it is mystical. Incidentally, impartation involves more than just laying hands on someone. As we rub shoulders, spend time or walk with someone (better yet – sit under their teaching or leadership) there is a transferrable anointing or empowerment that may get subjectively activated. The anointing is a term associated more with the operation or the “how” regarding Holy Spirit’s flowing/functioning through us (i.e. if I operate in divine healing and you do not, that does not mean I “have” something you lack. I am just operating in something we can all access. And by impartation, you are enabled also to walk in it). But the moment we elevate someone to a pedestal as possessing something we are spiritually missing, we have forgotten the gospel. Impartation is more of assisting someone to access the loaded bank account they already have. But our theological grid for impartation must be grounded foremost in identity, knowing we already possess a full inheritance in Christ – even if we haven’t seen it manifest yet. Sometimes I see people attempting to theologically bridge a distinction between Holy Spirit “dwelling within” versus the Spirit “coming upon” someone (improperly separating the two terms). Scripture does
use both sets of terminology. But I find it futile to parse out this difference too much in a way that often leads to wrong conclusions that distract from a Christological focus. You cannot think in terms of space and geography (or even time) when you are discussing the Spirit of God. These are human language issues we are dealing with here. There are so many Pentecostal formulas in this arena that it gets rather mind-numbing (such as, “Well you have God within, but you still need Him to come upon you”). If the conclusion you draw lands the focus back into your own lap to somehow “generate” the Holy Ghost or make him appear, chances are the focus has shifted away from Jesus. I simply view the “coming upon” verses as being outward, subjective experiences of the One who already “dwells within.” Not God floating down from the sky. Nevertheless, I do not want to mock that imagery too much – after all we see Holy Spirit descend as dove upon the Christ. The imagery of God “coming down” helps us to remember He does not originate with us. We came from Him, not the other way around. Nevertheless, the Glory of the Gospel is that He has planted Himself within us, making His abode with us as living temples. And now, as David prophesied, we are “olive trees in the house of our God” (Psalm 52:8) – sources of the anointing oil itself. Do All Have the Spirit of Christ?
an outward manifestation of something that has always been mystically true from God’s perspective. No one had ever really been without the Spirit of God. So let us stop compartmentalizing and thinking spatially: I’m over here; God’s over there. The Spirit is not limited to time and space. Let us not even think in terms of “when” the Spirit came. Pentecost was the full bore manifestation of this wine that was poured out from the foundation of the world. Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in hell, you are there (Psalm 139:7-8).
of humanity has been objectively forgiven, separated from sin and resurrected in the Last Adam. Does that mean they know it? Does that mean they are living like it? Of course not! In fact, they are still free to reject their inclusion and have hell if they want it. We are free to live according to the delusion of sin. But God did not just pour His Spirit out on the good boys and girls. For those who reject His presence, they are rejecting the very consuming fire of love that was intended for their good, yet becomes the very tortuous fires of coal on their head … because the nature of hell is trying to escape the inescapable love of God.
of humanity, awakening them to the
Of course without faith (trust) we are not going to be manifesting and rightly experiencing God’s presence. But He is there nonetheless, brooding over all of humanity – pointing them to Jesus. Holy Spirit is not skiddishly fluttering away from sinners so that they don’t contaminate Him. Unfortunately, most people don’t believe. But how can they believe if they have not heard? And even worse – the message they do hear is usually incorrect. It is a message of “believe to get included,” rather than “believe that you are included.”
truth of their real identity in Christ.”
No Separation from His Presence
We are talking about “Him who fills everything in every way” (Eph. 1:23). Separation was always the delusion of sin, but it was never a reality. Like Adam, we were hiding in the bushes from a God who is everywhere. His presence upholds the very existence of the cosmos. It is not just that God Himself is bound up in the
“Holy Spirit is brooding over the face
incarnation, but that in the incarnation he bound the very cosmos to Himself! There is no bush you can Unfortunately, we have divorced our Calvary from our hide under that is not blazing with the glory of God. Pentecost. Since the Trinity is inseparable, we get Heaven and earth are full of His glory. the full package in one. But this begs the question of “Who gets the Trinity?” The Gospel is not inviting For in Him all things were created: things in Jesus into your life. It is the good news that He alheaven and on earth, visible and invisible, ready included you into His life from the foundation whether thrones or powers or rulers or authoriof the world, before you ever voted on the matter. If ties; all things have been created through Him you really even want to get technical, since Christ and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him died for all humanity, even unbelievers have Him in all things hold together (Col. 1:16-17). a hidden way. As Paul told the pagans on Mars Hill in Acts 17:22, “In Him we live and move and have our Faith is Awakening being. Even as your own poets have said, ‘We are His offspring.’” Or consider when Jesus was speaking What this means is that Episcopals have the Spirit of before the cross (and before Pentecost), in Luke 17, God. Democrats have the Spirit of God. So do howhen He told his hearers that they already had the mosexuals and satanic rock bands. Every unbeliever, whole Kingdom inside of them! It was already there, in including Adolph Hitler and the entire staff of the IRS a hidden way - even though none of them were aware has the Spirit of God. Kim Jong Un, Donald Trump, or continually accessing it by faith as New Covenant the KKK, the Black Panthers and Pee Wee Herman. believers. That’s right … Jesus told complete unbe- Holy Spirit is brooding over the face of humanity, lievers that the Kingdom was within them. awakening them to the truth of their real identity in Christ. Awakening them to their inclusion in the life of When the scriptures tell us that His Spirit was poured the Trinity. Faith is not the magic formula that gets you out on all flesh, I am convinced that it really means all into God. It is awakening to the facts. The fact that if flesh. The fulfillment of Joel’s prophecy in Acts 2 was one died for all, all have already died (2 Cor. 5:14). All
I have written clearly and extensively in my book Cosmos Reborn that I am not a universalist. I am not erasing hell. But I do have a hope for the salvation of all men. Even God has this hope. Scripture says in 2 Pet. 3:9, “He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” And again in 2 Tim. 2:4, “(God) wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.” To have hope is not to write off every verse on hell. Although I can say I am not a universalist until I am blue in the face, but people will still paint you into a box because they do not have a proper understanding of the atonement. Unless you are a die-hard hyper Calvinist, most Christians realize that the work of the cross was for everybody. Just as all of humanity was included in the fall of the first Adam, so was every human being included in the work of the Last Adam. In Romans 5, Paul says, “Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the One Man the many will Continued on page 10
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be made righteous.”And again, in 1 Cor. 15:22, Paul the heathen is not that God loves or favors you more. says, “For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be The only difference between a believer and non-bemade alive.” liever is that the believer believes. And therefore as believers, we begin to walk according to reality and Now you can call Paul a liar, or you can disbelieve experience the benefits. him. Or you can wrongly think this invalidates every verse about “judgment” (a loaded and misunderstood So let us look at the scripture … word). But me, I am not drawing any dogmatic conclusions except to say that every last human being was Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not included in the vicarious life, death and resurrection of have the Son of God does not have life (1 John Jesus. In fact, very many mainline denominations al5:12). ready believe in a universal atonement, which means every human being was included in Christ’s saving So does this indicate some people do not have the work. They just differ on how it all works out and the Son? Well not so fast. The word “have” is the Greek role of faith. word echo. It literally means to “resonate with” (much like the English word “echo” today). The verse literally But we cannot write off the fact that outsiders have means some people are not actively participating and been made insiders, before they even realized it. resonating with the salvation He has already freely The issue is that everyone is included in Him, if even poured out on them. Francois Du Toit’s Mirror Bible only in a hidden way. There is no such thing as being paraphrases the verse this way: “outside of God.” And this truth must carry over into our pneumatology if we are to know anything about To mirror-echo the Son is to mirror-echo life; the nature of Holy Spirit. There is no separation from those who ignore this inner resonance concernGod’s Spirit. The Bible, except for one mistranslated ing the Son, miss out on the very life of their deverse in the King James, never even once says that sign! hell is separation from God! In Revelation 14:10, we see that those who are tormented are still “in the pres- “It is not your job to pull the Holy Spirit ence of the Lamb and His holy angels.” No separa- down from heaven and get Him into peotion. It is the very fiery presence of God itself that ple. He has already been there, behind the the reprobate hate because they cannot escape His scenes, working on every soul that you love. It is love that torments them, for their refusal to meet...” accept it! They want the rocks to fall upon them and hide them from His presence. The same fire lights up But specifically concerning “not having” Holy Spirit, heaven and hell – it is the fire of His love. Even His many often point to the following: wrath is a hot extension of His love! You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh But Only Christians Have the Spirit? but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not John 14:20 says, “In that day you will realize that I have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.” Christ (Rom. 8:9). There was no point that Jesus was not in the Father. And there was no point that you were not in Jesus. For starters, this is not to be lifted out of context and The issue is that most have not yet “realized” it by turned into a proof that some people do not belong to faith. This is what conversion is: a realization. And this God. In the context here, Paul is addressing believunion is exactly what Jesus came to both accomplish ers - not making a statement about unbelievers. He and reveal. To wake us up to the truth. is warning disobedient believers who are refusing to submit to the Holy Spirit in their lives. He is essentially The biggest hurdle people have in terms of pneuma- telling them, “You say that the Spirit of God lives in tology is this: they say, “But John, doesn’t scripture tell you, and you are right. However, your life should be us that only Christians have the Holy Spirit?” Keep in reflecting the Spirit of Christ!” As he says later in verse mind that the word Pharisee means “separatist.” So 12, “We have an obligation - but it is not to the sinful be careful of your motive in raising these questions. nature.” Do we simply want to affirm that we are different from everyone else? The only difference between you and Nevertheless, the bottom line is we are again dealing
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with the word echo when we speak of the “having” the Holy Spirit in this verse. So let us look once more at the Mirror Bible for a better perspective here on Romans 8:9: But you are not ruled by a flesh-consciousness (law of works), but by a Spirit-consciousness (faith); God’s Spirit is at home in you. Anyone who does not see himself full clothed and identified in the Spirit of Christ cannot be himself. Again, having the Spirit here refers to echoing: identifying with, resonating with or walking with the Spirit who is already fully present. And in terms of “belonging to Christ” (i.e. “they do not belong to Christ”), the Greek word is hauto, which likewise relates to “identifying” with the truth. Sadly, many do not identify with Christ. Humanity is in an identity crisis. It is not your job to pull the Holy Spirit down from heaven and get Him into people. He has already been there, behind the scenes, working on every soul that you meet, like a mother hen over her eggs, trying to awaken people to a union and a reconciliation that Jesus Christ has already accomplished for them. This changes how we see humanity. People are confused by so many lies and outright demonic influences. Our job is not to get them included. It is to awaken them with the good news that they are already included, so that they repent (change their minds). And yes, outward actions begin to change as well as they begin to actively respond and live and resonate with the Spirit who has been there all along inviting them into an active relationship. Do not just view the world through the dualistic lens of insiders and outsiders. Do not view people as potential hell fodder. Know they are members of the family who just do not realize it yet. You may actually find yourselves really falling in love with people all over again - preaching not just a potential Gospel, but solid good news that humanity wants to hear: a humanity that feels alienated and separated from a God who has already drawn near. Closer than the air they breathe. The Kingdom is right here, at hand. And do not divorce the person of Christ from the operations of Holy Spirit. In His hypostatic union as the God-Man, His divinity and your humanity have forever been united. For Him to remove His Spirit from you, he would have to reverse the incarnation itself. In Him, the cosmos has been rewired: heaven and earth are completely united.
Meditations of the Mystics Contemplative Silence & Awakening to the True Self
“Every one of us is shadowed by an illusory person: We can be ourselves or not, as we please. We are at a false self. liberty to be real, or to be unreal. We may be true or false, the choice is ours. We may wear now one mask This is the person that I want myself to be but who and now another, and never, if we so desire, appear cannot exist, because God—because Truth, Light— with our own true face.” knows nothing about him. And to be unknown to God is altogether too much privacy. – Thomas Merton
“God spoke His eternal word in silence, and He wishes us to receive His words in silence. If we are merely speculative students of Scripture, breaking the words of God up into scientific fragments and deafening our spirit with the noise of human argument … then we cannot hear the word who speaks to us silently in the words of God.”
“The True Self does not teach us compassion as – Thomas Merton much as it is compassion. Loving from this core of “...if we spend a few moments in contemplation evyour being is experienced as a river within you that ery day, we deepen and transform the remaining moflows of its own accord” ments of the day, rendering ourselves available to others, effective and creative in a way that we could – Richard Rohr We are not very good at recognizing illusions, least not otherwise be.” of all the ones we cherish most about ourselves—the ones we are born and raised with and which feed the “Our society is addicted to noise. We find it impossible – Metropolitan Kallistos Ware roots of sin. For most of the people in the world, there to drive our vehicles without the radio on or a CD playis no greater subjective reality than this false self of ing. Our televisions are running from the moment we “Some find peace and stillness in reading, others in theirs, which cannot exist. A life devoted to maintain- return from work. We take our runs with earphones, handiwork or art, yet others in music. While these ing and expanding this false self, this shadow, is what filling our minds with music. We even walk with our things may seem to us to be neutral and not specififriends while listening to our own music. We live as is called a life of sin. cally spiritual or godly activities, if they help us to acthough we were afraid of silence. ... noise keeps us quire some measure of stillness, they should not be All sin starts from the assumption that my false self, from connecting with our inner self, wherein we have dismissed so quickly as spiritually unprofitable.” the self that exists only in my own egocentric desires, the opportunity for communion with God. Without siis the fundamental reality of life around which every- lence, we are unable to hear the voice of God speak– Archimandrite Vassilios Papavassiliou thing else in the universe is ordered. Thus I use up ing in the stillness of our heart.” my life in the desire for pleasures and the thirst for “The world of men has forgotten the joys of silence, experiences, for power, honor, knowledge, feeling - Abbot Tryphon the peace of solitude which is necessary, to some loved, in order to clothe this false self and construct extent, for the fullness of human living. … Man can“We live, in fact, in a world starved for solitude, siits nothingness into something objectively real. And not be happy for long unless he is in contact with the I wind experiences around myself and cover myself lence, and privacy, and therefore starved for meditasprings of spiritual life which are hidden in the depths with pleasures and glory like bandages in order to tion and true friendship.” of his own soul. If man is exiled constantly from his make myself perceptible to myself and to the world, own home, locked out of his spiritual solitude, he as if I were an invisible body that could only become – C.S. Lewis ceases to be a true person.” visible when something visible covered its surface. “The lover of silence draws close to God. He talks to – Thomas Merton To be a saint means to be my true self. Therefore the Him in secret and God enlightens him. …Silence is problem of sanctity and salvation is in fact the prob- a way of waiting, a way of watching, and a way of “Contemplation is the highest expression of man’s lem of finding out who I truly am and of discovering my listening to what is going on within and around us. It is intellectual and spiritual life. It is that life itself, fully a way of interiority, of stopping and then of exploring true self, my essence or core. awake, fully active, fully aware that it is alive. It is a the cellars of the heart and the center of life. Silence spiritual wonder. It is spontaneous awe at the sacredis fullness, not emptiness; it is not an absence, but the Trees and animals have no problem. God makes ness of life, of being. It is gratitude for life, for awareawareness of a Presence.” them what they are without consulting them, and they ness and for being.” are perfectly satisfied. – St. John Climacus – Thomas Merton With us it is different. God leaves us free to be whatever we like. My false and private self is the one who wants to exist outside the reach of God’s will and God’s love— outside of reality and outside of life. And such a self cannot help but be an illusion.
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Itinerary Find the Party Near You!
Schools, conferences & mission trips with John Crowder
2017 Reformation 500 Webcast
October 29
Free at: TheNewMystics.com/Reform
Minnesota Amish Party
November 17-18
Fun for the Shunned in Long Prairie
Hong Kong, China
December 1-2
Gospel Party & Outreach
Philippines Healing Crusades
December 6-8
Cuayan City, Isabela
Live Monthly Web Conference: Interact With John Crowder
2018 Charlotte Mystical School
January 12-14
Charlotte, NC
Poland Gospel Party
January 29-30
Warsaw, Poland
France Mystical School
February 2-4
Angers, France
Hawaii Marriage Retreat
February 15-17
Lahaina, Maui
Kashmir India & Nepal Mission
March 11-18
Trip Open for Applicants
Springfield Mystical School
April 20-22
Springfield, Illinois
Milwaukee Mystical School
May 18-20
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
UK Gospel Mania
June 15-17
Bristol, England
Ireland Mystical School
August 24-26
Belfast, Northern Ireland
Islay Gentlemen’s Retreat
August 28-30
w/ Baxter Kruger & Godfrey Birtill
Aberdeen Scotland Conference
Aug. 31-Sept. 2
w/ Baxter Kruger & Godfrey Birtill
Scandalous Love Las Vegas
September 13-16
Las Vegas, Nevada
STAN Tour: Internship
February 2019
Open to Applicants Afghanistan, Pakistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan & Kazakhstan
Schedule subject to change. Sign up for events early at:
www.thenewmystics.com 12 | the ecstatic : fall-winter 2017
Our interactive monthly Web seminar, Inner Sanctum, connects supernatural gospel grace drinkers all around the world on a regular basis. The live teaching and exclusive online chat features have enabled us to bring fresh revelation to viewers right to their homes, churches and house groups. Each month, we answer your burning questions and unpackage the glorious gospel in a fresh, intoxicating atmosphere of impartation and glory! If you’re diving into grace revelation and want to plug in deeper with lifechanging messages, we invite you or your group to join as a member of our online community at www.TheNewMystics.TV
FRESH LIVE MATERIAL EACH MONTH DIRECT ACCESS TO JOHN CROWDER PRIVATE RESOURCES FOR MEMBERS ONLY Upcoming Broadcast Schedule: 2017 Dates: November 5 December 17
2018 Dates: January 21 February 25 March 4 April 8
www.TheNewMystics.TV
All seminars are held on Sunday nights at 9 p.m. Eastern/6 p.m. Pacific
Online Community ... Intoxicating Fun! Our ministry events are full of joy and impartation, but let’s face it ... you can’t make it to every conference in the world! Inner Sanctum is a way to plug you into a steady diet of gospel revelation right in your own home. Everywhere we travel, people are always asking us, “How can we stay connected with the Message?” The Inner Sanctum is a great tool as you grow in grace. Our Most Comprehensive Teaching Resource! Since we’ve launched Inner Sanctum at TheNewMystics.TV, we have posted more than 60 hours of archived teachings – and as a member, you receive instant access to watch all of this footage, anytime! Your monthly membership contribution ($19.95) also helps support our ministry endeavors all around the world! Gather your family and friends to enjoy each month’s event together! Each month, you can take part in our live, interactive seminars where John Crowder spends several hours engaging one-on-one with viewers right from his home study. Ask us your questions live for our real-time Q&A ... or just kick back and have a laugh as other members log in and join the fun. These are NOT recorded church meetings! Instead, John engages live-in-person with viewers, answering your questions and getting you activated in the gospel message. Join us as we savor the bliss of mystical Christianity and the supernatural realities of the new creation. Finally, a fun way to feast on the finished work no matter where you live!
Construction Underway on Philippines Orphanage
Construction is fully underway on our new home for abandoned children near Manila. SOT will bring a team to visit the site by year end. Thanks to our friends and partners for helping us rescue young lives and support them on a regular basis! We have not merely broken ground, but are edging toward completion on our brand new home for abandoned children in Manila, Philippines. Thanks to the support of our friends and partners, we have almost reached our goal to begin rescuing even more young lives. Our friends at LifeChild Asia, who also operate nearby orphanages are providing invaluable organizational partnership and local support. Our goal is to reach completion by December and begin bringing new children immediately into the home by our inaugural visit. SOT is bringing a mission team of 30 people to launch the home, minister in the nearby garbage dumps and celebrate with the kids toward the end of this year, as well as hosting evangelism crusades in the neighboring region of Isabela, Philippines. At Sons of Thunder, a long-standing part of our mission statement and vision has been to release the heart of the Father through the tangible care and support of orphaned children. Since 2007, we have directly rescued abandoned children in developing nations, bringing food, education and most of all, a loving home for these vulnerable forgotten on the margins of society. We are excited to announce a fresh
new endeavor in the nations to save the lives of even more little ones! To date, we have had the amazing opportunity to rescue dozens of young lives in India in the children’s homes we have operated there. It has been amazing to watch some of our kids, who were so small when we began, growing up over the years and even venture off to college. Our hearts have been gripped to the core with not only saving lives, but watching them succeed and thrive. Our first home constructed in Mumbai is our largest, housing upward of 30 children. We also spent many years running a second home in Rajahmundry, India. The new construction in the Philippines expands the scope of our child rescue operations. We are building outside the Wawa garbage dumps on the island of Luzon, in which more than a thousand families live in abject poverty. We are still fundraising for the new facility, which has required tens of thousands in capital building funds. Besides final construction costs, we are also looking for new monthly partners to help us with the ongoing fresh monthly commitment to feed, educate, clothe and provide regular oversight and staff
for the children. Currently we send thousands in support each month for our orphan work in India, so we appreciate both the continued and renewed support from you – our friends and partners – to join together with us in this fresh opportunity to be fathers to the fatherless and bread to the hungry. This new commitment is a major step up for us financially, and we trust that as the Lord moves on your hearts to join with us, the blessings and favor associated with moving in His heart for the poor will manifest on your lives! Please consider contributing to our work with orphans in India and the Philippines by continuing as part of the Sons of Thunder team as a monthly financial partner. You can jump onboard easily online at: www.thenewmystics.com/partners You can also make a one-time donation to the home at www.paypal.me/johncrowder and include the note “orphans” on your donation. Or you can find out more about our existing children’s homes and donate through our missions page: www.thenewmystics.com/missions
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India Mission Reaches Garbage Dumps, Poor
Return with us Again to India & Nepal Next March On our recent trip to Mumbai, India, our team plunged into the garbage dumps, bringing a metric ton of food to the poorest of the poor - spending time to share God’s tangible love and pray with them. We also hosted a large outreach event where many miracles manifested: eyesight was restored, tumors disappeared, the lame walked and countless more were healed. We also spent two days layering the Gospel of grace in a pastor’s conference, which gathered leaders from all around the nation. A group from Chennai who have been following John’s ministry for years also hosted him for a big Holy Ghost drinking party!
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Finally, we enjoyed spending time with our kids at the Sons of Thunder Mumbai children’s home. Some of the youth are already reaching college age and we hope to provide some support for their future education. If you missed our last India adventure, it is not to late to join our next and only upcoming trip currently open to applicants: we’re headed to the northern Indian province of Kashmir together with the nation of Nepal both in one trip in March 2018. See story on the next page! Would you like to donate to our orphans? Visit www.thenewmystics.com/missions
YOU can Join us on the Mission Field! Travel with us to Indian Kashmir & Nepal Miracle Crusade
Experience the supernatural and release the glorious Gospel into the nations as part of a Sons of Thunder mission trip next March 2018. Pairing together both the heights of the Himalayas in Indian Kashmir, together with the lowland jungles of Nepal, this joint mission trip with John Crowder and Matt Spinks will be like none other! You will visit two nations on one trip, as you tangibly release the glory of the Kingdom. Known as “the most beautiful place on earth,” the mountainous region of Kashmir is also a land of conflict. Our team will venture into Jammu to equip local believers in the message of grace. Next we are off to Kathmandu, Nepal and then into the jungles of Chitwan where we will gather a massive crowd for a miracle evangelism campaign. You will heal the sick, release impartation and see the liberating power of the Gospel flow through you. These trips are great for getting activated in
the anointing. In our spare time, there’s also the option of jeep rhino safaris and elephant riding on tap. Where Do I Begin? If you have a heart for missions, we encourage you to lean into the faith of Christ - taking the first simple step by sending in your initial application and deposit! Registration is now open and the sign up deadline is December 1 (or earlier if the trip fills up). Keep in mind you do not need your entire trip payment by that time. Only your initial application and deposit are needed to secure your spot, so take that faith plunge and apply early. You will have more time to raise the remainder of your funds, with final payment due January 10, 2018. This is a “make your own way trip,” which means we allow you to purchase your own plane ticket to lower costs. Many folks end up finding friends or family who donate
air miles, making the trip more affordable. The team will meet up onsite in Kashmir. Total cost for the trip is $2,150. This includes all of your hotels, two meals per day, ground transportation, your flights from Kashmir to Kathmandu and from Kathmandu to Chitwan - it also helps contribute toward the outreaches (Although our first stop is in the Himalayas, there are no requirements for climbing or hiking). Email us with any questions at info@thenewmystics.com or visit the trip Web page at www.thenewmystics.com/trek If you are unable to join the team, but would like to contribute to the outreaches – you can visit www.thenewmystics.com/missions to send a donation toward the mission. Total Cost: $2,150 Team Applications Due: DECEMBER 1, 2017 Final Trip Payment Due: JANUARY 10, 2018 Trip Dates: MARCH 11-18, 2018 Registration: WWW.THENEWMYSTICS.COM/TREK
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The Subjective Experience of An Objective Reality by Dr. Steve McVey For many years, I didn’t truly see the finished work of Christ as the gospel. I certainly said I saw it that way but, in reality, I saw the work of the cross more as a potential gospel. My view was that if people would ask God to forgive their sin, He would. If a person would pray to get right with God, He would answer that prayer. If somebody would come to God in faith, the great gulf of sin that separated her from God would be bridged. It all depended on the person - his faith - her decision. I don’t see the gospel of Jesus Christ that way anymore. The gospel isn’t a sales pitch in which we tell people that if they’ll do this, then God will do that. The gospel is an announcement of good news. When Jesus said, “It is finished,” He really meant it.
experience the personal benefit of what He has done. Our sin has already been forgiven, but that objective reality has no personal value to us until we believe it. The Father has accepted us. That’s real. It’s when accept Him that we see the beauty of His acceptance and are transformed. We love Him because He first loved us. The Emancipation Proclamation was signed by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, setting all slaves in the United States free. That was an objective reality. However,
We have been justified and reconciled to God by the finished work of Christ, not by a decision that we may or may not make. The good news of the gospel isn’t that God won’t count our trespasses against us if we come to Him. The gospel is the news that He doesn’t count our sin against us because He has come to us! As the One who came to take away the sins of the world, He has dealt with the matter of sin once for all. Does that mean that everybody is automatically a Christian? No, not at all. A Christian is a follower of Jesus Christ; one who trusts Him and is depending on nothing or nobody else as the source of his right standing with God. I have often said that salvation is the subjective experience of an objective reality. God has done what He has done, whether we believe it or not. We have been reconciled to Him, but it is in the believing that we begin to
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with the sin of mankind. Jesus Christ has set us free from sin’s tyranny over us. That’s an objective fact, but that doesn’t mean everybody is living out of that reality. One theologian was asked, “When were you saved?” “Well, I suppose it was 2000 years ago,” he answered. What did he mean? He meant that the objective reality of salvation took place at the cross. Trusting Christ now doesn’t bring something into existence. Instead, trusting Him now is simply a response predicated on the fact that we, at last, see what He has already accomplished for us and we now believe it! We begin to live in the reality that was brought into existence at the cross. We begin to enjoy today the subjective experience of an objective reality that was settled long ago. Remember that faith doesn’t make anything happen. Faith is the evidence of things not seen. Those things are there already. They’re just not seen. Through faith, the invisible reality that already exists becomes our visible experience. Through faith, the objective become subjective.
that didn’t mean they all experientially benefited from it. Shelby Foote, in his three-volume work on the Civil War recorded the response of one slave that revealed the mindset of many. This slave said, “I don’t know nothin’ ‘bout Abraham Lincoln, ‘cept he set us free. And I don’t know nothing ‘bout that neither.” That man’s experience mirrors that of many people today. Jesus Christ has dealt
There’s nothing left for God to do for mankind. He has already done it all. To proclaim the gospel is to tell people that it really is finished. To experience salvation firsthand is to believe it and live from the reality of His work on our behalf.
Steve McVey is the founder of Grace Walk Ministries and the author of 16 books. Find more about Steve at www.gracewalk.org
A Note on Union with Christ By Dr. C. Baxter Kruger, Ph.D.
“Father, I have made Your name known to them, and I will make it known, that the love wherewith You love Me may be in them, and I in them.” —Jesus, John 17:26 “The Incarnation means that God Himself condescended to enter into our alienated human existence, to lay hold of it, to bind it in union with Himself…” —Thomas F. Torrance, The School of Faith The apostles lead us to contemplate the fact that Jesus Christ is the eternal Son of the Father incarnate. Some of their statements about Jesus are quite astounding. It was fidelity to this apostolic witness to Jesus that expanded the mind of the early Church and led to the recognition that God is eternally Father, Son and Holy Spirit—three distinct persons, indivisibly one divine being. This vision of Trinitarian oneness led the fathers at Nicaea to proclaim with the apostles that all things were created from the Father through the Son and in the Holy Spirit, echoing John and Paul’s insistence that all things were created in and through and by and for the Son. A Trinitarian discussion of union with Christ begins here with the oneness of the Triune God and with the Son’s union with all creation as the Creator and Sustainer of all things—prior to the incarnation. It is striking that so much of what is said about union with Christ ignores this very proclamation and assumes separation, that is to say, assumes that creation and the human race within it have existence and being and life apart from the Son of God. For the apostles and the Nicene theologians the Son as Creator is held together with His ongoing sustaining of creation, such that any rupture between the Son of God and creation threatens creation with nonbeing. The incarnation of the Son anointed in the Spirit is thus not to be viewed as the establishment of a previously non-existing relationship or union between the anointed Son and the human race. For the cosmos would vanish in an instant without Him. To be sure, the Fall of Adam constitutes a rebellion from the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and a declaration of independence from the Son as the very source and meaning of human existence. The Fall is a denial of human participation in the life of the blessed Trinity and thus threatened the union between Adam
and Eve and the Triune God. As Athanasius said, the human race was on the road to ruin and lapsing into nonbeing. In its deepest sense, the incarnation addresses this threat of our ultimate disappearance from existence. In becoming flesh, the Son of God establishes His existing divine relationship or union with humanity, which was seriously jeopardized by Adam’s rejection, inside the very specific context of human alienation and rebellion. In an act of astonishing redemptive genius, the Son of God entered personally into the reality that threatened His union with us, namely, our rejection of Him. By giving Himself into the hands of wicked men He yielded to our
great darkness and rebellion, suffering them personally, thereby using our alien vision and rebellion as the means of establishing His union with us in our sin. Bearing the insidious scorn of broken humanity, Jesus met us and accepted us precisely in our resistance and unwillingness to come to Him, indeed in our hatred of Him and of His exposing light. Therein the incarnate, crucified and resurrected Son secured His union with us by way of our unbelief, once and for all obliterating the threat of our nonexistence. For He is a merciful Creator who loves the human race. The response of the human race to the presence of the Father’s Son and Creator incarnate was to damn Him, and damn Him with bitterness and enmity, giving Him gall as His last drink. The stunning self-surrender of the Son of God to be despised and forsaken by sinners and to endure our hostility against Him is our Creator’s personal entry into our deepest iniquity. Without our vote, without our willing response to Him, we could not speak of union here
or even of relationship, but only of a strange, antirelational, legal and external divine act of abstract sovereignty. But the human race voted indeed. We responded. We, Jew and Gentile together, damned and cursed and crucified the incarnate Creator and Son of God—deicide, the rejection and killing of God. What could possibly be more vile? Yet it is precisely this most vile act that is taken up and experienced by Jesus. In utter oneness with His Father and the Holy Spirit, and as the Creator and Sustainer of all things, the Son of God became one of us, and we betrayed Him with disdain and tortured Him in our scoffing rage. It was not the wrath of the Father that was poured out on Jesus at Calvary, but the wrath of the human race. Scripture is crystal clear: with venomous contempt we condemned our Creator, banishing Him from our presence on Golgotha’s hill. And the One crucified by humanity is the Father’s eternal Son, the One anointed in the Holy Spirit, and the One in and through and by and for Whom all things were and are created and are constantly sustained. Thus as Jesus bowed as an innocent lamb to be slaughtered by the human race, He brought His oneness with His Father and the Holy Spirit— and His divine, but jeopardized union with the human race—into our twisted blindness and horrifying iniquity. As such Jesus Christ is the Creator meeting us at our most violent and wicked worst, using our bitter rejection of Him to bind us in union with Him forever, thereby rendering separation from Him an eternal impossibility and destroying every threat to our ceasing to be. Here is unimaginable sin and unimaginable love meeting in one Person. The crucified Son is the mercy seat, the place where the blessed Trinity in the person of the Son experienced and endured and accepted and embraced the human race in its alienation and enmity against the Triune God in astonishing and everlasting mercy. Here is the New Covenant, the new relationship between the Creator and anointed Son and His broken creatures, born in the shed blood of breathtaking divine mercy and human treachery. And here in Jesus on the cross at our hands is the meaning of union. The crucified Son is Himself the union between the Father and the Holy Spirit, indivisibly one in Him, with those whom Continued on page 18
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< Continued from page 17 He created yet who responded to Him in unbelief and unspeakable derision. In our rejection of the Son of God, and in His willful surrender to our bizarre blindness, we stand before a union with Jesus made real not by our faith and repentance, but by our unbelief and treason. Such a union is so astonishing that it is almost unbelievable, but it is the gospel itself. It is both too beautiful and too horrible for words, but so it is. It is the Holy Spirit’s determined delight to reveal this reality, this union, in us, inside our own blindness. The Spirit’s mission is not to create a relationship between us and Jesus, as if that union were not already made real in our rejection of our Lord. The Holy Spirit does not come to us from the outside, as if the Spirit were absent in the incarnation as a mere spectator watching the Son as He bowed before our hatred. The Holy Spirit was indivisibly one with Jesus as He experienced our wrath. And thus the Spirit moves not from absence to presence, but from union with us in our darkness in Jesus to the work of revealing this union in us in our fallen minds. In oneness with Jesus in His oneness with us, the Holy Spirit comes to us to reveal the truth of all truths—to lead us to acknowledge and embrace Jesus as our Creator and Lord, salvation and life, the true and only source and meaning of our humanity. As the Spirit leads us to discover Jesus Himself within us and inside the great illusion, we behold the One whom we have pierced and encounter the real gospel—the limitless mercy of the Triune God—which both shocks and relieves us in our self-incarcerating pride and overwhelming anxiety. In so doing, the Spirit reveals a reality for us to believe, a reality that we can rest in and allow to silence our guilt and shame, our fear and forlorn sense of worthlessness. As we discover that we rejected and damned Jesus, and that this Son is indivisibly one with His Father, we see that in the very event of our shameful crucifying of Jesus, the Father was not abandoning Jesus or us, but accepting and embracing us as His beloved children in our unspeakable waywardness. And as we discover that the Holy Spirit was indivisibly one with Jesus as He submitted Himself to us in our dastardly unbelief, we begin to see that the Holy Spirit has made our traumatized, fear-stricken souls, our self-righteous, blind and obstinate hearts the very Temple where the Holy Spirit chooses to dwell in infinite, creative joy, and power, and endless gifts. Indeed, here we see that as we rose against and snuffed out the Father’s Son, we unwittingly offered—from the pit of our insane and faithless apostasy—the one true and faithful Son as our response to the Father. The discovery of this Fa-
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ther and this Son and this Holy Spirit in us has the actual authority and weight with our souls to free us from our self-loathing and allow ourselves precisely as guilt-ridden, shame-riddled covenant-breaking sons and daughters to be loved by the Father Himself, prodigals stunned by the abounding goodness of our Father’s heart and inspirited by the staggering love and humility of our brother Jesus. Now is the age of revelation and judgment, the age in which the Holy Spirit is at work revealing Christ in us and patiently giving us eyes to see that Jesus— through our rejection of Him—is now united with us in our alienation. His “I AM” now dwells in our “I Am
Dr. C. Baxter Kruger is a theologian, writer, fishing lure designer and director of Perichoresis Ministries. Baxter earned his PhD from Kings College, Aberdeen University in Aberdeen, Scotland under Professor James B. Torrance. He is the author of eight books. Find Him online at www.perichoresis.org Not,” and our Father is most pleased to reveal His Son in us in the joy of the Holy Spirit. Christ in you, the hope of glory, is the deepest truth about us and is to be proclaimed as the gospel to every human being. As truth, Christ in you is also the light which shines in the darkness, summoning us to take sides with Jesus against the way we think and see and feel and project, even while warning us that if we don’t we doom ourselves to the misery of living in the great illusion and its fear. Now the human race stands under the command of Jesus: Abide in Me and in My love
and you will bear much fruit. Now comes the loaded promise of Jesus: If you will walk with Me I will lead you to experience My Father with Me and a life in the Holy Spirit that is utterly inconceivable to you at this moment, a life not of loneliness and dread, stuck in sadness and self-righteousness and religion, but a life of hope, of freedom to know and to be known and delighted in. I meet you in your illusion of separation, in the lie of the evil one. My presence in love calls you to abide in My love, accept My acceptance of you as you are, let my Father be your Father, and I promise that My own “I AM” will flow as a river of living water from your innermost being into your shattered life of pretense. Abide in Me and you will bear much fruit means: if you take sides with Me against the way you see My Father as the harsh judge eagerly watching every move you make from the infinite distance of a disapproving heart, and against the way you see yourself as a loser, an apostate worthy only of disgust, or as the all-knowing competent one who cannot be told a thing, and against your conclusion that your enemies are outside of Me and My love, I will lead you into the shalom of the Triune God from the inside out, and the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the seas. . The gospel is not the news that we can receive Jesus Christ into our lives; the gospel is the news that Jesus Christ has received us into His life. And the us He has received into His life is not the Sunday version of us, but the blind and obstinate, the faithless and fearful and terrified us. The revelation of Christ in us thus awakens almost unbelievable hope even as it exposes and challenges our alien way of seeing, our way of believing which seems to be the most obvious thing in the world to us. The light of union confronts the assumptions of our fallen minds, the assumption that we are separated from God and that He has abandoned us in justice, the assumption that we are unworthy of His care and have forfeited any right to His love, the assumption that the Holy Spirit is to be feared and avoided at all costs, and the assumption that we must cross an unknown divide to make things right with God before we are safe. It is here in the revelation of Jesus’ union with us that we learn the nature of true faith and the nature of sin. Faith is not an independent act conjured up from our own resources that moves us into right relationship with God. Faith is believing in Jesus who is revealing Himself in the Spirit inside our own hearts and alien inner worlds of fear and self-righteousness and pretense. Faith does not create union with Christ; faith is believing the union is true, which leads into ever
increasing freedom to experience Jesus Himself and His Father in the Holy Spirit. Faith is seeing with Jesus’ eyes and learning to agree with Him in trust, and thus share in His peace and hope and joy. Sin is resisting the Holy Spirit’s revelation of Jesus in us, refusing to see with His eyes and insisting that Jesus Christ change His ways and join ours. Sin is the insistence that Jesus repent and believe in us, that He take sides with us and with the way we see and perceive and feel and project, that He change the way He sees Himself and His Father and the Holy Spirit, and us, and our enemies, and learn from us about the real world. Nothing in heaven or on earth can destroy the union that Jesus established with us when He became the Lamb surrendering Himself to our will to slaughter and destroy. But we can insist on imposing our darkness upon Jesus Christ and His world. We can fight Him and disagree with His enlightening presence and love. He will never break ties with us or divorce or abandon us in our folly, yet we are free to sin, to mock Him, to resist our own identity in union with Him, to invent gods and goddesses, grand religions and religious ways back to our deities, even while we breathe Christological air and have our very being in union with Jesus Christ. We are free to continue to see with the foreign eyes of unbelief toward Jesus and to experience the tumultuous chaos of our own theories if we so choose. We are free to carry on living in our own worlds, the worlds of false religion and pretense, of self-generated and grandi-
ose illusions of meaning and purpose, of self-centered pride and manipulation, of jealousy, anger, and wrath, of dread, meaninglessness, and despair. But we are not free to separate ourselves from the love of God in Christ Jesus, or from the Father’s eternal embrace of us in our wickedness, or from the Spirit’s choice to dwell with us in our great confusion. And we are not free to escape the reality or the revelation of Christ in us. Jesus will never force us to take sides with Him, but by our own doing we have invited Him into the deepest abyss of confusion in our own souls. In rejecting Him we opened the door to our wound. In crucifying the Creator Son, we opened our alienation to His presence and the Father’s embrace. There He speaks as the living Word of God, the humble brother of the human race, the light of life shining in the great darkness. There the Holy Spirit, who indivisibly accompanied the Son into the far country of our murder and rage, cries “Abba! Father!” bearing witness with our spirits that we are sons and daughters of the Father, joint heirs with Jesus Himself, heirs of God and the Triune life. The Son of God in His union with us summons us in the Spirit to believe, to trust, to weep in the hope of His presence in us, to let go of our assumptions and illusions and share life with Him in the Spirit’s delight and in the unearthly assurance of our Father’s steadfast love. This is the fight of faith, a fight between the believing of Jesus Christ Himself and our own believing, between the revelation of Jesus in us and our own but broken way of
seeing where our default setting is the assumption of separation from Jesus. It is a fight which begins with our rejection of Jesus and is quickened by the mind-blowing revelation of Christ in us in the Holy Spirit, and thus carries the promise of nothing less than the life and glory of the Triune God. And it is a fight that we must engage personally—not to become united with Jesus—but in order to live in and out of His union with us, in order to participate with Him in dismantling our alien way of seeing so that His heart and soul and mind, and His own relationship with His Father and His own anointing in the Holy Spirit are free to have the run of the house in our souls, even as we hear that Jesus Christ is the author and finisher of faith. It is an infinitely unlikely impossible possibility that we would finally resist Jesus encountering us in His love, and His witness addressing us from the depths of our own souls in so beautiful and quickening a hope. But even if we do, and choose to continue to live in the illusion of separation and its cascading misery of great darkness, we can never cease to be. For it is impossible that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit will ever go back on the union they dreamed in eternity and now made real for us in Jesus’ submission to us in our alienation. And it is impossible that Jesus will ever stop loving us in our darkness, or that the Holy Spirit will ever give up on giving us eyes to see the truth, or that the Father will abandon us, relinquishing His love and withdrawing His passionate opposition to our unbelief and its hell.
Catch an Event with John & Baxter Together!
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NEW & CLASSIC BOOKS FROM JOHN & LILY CROWDER
Money. Sex. Beer. God. In this Biblical companion to the happy life, learn how religious mindsets of gnostic dualism slipped in over 2,000 years of church history and blinded us to the God-given joys and pleasures of this world. We have often separated our spirituality from earthiness. But did Jesus really condemn all enjoyment of this world? Ditch religion for the joy of incarnation as John Crowder covers topics your pastor is afraid to talk about.
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Chosen for Paradise The topic of election has confused theologians for centuries. Does God harden hearts and choose some to fry forever in Hell? Explore the tough passages of Romans 9-11 and gain new light on the debated doctrine. God is not choosing one human over another. Jesus Christ is the chosen, elect man on behalf of all humanity. And you are fully included in Him. John’s shortest book aims to cheer up theology’s biggest problem ever!
Cosmos Reborn Need a religious detox? Have a dose of happy theology on the new creation! A grace-centered look at regeneration, the new creation and the new birth. See the massive, cosmic scope of the finished work of the cross as John makes a scandalous case that the Father of Jesus Christ is in a good mood. Get a gospel view of wrath, hell and dispel the myth of a dark, schizophrenic god of religion. One of our deepest books!
Grace for the Contemplative Parent Based on the classic Practice of the Presence of God, Lily gears this book for real-time parents whose lives are full of dirty diapers and soccer practice. Don’t have luxurious hours of quiet time like a 17th century monk? You are not missing out. Be awakened to the very real presence of Christ in your everyday, seemingly “mundane” state of affairs. Full of practical, down-to-earth examples and wisdom from a mother of four.
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Seven Spirits Burning
Mystical Union
The New Mystics
The Ecstasy of Loving God
John’s long-awaited Seven Spirits Burning is an extensive, Biblical plunge into the nature and operation of the sevenfold Spirit of God. This book unpackages a deep theological and Christocentric understanding of the seven Spirits. John has taught for years on the seven Spirits, but not until now has he released this detailed compilation of his study and experience. This book could possibly be the magnum opus of anything written to date on the Spirit’s sevenfold nature.
When you think of the cross, do you think of fun? Get ready for the gospel as you’ve never heard it. With clear revelatory truths on the New Creation and the scandalous joys of the cross, Mystical Union promises to be one of John’s most revolutionary, lifechanging works. The happy gospel of grace is about uninterrupted union with the Divine. This book lays out our most core beliefs. It promises to wreck your theology and cheer you up with undeniable Biblical truths on the free gift of perfection.
God has destined you to live in the joyful radiance of Himself, just as Adam was called to live in the realm of Eden. Ecstasy, or “extasis,” is the Greek term for trance, and is linked with a pleasurable, God-given state of out-of body experience recorded throughout the New Testament and the church age. In this book, John takes us on a journey from Old and New Testament ecstatic prophets to the future ecstatics who will usher in a massive wave of harvest Glory to the streets in these last days.
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The Priesthood of Christ The Relevance and Perfecting of the Office
Miracle Healing Session Healing Release & Impartation
While priesthood seems an irrelevant topic in today’s culture of Instagram, Netflix and backyard barbecues, all of humanity longs inwardly for the role of a priest - one who will atone for their sense of guilt and offer to God the perfect worship they can never muster up. How was Christ “perfected” as our High Priest?
John often says he has never done a whole teaching solely on healing ... He just teaches on the gospel and does healings. In this session devoted completely to healing miracles and impartation, John brings a finished work perspective and grace focus to the subject of bodily miracles. Get free from striving to “work up” faith for healing!
Killing the Sacred Cow
Communion
A Beginner’s Guide to Why we are so Offensive
Participating in Sacramental Union
John Crowder gives an overview of many major concepts the Lord has downloaded to him over the years. He walks through a journey of various topics: from a focus on the supernatural, the wine of God’s presence, our union with God, the inclusion of humanity in the gospel, freedom from dualisms and much more. A good scandalous snapshot of our experiential and theological journey.
In this teaching John Crowder covers the topic of communion. Is it a mere symbol or a mystical sacrament? How do we view communion from a perspective of the finished work of the cross? John also explores the rich history of eucharistic miracles and ancient communion celebrations that led to modern revivalism.
Christology & Prolepsis
Baptism
The Incarnation as an Eternal Reality
Understanding Water & Spirit Baptism
“Prolepsis” is the foreshadowing, or anticipation of the coming Christ that always existed in a hidden way throughout the course of human history. Jesus did not merely come onto the scene 2,000 years ago. In the beginning was the Word and all things were created through Him. In this teaching, John explores Christ as eternal sum of all things.
In this teaching John covers the role of water baptism from a finished work perspective. Not a superstitious act required to “purchase” salvation, nor a symbol pointing to your own “personal faith,” baptism is a sacrament that points to your death with Christ before you ever even realized it! John also covers “spirit baptism.” Do you get Holy Spirit in a separate act from your conversion?
Ephesians Euphoria Four-part Series on the Cosmic Incarnation
Catch the grace of the gospel and the cosmic scheme of the incarnation in this fourpart series as John Crowder walks through the entire book of Ephesians, dispelling our dualistic notions of separation from God and encouraging a practical life lived out to the glory of God in the beauty of holiness.
Abiding in the Wine Vine Sap Suckling & Fruit Bearing
“Abiding” is a passive work - not an active one. We exist in Christ, and He bears fruit through us. In this teaching, John Crowder expands on the fruit of the Spirit that is produced through our effortless union with Christ. This is a study and meditation on love, joy, patience, peace, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control from Galatians 5.
the ecstatic : fall-winter 2017 | 21
Digital Download Store: www.johncrowder.net A Better Word
Cruciformity
The Bible: Infallible, Irrelevant or Holding a Secret?
The Divine Nature of Self-Giving Love
In this teaching John touches on the topic of the inspiration of scripture, offering a different perspective on the controversial topic. What do we do with tough passages like the flood, genocide and other scriptures that appear to paint God as a moral monster? There is a Word within the Word - an underlying “Yes!” hidden within the “No!”
Christ did not simply die for us as an action. But the crucifixion speaks of His nature as the cruciform God. It is “because” He is God that Christ emptied Himself. God’s nature is other-giving love. As we explore what it means to have the divine nature - to embrace “theosis” or being God-like - the end result is always self-emptying love.
God in the Unbeliever
Losing Your Salvation
Seeing Christ Hidden in Humanity
Eliminating Fear of Divine Abandonment
Modern evangelicalism has conditioned us with an insider-outsider mentality. Jesus supposedly “jumps inside” a person when they make their salvation “decision.” But is this the message of the apostle Paul? If all of humanity is included in the Last Adam, as Paul clearly articulates, how does that play into our understanding of our fellow man and the dynamics of being “in Christ?”
A number of passages in scripture are mishandled in a way to instill the fear of losing our salvation. But salvation was never based on our performance or even our ability to drum up faith on our own. In this teaching, John Crowder tackles some tough passages offering a radical grace perspective.
Woven into the Trinity Grafted Into the Incarnation
Why is a revelation of the Trinity core to our understanding of the nature of God? Unlike the unitarian concept of God that is directly based on our human performance to please him, instead we have been grafted into Jesus’ relationship with the Father in the Spirit. Our relationship with God is fully mediated through the incarnate Son - our salvation rests completely on His faithfulness, His vicarious repentance on our behalf and His baptism into our death. God is family. He is other-giving love.
Contemplating the Mystery
John Crowder’s Joy Clinic Three-Part Extended Teaching Set
Do you suffer from Religion, Burnout, Boredom, Depression, Unbelief or Legalism? Looking for a quick, easy remedy that seems too good to be true? This is just what the doctor ordered! In this three-part series John lays out a multi-dimensional gospel feast. Covering new creation realities and the joy of the glorious gospel, he addresses the identity of the believer and dispels the theological myth of an angry, schizophrenic God.
Renewing the Mind
The Divine Dance of Theology and Contemplation
Gospel Joy Explosions to the Brain
Contemplation is the practice of His presence. Christ is the object of our contemplation. Our intersection between the seen and the unseen, the finite and the infinite. Contemplation - as a mode of enjoyment - is never an end in itself. It does not exist if it is detatched from the Person who is contemplated or enjoyed. And theology is not to become mere intellectualism. When Christ is given His place, the scriptures find their place.
The renewal of the mind is a happy journey of having our thought life infused with the joy of our salvation and saturated with the revelation of our true identity in Christ. Tired of stupid thinking that produces strife and tension? As we stay plugged into the word of truth, we “know the truth” and the truth sets us free.
Hearing God for Dummies
Manifested Sons of God
New Covenant Prophetic Insights
Effortlessly Shine in the Supernatural Life
Most charismatics think they know everything about the prophetic. But much of the prophetic movement has been derailed in old covenant style future-telling. A new covenant people are emerging who can point backward to the cross, releasing faith for what’s already been given to us. Get practical tips on hearing God!
All of creation awaits the “revealing” of your sonship. You were created for the supernatural life. Manifesting our divine identity is as effortless as realizing who we really are – adopted heirs entrusted with authority in heaven and earth. John explores our miraculous inheritance in Romans 8 from a finished work perspective.
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Raising Family in Grace
The Election Series
The Gospel at Home with John & Lily
Seeing Romans 9-11 Through a New Lens
John and Lily Crowder explore the topic of marriage and family life in the grace and glory of God. The gospel radically liberates parents from the stress and fear of religious performance, infusing children with identity and life. This extended teaching features Q&A and practical tips on practicing the presence at home.
Romans 9-11 contains some of the most difficult and misunderstood concepts ... In this 5-part series, John Crowder shoots religious cows on every side of the debate - cheering up your perspective of God, hell and predestination. Going beyond the Calvinist-ArminianUniversalist debate John presents a strong hope in Christ - the Vicarious Man, who is both Elector and Elected. This is one of our most stretching teaching sets.
Drunken Theology 101 Extended Teaching on the Cross
Divine Creativity And the Graven Image of the Law
Get new creation foundations for your bliss as John expands on the revelation of the gospel in this two-hour teaching session from Australia. Tap into the mysticism of St. Paul, the glorious drink of divine union and the beautiful gift of perfection. This is a powerful summation of finished works theology that will cheer you up, infuse you with joy and transform your understanding of Christianity.
Ever notice that religious folk are usually not creative? Longing for the Spirit of Creativity the Spirit Himself - to manifest more through your life? Often, what Christian artists deem to be “creative” is really just a dead, copycat repetition of types and shadows. But now, since you are restored to the true image of God in Christ, you can manifest a fresh expression of the divine.
Drink Grace Straight
Mystical Union Audiobook
Revelations of the Glory
The knowledge of the Glory of God is filling the earth in this hour. Ever wonder what the “knowledge of the Glory” actually is? It is the pure revelation of the gospel. Grace has to be drunk straight. Any mixture of law added to your pure drink of grace, and it ceases to be true grace. Drink deep of the gospel revelation in this teaching!
Read by John Crowder
In this audiobook recording, listen as John Crowder reads his classic, Mystical Union. The gospel is a mystical message, based on an instant and effortless union with God achieved at Christ’s cross. There is a delicious feast prepared for the believer. This book threatens to turn your Christianity upside down. Makes a great easy listening audio companion to the hardback book.
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Get Brainwashed in the Gospel Available at JOHNCROWDER.NET
This Device Includes: 45 Full Length Audio Teachings by John Crowder 2 Full Length Audio Books (Mystical Union & Money. Sex. Beer. God.) Material Not Available on our Digital Download Store Earbuds included USB Charger Cable/Sync Cable Included Slim Design - Zinc Construction No Batteries Needed More Than 5 GB Additional Space for Extra Audio Files Built in Speaker Supports MP3, WMA and Other Lossless Audio Formats Supports FM Radio, Voice Recording & Ebook Reading 24 Optional Languages, Manual Included
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24 | the ecstatic : fall-winter 2017