Tim Challies: The Boundaries of Evangelicalism
One of the fundamentalist versions of mysticism is discerning God’s will in a particular decision via “inner peace.”
[dmyers]One of the fundamentalist versions of mysticism is discerning God’s will in a particular decision via “inner peace.”
Do I hear an ax being ground?
Lee
Looking at the comments section of that article reminded me of this other one on Mike Horton’s review of Jesus Calling, where readers of a Reformed blog seemed so surprised that a prominent theologian would affirm the sufficiency of Scripture.
[Lee][dmyers]One of the fundamentalist versions of mysticism is discerning God’s will in a particular decision via “inner peace.”
Do I hear an ax being ground?
Fair question. I suppose you could call it axe grinding to the extent I can think of a couple individuals in particular who were close to me and who put their “inner peace” ahead of biblical standards.
But I don’t think it is merely axe grinding, because it goes beyond being an issue of merely personal consequence to me. I was taught (as part of various groups) on many occasions to place importance on inner peace in discerning “the will of God” in decision-making, I observed others being taught the same, and I have seen references to that criteria in blogs/internet sources even recently. So it is also a systemic problem.
[dmyers][Lee][dmyers]One of the fundamentalist versions of mysticism is discerning God’s will in a particular decision via “inner peace.”
Do I hear an ax being ground?
Fair question. I suppose you could call it axe grinding to the extent I can think of a couple individuals in particular who were close to me and who put their “inner peace” ahead of biblical standards.
But I don’t think it is merely axe grinding, because it goes beyond being an issue of merely personal consequence to me. I was taught (as part of various groups) on many occasions to place importance on inner peace in discerning “the will of God” in decision-making, I observed others being taught the same, and I have seen references to that criteria in blogs/internet sources even recently. So it is also a systemic problem.
Fair answer. I suppose I should have communicated that the issue was not the “inner peace”, a concept that I find appalling for the most part, but on the “fundamentalist versions of mysticism.” My tent is pretty large, and I find this piece of advice as readily in every other circle as I do in fundamentalist circles; i.e., it is not a fundamentalist issue as much as it is an issue to all well-meaning believers of practically every stripe whose ability to communicate applying the will of God to specific situations is “impaired.”
Lee
[Lee][dmyers][Lee][dmyers]One of the fundamentalist versions of mysticism is discerning God’s will in a particular decision via “inner peace.”
Do I hear an ax being ground?
Fair question. I suppose you could call it axe grinding to the extent I can think of a couple individuals in particular who were close to me and who put their “inner peace” ahead of biblical standards.
But I don’t think it is merely axe grinding, because it goes beyond being an issue of merely personal consequence to me. I was taught (as part of various groups) on many occasions to place importance on inner peace in discerning “the will of God” in decision-making, I observed others being taught the same, and I have seen references to that criteria in blogs/internet sources even recently. So it is also a systemic problem.
Fair answer. I suppose I should have communicated that the issue was not the “inner peace”, a concept that I find appalling for the most part, but on the “fundamentalist versions of mysticism.” My tent is pretty large, and I find this piece of advice as readily in every other circle as I do in fundamentalist circles; i.e., it is not a fundamentalist issue as much as it is an issue to all well-meaning believers of practically every stripe whose ability to communicate applying the will of God to specific situations is “impaired.”
Lee: Agreed. But it stands out more (to me) in fundamentalist circles, which would generally consider themselves non- or anti-mystic.
Discussion