Christian Leaders Who Promote “Mark Of Beast” (R$E)

YWAM—Wants Every YWAMer to Practice Contemplative Prayer!

June 18, 2018 by Lighthouse Trails Editors

SCREENSHOT OF YWAM JUNE 2018PROMO FOR CONTEMPLATIVE PRAYER (Used in accordance with the US Fair Use Act for purposes of critique and review)

  

YWAM (Youth With a Mission), an evangelical missions organization (founded in 1960  by Loren Cunningham) that trains about 25,000 people every year for world-wide mission trips, has issued an announcement regarding its commitment to teaching contemplative prayer. On Saturday, a reader alerted Lighthouse Trails to a June 2018 YWAM promotional audio piece on the YWAM website promoting contemplative prayer practices. While Lighthouse Trails has known about YWAM’s propensity toward contemplative prayer for over a decade, this month’s promo is one of the more blatant ministry-wide efforts YWAM has taken in bringing the organization’s participants fully on board with the New Age/New Spirituality contemplative prayer movement.  The promo begins:

Thank you for joining us this month as we take up “The Invitation” and join together with thousands of YWAMers from around the world as we pray and hear from God about Contemplative Prayer.1

It was in 2006 that Lighthouse Trails first alerted our readers to YWAM’s interest in contemplative prayer and the emergent church in an article titled,  “Red Moon Rising: An Army for God with a “Violent Reaction.”2 That article revealed that YWAM had partnered with the UK contemplative group 24/7 Prayer with Pete Greig and his mystical boiler rooms that were becoming part of many churches’ youth programs.
Over the years, Lighthouse Trails has observed that YWAM has seen nothing wrong with contemplative spirituality. As we saw with other organizations that have gone in this direction, we witnessed YWAM changing their philosophy on how to do missions (what we call “the new missiology”). In Roger Oakland’s 2007 book on the emerging church, Faith Undone, Oakland states:

A May/June 2000 issue of Watchman’s Trumpet magazine explains what this new missiology really entails:
“Several international missions organizations, including Youth With a Mission (YWAM), are testing a new approach to missionary work in areas where Christianity is unwelcome. A March 24, 2000, Charisma News Service report said some missionaries are now making converts but are allowing them to “hold on to many of their traditional religious beliefs and practices” so as to refrain from offending others within their culture.”
The Charisma article in which Watchman’s Trumpet reports elaborates:
“’Messianic Muslims’ who continue to read the Koran, visit the mosque and say their daily prayers but accept Christ as their Savior, are the products of the strategy, which is being tried in several countries, according to Youth With a Mission (YWAM), one of the organizations involved.”
The Charisma story reports that a YWAM staff newsletter notes the new converts’ lifestyle changes (or lack thereof):
“They [the new converts] continued a life of following the Islamic requirements, including mosque attendance, fasting and Koranic reading, besides getting together as a fellowship of Muslims who acknowledge Christ as the source of God’s mercy for them.”
When one of the largest missionary societies (YWAM) becomes a proponent of the new missiology, telling converts they can remain in their own religious traditions, the disastrous results should be quite sobering for any discerning Christian.3

The reason it’s important to mention this section by Roger Oakland is because this new way of looking at missions (viewing it in more interspiritual terms) is one of the “fruits” of contemplative prayer.  As Ray Yungen, who researched the contemplative prayer movement for over twenty years, often stated, when one begins practicing this mystical form of prayer, one’s views on the Cross, on salvation, and on God’s Word begin to be altered. In time, the contemplative practitioner begins to embrace a more panentheistic (God in all), interspiritual (all paths lead to God) view. This is why Lighthouse Trails keeps warning about contemplative prayer. We have been accused of being haters, dividers, bigots, and troublemakers because we do not let up. But when one realizes that practicing contemplative prayer puts a person in great spiritual danger, warning about it is actually an act of love, not hate, as some suppose.
Brennan Manning, a favorite contemplative of YWAM and other mission groups (such as Young Life), made the following revealing remarks in his popular book The Signature of Jesus:

[T]he first step in faith is to stop thinking about God at the time of prayer.
[C]ontemplative spirituality tends to emphasize the need for a change in consciousness . . . we must come to see reality differently.
Choose a single, sacred word . . . repeat the sacred word inwardly, slowly, and often.
[E]nter into the great silence of God. Alone in that silence, the noise within will subside and the Voice of Love will be heard.4

Lighthouse Trails believes that this “Voice of Love” reached during contemplative prayer is not the voice of God at all, but rather it is from the same source as that reached during Buddhist, Hindu, Islamic, and New Age meditation. As most mystics teach, the methods are the same, and the results are the same. Consider this by occultist Richard Kirby from his book The Mission of Mysticism:

The meditation of advanced occultists [New Agers] is identical with the prayer of advanced mystics [contemplatives]: it is no accident that both traditions use the same word for the highest reaches of their respective activities—contemplation.5

The YWAM audio promotional on contemplative prayer continues:

In this edition of The Invitation, we invite you to consider what we can learn from the contemplative tradition of the global Church, and why contemplative practices might be a helpful balance to our busy, activity-oriented lives.

Steve Cochrane, one of YWAM’s leaders, spoke of his own journey into contemplative practices. “In the past decade, I’ve been on a more focused pilgrimage to listen to what Spirit is saying from a diversity of those that have walked the road before in deeper devotion to Christ.”  As Steve says, the work of “friends from the past” teaches us to sink down into the presence of God in the midst of our active lives.6

Contemplatives believe that in order for us to really hear the voice of God, we must remove all mental distractions and thoughts. Since the brain is always active and thoughts cannot be stopped, we need a method to “still the mind” (i.e., put it into neutral, so to speak). How can we do that? Through a mantric-like practice (repeating a word or phrase until we can get our minds into an altered state). When YWAM leader Steve Cochrane talks about “friends from the past” who teach us how to “sink down into the presence of God,” he is speaking of the mystics. Cochrane, who works with the University of the Nations, is the author of the 2017 book, Many Monks Across the Sea: Church of the East Monastic Mission in Ninth-Century Asia.  One of the books Cochrane mentions in his bibliography is Merton and Sufism. In A Time of Departing, Ray Yungen describes a story from Merton and Sufism where Thomas Merton is talking to a Sufi teacher (an Islamic mystic) about Merton’s desire for unity between Christians and Muslims. The Sufi teacher tells Merton that doctrines such as salvation through the atonement ( the Cross) keep that unity from happening. Merton agrees but suggests that unity can take place at the mystical level where such beliefs of “little value” can be ignored. Merton stated:

Personally, in matters where dogmatic beliefs differ, I think that controversy [of the Cross] is of little value because it takes us away from the spiritual realities into the realm of words and ideas . . . in words there are apt to be infinite complexities and subtleties which are beyond resolution. . . . But much more important [than the Cross] is the sharing of the experience of divine light . . . It is here that the area of fruitful dialogue exists between Christianity and Islam.7

For Merton, the “fruitful dialogue” that can be obtained (through mysticism) between Christians and Muslims was more important than preaching the Gospel that proclaims salvation through Jesus Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross.
The YWAM audio continues:

Over recent years, a significant number of us in the YWAM family have, like Steve, been growing more familiar with contemplative practices.  . . . Since around the third century the people of God have been engaging in practices that we now call Contemplative . . . A few of these contemplative practices involve: breath prayers, which consist of praying a short phrase with your in- and your out-breath; lectio devina [divina], which is a meditative way of reading short passages of scripture; and silent prayer such as Centering Prayer.8

What is YWAM’s hope? To see everyone who is involved with YWAM practice contemplative prayer:

If you only have a few moments to pray, ask the Lord to convict each of our students and workers to experience God in deeper ways through contemplative methods.9

If you know someone who is working with YWAM, please ask that person to read this article and to reconsider working in an organization that believes mystical practices are the path to hearing God’s voice. As born-again believers, we have the Word of God and the Holy Spirit, neither of which direct us to repeat a word or phrase or focus on the breath to be led by God. God is much greater than that, and He can lead us faithfully without any help from teachings that lead people AWAY from the Cross rather than to it.
Endnotes:
1. https://ywam.org/blog/2018/06/11/contemplative-prayer/
2. https://www.lighthousetrailsresearch.com/blog/?p=4009
3. Roger Oakland, Faith Undone: the emerging church—a new reformation or an end-time deception (Eureka, MT: Lighthouse Trails Publishing, 2007), p. 175; citing 1) “Youth with a Mission Experiments with New, Unscriptural Missions Strategy” (Foundation, Watchman’s Trumpet, May – June 2000, http://www.feasite.org/WTrumpet/fbcwt004.htm#Youth%20With), p. 39 and 2) Andy Butcher, “Radical Missionary Approach Produces ‘Messianic Muslims’ Retaining Islamic Identity” (Charisma News Service, March 24, 2000, http://web.archive.org/web/20010818051517/www.charismanew s.com/news.cgi?a=285&t=news.html).
4. Brennan Manning, The Signature of Jesus (Sisters, OR: Multnomah, 1996, Revised Edition), p. 212-218
5. Richard Kirby, The Mission of Mysticism (London, UK: SPCK, 1979), p. 7.
6 https://ywam.org/blog/2018/06/11/contemplative-prayer/
7.  From Ray Yungen in A Time of Departing (pp. 59-60) citing from Rob Baker and Gray Henry, Editors, Merton and Sufism (Louisville, KY: Fons Vitae, 1999), p. 109.
8. https://ywam.org/blog/2018/06/11/contemplative-prayer
9. Ibid.
Related Information:
5 Things You Should Know About Contemplative Prayer by Ray Yungen
So You Want to Practice “Good” Contemplative Prayer—What’s Wrong With That by Lynn Pratt
Oneness vs. Separation Heresy “Now” in the Church by Warren B. Smith
Focus on the Family STILL Defends Contemplative Prayer—Says Jesus and Disciples Practiced It

The Poison of False Teachings - Updated and Revised

An International Perspective on Global Spiritual Contamination
 by Jean-Louis Mondon

A few years ago, I was researching for an article I was writing on the subject of  “The Poison of False Teachings”. I found an interesting comment related to the theme posted by a brother on a French site “VoxDei”. The comment might be sufficient to illustrate the main idea of my article since I cannot locate the original French text. See the additional commentary below.

My original article was written in the spring of 2005 when I had just come back from my second trip to Brazil. While shopping in a Christian bookstore, I was surprised and dismayed to see the same books we could find on the racks of most Christian and secular bookstores in the US. They were translated and sold quickly because of their popularity in the US. Needless to say, discernment is absent and sorely lacking from a lot of Central and South American Churches

Back in the US, I was hit with the news that the conservative church I was attending since 2001 had started a Sunday School study program with Warren´s book “Purpose Driven Church”. I was helping the Pastor in the Hispanic mission and after talking to him about the book, he invited me to teach a class on the New Age Movement and false teachings instead of Rick Warren´s book. Our Hispanic brothers were very receptive, the discussions were lively and interesting often expanding on other ramifications of the deceptive nature of other Christian emergent and other "movements" and their misleading doctrines. 

I could sense a real hunger and thirst for knowledge and the need to be equipped to expose the lies when they were witnessing to people in the community. I was greatly helped in my research by Warren B. Smith´s first edition of his book “Deceived on Purpose” that can be purchased at “Lighthouse Trail Research”

While still in the US, I started blogging about the same time as the book “The Shack” by Paul Young was received so openly with great fanfare in the Christian Community since after all it was only fiction and we christians also need to be entertained by writers who are not teaching doctrine, but simply are using their God-given inspiration in relating true experiences so touching and personal that they resonate with the majority of readers. Hoorah for sanctified imagination!

Well, back to the present with a movie based on “The Shack” and the recent release of another book “ Lies we believe about God” which doesn´t leave a lot of wiggle room as to the intent in writing his first book. Find the excellent review by the “Lighthouse Trail Research” where you can also purchase the new booklet “The Shack and its New Age Leaven HERE   http://www.lighthousetrailsresearch.com/blog/?p=12290

              __________________________________________________

The Poison of False Teachings

The ever pressing need for spiritual discernment in today´s church.

The following is an illustration demonstrating the process of contamination. (Based on my own experiences both physical and spiritual as a flower grower and supervisor on a  chrysanthemums flower ranch in S. California.)

Setting the stage

A greenhouse full of flowers and plants.

It´s time to fertilize the plants to help them grow and to become strong and beautiful.

Equipment needed:

A tank for mixing, water, a pump and a hose with a nozzle to carry the water and fertilizer mixture under pressure to spray the plants.

Worker´s equipment:

Waterproof  protective suit, boots, gloves and a protective respirator mask.

Fertilizer: (Percentage not accurate, solely used for the story).

Chemical contents in a paper bag in soluble powder form.

Inert ingredients: 99.5 %

Active ingredients: 0.5 %

Instructions:

Fill the tank, dilute the appropriate dose of fertilizer and start spraying the plants.

Expected results:

Plant growth.

Change of scene

Now let´s imagine a scenario in which instead of fertilizer somebody inadvertently, without paying attention to the warning on the label or perhaps intentionally would mix an insecticide or pesticide to the water.

Everything stays the same, the place, the worker, the plants and flowers, the water, the equipment, even the inert ingredients in equal measure, everything, except the 0.5 percent (more or less) of the lethal amount of poison for the plants.

What would be the effect on the plants?  At least, they would wilt, become yellow, lose their vigor, their beauty and even dies if the insecticide concentration was strong enough.

Now let´s change the scene once again.

Let´s imagine any church building. We see the building, the people, the praise group or choir, the musical instruments, the pulpit and the pastor preaching from the word of God, the Bible. 

Or it could be a Sunday school or a home group meeting in which the leader and participants share their testimonies, stories or illustrations aimed at helping the group understand the lesson.

So you see the parallel with the situation in the greenhouse.

Every time someone (the worker spraying the plants) brings the Word of God and explains it simply, clearly and faithfully the Scriptures under the anointing of the Holy Spirit, the listeners (represented by the plants) grow in wisdom, understanding, love, inner strength, etc. and are consoled, encouraged in all the aspects of  Christian living if they practice the lessons of the Scriptures with diligence and obedience to the Lord´s words and his commands.

The stories, illustrations, parables, poems and personal testimonies can be compared to the inert ingredients that help to carry the biblical message to the participants. They are neutral and serve as a framework for the spiritual content.  They can be interesting, fascinating, but what provides the growth in the Christian hearer is the powerful and penetrating Word of God that operates a work of conversion in the sinner, purifying the human heart and spirit. It is the Holy Spirit who through the Word illuminates, establishes and edifies by giving him or her light, strength, peace and consolation. The list of blessings and benefits of the Word of God in the life of the believers is inexhaustible.

The Word of God is so filled with life, power and so efficacious that just one verse of the Bible is enough to change a hard and impenetrable heart, to open the mind and change the  life of a man and to draw him from death to eternal life, from darkness into His marvelous light by the power of the Holy Spirit who applies the Word of Life in the heart of the sinner and operates His invisible and yet manifest work. Jesus said: “my words, they are life and they are spirit”.

New change of scenario.

Here we have the same situation, the same building, the same congregation, the same praise group, instruments, pulpit, the same pastors, The same Bible, everything is similar.

It could happen that some illustrations, poems or stories accompanying the message or the biblical lesson contain doubtful and imperceptible doctrinal elements and false teaching, read from a book or watched and remembered from a radio or a TV program. Or even worse, a deliberate departure, addition to or subtraction, or distortion from the very meaning of the words, verse or context, an action forbidden by God himself  who made this very clear in the scriptures of the Old and New Testament.

Let´s suppose that the person doing it lacks discernment and speaks with no knowledge of the origin, nature or the impact of what he is relating. It does not matter, the effect can still have devastating consequences in the life of the people who hear, absorb and assimilate the teaching because poison is poison even in small quantities, even coming from a well-intentioned person.  Depending on the vulnerability and lack of discernment of the believer the influence and its effect will be more or less serious.

In the church, our Father God gave us everything we need, the structures, the equipment, the pastors, the teachers, the brothers and sisters participating in the worship. He gave the breath and the voice to praise him, to proclaim his message of love and pardon, our mind and heart to receive, believe and share the good news of the Gospel. This Word, and the practice of good works that the Father entrusts to our responsibility helps us to grow, mature and  to be conformed to the image of our Lord Jesus. His Word is pure and cannot be mixed with anything  else that is impure. 

A teaching that is contrary to the Word of God is poison to our soul. We must not allow our mouth to transmit what is poisonous (venom coming from the  serpent mouth) to others ears.

Pastors and teachers, of course, bear a greater measure of responsibility when it comes down to exercising wisdom and prudence towards preaching and teaching the Word of God. Indeed, every Christian ought to use the Word (written) as a filtration system to judge what is good and true (see Acts 17:11 as Paul talks about the noble Bereans) when spiritual teaching is involved. The Scriptures along with the help of the Holy Spirit help us to discern and to protect our minds from error and we must handle them as offensive weapon to combat the lies and wiles of the adversary.

  

Antidote, protection, discernment of the Spirit and preserving our freedom in Christ.

The best antidote if we inadvertently or willingly swallowed spiritual poison is the truth of Word of God that purifies us (Eph. 5:26-27). Interestingly enough the hope of seeing our Lord and waiting expectantly for his soon return purifies us also. (I John 3:3). 
Confessing our participating in the process is important to be cleansed according to 1 John 1:9:  If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 

Deception by false teachers involves both false teachers and those with itching ears who prop them on a pedestal that will eventually be exposed and fall. Unfortunately, the followers will suffer great harm and suffering when their eyes are finally opened. I am speaking from my own experience. 
Matthew 15:14: "Let them alone; they are blind guides of the blind. And if a blind man guides a blind man, both will fall into a pit."

The Word of God is compared to bread. Jesus warned us that our bread must be kept from any addition of the yeast of the Pharisees that is hypocrisy when we embrace the position and conduct of those who spread false teachings and add burdens that the Lord himself has not given us. It is interesting to note that the leavening that the baker uses to make the bread rise can only be effective in a lukewarm environment described perfectly in the spiritual condition of the church of Laodicea in the book of Revelation.  Yeast cannot survive or thrive in hot or cold temperatures which neutralize its active properties. It is enough to observe the effects to recognize the causes. 

Zeal without knowledge is unprofitable. Prov. 19:2; Romans 19:2.

Knowledge without love puffs up like yeast.

Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that “We all possess knowledge. But knowledge puffs up while love builds up. Those who think they know something do not yet know as they ought to know. But whoever loves God is known by God. I Corinthians 8:1.

For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision, nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love. You were running a good race. Who cut in on you to keep you from obeying the truth?  That kind of persuasion does not come from the one who calls you.  “A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough.”  I am confident in the Lord that you will take no other view. The one who is throwing you into confusion, whoever that may be, will have to pay the penalty. Galatians 5: 6-10.

Every word of God is pure: he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him. Proverbs 30:5

For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do. Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need. Hebrews 4:12-16.

In conclusion, here is a strong word of exhortation to love and walk in the Spirit in order to preserve the freedom to which we were called and for which Christ died.

“You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love.  For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”  If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.  So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.  For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want.  But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.” Galatians 5:13-18.

        _____________________________________________________

 Additional commentary on the effects of the spiritual contamination of false teachings.

Philippe, a French blogger shared the following in a comment: (Translation by this blogger)

"I found an article on false doctrines with the following passage with a  good explanation of the mixture with false teachings.

In the Greek text of 1 Thessalonians, the name for the impurity rising to the top through the infiltration of an erroneous teaching is “Akatharsis”. The opposite term in Greek is Katharsis, from which the English name “Catharsis” is derived. This term does not mean impure in the sense of “our sin not being washed”. (In that case, a very different  word  “Absolusio” would be used, where we get the term “Absolution” from.)

It does not mean either “separate the evil and hold on to the good”. The Septuagint translates this from the Hebrew text with the meaning of “take the good from the evil”, using again another Greek word “Ekagageis” found in Jeremiah 15:19. The impurity of "Akatharsis" means that there is a mixture that cannot be washed and for which there exists no efficient process of separation. In "Katharsis", there is a purifying form of some substance. However in Akatharsis, we find something which is a mixture of pure and impure.

This mixing is not simply something superficial that can be washed away. We are dealing with an homogeneous blend that needs to be discarded and totally replaced.

It seems impossible to me once the leaven incorporated to the dough has risen to separate the flour from the leaven.

Therefore, we must leave the churches that spread false doctrines, because it is impossible to change them.

We need to leave them before we become contaminated ourselves."

                                            _______________________________________________-

For a deeper study of the passage in 1 Thessalonians 5:21-22, link to 1Thessalonians 5:22—The Sin Sniffer’s Catch-All Verse