The Ecstatic - Volume 12

THE

Spring-Summer 2015

ecstatic MAGAZINE

Also

Cuba Mission Indonesia Mission Cana Seminary Online

KILLING THE SACRED COW A Beginner’s Guide to why we are so Offensive

Spring-Summer 2016

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News

Middle East Mission Reaches Refugees

Over the past summer, a Sons of Thunder team comprised of 20 internationals from the USA, Norway, UK, Canada and Holland traveled to Jordan to the Syrian border for an outreach to refugees fleeing the current civil war crisis in the region. All have been displaced from their homes, and were unable to receive jobs or relief from UN refugee camps. Bringing food, healing the sick and offering prayer, the SOT team carried love, joy and hope to many in the most desperate of situations. In addition, we hosted a local gathering preaching the good news of grace in the supernatural power of the Spirit.

Gospel Mania USA Comes to West Coast

John Crowder and worship musician Tim Wright are blasting both coasts of the USA. The West Coast leg of the Gospel Mania Tour comes to four cities in April. We invite everyone in the region to come enjoy a big drink of Gospel glory.

The two will visit: Port Hueneme, Southern California April 20-21 Woodland Park, Colorado April 22-23 Phoenix, Arizona April 24-25 Portland, Oregon April 26-27 Space is limited. Early bird registration available online at www.TheNewMystics.com/Tour

Gospel Mania USA Comes to East Coast Crowder’s Newest Book Out This Spring

In this scandalous upcoming book, John Crowder offers a biblical companion to the happy life. Money.Sex.Beer.God. exposes the encroachment of Gnosticism over 2,000 years of church history ... the idea that the natural, material world is somehow evil and at odds with our spirituality. Crowder makes the case that God is pro-party, and that Biblical guidelines of morality are issued to preserve and enhance our joy - never to diminish it. Specifically, he hits the most controversial, real-life topics imaginable — money, sex, alcohol and more. Get it now at www.JohnCrowder.net

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Gospel Mania’s East Coast leg with John Crowder and worship musician Tim Wright picks back up in October coming to four cities. Tickets are now on sale for this ecstatic event, so lock in a spot early for the region nearest you.

The two will visit: Pepperell, Massachusetts Oct. 19-20 Harrisburg, Pennsylvania Oct. 21-22 Nashville, Tennessee Oct. 23-24 Chicago, Illinois Oct. 25-26 Space is limited. Early bird registration available online at: www.TheNewMystics.com/Tour

News

Indonesia Ignites - Join us Again in 2016 SOT brought a team to Jakarta, Indonesia reaching the poorest of the poor last fall - visiting leper colonies, feeding the hungry in the garbage dumps and preaching the scandal of grace! There was such an explosion of glory and power, we have decided to return again to Indonesia this year in November 2016. But our next trip will also include an added stop in Manilla, Philippines where we will preach the Gospel and release impartation in a massive national gathering. Find out more about this trip on page 13, and join us on the mission field! Find out more at www.thenewmystics.com/asia

Cana Online Seminary Returns this Fall

Due to popular demand, Cana Online Seminary returns as an online classroom starting November 2, 2016. Cana has a one or two-year enrollment option. Cana is a drunken seminary – not just a dry intellectual course in doctrine. The vision is for happy theology woven seamlessly together with the intoxicating practice of the presence of God. Students gain a strong, revelatory understanding of the finished work of the cross as a basis for mystical, contemplative experience. A seamless union of Spirit and Word.

At Cana we have a rich roster of doctorate level theologians together with mystical ecstatics sharing the same platform.

Founded by John Crowder, speakers include Dr. C. Baxter Kruger, Mirror Bible translator Francois Du Toit, Matt Spinks, Dr. Eric Wilding, Rod Williams, Tony Seigh, Lily Crowder and more.

Registration for the 2016-2017 school year opens March 30.

Early bird sign up rates of $650 for the entire first year are available at www.Cana.co until October 14. Then the cost for the entire year increases to $700 (still considerably lower than our live school tuition in Portland). Students also have the option of enrolling for just one semester at a time (first semester is $275 and second semester is $375). A second- year course of Cana will also be available to those completing the first year.

SOT Sends Mission Team to Cuba This spring, SOT is bringing a team of 30 to Havana, Cuba for a mission to underground churches, sharing the love and power of the Gospel. Cuba is more open than ever before to the Message, with restrictions easing for ministry travel. Although this trip in March is full, you can still join us in the the Philippines and the Muslim country of Indonesia this fall. Visit www.thenewmystics.com/cuba

Our course themes cover the finished work of the cross, Trinitarian theology, supernatural experience, contemplative spirituality, New Covenant grace and mystical Christianity. Students are also provided with both required and recommended reading lists. Cana’s course of study is accessible enough for folks with no theological background, yet deep enough to challenge and train existing pastors and ministers. Online students receive a weekly video class, along with a web exam. Find out more at www.Cana.co or write us at cana@thenewmystics.com

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From the Publisher ...

This installment of The Ecstatic is in many ways chiefly voted to iconoclasm – the shattering of our false and idolatrous images of God. Included is an original piece I have written directly on the subject inspired largely by C.S. Lewis. It is further amplified by a short article from Dr. Steve McVey, “Do we all Worship the Same God?” Our most extensive offering is an extended excerpt from my upcoming book Money.Sex.Beer.God. Although the article deals with iconoclasm in a more indirect manner, the principle is still resoundingly clear. Our concept of a distant, static God who sits separate from our earthy, human pleasures and natural world existence is a product of pagan Greek thinking. So often the church has vilified the very real-world gifts of God – demonizing or perverting them, rather than baptizing them through a lens of an incarnate Gospel.

In this issue Overall, readers will find us sticking closely to the themes we’ve built upon for years: the return to a Christ-centered, joyous, ecstatic message of union with the author of pleasure itself. The good news of scandalous grace further resounds in this issue in the writings of Fr. Robert Capon, together with an original piece from Rod Williams, senior coordinator of our Cana New Wine Seminary. For all you Gospel junkies interested in Cana Seminary, you’ll be pleased to learn that the course will be offered again online this fall as a distance-learning course!

In other happenings, you’ll get updates from our recent mission trips to the Muslim world and beyond – and be sure to check out our upcoming mission trip planned for next fall where you can join us in two nations, Indonesia and Philippines. Our regular Meditations section features contemplative thoughts from Madame Jeanne Guyon.

Stay Subscribed to The Ecstatic This is our fourth issue of The Ecstatic since our publication has gone digital, though we do provide some print copies to partners in the U.S. Although we recognize many prefer a print edition of the magazine, our transition to digital allows us to distribute freely 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. Those of you who join the newslist will also receive our regular Jesus Trip teaching videos.

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 union with God. 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 © 2016 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

www.TheNewMystics.com

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Contents 2 5 9 11 12 13 14 16 18

News: The Latest from Sons of Thunder The Life of the Party - John Crowder God Reveals Himself - Rod Williams Vulgar Grace - Fr. Robert Capon Sons of Thunder Itinerary Indonesia Mission Do We All Worship the Same God? - Dr. Steve McVey The Great Iconoclast - John Crowder Meditations of the Mystics - Madame Jeanne Guyon

subscribe at www.thenewmystics.com

Join Sons of Thunder on Social Networking

Follow our Public Profile page at: www.Facebook.com/RevJohnCrowder Visit the page and click “Like” in order to stay up to date with posts, exciting events, testimonies and more. In addition, we are also on Twitter – you can follow John’s happenings at www.Twitter.com/TheNewMystics And if you have an iPhone, you will want to download “The New Mystics” Application for free. Besides helping you keep tabs on the ministry, the iPhone app enables you to watch each week’s Jesus Trip video from the convenience of your mobile device.

The Life of the Party Excerpt from Money.Sex.Beer.God. God is pro pleasure. Mankind was created to dwell in the bliss of God’s presence in Eden. Eden literally means pleasure or voluptuous living.1 God walked with Adam in the garden in the cool of the day, which in Hebrew is ruach (walking in the delight of His Spirit).2 Humanity was not created for depression, toil and the curse of a fallen world.

Deep within, humanity longs for the ultimate satisfaction for which we were created – to drink of those rivers of pleasure that flow from His side forevermore (Psalm 36:8, Gen. 2:10). Religionists have wrongly attributed the desire for pleasure to the sinful nature. But the sinful nature was that fallen Adamic delusion that we could find ultimate satisfaction outside of God. Christians have often viewed the heathen world chasing after gratification and thus concluded that the pursuit of happiness is inherently wrong.

Furthermore it is often stated that the believer should attempt to crucify and kill off his appetite for pleasure. But the heathen also have noses on their faces. Does that mean we should cut off our noses? No there is a God-shaped hole in the heart of every man that cannot be quenched. Any number of legalisms and attempts to suppress it only cause a perversion of those appetites and cause sin to increase (Rom. 5:20).

“But be sure that human feelings can never be completely stifled. If they are forbidden their normal course, like a river they will cut another channel through the life and flow out to curse and ruin and destroy,” writes A.W. Tozer. 3 People unknowingly pursue drugs, materialism, substance abuse and promiscuity in a misguided chase to recapture this lost sense of satisfaction that only the presence of God can provide – something man inherently remembers from the garden. Sin offers any number of momentary indulgences that are followed by devastation to health and homes, ending in broken families, poverty, suicide and destruction for future generations. There are countless billboards offering the promise of

by John Crowder

satisfaction in this world, but if you are going to be a real hedonist – a true pleasure seeker – you must inevitably embrace Jesus. He is the fountainhead of all delight. “Christ arrived as the high priest of the bliss that was to be…” (Heb. 9:11, James Moffatt Translation).

of the fall of Adam is the concept of separation from God. This idea was profoundly developed and flourished in early Greek philosophy, which has influenced and permeated Christian theology in the Western world for nearly 2,000 years.

But here is where Pandora’s box of confusion lays waste to our fragmented minds in the attempt to partition off our natural world existence apart from our spirituality. While mouthing the words “God is good” we foster a lingering suspicion that He is not authentically good by our own definition of the word (perhaps “good for us” like cough medicine, but not in the sense of ecstatic everlasting delight); He can’t fulfill our itch. Our contorted view that God is intrinsically against us is bolstered by innumerable religious fears that He is the supreme Ego who cannot be supplicated, demands retribution and sits far away aloof and non-sympathetic to our day-to-day existence. We project our own fears,

Incarnation vs. Greek Dualism The incarnation is a monumental shift in how we must view reality. God has come close. Heaven and earth are reconciled in the incarnation. God and man find their union in the flesh and blood person of Jesus Christ. Heaven and earth have been permanently rewired in the person of Christ.

And this union somehow cosmically stands outside the limitations of time and space. Long before little baby Jesus was born in a manger in Bethlehem, His death mystically pre-dated the foundation of the world! (Rev. 13:8, 1 Peter 1:20) God was never separate from us. Separation was the very delusion of Adam’s fall.

“Jesus ate, drank, sweat, farted and laughed with His buddies.

He fully incorporated the human life into the Godhead.” condemnation and human hatred onto our image of Him, essentially inventing a caricatured entity of G.O.D. Inc. which is a distant spectre of a deity who cannot possibly relate to our real-time joys of living.

Don’t make me come down there!

Our fallen minds have contrived a division between God and ourselves. Invented a concept of an ethereal, unrelatable deity who cannot possibly empathize with our temporal needs and wants because He is essentially unnatural … a disembodied, incorporeal spook. When we fell away from God, we wrongly assumed that He fell away from us.

Over several millennia, the fallen Adamic mind perfected its own detailed theology that God is over there, and I am over here. The foundational doctrine

In a very real sense, there has never been a separation between Heaven and earth – except in the enmity of our own minds caused by sin (Col. 1:21-22). We have been obsessed with a separation that doesn’t exist from His perspective.

A separation He has dealt with once and for all – even before it happened. Yes, separation was very “real” from our point of view. Isaiah 59 tells us that our sins “separated us” from God. It blinded us to the actuality of His love and nearness. As the chapter continues, “Like the blind we grope along the wall, feeling our way like people without eyes” (Isa. 59:2). It blinded us to His glory, but sin never veritably “removed” God from us. Isaiah says this glory completely fills heaven and earth (Isa. 6:3). Indeed sin caused us to pull away and hide in the bushes like Adam. Fleeing from intimacy, relationship and vulnerability. But there is no rock we could hide under, no bush that is not aflame with His presence. David said, “If I make my bed in hell, there you are!” (Psalm 139:8). Sin had two radically different effects upon man and God. For man, sin caused us to run away from God. For God, it caused Him to run toward man. And this God-to-human Continued on page 6

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< Continued from page 5 movement was consummated in the incarnation, life, death and resurrection of Jesus (something He had always fore-ordained from the dawn of time, before we ever fell in Adam). The New Testament never tells us that Jesus died to “reconcile God back to us” as if God had ever pulled back from us, disgusted by our failings. No, the scriptures clearly state that Christ died to “reconcile us back to God” (2 Cor. 5:18-19, Col. 1:20, Rom. 5:10, Eph. 2:16). The Gospel is concerned with pulling us back – waking us up to the reality that we were never abandoned. The cross was not about God being paid off so the Father could love us. It was about repairing our corrupted state! We were the ones that needed the fix. God was always present and for us, even when we fell into the delusion that we could run and exist apart from Mr. Existence Himself. He has always unconditionally loved us.

Bad theology produces bad worldviews. And such worldviews have caused all sorts of destruction throughout the centuries. The incarnation flies in the face of the Greek dualism that has shaped many of our ideas about theology, science, politics and life itself. Dualism essentially defines a separation between “natural world” and “spiritual world.” Visible and invisible. Mind versus matter.

Spirit substance versus material container … and most prominently, the idea that God is separate from man. This stuff infected the ideas of the early Church in our Western world from the beginning.

The dualistic concept that God is distant from us is the source of our problems. But there is a far greater level of trouble when this dualism blossoms into what is called gnosticism.

Gnosticism takes this numbskull idea to an extreme that the material world is divorced from the spiritual world. Gnostics go so far as to say the material world is evil! This is the core concept of religion.

Gnostics didn’t even believe Jesus came in the flesh, because His natural body would have been evil. They thought He was just a “spirit being.” No way could God have stepped into our stinky, sullied human flesh! So the apostle John had to warn us that anyone claiming Christ didn’t come in the flesh is of the antichrist (1 John 4:3, 2 John 1:7). Jesus ate, drank, sweat, farted and laughed with His buddies. He fully incorporated the human life into the Godhead. But gnosticism holds to the premise that we must reject everything that is natural and earthy. We must beat up our bodies to gain spiritual benefit. This is why religion loves practices

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like fasting and asceticism. Anything physically pleasurable is considered wrong.

This vilification of the natural world manifests in a thousand ways in religion today. Money, wine and music are considered evil. Procreate with your wife, but don’t enjoy it, because physical pleasure is wrong! Wear uncomfortable, starchy clothes to church – you can’t possibly be comfortable and spiritual at the same time. Rejecting the world and rejecting selfish worldliness are radically different things.

We have conceived that God is the brutal taskmaster – the grumpy school marm who doesn’t want us to enjoy life. But this religious rejection of natural goodness and pleasure of earthly living is actually the spirit of the antichrist. It masquerades as “holiness.” The Bible never once tells us the antichrist is one specific person we need to one day look out for like the fiction of Tim LaHaye. Religion

“The dualistic concept that God is distant from us is the source of our problems.”

is the antichrist spirit. But we don’t think religion is that bad. “It’s not like murder or pornography or rape … It’s only religion! Shows up to church every Sunday.” We think of religion as the white witch of the east … not as wicked as outright carnality. But religion is the very anti-incarnation that seeks to impose a division between God and humanity and get you climbing an endless hill of redundant works to bridge a non-existent gap that can never be breached with God. It throws salvation back upon your lap to kill of your natural self and appetites and climb some unseen spiritual ladder. But in actuality, those God-given appetites are not wrong. They are in need of proper direction.

The goal of this gnostic-antichrist spirit is kill off your humanity in the name of “death to self” and somehow arrive at becoming a disembodied spirit.

For the gnostic, the “spirit realm” is good, but the physical world is wicked. Life in this world is a fallen danger zone. Or is it?

Life is in Christ and He lights up the light of mankind (John 1:4).

In my book Money.Sex.Beer.God. I aim to give a thorough explanation of how dualism and gnosticism have influenced the thought of Western

culture and in the church with a broader historical snapshot. Besides tackling specifics on the church’s confusion around these “natural world pleasures,” we also take a glance at some early heresies that confused or ignored the incarnation, attempting to diminish God’s humanity in Jesus. And we will look at numerous philosophies that were influenced by this dualistic worldview that still bolsters the idea of separation from God in our society to this day.

What is often taught as “the gospel” is really just a rehashed version of the ancient pagan Greek philosophy of Plato. We will unweave some bad thinking and hopefully cheer you up a bit.

Together with legalism (trying to please God by rule-keeping), gnosticism was the biggest heresy in the early church. All of Paul’s churches fell into one of those two problems. And although it has come in many packages, it remains the largest problem today. Causing untold harm to how we relate to the natural world around us.

We need to deal with the fundamental way that we think (Repent! The Greek word metanoia means change your mind) about the relation between our spiritual and natural lives. And booze, cash and copulation tend to clash with spirituality in the minds of most churchgoers. We need to reformat our understanding to know that – thanks to Jesus – there is no split between our spirituality and the daily pleasures of living. This opens up to us such a place of wholeness and harmony … it settles the unrequited tempests of addiction and idolatry as well as misplaced self-denial.

I began by saying that God is pro pleasure. His presence is pure ecstasy and the thing we crave at our deepest level. This in no way ever precludes the rock solid fact that God also gives us natural pleasures! He never expected that the only time you’re ever allowed to experience happiness is when you get a goose bump and a shiver during a foot-stomping Holy Ghost meeting. God made boobs and gold and single malt scotch. He made tropical beaches, coffee, pheromones, fatty foods and carbohydrates.

The truth lies not in the eradication of appetites and desires, but directing them toward their biblical outlets. We are to consider ourselves dead to sin (Col. 3:5), and realize that our truest longings are satisfied in God alone. But we do not call his gifts sinful. Only their perverted uses. Therefore we can appreciate those good things of life with which He

graces us in a wholesome balance.

The Bible as Pleasure Manual Somehow the sacred texts of scripture have been so abused by our dualistic minds, we have failed to see their whole purpose. The Bible is not an arbitrary rulebook designed to quench our pleasure. In fact, the scriptures are all about enhancing our pleasure.

I’m not promoting narcissistic selfishness. Ironicaly, the highest joys are thinking outside ourselves! The point was never to enforce haphazard regulations against anything that is fun. In fact, just the opposite is true.

When Christ is given His place, then the scriptures find their place. Otherwise you are looking at an impossible, conflicted list of hair cutting patterns and genital mutilations. Scripture is the means of grace by which we see Him. Yet when improperly handled, it becomes the very object of biblio-idolatry that blinds us to the Author Himself. In other words, when I read Leviticus, I don’t see a big legalistic finger pointing at me, condemning me for my failure at upholding the law. Instead, I see every scripture pointing its finger at Jesus Christ and His finished work. He is the Ultimate Word of God and the lens through which I read every other text. Now even Leviticus cheers me up!

In the New Testament we find freedom from the law of sin and death – freedom from ceremonial and legal regulations of the Mosaic codes that were never intended to fix up our problems anyway. The law highlighted our need for grace. But the apostles did not leave it there. “Okay kids, now that you’re free from the requirements of the law, just go poke around in the dark and try your damnedest to figure out a way to live that works best for you.” No. Surely whom the Son sets free is free indeed. We are children of liberty. But only a deadbeat father would let his kids run loose without providing direction on how their lives are to be most successfully spent and satisfactorily lived. The Abba of Jesus is our Abba, and He wants the best for us.

Freedom from the law does not mean the scriptures are no longer applicable to us today in terms of guiding how we should live! In the New Testament, the apostles have extracted for us the very spirit of right living that was shadowed in the law. Peter, Paul and John dismiss the redundant Old Testament regulations on what to eat and what to wear and hundreds of eccentric commands that were only shadows pointing to Christ. They had

no real moral value. External rules that would be meaningless once the True Substance – which is Jesus – has appeared.

But there are many moral guidelines that are timeless, and the apostles (men directly commissioned by Christ Himself to teach us), by divine inspiration tell us what guidelines carry over into this new era of grace. Circumcision is irrelevant they say. Paul tells us clipping the end of your tallywhacker is pointless, but he also tells us not to stick it into someone you aren’t married

You didn’t see the patriarchs taking vows of celibacy because they thought sex was evil. They had a culture of feasting and wine drinking. And when have you ever known a Jewish brother to take a vow of poverty? to, because that goes against the spirit of the law, which is love. True love – on that level – is not to be confused with mere lust. So tallywhacker usage is confined to a committed, monogamous, married relationship, where sex is designed to give us the deepest, lasting fulfillment the way God intended.

And all that for our ultimate pleasure.

In other words, New Testament moral guidelines are veritably recipes for satisfaction. Not prohibitions to quench your party. They are parameters to aim you toward the fullness of life in this world according to God’s design. Although in the name of “freedom” we often feel we can make better decisions for ourselves than what the New Testament scriptures prescribe. The end game is always going to be a lesser enjoyment and diminished glory than if we listened to the One who sees the end from the beginning. God will still love us if we forge an unbiblical path. Love is not performance based.

But why settle for less than his perfect blissful prescription for our lives?

Part of the problem is that most people see the scriptures as a homogenous book of restrictions.

They don’t know the difference between old and new covenants. Between law and grace. Between a life of regulation and a life of relational communion in the Spirit. They don’t know that Jesus perfected us. The average Christian grasps the basic concept

that Old Covenant rules don’t make you holy (forfeiting shellfish or baby back pork ribs doesn’t fix your heart – Jesus does). However, the problem is that these same Christians often think that the New Covenant moral guidelines – such as those in Paul’s letters – constitute a sort of New Testament law.

Paul did not offer moral guidelines as a way to purify you or make you holy. “Husbands honor your wives.

Parents don’t exasperate your children … Do these things and you will become holy.” No! That is the exact opposite of what Paul said. He always starts with the indicative (“You are already holy thanks to Jesus”), and then moves to the imperative action (“Now since you are holy, start acting like it!”). He always starts with identity, and out of that flows our action. Change of lifestyle is presented as a fruit of recognizing our gift of holiness, not a surcharge by which we somehow purchase it.

When we understand that the moral guidelines in the epistles are not a formula for “getting right” with God, it changes everything. It takes performance out of the equation. I can now see that God already loves and accepts me regardless. So why does He tell me to live a certain way? Because only in walking in this God-given design am I going to experience all of the deep joys and divine happiness He has intended in this world. I can live a life of true charity and be a blessing to others as well in my family, community and society.

If we feel that biblical morality is an impersonal, onesize-fits-all blanket formula that feels restrictive, we have missed the point. God speaks to us about living life in ways that apply to everyone – because they are principles that apply to all that is intrinsically human. If we feel differently than what we find in scripture, it does not mean our emotional longings are wrong – but they are sometimes misplaced due to our lack of understanding.

Old Covenant Hebrew thought (even with its legal restrictions) was not infected with the Greek dualisms we now have in modern Christianity. In many ways, they understood that God was proparty much more than we do today! So much of what the church calls evil was considered a gift by our Jewish forefathers who did not dissect a difference between their physical and spiritual lives. You didn’t see the patriarchs taking vows of celibacy because they thought sex was evil. They had a culture of feasting and wine drinking. And Continued on page 8

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< Continued from page 7 when have you ever known a Jewish brother to take a vow of poverty?

In some ways, even the Old Covenant Jewish law was less restrictive than what many fundamentalist Christian preachers impose upon their flocks today.

But the truth of the biblical model is far different.

Only in the biblical model do natural world pleasures serve us, rather than destroy us. We are made to enjoy life’s pleasures. The key is that we filter those pleasures through the word. The scriptures serve as a guide to prevent us from going into the ditch of abuse. For instance, alcohol is a gift. But we are warned away from excess and overindulgence and encouraged to use moderation. A few drams of 16-year Lagavulin never hurt anyone. But drink a whole bottle of Jack Daniels everyday and you are going to end up in a gutter, broke, losing your job and getting a divorce. That is not pleasurable. See, contrary to popular opinion, the scriptures are propleasure at their core.

Greek and Roman Gnosticism Before addressing specific details of scripture related to money, hooch and nookie … We must know that our big-picture worldview on these earthly delights have been influenced by two types of gnostic thinking. These are two forms are Greek and Roman gnosticism. Both consider the physical world evil, but they deal with it differently.

Greek gnosticism is about beating up the body. It is heavy on asceticism, trying to kill off the natural.

Fasting is big for the Greek gnostic, because it is all about starving off the physical man in order to attain the spiritual. Money is obviously considered evil by these guys (Jesus never knocked money by the way, only the idolatry of it). For centuries our Catholic brothers have seen poverty as a virtue!

And who is the person that all Christians agree to hate? The prosperity preaching televangelist of course, because we still think of prosperity as being evil.

Then there’s sex. What an area of confusion for the church! Ever since the early church, it’s been taught that sex is sinful and that our bodies are dirty. Hence the age-old vow of celibacy and a twomillennia-old misconstruction of Paul’s teachings on singleness being better than marriage. Gnosticism rejects sex as inherently dirty even within the bonds of holy matrimony.

And obviously alcohol gets demonized by many

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Christians. The list goes on: music, dancing, etc.

Physical world gifts that the Greek gnostic rejects as sinful.

On the other hand, the Roman version of gnosticism also views the material world as intrinsically evil – but the Roman gnostic deals with it differently.

Rather than taking the ascetic route of fasting and self-denial, the Roman gnostic figures “We’re all trapped in this evil, fallen world. There’s nothing we can do about it anyway … so let’s have an orgy!”

The Roman gnostic turns to licentiousness and overindulgence as he figures his escape from the “evil world” is impossible. He can do anything he wants, and in a sense, nothing is truly considered “sinful” to these cats.

Paul, in his preaching of the scandalous grace of the cross was often accused of teaching “license to sin” and thus his adversaries leveled a charge that he was teaching Roman gnosticism. But grace is not freedom to sin; it is freedom from sin!

us guidelines on earthly delights not because He is anti-fun, but because He is actually the life of the party. Gnosticism has duped us into thinking the scriptures are anti-fun. Anti-earth. Anti-life. But in reality, the New Testament moral guidelines have always been about enhancing and sustaining our holistic joy! A joy that is intrinsically from God, sourced in God and organically connected to our life in the Spirit – the source of all satisfaction. A refreshing, right understanding of scripture directs us into the full, satisfying abundant life God has always intended for us in this world and the next.

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From Strong’s Concordance: Ednah H5727 pleasure

Gen. 3:8 “and they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the cool of the day (Strong’s Concordance Ruach H7307 a term for breath or wind, but often used for Holy Spirit) 2

A.W. Tozer, That Incredible Christian (Harrisburg, Pa.: Christian Publications, 1964), 50-52.

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Paul, in his preaching of the scandalous grace of the cross was often accused of teaching “license to sin” and thus his adversaries leveled a charge that he was teaching Roman gnosticism. But grace is not freedom to sin; it is freedom from sin!

In Christianity today, you see both of these manifestations. Either strict denial of all “wine, women and song” or else a loose, careless, antinomian living. Interestingly, Jesus warned us of two types of bad yeast – the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod (Mark 8:15).

One represents religious abstinence and the other represents worldly overindulgence. But Christ Himself is the true leaven of Heaven (Matt. 13:33) which is worked throughout the whole dough of our humanity so that we experience unity and wholeness in our earthly and spiritual lives.

The fact is that God gives us natural world pleasures as a gift to be received with thanksgiving!

Again, the ancient Hebraic mind always understood this. We may enjoy the world without being worldly when we take in life through the word! God gives

This article is excerpted from John Crowder’s newest book Money.

Sex.Beer.God. scheduled for release spring 2016. Get it at: www.johncrowder.net

GOD REVEALS HIMSELF Foundations in Joy Religion seeks to beat us up about doing more and trying harder to convince a reluctant and distant God to change His mind and come close — to love us. We have been taught that we must convince God to reveal Himself in response to us, yet He is the one who pursues us for relationship. When God stopped Abraham from sacrificing Isaac, He said that, if He needs a sacrifice, He will supply one. Our God supplies what we need. The God who created us does not depend upon us to seek Him. He seeks us. He reveals Himself.

Yes, we do grow in our relationship with God over time and we willingly respond in the loving relationship that God is freely offering to all men. However, well meaning terms like “keys,” “levels,” “pressing in,” “positioning ourselves,” “crying out for more,” and “getting marked” reinforce an impression that God is distant and reluctant.

“The Self-revealing of the Word is in every dimension — above, in creation; below, in the Incarnation; in the depth, in Hades; in the breadth, throughout the world. All things have been filled with the knowledge of God,” wrote Athanasius of Alexandria in On the Incarnation. “Even on the cross, He did not hide Himself from sight; rather, He made all creation witness to the presence of its Maker.”

Thomas F. Torrance, in The Trinitarian Faith, writes: …if we are really to know God it can be only through sharing in some incredible way in the knowledge which God has of himself. That is to say, we can know God only if he brings us into communion with him in the inner relations of his own being as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This sharing in the knowledge that God has of himself was made possible through the incarnation of God’s Son and his mediation of the Spirit of the Father and the Son. In the incarnation God communicated himself to us in Jesus Christ his beloved Son, not something about himself, but his very SELF, and thereby made himself known to us according to his own divine nature as Father.

We may coax Janus (the two-faced Greek god of mercy and judgment) to slightly turn the other face toward us, but the real God takes the initiative to show His goodness to us. It is His kindness that leads us to change our minds. We love Him, because He first loved us. Truly God is the one who has been relentless in His loving pursuit of us.

Religion seeks to beat us up about doing more and trying harder to convince a reluctant and distant God to change His mind and come close — to love us.

FOR THE JOY SET BEFORE HIM It was not for the passionless purpose of balancing a theological equation that Christ endured the cross, but for the joy set before Him — the restoration of our joy.

These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full (John 15:11, KJV).

When we lost sight of who we were in our darkness, Jesus came as the Light of the World to restore us to the joy of conscious union with our family of origin.

In John 14:20, Jesus revealed that beholding His soon coming death and resurrection would convince us of our ever-present union.

At that time [when that day comes] you will know [for yourselves] that I am in My Father, and you [are] in Me, and I [am] in you (John 14:20, AMP).

Union is not a future goal you seek to accomplish.

It is a revelation. You were recreated and born anew from above in an ecstatic expression of the original joyful union of the blessed Trinity when Jesus was raised from the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit.

On account of his vast mercy, he has given us new birth. You have been born anew into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the

By Rod Williams

dead (1 Peter 1:3, CEB).

Therefore if any person is [ingrafted] in Christ (the Messiah) he is a new creation (a new creature altogether); the old [previous moral and spiritual condition] has passed away. Behold, the fresh and new has come! (2 Cor. 5:17, AMP).

This restoration to joy lies not in a new insight or tool provided by Jesus for you to accomplish, but it is literally, IN Him and BY Him that we have been made new IN joy. Jesus did that!

“We are not saved by what Jesus taught, and we are certainly not saved by what we understand Jesus to have taught. We are saved by Jesus Himself, dead and risen. ‘Follow Me,’ He says. It is the only word that finally matters,” writes Robert Farrar Capon.

REST IN JOY Joy springs from spontaneous connection with divine rest. Our joy is founded on the rest of God, when we give up on any alternative identity, reality, activity or excuse and receive the unconditional love of God that made us new!

For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from His (Heb. 4:10, KJV).

For we which have believed do enter into rest, as He said, as I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world (Heb. 4:3, KJV).

Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief (Heb. 4:11, KJV).

BECOMING WHAT YOU BEHOLD We become what we behold. Behold the First Family, the face of our Genesis and the source of our Joy. Behold their perichoresis – the interpenetrating indwelling of the Trinity. The Lord our God is One. This Family has always thrived in mutual in-

Continued on page 10>

the ecstatic : spring-summer 2016 | 9

< Continued from page 9 dwelling, other centered love that is complete and beyond beautiful. They are truly One. Nothing of themselves is hidden or held back as they literally dwell in each other.

Here there is no shadow of turning, no conflict.

They are love without condition. They are peace without exception. They are joy without measure.

God’s justice is completely satisfied that mercy triumphs. They have only one opinion, one stance and one plan — love. God is love. Father, Son and Holy Spirit truly belong to one another.

Yet, in all their agreement and indwelling union, they exist as three persons. The individual being of Father, Son and Holy Spirit is completely empowered and celebrated by all three. Grounded in perichoresis, they have parrhesia — bold expression of their identity that is distinct but not separate.

Each lives, acts and experiences eternal life as their own, yet they would never dream of withholding anything from one another. All of life is shared completely in their union. Each celebrates the other. Any joy of the individual is the joy of all. Joy is the power which sustains perichoresis. The joy of the other is so highly valued within the love and peace of their union. Father, Son and Holy Spirit truly matter to one another.

This joyfully empowered utter oneness leaves no separation between their knowing of and their being in one another. Although we live and move and have our being in them now, we know in part. One day we shall see them as they are and we shall see who we have always been — beloved sons and daughters of the Most High God. They belong. They matter. You belong. You Matter.

Their joy is your joy.

JOINING GOD IN JOY Jesus did nothing alone. Since the Father and Jesus are one, He could not experience the cross without the presence of the Father. Because the Trinity is One in everything, wherever the Father and the Son are, Holy Spirit is present.

To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation (2 Cor. 5:19, KJV).

If nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus, what can possibly separate the Father from the Son? Jesus did not come to broker a theological deal in heaven but that our joy might be full on earth. He did not come to placate some dark side of His Father, for the Father of Jesus has no such conflict within Himself. He came into our darkness with His marvelous light to show us life eternal — His life with His Father and Holy Spirit.

This is the life of our origin. He came to show us that, at the highest level of reality, in the Family of the Most High God — we belong and we matter.

When we lost sight of who we were and practiced bad behaviors, He did not point a finger in disgust at a distance, but came utterly near as Emmanuel, God with us, to become us in our darkness and lead us out to His marvelous light. It was not for theological tidiness, legal litigation or account auditing that the Creator of All Things became man.

Hebrews tells us that it was for the joy set before Him that Jesus endured the unbearable pain of the cross. What was that joy? That would be you and me.

The purpose of the blood of Jesus is clear — it is

10 | the ecstatic : spring-summer 2016

for our conscience (Heb. 10:22)! Why? Because God knows we must have an innocent conscience to have a truly intimate relationship. Jesus demonstrated that the unconditional love of God keeps no record of wrongs, is long-suffering and always hopes.

The Father was in Christ Jesus reconciling the cosmos to Himself, not counting men’s sins against them. Father, Son and Holy Spirit conspired from the foundation of the world to save us. They took all the initiative. You have not chosen me, I have chosen you, said Jesus. We are reconciled first by God to Himself, so we can live a life reconciled with Him. We love Him because He first loved us.

He forgives His enemies. It is His kindness that leads us to repentance.

Shocking, but true — Forgiveness precedes repentance. Repentance is metanoia — getting our mind to agree with the mind of God. We became enemies in our minds. Jesus came to change our mind about God, not God’s mind about us. We are forgiven first so that we can repent or metanoia, change our minds and agree with what God already knows to be true about us. He made peace with us first so we could make peace with Him. If He does not have faith in us first, wherein shall we have faith at all? He gives us the gift of faith, so that we can believe in His goodness. His faith becomes our faith. His love becomes our love. His joy becomes our joy.

Throw up your best argument against the goodness of God. Tell Him how you are excluded and He will show you that you are already more than included.

If you feel accused, He says you are acquitted. If you feel like an outsider, you are grafted in. If you think you are a slave or servant, He calls you son and friend.

Jesus did nothing alone.

Since the Father and Jesus are one, He could not experience the cross without the presence of the Father.

What purpose is this salvation so complete and persuasive?

These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full (John 15:11, KJV).

LISTENING FOR THE MUSIC Behold the love that cannot be changed by your behavior, yet it changes your behavior and your experience to joy. Joy is more than an emotion we visit due to favorable circumstances or a temporary experience. It is His joy within us that remains as He desired.

This joy is not the absence of problems, defects, errors or sins. It is not denial about real problems and legitimate changes needed in our lives.

We can acknowledge what is “true” that needs to change, yet see THE Truth above and beyond that actually changes us. Jesus Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. This is the transcendent reality of what is most true about you.

True freedom is living conscious of your loving union now with Father, Son and Holy Spirit, consistent with how you were created to be — joyful.

Sin absolutely matters. It hurts us all so much.

However, if we could truly change by ourselves observing rules, there would be no need for the incarnation of Jesus.

I have been crucified with Christ [in Him I have shared His crucifixion]; it is no longer I who live, but Christ (the Messiah) lives in me; and the life I now live in the body I live by faith in (by adherence to and reliance on and complete trust in) the Son of God, Who loved me and gave Himself up for me.

[Therefore, I do not treat God’s gracious gift as something of minor importance and defeat its very purpose]; I do not set aside and invalidate and frustrate and nullify the grace (unmerited favor) of God. For if justification (righteousness, acquittal from guilt) comes through [observing the ritual of] the Law, then Christ (the Messiah) died groundlessly and to no purpose and in vain. [His death was then wholly superfluous.] (Gal. 2:20–21, AMP) True repentance, “metanoia” (Greek), is therefore not about feeling bad, for that is mere sorrow. It is not about renewed determination to do more and try harder to convince God to give you another chance. We needed a Savior to do what we could never do. Jesus did not come to change God’s mind about us, but our minds about God. He came to show us who we truly were and how we could live. Jesus came that we might have a true change of mind leading to Joy. This joy does not come from reminding ourselves about what is wrong with us, but agreeing with God about what He made right about us in Christ Jesus. Holy Spirit is not trying to “convict” you of sin, but to acquit your conscience that you might live in the reality of your righteousness. He reconciled us in the past so that we could live reconciled in the present (2 Cor. 5:14–6:2). He made peace with us in the past so that we could live in peace with Him today (Rom. 8:1).

“But all the while, there was one thing we most needed even from the start, and certainly will need from here on out into the New Jerusalem: the ability to take our freedom seriously and act on it, to live not in fear of mistakes but in the knowledge that no mistake can hold a candle to the love that draws us home. My repentance, accordingly, is not so much for my failings but for the two-bit attitude toward them by which I made them more sovereign than grace. Grace — the imperative to hear the music, not just listen for errors — makes all infirmities occasions of glory,” writes Capon.

Why not be fully persuaded that you are completely loved without condition? Let go of the past and see that the unauthentic you died with Christ.

Behold your co-resurrection in Christ when Jesus was raised by the power of the Holy Spirit that now dwells within you. Be filled with the consciousness of the very present reality of your union with Father, Son and Holy Spirit. See that you completely belong and you truly matter — now!

Yes, you have the faith! His faith is your faith. His faith arises in you to simply rejoice with God about the perfection of your relationship with Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Joy is yours!

This is the joy set before Jesus that caused Him to give all of Himself to you. You have a firm foundation for joy in Jesus Christ. His joy is your joy!

Vulgar Grace

By Fr. Robert Capon The entire human race is profoundly and desperately religious. From the dim beginnings of our history right up to the present day, there is not a man, woman, or child of us who has ever been immune to the temptation to think that the relationship between God and humanity can be repaired from our side, by our efforts. Whether those efforts involve creedal correctness, cultic performances, or ethical achievements – or whether they amount to little more than crassly superstitious behavior – we are all, at some deep level, committed to them. If we are not convinced that God can be conned into being favorable to us by dint of our doctrinal orthodoxy, or chicken sacrifices, or the gritting of our moral teeth, we still have a hard time shaking the belief that stepping over sidewalk cracks, or hanging up the bath towel so the label won’t show, will somehow render the Ruler of the Universe kindhearted, softheaded, or both.

But as the Epistle to the Hebrews pointed out long ago, all such behavior is bunk. The blood of bulls and goats cannot take away sins, nor can any other religious act do what it sets out to do. Either it is ineffective for its purpose, or the supposedly effective intellectual, spiritual, or moral uprightness it counts on to do the job is simply unavailable. The point is, we haven’t got a card in our hand that can take even a single trick against God. Religion, therefore – despite the correctness of its insistence that something needs to be done about our relationship with God – remains unqualified bad news: it traps us in a game we will always and everywhere lose.

But the Gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is precisely Good News. It is the announcement, in the death and resurrection of Jesus, that God has simply called off the game – that he has taken all the disasters religion was trying to remedy and, without any recourse to religion at all, set them to rights by himself.

How sad then when the church acts as if it is in the religion business rather than in the Gospelproclaiming business. What a disservice, not

only to itself but to a world perpetually sinking in the quagmire of religiosity, when it harps on creed, cult, and conduct as the touchstones of salvation. What a perversion of the truth that sets us free (John 8:32) when it takes the news that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us (Rom. 5:8), and turns it into a proclamation of God as just one more insufferable bookkeeper. …

The Messiah whom Jesus’ contemporaries expected – and likewise any and all of the messiahs the world has looked to ever since (even, alas, the church’s all-too-often graceless, punishing version of Jesus’ own messiahship) – are like nothing so much as religious versions of

Yes, it’s crazy. And yes, it’s wild, outrageous, and vulgar.

And any God who would do such a thing is a God who has no taste. And worst of all, it doesn’t sell worth beans.

But it is Good News – the only permanently good news there is – and therefore I find it absolutely captivating.

“Santa Claus is coming to town.” The words of that dreadful Christmas song sum up perfectly the only kind of messianic behavior the human race, in its self-destructive folly, is prepared to accept: “He’s making a list; he’s checking it twice; he’s going to find out who’s naughty or nice” - and so on into the dark night of all the tests this naughty world can never pass. For my money, what Jesus senses clearly and for the first time in the coin in the fish’s mouth (Matt.

17:24-27) is that he is not, thank God, Santa

Claus. He will come to the world’s sins with no lists to check, no tests to grade, no debts to collect, no scores to settle. He will wipe away the handwriting that was against us and nail it to his cross (Col. 2:14). He will save, not some miniscule coterie of good little boys and girls with religious money in their piggy banks, but all the stone-broke, deadbeat, overextended children of this world whom he, as the Son of man – the Holy Child of God, the Ultimate Big Kid, if you please – will set free in the liberation of his death.

And when he senses that ... well, it is simply to laugh. He tacks a “Gone Fishing” sign over the sweatshop of religion, and for all the debts of all sinners who ever lived, he provides exact change for free. How nice it would be if the Church could only remember to keep itself in on the joke.

He has done the whole job in Jesus once and for all and simply invited us to believe it – to trust the bizarre, unprovable proposition that in him, every last person on earth is already home free without a single religious exertion: no fasting till your knees fold, no prayers you have to get right or else, no standing on your head with your right thumb in your left ear and reciting the correct creed – no nothing… The entire show has been set to rights in the Mystery of Christ – even though nobody can see a single improvement. Yes, it’s crazy. And yes, it’s wild, outrageous, and vulgar. And any God who would do such a thing is a God who has no taste. And worst of all, it doesn’t sell worth beans. But it is Good News – the only permanently good news there is – and therefore I find it absolutely captivating. *** Excerpted from Kingdom, Grace, Judgment and The Romance of the Word by Fr. Robert Capon.

the ecstatic : spring-summer 2016 | 11

Itinerary Find the Party Near You!

Schools, conferences & mission trips with John Crowder

2016 Chico Mystical School

April 1-3

North California-Redding Area

Seattle Mystical School

April 8-10

Seattle, Washington

Port Hueneme, Calif.

April 20-21

Gospel Mania West Coast

Woodland Park, Colorado

April 22-23

Gospel Mania West Coast

Phoenix, Arizona

Live Monthly Web Conference: Interact With John Crowder

April 24-25

Gospel Mania West Coast

Portland, Oregon

April 26-27

Gospel Mania West Coast

Vancouver Mystical School

May 13-15

British Columbia, Canada

Florida Mystical School

July 29-31

Tampa, Florida

Sweden Mystical School

August 12-14

Stockholm, Sweden

Iceland Glory Gathering

August 15

Rejkavik, Iceland

Greenland Outreach

August 19-20

Ilulissat, Greenland

Russia Glory Gathering

August 23-24

St. Petersburg, Russia

Wisconsin Mystical School

September 9-11

Manitowoc County

Pepperell, Massachusetts

October 19-20

Gospel Mania East Coast

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

October 21-22

Gospel Mania East Coast

Nashville, Tennessee

October 23-24

Gospel Mania East Coast

Chicago, Illinois

October 25-26

Gospel Mania East Coast

Indonesia-Philippines Mission

November 11-20

Jakarta and Manilla

Switzerland Mystical School

Geneva, Switzerland

December 2-4

Schedule subject to change. Sign up for events early at:

www.thenewmystics.com 12 | the ecstatic : spring-summer 2016

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 Newly Relaunched – More User Friendly & More Features!

We just overhauled the Inner Sanctum with lots of new features, including a social media platform where you can create a profile, share pictures and chat with friends 24-hours a day. Here is a list of upcoming live broadcast dates – so mark your calendar.

This schedule is subject to change, so keep an eye on the Web site.

Upcoming Broadcast Schedule: February 28 March 28* *(Monday Night) April 17 May 22 June 12

July 17 August 7 September 18 October 16 November 27 December 11

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 40 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!

Team Visits Lepers Dumps & Muslim Slums Return with us to Indonesia/Philippines in 2016 Sons of Thunder recently took a mission team to Indonesia, the largest Muslim nation of the world, bringing the party to the poorest of the poor in the very margins of society. We also have plans to return in Fall 2016, in a blowout tour that also includes a stop in the Philippines.

Our international team visited the leper colonies of Jakarta, spending time and sharing hugs with one of the most outcast segments of the population. Bringing food, prayer and Gospel cheer, we preached and demonstrated God’s love and inclusion in Christ with tangible relief of groceries and the Father’s healing touch. Next, we ventured to the nation’s largest garbage dump, seeking out those who literally live and scrape along by rummaging through scraps amid smoldering mountains of rubbish.

The team fed hundreds of impoverished Christians, Muslims or just whoever was hungry – both in the slums and right in the garbage dumps.

Their reception to the Gospel message was overwhelmingly positive in an atmosphere of joy and supernatural manifestation right in the midst of their poverty. In addition, we also hosted glory meetings in the churches, where a heavy atmosphere of God’s miracle working presence rested in a weighty drunken melee. Many were touched and were first awakened to the message of grace, while signs followed as dozens of large feathers began appearing out of thin air and people were physically healed.

There is always such a thick, sticky weight of glory when we visit Indonesia that we have decided to return once more in November 2016. Our team will again party with the lepers, visit the garbage dumps and reach out to the hungry. But our upcoming trip will be unique, as we will also add Manila, Philippines to the itinerary. In the Philippines, we will host a massive gathering, preaching the grace of Christ crucified and releasing a powerful impartation of healing, miracles and the

intoxicating love of Jesus Christ. And you get to participate!

If you are hungry to experience the supernatural – seeing and feeling the Lord operate tangibly through you in blessing the poor – prayerfully consider joining us on the next mission. The trip is now open for applicants to join us. Take a faith step and plunge into something different – watch the Lord provide for you every step of the way and literally experience a life-changing point of departure from all you’ve ever known!

Space is limited. Early registration recommended.

Total Cost: $1,950 (see details online) Team Applications Due: June 31, 2015 Final Trip Payment Due: Aug. 31, 2015 Trip Dates: Nov. 11-20, 2016 Registration: www.TheNewMystics.Com/Asia

the ecstatic : spring-summer 2016 | 13

Do We All Worship The Same God?

By Dr. Steve McVey

Their god supposedly created them just so he could have humans to validate his value and do his bidding in the world. My God created me to know Him and to revel in the reality that He knows me.

(John 17:3) My God doesn’t need anybody to do anything for Him but, on the other hand, is gracious enough to allow us to participate in what He is doing in the world. (Acts 17:25, Ephesians 2:10)

by our feeble and futile efforts. He is a petty mini-god whose obsessive compulsion about the moral minutia of our daily lives takes precedence over any love we would want him to actually have for us as individuals. He certainly will feel strongly about us at any given moment but you can be sure that how he feels is inseparably connected to whatever we are doing at that very moment.

Do we all worship the same God? Not me. I know it may sound harsh but the God I know isn’t the same god as theirs.

Their god imposed a holy book upon them with strict orders to adhere to its teaching or else.

My God lovingly gifted us with inspired scripture to show the beauty of His love by pointing us to the love revealed in His Son through its words. (John 5:39) Their god demands that they convert people to him by whatever means it takes. My God empowers those who follow Him to love people into the conscious awareness of His embrace.

(Romans 2:4) Their god judges them based on how they act, talk, feel and even think. My God loves and accepts me no matter how wrong I get it at times.

(2 Timothy 2:13)

Their god is for their religion and theirs alone.

My God isn’t into religion at all but is eternally committed to people of every nation, culture and even religion. (Ephesians 4:6) Their god insists on a theistic government that fits their religious views on every issue. My God seeks to invade every government with one and only one agenda – expressing pure love to all. (Genesis 22:18) Their god is into payback toward those who act in ways he has not ordered. My God is concerned with put-back by making things right for those who misbehave and changing their hearts. (Isaiah 30:18) Who is this god and who are they? This god is the god of my past and they are the beloved inmates of the prison in which I lived for so long, the ones for whom I still feel nostalgic affection and an authentic, heartfelt connection. This pseudo-deity is the god of the Bible-believing, church-going, clean-living, faithful Christians who have seen the Abba of Jesus be reduced to a religious icon who needs to be appeased

Thank God for the day I walked away from that god. I renounced him and have never looked back. I walked out of the darkness of dead duty into the Light of Life and in that Light encountered the True and Living God. No, we don’t all worship the same God. Some gods are not to be followed but forsaken. It sometimes feels blasphemous to reject the god of our distorted imaginations. Idols seem very real when we have lived with them for a long time, but the doorway to freedom is entered as grace empowers us to say no to the false gods to whom we have sworn allegiance and to say yes to the God perfectly revealed in Jesus Christ. If our God doesn’t look just like Jesus, we’ve been duped for He and He alone is “the exact representation of His nature” (Hebrews 1:3).

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BEER. GOD. a new book from John Crowder available at JohnCrowder.net the ecstatic : spring-summer 2016 | 15

The Great Iconoclast In 1952 when Joy Davidman Gresham – future wife of author C.S. Lewis asked him to autograph her copy of his work, The Great Divorce, he wrote, “There are three images in my mind which I must continually forsake and replace by better ones: the false image of God, the false image of my neighbours, and the false image of myself.”

This would be the central motif of a chapter to the book Lewis would never complete on iconoclasm. An iconoclast is one who attacks idols, venerated religious symbols, beliefs or institutions.

Lewis called God the Great Iconoclast.

God will not be confined to our limited, static perceptions of Him. He is too fluid, sublime and living to be contained within the shabby framework of our finite capacities of understanding. He does not dwell in manmade temples, theological constructs or ideologies.

Writers Jerry Root and Jennifer Trafton highlight this recurring theme of Lewis’ work – that God is iconoclastic — continually breaking our images or idols, “An image of God (or of another person, or oneself) formed after reading a book, hearing a lecture or sermon, or having a conversation with a friend may temporarily give greater clarity of thought. But if it is held too tightly, it becomes an idol that must be broken in order to allow a better image to take its place.”

It is impossible to see Him as He is when our minds are muddled with our own distorted ideas about Him. But man’s thoughts are silenced in the awe of His tangible majesty and splendor. He’s bigger than our mental roadblocks, and opinions are irretrievably altered by His real presence. We learn to let go. We transcend the limitations of human understanding, which give way like a wet tissue under the enormous weight of Mr. Reality Himself. Shall we then say that intellectual pursuit is a vanity? A futile practice of articulating the cloud of unknowing? By no means. Our lives are continually transformed by metanoia – the changing and renewal of our minds – in which this divine iconoclasm is so vital. Every breaking of mental strongholds makes way for a resurrection of fresh revelation. Yet the very aim of theological instruction should not be to construct new tabernacles, but to have our hearts engaged by the presence of God. Ultimately all our concepts and theology must stop

By John Crowder

at the door of faith … of trust. We will never have all the answers, but can rest assured that the Answer has us.

exceeds the capacity of our customary speech. For God is more truly contemplated than spoken of, and exists more truly than He is contemplated.”

The late Brennan Manning also articulated this principle of iconoclasm so clearly:

James Torrance puts it this way, “More important than our experience of Christ is the Christ of our experience.” In your highest modes of enjoying Him, He is still more real than the experience itself. Language is insufficient to communicate His incommunicable nature. Yet God is breathed through human lips. Oh the joys of articulating the Mystery!

In my own life, honoring the First Commandment, “I am Yahweh your God: you shall have no gods except me,” has meant repudiating the god of fear and wrath handed on to me by preachers, teachers and church authorities in my youth, repudiating the strange god who sees all non-Christians as good-for-nothings, who consigns all heathens to hell, who has given any one denomination a bonded franchise for salvation, who rubs his hands together with malicious glee and sends a Catholic to hell because he ate a hot dog on Friday, April 27, 1949. It has meant repudiating the strange god who flinches at gracing certain other churches with his presence; who despises a beleaguered couple who practice birth control; who forbids a divorcee the Eucharist; who ordains that some of his creatures (whether for race or creed or some other reason) shall be denied equal opportunity for employment and housing; who tells married Catholic priests that they are excommunicated and mature women that in America they can be vice president of the country but in the church they must sit down, submit and shut up. This same spiritual process of repudiating unreal images of God can be found in the writings of the Hebrew prophets and in the work of spiritual formation that Jesus undertook with His first disciples. Because they had fashioned their own image of the Messiah, they resisted the mission of the real Messiah, asking Him impatiently when He would triumphantly reveal His power to Israel. They looked for an unreal messiah of their own making and found a real one of God’s making — but only after they were dispossessed of all their illusions and expectations. Expectations are our subtle attempts to control God and manipulate mystery. We can get so wrapped up in them that when Jesus breaks into our lives in new and surprising ways, we neither recognize Him nor hear His message.

In Surprised by Joy, Lewis says that in God’s mercy He destroys the walls of the temples we build in order to give us a greater revelation of Himself. The same is true of all our conceptualizations of Him, even those borne through divine encounter itself.

He is far more real than the loftiest experience. Augustine said, “The supreme excellence of the divinity

Our images of God must give way to God Himself.

And surely our own insecurities, sin consciousness and low estimations of ourselves must likewise be shattered by the reality of our true identity in Him – as holy, spotless perfect children of light in whom no darkness dwells thanks to the finished work of Christ. The Adamic nature – the very lie existence of sinfulness has been eradicated completely and decisively at the cross. Furthermore, our vision of humanity must also be radically shifted.

Perhaps a key to abundantly loving our neighbor is to drop the false projections: the familiarity that breeds contempt – the thousand shallow categorizations and snap judgments by which we classify our fellow man (so often hurling our own self-loathing onto them) – having locked them into static, caricature images and dulling ourselves to the very mystique of the divine spark latent within all humanity.

Our journey is to continually wake up to the inherent glory of God resident within our children, our spouse, our neighbors and friends.

In A Grief Observed, following the tragic passing of his wife Joy to cancer in 1960, C.S. Lewis was forced to face these idolatrous boxes of iconoclasm in the most painful of ways. His own temporal and changing perceptions of her had been radically incomplete.

“All reality is iconoclastic,” he wrote. “The earthly beloved, even in this life, incessantly triumphs over your mere idea of her.” Not only must we discover the True Self. But also our True Neighbor. And quite often we do so despite the fact that our neighbors may not know themselves. We see the same line of thought echoed in the late catholic mystic Thomas Merton, who wrote, “The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image.”

Lewis says, “My idea of God is not a divine idea.

Continued on page 19 >

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Meditations of the Mystics Come! Drink the Living Waters of Christ

My purpose is to induce the whole world to love God and to serve Him in a way that is easier and simpler than any could imagine. I invite the simple and the childlike to approach their Father.

Oh, if only once we could be convinced of God’s goodness towards His children and of His desire to reveal Himself to them! We would no longer seek our own selfish desires. We would not be so quickly discouraged from pursuing what He is so longing to give us.

We have all been called to the depths of Christ just as surely as we have been called to salvation. When I speak of this “deep, inward relationship to Jesus Christ,” what do I mean? Actually, it is very simple. It is only the turning and yielding of your heart to the Lord.

It is the expression of love within your heart for Him. I give you an invitation: If you are thirsty, come to the living waters. Do not waste your precious time digging wells that have no water in them. If you are starving and can find nothing to satisfy your hunger, then come. Come, and you will be filled.

You who are weighted down with your load of wretchedness and your load of pain, come. You will be comforted!

Dear child of God, your Father has His arms of love open wide to you. Throw yourself into His arms. You who have strayed and wandered away as sheep, return to your Shepherd. You who are sinners, come to your Savior.

You may think yourself the one farthest from a deep experience with the Lord; but, in fact, the Lord has especially chosen you! You are the one most suited to know Him well.

The Prayer of Simplicity So let no one feel left out. Jesus Christ has called us all. Oh, I suppose there is one group who is left out!

Do not come if you have no heart. You see, before you come, there is one thing you must do: You must first give your heart to the Lord.

How then will you come to the Lord to know Him in such a deep way? It is a prayer that leads you into the presence of God and keeps you there at all times; a prayer that can be experienced under any conditions, any place, and any time, the prayer of simplicity.

Oh yes, there is one thing to be concerned about.

Selfish desires can cause this prayer to cease. But even here there is encouragement, for once you have enjoyed your Lord and tasted the sweetness of His love, you will find that even your selfish desires no longer hold any power. You will find it impossible to have pleasure in anything except Him. I realize that some of you may feel that you are very slow, that you have a poor understanding, and that you are very unspiritual. Dear reader, there is nothing in this universe that is easier to obtain than the enjoyment of Jesus Christ! Your Lord is more present to you than you are to yourself! Furthermore, His desire to give Himself to you is greater than your desire to lay hold of Him. How then do you begin? You need only one thing. You need only to know how to seek Him. You will discover that this way to God is more natural and easier than taking a breath. By this “prayer of simplicity,” this experiencing of Christ deep within, you may live by God Himself with less difficulty and with less interruption than you now live by the air which you take into you.

I would like to address you as though you were a be-

18 | the ecstatic : spring-summer 2016

ginner in Christ, one seeking to know Him. Let me suggest two ways for you to come to the Lord… “praying the Scripture” and “beholding the Lord.”

Praying the Scripture “Praying the Scripture” involves both reading and prayer. Turn to the Scripture. Be careful as you read.

Take in fully, gently and carefully what you are reading. Taste it and digest it as you read.

In the past it may habit, while reading, to move very quickly from one verse of Scripture to another until you had read the whole passage. Perhaps you were seeking to find the main point of the passage.

But in coming to the Lord by means of “praying the

Scripture” you do not read quickly; you read very slowly. You do not move from one passage to another, until you have sensed the very heart of what you have read. You may then want to take that portion of Scripture that has touched you and turn it into prayer.

“Praying the Scripture” is not judged by how much you read but by the way in which you read. If you read quickly, it will benefit you little. You will be like a bee that merely skims the surface of a flower. Instead, in this new way of reading with prayer, you must become as the bee who penetrates into the depths of the flower. You plunge deeply within to remove its deepest nectar.

Of course, there is a kind of reading the Scripture for scholarship and for study — but not here. To receive any deep, inward profit from the Scripture, you must read as I have described. Plunge into the very depths of the words you read until revelation, like a sweet aroma, breaks out upon you.

I am quite sure that if you will follow this course, little by little you will come to experience a very rich prayer that flows from your inward being.

Beholding the Lord The second kind of prayer is “beholding the Lord” or “waiting on the Lord” [and it] also makes use of the Scripture but it is not actually a time of reading.

In “praying the Scripture” you are seeking to find the Lord in what you are reading, in the very words

By Madame Jeanne Guyon themselves. In this path, therefore, the content of the Scripture is the focal point of your attention. But in “beholding the Lord” you come to the Lord in a totally different way. As you come before your Lord to sit in His presence, beholding Him, make use of the Scripture to quiet your mind.

The way to do this is really quite simple. First, read a passage of Scripture. As you read, pause. The pause should be quite gentle. You have paused so that you may set your mind on the Spirit. You have set your mind inwardly — on Christ. Once you sense the Lord’s presence, the content of what you have read is no longer important. The Scripture has served its purpose; it has quieted your mind; it has brought you to Him. By faith you can hold your heart in the Lord’s presence. Now, waiting before Him, turn all your attention toward your spirit. Do not allow your mind to wander.

If your mind begins to wander, just turn your attention back to the inward parts of your being.

Remember, the Lord once promised to come and make His home within you (John 14:23).

It is not that you will think about what you have read, but you will feed upon what you have read. Out of a love for the Lord you exert your will to hold your mind quiet before Him. When you have come to this state, you must allow your mind to rest.

How shall I describe what to do next? In this very peaceful state, swallow what you have tasted. This is like enjoying the flavor of a very tasty food. In this quiet, peaceful state, simply take in what is there as nourishment. Stay with what the Lord has revealed to you; stay there just as long as the sense of the Lord is also there.

The awareness of His presence will eventually begin to decrease. When this happens, utter some words of love to the Lord or simply call on His name. Do this quietly and gently with a believing heart. In so doing, you will once again be brought back to the sweetness of His presence!

Wandering Thoughts Don’t try to deal with wandering thoughts by changing what you are thinking. If you pay attention to what you are thinking, you will only irritate your mind and stir it up more. Instead, withdraw from your mind! Keep turning within to the Lord’s presence.

Through many years of habit your mind has acquired the ability to wander all over the world, just as it pleases; so what I speak of here is something that is to serve as a discipline to your mind.

Be assured that as your soul becomes more accustomed to withdrawing to inward things, this process will become much easier. There are two reasons that you will find it easier to each time to bring your mind under subjection to the Lord. One is that the mind, after much practice, will form a new habit of turning deep within. The second is that you have a gracious Lord!

The Lord’s chief desire is to reveal Himself to you and, in order for Him to do that, He gives you abundant grace. The Lord gives you the experience of enjoying His presence. He touches you, and His touch is so delightful that, more than ever, you are drawn inwardly to Him. (Excerpts taken from Experiencing the Depths of Jesus Christ by Jeanne Guyon, written in 1685)

< Continued from page 16 It has to be shattered time after time. He shatters it Himself. He is the great iconoclast. Could we not almost say that this shattering is one of the marks of His presence?”

digms of His day.

Again, in his Letters to Malcolm (published posthumously), Lewis writes, “God must continually work as the iconoclast. Every idea of Him we form He must in mercy shatter. The most blessed result of prayer would be to rise thinking, ‘But I never knew before. I never dreamed …’”

No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him (Matt. 11:27).

Our friend Andre Rabe writes that Jesus comes “to make you an atheist in the god of your own making.

He comes to bring your faith – your way of subjecting God to your own understanding – He comes to bring that to an end.”

It is only at this place where our ideas and our faith is completely devastated that we have an opportunity to meet the God who transcends all our ideas about God. This is why so many church fathers and mystics have said something similar to this: To experience God is to experience the complete and utter failure of your own intellect.

This does not mean that we abandon our intellectual pursuit of Him. The silence that best describes God is not a silence of emptiness, but rather the awe at the superabundance of what can be said about Him. It is in this place of encounter that our concepts are continually drawn by the infinite God to transcend its own limits.

Yet in all this, we live in a postmodern world and theological climate in which everything is up for grabs.

There is clearly a propensity to make an idol of iconoclasm by exalting it as an end in itself.

Left in the void of unknowing – in the dark night of continual ambiguity about the nature of God – iconoclasm alone would be quite a depressing, forlorn prescription. Quite existential in fact. Can we know anything for certain? How can we know God? How do we know the unknown?

There is no rest in continual deconstruction. In fact, many relativistic philosophies determinedly make an idol of deconstructionism itself. A constant apophatic theology (telling us what God is not) must eventually make way for the positive affirmation of Who God is.

Of course Jesus was Himself a deconstructionist. He constantly challenged the prevailing religious para-

Remember when Jesus scandalously told the professional religious elite that none of them knew God?

No one knows the Father … this statement taken alone is quite daunting. But the greatest news on the planet is that Jesus in His humanity is the Knower. And Jesus in His divinity He is the Known God. The Known becomes the Knower. Jesus knows the Father for us – and as us – so we can know the Father through Him. And because of Him, one day we shall fully know, even as we are fully known (1 Cor. 13:12).

Jesus frustrates our own limited attempts at apprehending Him – but the tension only serves the ultimate release of seeing Him more clearly.

We are saved through trusting Jesus, not by figuring Him out. Perfect theology is a Person. The Mystery has chosen to reveal Himself fully and completely in the person of Jesus Christ.

Furthermore, scripture is a gift and a springboard for this revelation. There is interdependency. For how would we know the Christ of the scriptures except by the scriptures? And how would we understand the scriptures apart from knowing Him? But scriptures are no end in and of themselves, which is biblio-idolatry.

They all point to Him. And while they are often confused by our own human subjectivity, the scriptures are a diverse yet divinely unified sacred fixed point by which God’s voice is heard – resounding with the ultimate text which is Christ Himself.

“Whatever study of Scripture that excludes the unveiling of Jesus Christ is a futile study,” says Mirror Bible translator Francois Du Toit. “The only way to engage in scripture without more division or confusion is to see in it Jesus Christ.”

Jesus as the self-revealed image of the invisible God is the solid declaration of all that God is. All our epistemology (knowing) of God is summed up in Him. But to say He is summed up in Jesus, is this to truncate and limit God? No more than admitting His own self-imposed limitations by stepping into the very creation He breathed into existence … all in order to reveal Himself and draw His creatures into eternal communion.

God looks like Jesus. Existential ideologies that posit change for uncertainty to be the only constant (for all their presuppositions of evolving beyond the limitations of the human mind) amount to nothing more than another icon, image and ironically a box of rationality that says God cannot be revealed. In other words, iconoclasm left alone is the dark frustration of an unrevealed mystery.

Paul never says we will fully, intellectually grasp the Mystery. He says we have fellowship with the Mystery (Eph. 3:9). The Mystery is a Person with whom we forever interact. A Mystery whose very goal was to expose Himself – to be stripped bare and plainly published. In fact, the apostle Paul uses the word musterion more than any other New Testament writer, and almost exclusively in the sense that the Mystery has been revealed. Here in Ephesians 3:9, he wanted to “explain” or “make plain” and “bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things.” Paul was entrusted with an “administration of this secret.” The Secret does not exclude. It is self-revealing. Easy enough for a child understand is this Gospel which is searched out as the glory of kings.

Truth is a Person. Truth is not changing, though our perceptions of Him surely are. Truth is not relative, but He is alive. Our theological foundation must be solid – but it is not cold, stoic, lifeless dogma. We have a living Foundation. In the world of theological complexity, we can rest in one thing for sure … that God is completely summed up in Jesus Christ.

Christ is the object of our contemplation. Our intersection between the seen and the unseen, the finite and the infinite. We will never exhaust the depths of discovering His beauty, and yet we have fully arrived into Him in whom we live, move and have our being.

Sources: “The Great Iconoclast” by Jerry Root and Jennifer Trafton, Christian History & Biography 2005 The Relentless Tenderness of Jesus, by Brennan Manning, 2004.

Icons of Beauty, Andre Rabe.

Francois Du Toit session from Cana New Wine Seminary summer 2014.

the ecstatic : spring-summer 2016 | 19

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What if God’s predestination is not about choosing some for bliss and others for destruction? John Crowder explores the volatile passages of Romans 9-11 to shed new light on the debated doctrine of election. God is not choosing one human over another. Jesus Christ is the chosen, elected man on behalf of all humanity. And you are fully included in Him. John’s shortest book ever aims to cheer up theology’s biggest problem ever! Written as a companion book to Cosmos Reborn.

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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?

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Ephesians Euphoria Four-part Series on the Cosmic Incarnation

Abiding in the Wine Vine Sap Suckling & Fruit Bearing

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” 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.

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.

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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.

22 | the ecstatic : spring-summer 2016

John Crowder’s Joy Clinic Three-Part Extended Teaching Set

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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.

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Digital Download Store: www.johncrowder.net Contemplating the Mystery

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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.

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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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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.

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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 author John Crowder reads his newest release, 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.

the ecstatic : spring-summer 2016 | 23

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