The word "mystical" unfortunately has such a heretical connotation for modern day Christians. This
is very unforunate! Of course the word mystical may have pretty weird and bad
connotations, like engaging in some sort of spirituality that’s cultish and off
the radar of established orthodoxy. I’m not talking about that type of mysticism. I'm talking
about experiencing spiritual realities in the Jesus walk that transcend (but do
not contradict) reason/rationality/logic/abstract systematic theology.
Biblical examples that come to my mind are experiencing a "love that surpasses knowledge" (Ephesians 3:19), a "peace of God that transcends all understanding" (Philippians 4:7), and an "inexpressible joy" (1 Peter 1:8), all within the theme of being experientially in union with Christ. Because God is spirit and we must worship him with our spirits (John 4:24), we have to first learn to detect the movings of our own spirit and God's Spirit and do our part in uniting the two, which is very mysterious, yet can be concretely sensed in one's consciousness. I am strongly convinced, after reading some non-Protestant Christian literature, that Paul had a strong mystical side to him. I don’t think he was someone who was purely rational/logical for the most part, then turned on his mystical attitude when he was writing 2 or 3 verses, then turned it off and turned back on his purely rational/logical personality. No, I think he was a mystic and good intellectual thinker combined.
Biblical examples that come to my mind are experiencing a "love that surpasses knowledge" (Ephesians 3:19), a "peace of God that transcends all understanding" (Philippians 4:7), and an "inexpressible joy" (1 Peter 1:8), all within the theme of being experientially in union with Christ. Because God is spirit and we must worship him with our spirits (John 4:24), we have to first learn to detect the movings of our own spirit and God's Spirit and do our part in uniting the two, which is very mysterious, yet can be concretely sensed in one's consciousness. I am strongly convinced, after reading some non-Protestant Christian literature, that Paul had a strong mystical side to him. I don’t think he was someone who was purely rational/logical for the most part, then turned on his mystical attitude when he was writing 2 or 3 verses, then turned it off and turned back on his purely rational/logical personality. No, I think he was a mystic and good intellectual thinker combined.
With the exception of some
Charismatic/Pentecostal spirituality in North American Evangelicalism, the
North American church seems to be missing this mystical side of the Jesus life.
I think that although modern day Protestants may think that Christian mysticism is "weird", Paul and the early Church would have probably thought that the non-mystical "wooden spirituality” of a lot of modern day Protestants is "weird" indeed. If 2Pac and Biggie saw hip-hoppers in 2050 being “wooden” and “purely rational” in their hip-hop due to them being completely sucked dry of the urban-hipness of hip-hop in the late 1990s with its distinctive vibrancy and vivacious spirit of “hypeness” and “coolness” and “sickness”, they would be shocked out of their wits and find that hip-hopless-hip-hop dry and weird.
I think that although modern day Protestants may think that Christian mysticism is "weird", Paul and the early Church would have probably thought that the non-mystical "wooden spirituality” of a lot of modern day Protestants is "weird" indeed. If 2Pac and Biggie saw hip-hoppers in 2050 being “wooden” and “purely rational” in their hip-hop due to them being completely sucked dry of the urban-hipness of hip-hop in the late 1990s with its distinctive vibrancy and vivacious spirit of “hypeness” and “coolness” and “sickness”, they would be shocked out of their wits and find that hip-hopless-hip-hop dry and weird.
And yet, there is a difference
between how North Americans Charismatic Christians seem to experience this
biblical “love that surpasses knowledge”, “peace that passes understanding”, and
“inexpressible joy” compared to how people who follow the Christian spirituality of
medieval Catholic and Eastern Orthodox monks and nuns experience it.
(I do recognize that there is some overlap and that not all experiences fall neatly within only 1 category, and that there are distinctions amongst the experiences of medieval Catholic spirituality and Eastern Orthodox spirituality themselves. But for the sake of making a generalized observation, the following are my thoughts after dabbling, for a limited time, in both spiritualities)
North American "Charismatic" spirituality is, in my opinion, pretty "Western" in its mystical experiences of union with God. Although it is cool and friggin wicked, it is different from the Christian mysticism of awesome medieval catholics and wicked eastern orthodox monks. This Charismatic mystical stuff is more like Christian X-men with direct cause-and-effects experienced "in your face", where unexplainable yet undeniable events are unmistakably unfolding in your midst. The mystical stuff is localized in time and space somewhere in distinct events in certain times and places, whether it's how your Spirit-filled emotions feel at a given time, somebody's body parts getting supernaturally healed with resulting effects of divine warmth on the body parts, casting out demons in order to worship God and feeling "spiritual darkness leave" and "spiritual light entering" in one's spirit, speaking and praying in tongues, and tuning into the Spirit in a distinct time and place for a Spirit-filled worship session.
On the other hand, the mystical spirituality of medieval Catholics and Eastern Orthodox monks is like the Matrix, where your whole experiential interpretation of the whole of reality undergoes a subtle yet noticeable "tectonic shift" in how you understand the fundamental nature of things. It seems that rather than the focus of mystical experiences being really concentrated and localized in certain distinct events in time and space, there seems to be a whole settled transformation of the “wallpaper of one’s consciousness” and with the resulting metamorphosis of perceived reality, you use that contemplative lens of the soul to interpret reality in a permanently changed way for the rest of your life. The result of this is that one experiences subtle yet noticeable effects on the physical world while living from another reality, which is the Kingdom of God (John 3:8).
Both are friggin awesome. The "spiritual chemical reaction" of mixing the two approximates the spirituality of the Jesus walk of the New Testament baby.
(I do recognize that there is some overlap and that not all experiences fall neatly within only 1 category, and that there are distinctions amongst the experiences of medieval Catholic spirituality and Eastern Orthodox spirituality themselves. But for the sake of making a generalized observation, the following are my thoughts after dabbling, for a limited time, in both spiritualities)
North American "Charismatic" spirituality is, in my opinion, pretty "Western" in its mystical experiences of union with God. Although it is cool and friggin wicked, it is different from the Christian mysticism of awesome medieval catholics and wicked eastern orthodox monks. This Charismatic mystical stuff is more like Christian X-men with direct cause-and-effects experienced "in your face", where unexplainable yet undeniable events are unmistakably unfolding in your midst. The mystical stuff is localized in time and space somewhere in distinct events in certain times and places, whether it's how your Spirit-filled emotions feel at a given time, somebody's body parts getting supernaturally healed with resulting effects of divine warmth on the body parts, casting out demons in order to worship God and feeling "spiritual darkness leave" and "spiritual light entering" in one's spirit, speaking and praying in tongues, and tuning into the Spirit in a distinct time and place for a Spirit-filled worship session.
On the other hand, the mystical spirituality of medieval Catholics and Eastern Orthodox monks is like the Matrix, where your whole experiential interpretation of the whole of reality undergoes a subtle yet noticeable "tectonic shift" in how you understand the fundamental nature of things. It seems that rather than the focus of mystical experiences being really concentrated and localized in certain distinct events in time and space, there seems to be a whole settled transformation of the “wallpaper of one’s consciousness” and with the resulting metamorphosis of perceived reality, you use that contemplative lens of the soul to interpret reality in a permanently changed way for the rest of your life. The result of this is that one experiences subtle yet noticeable effects on the physical world while living from another reality, which is the Kingdom of God (John 3:8).
Both are friggin awesome. The "spiritual chemical reaction" of mixing the two approximates the spirituality of the Jesus walk of the New Testament baby.
I am a skeptic about the whole mysticism thing as I used to be into Dallas Willard as a lost man, and it didn't help until I was convicted of my sin and need for Christ.
ReplyDeleteBut I do agree that the Christian life is more than what goes on in our mind. Perhaps one simple truth Christians forget is Jesus is alive and is to be interacted with, and sometimes in the study of truth in the form of dry doctrine/define the terms/systematic theology etc... that relationship is lost.(Understanding the truth therefore is so important in helping us tell the real Jesus from false ones)