Posts
Don't be fooled by the use of "Christ" and "God" in their titles or content. There is nothing Christian about these new age, gnostic books but deception after deception. If you don't know your bible well and do not have a walk with Christ, it is easy to be misled by the rubbish written in these books.
Eckhart Tolle's book, A New Earth, may be a bestseller and pitched by Oprah and her Book Club to be the real deal; but there is nothing real about this book. I particularly abhor how Oprah tells Christians that it is okay to read this book because she is a Christian herself. I believe that whilst she is a baptised Christian, I believe she is practicing new age beliefs and modern gnosticism, and that she is a backslidden Christian who might have been disillusioned by legalism, never got to know grace and sought for a different answer to her spiritual walk.
What Oprah's done for Tolle is this - championing of his books online and on her show, including promoting a 10-week online seminar series, watched by 11 million people. I caught bits of it on youtube and it is basically HYPNOSIS. =pp
Gnosis says the wisdom has to come from within the person, Christianity says Christ is the source of our wisdom. Gnostic books are full of half truths and lies - not easy for the less discerning amongst us to filter through.
Tolle acknowledges Christ merely as a teacher and misquotes much of the bible to fit his purpose. I have not read the whole book but I've read enough in Borders to feel both worried for Oprah fans who are being won over by her charisma to purchase and read this book. IT IS NOT CHRISTIAN. STEER CLEAR OF IT!
FYI, I find it interesting that his writing is comparable to another new age writer with the very, VERY dubious name of Belzebub.
Some articles/ views on Tolleism -
Robert Barron:
Tolle sees Jesus primarily as a
teacher and interprets salvation as a transformation of consciousness,
a kind of waking up to a new awareness. The Church certainly affirms
that Jesus is a teacher, but it emphatically states that He is
infinitely more than a spiritual guru, a wise and enlightened
philosopher. Jesus is God, and that makes all the difference. He is not
simply one teacher among many who has found a way to God; He in person
is the way; He is not simply one enlightened figure among many who has
come upon the truth; He in person is the truth. What He brings,
therefore, is not one teaching, however moving and transformative.
Marcia Montenegro:
The basics of this book are-
-
You identify with your ego, which brings you sorrow and pain, but you are not your ego and you are not your mind
-
Sin is forgetting that you are connected to the "Source"
-
You are deluded by identifying with "form" when actually, you are timeless "Presence;" you are formless "Being;" you are eternal "I Am"
-
You need to "awaken" to this true identity and be free of the ego and the mind so you can be your true Self, "formless Being"
-
Jesus was highly evolved man who realized these things and this is what he came to teach us
==========================================================================
I found this article also by Marcia Montenegro, an ex- New Age practitioner, very helpful. She identifies what are the key aspects of New Age teachings. Interestingly, some of them feel very Buddhist... I used to read Thic Nhat Hanh in my late teens & what Tolle says is not new, just re-packaged with a better marketing tool in Oprah. =p
WHAT IS THE NEW AGE?
The New Age is always a blend of beliefs; intermingling strands from Eastern accepted wisdom, New Thought, Gnosticism, the occult, and even Christianity. It uses terms from these beliefs but often changes the meaning, especially with Christianity, adding in other concepts along the way. Thus, the New Age has multiple facets, some of which differ widely from each other. However, the New Age embraces that which is compatible with its basic ideas:
-
God is one with the universe or is contained in the universe
-
Everything came out of God
-
We are pure eternal spirit, and come from God, and/or are pieces of God or are expressions of a divine being, and will return to God
-
God is usually not personal but is described as Intelligence, the Source, the One, the Divine, Consciousness, the Universe (Tolle uses "consciousness," "Being," "Presence," "Source") or variations of these
-
God emanated beings from himself in order for God to learn or experience something, and/or to experience him/herself in material form
-
We are trapped in our bodies and in a material existence; the world we see and our bodies are illusions or temporary forms that serve as vehicles for our eternal spirit
-
We are always evolving toward our purpose (usually through reincarnation), which is to awaken to our true Self, which is part of God or an expression of God
-
We must awaken to our true nature and reality by transcending the mind; thinking is a barrier to this awakening
-
Everything has a vibration; vibrations are higher or more spiritual the closer one is to realizing the true Self
-
Jesus was an advanced spiritual teacher, a highly evolved man who realized his true Self - the Christ Consciousness - a consciousness we all can attain
-
We have the ability to create our own reality
-
There is no sin, or sin is redefined as identification with the false self (or with form) and/or as a belief that we are separate from God
There are variations on the above, which are also very close to New Thought principles and to some Gnostic views. All the views above are embedded in some form in Tolle's book.
To hear it "straight from the Horse's mouth", check out this website by fellow Christians on Eckhart Tolle that features a video of him at what seems to be a snooze of a seminar, and the reflections by the Christians on how his views put forth in the video oppose what is taught in the Scriptures.
I love what this fellow Christian has to say on the comments section of that website:
"There is something very attractive although illusory in what Eckhart
has to say. He mentions how often our past failed performances create a
bad self image in the present, e.g., 2 or 3 failed marriages.
It
seems to me nevertheless that these are real moral failures. They have
real consequences in the present. Treating such real sins as though
they were nothing, and as though they were of no consequence, is to
deny that God has any sentiments about them. Subsequently we fail to
encounter His loving mercy and Fatherly forgiveness. As for me, I trust
the moral guidance of Jesus and cast myself on His self-giving love in
His crucifixion. Eckhart Tolle I'm not confident of. Jesus I love."
Eckhart sounds very logical but remember that what we deem true wisdom is seen as foolishness by this world. I dunno about you, but I'd rather be a fool for Christ anytime! =)
Forget about Anne Rice's irreverant attempts at fictionalizing Christ. A lot of her source materials are just downright unbiblical and wrong. Part of the reason for that? She is basing her books on Gnostic writings and Roman Catholic dogma. I must state that this does not mean I do not respect her walk with Christ. if anything, I am glad she is returning to Him and I believe the HS will show her the truth in time to come. I've told her very frankly (on FB where her fans slammed me hard) that her next novel is also very unbiblical, where the story is about a man who has to make amends for his past by serving under the angels. My dear ones, according to the NT we are above the angels and they serve us whenever we align with God's will for us. In fact, whilst they can sing His wonderful praises, do you know they can never sing one hymn we can? Yup. That hymn is Amazing Grace. Grace is God's gift to us and us alone =D Hallelujah!
Right back to the topic of Mark's Story - it is a brilliantly written book that attempts to show us the perspective of the disciple Mark during the time of Christ and after that, during the times of the Acts of the Apostles and the writing of the Epistles. It is a moving account and I really loved that the authors have been careful with Jewish history, culture and keeping it biblical.
It helped my walk to read this book because it gave me some insight as to what it meant to be a disciple in those days, in comparison to what it means to be a disciple today. I loved how Mark wasn't sure if Christ was the Christ at first, but how he was so convicted by the events that unfolded, he became one of the passionate disciples that made His Name known across the lands.
Catch a preview of the book here - http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0399154477/ref=sib_dp_ptu#reader-link
I am now reading John's Story and am in the earlier few chapters. -
This one is also a riveting read!!!! I love how the beginning of the book sees John being the last apostle standing (he was the last of the 12 to die) and his passionate fight against gnosticism (which btw is taking the world by storm again & oprah is unashamedly and sadly one of the promoters of gnosticism =pp).
I haven't read enough to tell you more about the story, but I can assure you both books are page turners that not only entertain but enlighten and lift up the name of Christ.
You can borrow them for FREE from our National Library and I can't wait for our library to purchase and put up LUKE'S STORY on the shelves soon. Woo!
As a wayward daughter myself who is close to her Dad, and as a parent with an insane love for her little one, when I first read this prodigal story of Katherine, a-girl-grown-out-of-hand, and her loving, forgiving and patient Daddy, I was all tears and Kleenex tissues.
I came across it first in this promotional tract that was selling for $2+ at my church's bookstore-
Reading the tract made me buy the actual book and I've since given away several of the tracts to people who have told me how moving the story of the prodigal gal is.
Here's an extract from the first page of the book:
The cross. Can you turn any direction without seeing one? Perched atop a chapel. Carved into a graveyard headstone. Engraved in a ring or suspended on a chain. The cross is the universal symbol of Christianity. An odd choice, don't you think? Strange that a tool of torture would come to embody a movement of hope.
Would you wear a tiny electric chair around your neck? Suspend a gold-plated hangman's noose on the wall? Would you print a picture of a firing squad on a business card? Yet we do so with the cross.
Why is the cross the symbol of our faith? To find the answer look no farther than the cross itself. Its design couldn't be simpler. One beam horizontal--the other vertical. One reaches out--like God's love. The other reaches up--as does God's holiness. One represents the width of His love; the other reflects the height of His holiness. The cross is the intersection. The cross is where God forgave His children without lowering His standards.
How could He do this? In a sentence: God put our sin on His Son and punished it there.
"God put on him the wrong who never did anything wrong, so we could be put right with God" (2 Corinthians 5:21 MSG).
Or as rendered elsewhere: "Christ never sinned! But God treated him as a sinner, so that Christ could make us acceptable to God" (CEV).
Envision the moment. God on His throne. You on the earth. And between you and God, suspended between you and heaven, is Christ on His cross. Your sins have been placed on Jesus. God, who punishes sin, releases His rightful wrath on your mistakes. Jesus receives the blow. Since Christ is between you and God, you don't. The sin is punished, but you are safe--safe in the shadow of the cross.
This is what God did, but why, why would He do it? Moral duty? Heavenly obligation? Paternal requirement? No. God is required to do nothing.
Besides, consider what He did. Just for you He gave His Son. His only Son. Would you do that? Would you offer the life of your child for someone else? I wouldn't. There are those for whom I would give my life. But ask me to make a list of those for whom I would kill my daughter? The sheet will be blank. I don't need a pencil. The list has no names.
But God's list contains the name of every person who ever lived. For this is the scope of His love. And this is the reason for the cross. He loves the world.
"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son" (John 3:16 NLT).
As boldly as the center beam proclaims God's holiness, the crossbeam declares His love. And, oh, how wide His love reaches.
Aren't you glad the verse does not read:
"For God so loved the rich..."?
Or, "For God so loved the famous..."?
Or, "For God so loved the thin..."?
It doesn't. Nor does it state, "For God so loved the Europeans or Africans..." "the sober or successful..." "the young or the old..."
No, when we read John 3:16, we simply (and happily) read, "For God so loved the world."
How wide is God's love? Wide enough for the whole world. Are you included in the world? Then you are included in God's love. God's love is just for you.
It's nice to be included. You aren't always. Universities exclude you if you aren't smart enough. Businesses exclude you if you aren't qualified enough, and, sadly, some churches exclude you if you aren't good enough.
But though they may exclude you, Christ includes you. When asked to describe the width of His love, He stretched one hand to the right and the other to the left and had them nailed in that position so you would know He died loving you.
But isn't there a limit? Surely there has to be an end to this love. You'd think so, wouldn't you? But David the adulterer never found it. Paul the murderer never found it. Peter the liar never found it. When it came to life, they hit bottom. But when it came to God's love, they never did.
They, like you, found their names on God's list of love.
Because God loves you, He has invited you to enjoy eternal life with Him in Heaven. Jesus said, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6 NIV). Jesus made a way to accept God's invitation, and He did it just for you. Accept God's invitation by believing that Jesus received the punishment for your sin by His death on the cross. Confess that you've sinned and ask His forgiveness. Invite Him into your life and ask for God's help to turn from your sin. You can pray something like this:
Dear God, I admit that I am a sinner and need Your forgiveness. Thank You for sending Jesus to suffer the punishment deserved for my sin. Please come into my life and help me live a life that pleases You. Amen.
If you have just accepted God's invitation to you, write your name below as a testimony of your decision. Then write to us and we'll send you free literature to help you grow in your new life with Christ.
Excerpted from He Chose the Nails: What God Did to Win Your Heart by Max Lucado. ©2000 Max Lucado. Used by permission of Word Publishing, Nashville, TN."This forty day journey cannot be taken lightly.
It's a challenging and often difficult process, but an incredibly fulfilling one. To take this dare requires a resolute mind and a steadfast determination.
It's not meant to be sampled or briefly tested, and those who quit early will forfeit the greatest benefits. If you will committ to a day at a time for empty days, the results could change your life and marriage.
Consider it a dare from others who have done it before you."
This is the gauntlet thrown down to couples out there or people who just want to learn what love truly means. =) The excerpt above is from the book "The Love Dare" by the writers of Fireproof - an awesome film that takes a close look at a failing marriage and how it bounces back to health. Really moving film. The Kendricks write really good stories. I recommend the movies by Sherwood Church to anyone who wants to watch meaningful films.
