Contemplative Prayer
Max Debono-De-Laurentis
When I was heavily involved in the occult/new age, one of the most important forms of developing your communion with the spirits was through mantra chanting and emptying the mind to hear what the spirit has to say to you. I understood that I was to hear my spirit tell me what to do. It worked, and I have the emotional scars to prove it.
When I got saved and set free through the shed Blood of Jesus and His resurrection, I believed this stuff was all behind me. I had repented of the occult practices I was involved in, from Martial Arts to Satan worship.
In the last 20 years as a believer I have seen more and more practices I thought I had left behind coming into the church and believers calling it Christian and Biblical. These practices have been around for three thousand years or so, and never until recently have they been called Biblical.
We are instructed:
Act 6:4 but we will give ourselves continually to prayer, and to the ministry of the word.
We are to pray continually in the ministry of His Word. This is important, as we are not instructed to focus on just ‘a word’, but His Word, Gods Word. His Word is the entire Gospel message from Genesis to Revelation. If we focus on this we will have a closer relationship with Him.
God tells us in Isaiah how much He hates these forms of worship. Repetitive prayers incense and other form of man ordained religious practice. God had already given the Law and practices He wanted followed.
He asks ‘who gave you permission to come before me in this manner?’
God does not want this from us even if done with the best of intentions or as He states “The Solemn Meeting”.
In this day of so called ‘spiritual enlightenment’ we need to be extremely careful as believers as to what we are taught and choose to believe.
Satan is the father of lies and he desires to confuse and destroy the saints, by not being as the Bereans, Christians are letting him. That frightens me. What about you?