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Giving Up
The Ghost

Caleb Miller
www.theimperfectpastor.com

Wittily titled "Giving Up The Ghost", this very readable and

accessible book is a ground-level survey of the nature and purpose
of the Holy Spirit in theology and practice. It's informed to an
extent by Caleb's own journey out of charismania and the so-called
grace movement; but while you might think that would lend it an
air of sneering suspicion and superiority with regard to all things
charismatic, you would be mistaken. The author does an
outstanding job of approaching all aspects of this subjectwhich,
let's be honest, is the basis for more whackiness in the church than
just about anything elsewith humility and openness.
As well as an analysis based on the questions of
who/what/where is the Spirit, Caleb takes an educated and in-depth
look at the biblical fruit and gifts of the Spirit, as well as the socalled five-fold ministries.
A strong and recurring emphasis that runs through the book
is the fact that the Spirit's ministry is primarily to bring us into
closer union with the Father, and in so doing to foster a Jesus-like
lifestyle and to make us concerned for the things that concerned

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Jesus, such as caring for the poor, touching the marginalised and
excluded, etc.
This is not a theology book per se, which will be good news
for those put off by musty academic tomes. However, it does have
a solid basis in theology. I would say it's more of a primer on how
to begin to rethink our understanding of the Spirit in new and
exciting ways which is something much of the church really
needs to do!

Rob Grayson
www.faithmeetsworld.com

Table of Contents

Introduction A Fine Wine

Chapter 1 Hooked on a Feeling
Chapter 2 Who?
Chapter 3 What?
Chapter 4 Close Encounters
Chapter 5 Scripturally Speaking...
Chapter 6 Madame Jesus
Chapter 7 Going After Gifts
Chapter 8 In Pursuit of Fruit
Conclusion Desire and the Dance

Introduction

A Fine Wine

WHEN IT COMES TO THE SPIRIT, anthropomorphisms

abound. Dont get out Google yetan anthropomorphism is (in
very simple terms) the assignment of human traits to God. An easy
example is the hand of God. God is Spirit, not human, so
hands arent something he has, yet that language is used to make
a point.

I think there are no more anthropomorphisms than those of

the Spirit. Shes a dove, fire, tongues of fire, light, wind, breath,
wisdom, life and so on. These things are all anthropomorphisms.
They talk about the energies of the Spirit in understandable ways.
Really, if were going to be strict, even personthat which I am

Giving Up the Ghost

advocating a recovery ofwould be one to an extent. But we use

the language we use to try and make sense of the
incomprehensible. I somewhat believe that any time someone tells
me

they

know

God,

their

knowledge

is

another

anthropomorphism of the one who rather prefers to remain

unknowable except through the person of Jesus.

The finest of wines without a glass is nothing but a mess.

And the most skillfully etched glass without wine is nothing but a
decoration. Ive begun to see theology as a fine wine glass.
Masterfully created, etched in such a way that the wine breathes as
it is poured. The glass is beautiful on its own, but emptynothing
but a decoration. The most painstakingly etched piece of crystal
doesnt really fulfill its full purpose until it is allowed to make the
wine center stage however. The wine then is how I view
experience. Aged perfectly it will send our heads spinning and
taste buds dancing. The wine is wonderful on its own, but without
a glass to pour it in, it makes a mess. Many would say "I just drink

Miller

from the bottle" and while it may be a quaint way of talking about
the Spirit, in this example, drinking from the bottle prohibits others
from tasting of the experience themselves. An experintialholic
does no good to anyone when the experience isn't shared with
others.

Trying to drink the wine without the glass to bring out its
beauty, aroma and flavor dishonors the wine, it cheapens it to a
quick means of getting drunk. Refusing to pour the wine into the
glass because we don't want the glass to get dirty dishonors the
glass, it degrades it to a mere dust gathering decoration. So it is
with theology and experience. Experience must be framed by
theology, and theology must contain experience if both are to be
honored rightly for what they are. Theology without experience is
dry, and a mere decoration, a waste. Experience without theology
is a mess, and once poured all over the floor, near impossible to put
back in the glass.

Giving Up the Ghost

God isnt the wine; he's the wine maker. Any vintner would
feel immense personal loss to watch their beloved wine be
irresponsibly poured out on the floor because someone didn't want
to use a glass. Jesus is the master etcher. His work of art is a glass
that enables the experience the Father wants to pour out on us be
its most beautiful and delicious. The Father's experiential wine
pairs with everything, and it is drunk responsibly through theology
perfected by the Son. Jesus is the summation of the Fathers selfrevelation, and Jesus revelation of Abba is the final answer to the
questions of theology. Drink daily, but drink responsibly and honor
what you are drinking for what it is, a masterful creation by the
universe's best vintner.

Both are disrespected when we simply chug the glass

without regard for the time and earth within the wine. The pain put
into making it, the characteristics and flavors brought out in slow
enjoyment, and the various nuances of tone and smell are all but
lost when we play bottoms up with wine.

Miller

***
Ive elected to keep the content largely experiential, and as such,
footnotes are at a minimum. Ok, there are no footnotes. It would be
impossible for me to name all the people Ive learned from over
the years. A good friend of mine says If you [writers] think youre
coming up with something new, you obviously havent read
enough. That fits here. There is likelihood of hearing the voices of
others on the pages of this book. That is to be expected. If you
think youve heard something somewhere else first, youre
probably right. Theres nothing new under the sun anyways.
Hopefully thats transparent enough.

My experience with the Spirit is just that. My. Experience.

In no way does our experience change the truth, rather our
experience serves to show us the God who cares about us whether
we get it all right or not. I am operating from a Christian paradigm,
but that does not mean my experiences are exclusive. Christianity
is not the way, Jesus is. Christianity is a set of principles for

Giving Up the Ghost

those who wish to be his disciples. Theres a big difference and I

dont have time in this book to discuss it at length. It will have to
suffice to say that Jesus was a Jew, and Paul remained one as well,
even after his mystical encounter with the Spirit of Jesus.

Im hoping we can take this little journey together, that we

can leave our place of knowing what the Spirit is all about, and
come to a place where we want to know who the Spirit is, in all her
beauty and grace. So lets do this, lets discuss all this weird and
wonderful stuff that happens when we experience the Spirit, or
when we experience a sudden rush of brain chemical goodness, or
when its just ourselves being overtly mimetic-either way. Mimetic
doesnt have to be bad. Mimetic can be exactly where we need to
be if we are imitating the right person (namely: Jesus). Even the
Apostle Paul says to imitate him as he imitates Christ. We were
created to mirror. Even with the discovery of mirror neurons (little
parts of the brain that fire whether we do the activity, or see
someone else do it) and discussions of the unified field theory we

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see the same issue picking up steam - that we are all connected.
And therein lies what I think the truth is regarding the Spirit. She
binds us, holds us all togetherand not in the corporeal, flesh and
blood sense only (she does that too), but in the universal were all
connected sense. More on that soon.

Once I heard the Spirit whisper to me jump on in, the

waters wine it took a moment, but the subtle irony soon hit me
and after a long dry spell with her, I began to enjoy the dance
again. Thats my hope for you with this little book. That somehow,
by the end of our short time together, youll learn to enjoy the
Spirits dance again. Im chiefest of skeptics when it comes to
things like this, but Im also firmly secure in the love and
fellowship of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Im secure that they
know what theyre doing and so I dont have to. Or at least some
of the time.

Giving Up the Ghost

With a title like Giving up the Ghost you might think Im

advocating dropping the Spirit all together. Im not. And I am. Im
certainly advocating the idea that the third person of the Godhead
is a specter, a disembodied soul from beyond ought to be done
away withand all that it entails. Things like having to be afraid
that the Spirit will make you do things you dont want to do, things
like wiggling and shaking and moving all about, or things like
sitting perfectly still. It makes no difference. The Spirit is a person,
not a horror flicks bad special effect. The ghost Im advocating
giving up is the one that is consigned only to odd behavior and
chanting. The ghost Id like to give up is that which in too many
circles, equates to parlor tricks and simple manifestations. Theres
no intimacy with a specter. Theres intimacy with a person
however, and I think we can discover that intimacy if we are
willing to take a more candid approach to a stuffy topic like
Pneumatology (theology dealing with the doctrines of the Spirit).

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I think if we give up that ghost, if we let go of that

misunderstanding, wed likely see a little more about this other part
of our Triune Godhead.

Chapter 1

Hooked on a Feeling

I REMEMBER THE FEELING WELL. The rush of emotion,

endorphins and that overwhelming feeling of peace. Those in
Charismatic circles might call it the baptism of the Spirit, but I
think of it more as a baptism. I think all too often we tend
towards finality in our approach to the things of faith, rather than
treating them as a journey, a new thing to be experienced each day.
In that light, things like this baptism, prayer, surrender, and even
salvation become daily events in the life of a disciple. Maybe not
in the life of a follower, or even a student, but a real disciple? What
would that look like?

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Back to the point at hand though. Something had happened

to me, and though it may not have had good backing theologically
speaking, it happened. We all have those friends who likely would
have stood at Jesus side while he was commanding Lazarus to
come forth explaining to him why, scientifically speaking,
people dont raise from the dead Jesus, learn some science.
Growing up, my dad told us frequently a man with an experience
is never at the mercy of a man with an argument. Not his own
quote, but it always stuck with me. This was one of those things
that I held close to my heart going through a fairly tumultuous
childhood (being bullied for my size and relative anonymity in the
various communities in which we lived). Every experience was
locked away to draw from later. Its more than 20 years later and
some still drive me today. Not in the same negative way, mind you,
but they continue to drive me to be what I am.
So what had happened? Did the Spirit fall as some say?
Was there some sort of outpouring? Or was it inherently mimetic
(monkey see, monkey do)? Though I cant say I have it all worked

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out, Id say a resounding yes! to all of the above. I think theres

always a falling that happensan outpouring evenwhen we
submit ourselves daily to the guidance, comfort and truth she
brings to us. She? Yeah, she. Well deal with that later, but for
now, just go get the book from the corner, Ill wait.

So there I was, drenched in the goodness of a feeling of

complete and total peace, all the while feeling like I just may never
feel like this again. So I cherished it. Just enjoyed what was
happening. While I dont have that overwhelming sense on a daily
basis, my life is generally peaceful still. So whatever happened
seemed to have some effect on me, and in a seemingly permanent
way. It didnt become me, but well talk about that in a few
paragraphs.
Another time was a little different. After receiving
communion with a group of friends outdoors, I walked down the
deck to see the property owners horse, perfectly alight from a
singular ray and shimmering in the moonlight. Maybe the horse

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was wet, maybe it was my brain, either way I felt that same peace
and a thought entered my head enjoy this, this is for you. So I
did. I didnt try to overanalyze it, I just enjoyed it. I could likely
start shimmering horse ministries and have a good time with it,
but thats just not me.

I think those experiences help to shape how I view this

(misunderstood) part of the Godhead. We somewhat miss the point
when we dont start with the Spirits identity. The Spirit is a
person. Let that one sink in for a moment, and all those
experiences become something a little different. Everything begins
to come back to the realm of intimacy. Intimacy is something I
cant put a box around, as much as I might like to try. It happens in
the simplest of moments, a connection with the Spirit through a
few moments with one of my children, or a day out with my wife.
It also happens in the most religious of moments (religious need
not have a negative connotation), attending church, mass, liturgy,
orthros or whatever name we want to slap on it.

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Heres what Im getting at. If I were to take any single

experience Ive ever had and try to then create a new movement or
doctrine out of that specific experience, Id likely still be stuck at
16, and searching for that singular experience again and again. Id
probably manifest that single experience time and time again as
well. This is the nature of being creative beings. We can suggest
ourselves into believing every experience is, as the first one was,
legitimate and intimate. Its almost self-mimetic. If however we are
willing to continue the journey with the Spirit, shell take us into
deeper things than we ever thought.

The problem is, I typically allow the experience to become

what I am defined by. And if youre anything like me, you do too.
Theres where the problem comes in for so many. Weve become
hooked on a feeling rather than enjoying the dance. Weve allowed
the experience to become what defines us, what gives us our
identities, and what gives us joy. This is devastating when the
experiences stop, or worse yet, we realize it was us manifesting our

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own desire the majority of the time. It can be a tremendous burden

to come to that place. I know it well. It creates us as zombies, stuck
in false animation, moving around in search of a singular meal.
Our cry isnt brains, brains! though, its feelings, feelings!.
Often the truth hurts worse than anything else. If we commit solely
to feelings, well, we miss the truth many times.

Lets think of it a different way. In the stories of the bible

we see Jesus healing people in various ways. Theres a blind man
healed with spit and dirt (gross), another healed with just spit (what
is it with Jesus and spit? Maybe a foreshadowing of the cross?), a
woman healed by touching his garment, people healed with just a
word, others healed by bathing in the Jordan river, and still others
in various other ways. Imagine a new church started from each
healing experience the bible says Jesus used. Theyd be hurling
accusations at each other for not using dirt and spit or only
dipping one time in the Jordan river instead of seven or even
better yet fighting over which part of the garment to touch to get

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healing. Thered be ministries springing up all over the Midwest

that go pick grain on the Sabbath, churches that host last supper
meetings where they invite prostitutes to wash peoples feetwell,
you get the point.

Any single experience is not the sum of the whole, it is a

part. And just like the conductor, Jesus is standing in front of the
orchestra about to begin the next movement. The problem is, so
many have gotten upcontent to hum the few bars they heard
from the previous movement for the rest of their lives, unaware
that the symphony plays on, with new movements coming meant
to engage every part of our being (including our minds). My mom
used to tell us so many are content to ride the wave to shore and
never get back in the ocean, and that helped to frame my journey
away from the ghost and into the person.

When we keep getting back in the ocean, we remind

ourselves that the experience will not define us, it will not become

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our identity, and it will just be a part of the experience that is life.
What defines us is us, everything we arethe good, the bad, the
mystical, the manic, the joy and the hurt. Just as we should never
allow a hurt to define you forever, we should never allow a single
experience of grace to become the definition to who we are. This is
part of the beauty to the story in the Old Testament of the burning
bush, where God reveals himself as I AM. Am says formerly,
currently, and to come. Am allows for the next thing, while
simultaneously granting the past its rightful place in the present.
Am walks backward into the future as one of my professors said,
embracing what was, and allowing for what is to become what will
be.

These experiences can be healing and binding at the same

time. All too often, we become addicted to the feeling we had
back then or over there. As addicts then, we will chase the
experience at all costs, even at the expense of our financial and
emotional future. We go to conferences, seminars, meetings,

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meetings, meetings, all in an effort to attain something that is

promised as a fruit of abiding, resting. Lest that be misinterpreted,
rest does not mean sloth. We can be lazy and sitting on our couch
awaiting the next manifestation, or we can, as Mother Teresa said,
be Seeking the face of God in everything, everyone, all the time,
and his hand in every happening; This is what it means to be
contemplative in the heart of the world. Seeing and adoring the
presence of Jesus, especially in the lowly appearance of bread, and
in the distressing disguise of the poor.

When we begin to seek the face of God in the other, we

find that our experiences change manifestation. What was once
merely contained within a set paradigm and set of rules about 12
keys to operating in the power of the spirit, becomes a new thing
each and every day, found in the lives of our little ones, our
friends, our spouse, our pet, even things like our garden, our
church, fishing, golfing and so on. Everything becomes sacred the
moment we realize the connectivity of the Spirit in all things.

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Lets address this using Paul as the framework. There's a

small difference in what is taught in relationship to the kenotic
nature of God as revealed in Christ and the journey of theosis.
(Kenosis is the self-emptying, self-giving nature of God found in
Christ. Theosis is the journey we take, becoming more like the
image of God). Paul best sums up the idea behind thisthough he
was rich for your sakes he became poor that you through his
poverty might become rich. You'll note that the plainest speech
Paul ever uses to say anything about "Jesus became ____ so you
can become ____" it is a willful misuse of "rich" and "poor" to
metaphorically make his point. Paul uses metaphorical language to
speak about Jesus' atonement, rather than literal "you can be
wealthy because of his blood" type language. Rather than being a
formula for financial gain, it is a cyclical means of transforming
the self into the image of Christ.

Theosis is the union side of all this, the equal and opposite
reaction to kenosis humbling. To claim theosis with no kenosis is

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to miss half the boat, so to speak. In other words, union with God
means absolutely nothing without self-emptying as the result of
that union. The journey of kenosis and theosis then is a cycle of
emptying ourselves so that we can be transformed more and more
into the image of God along the journey of faith and spirituality. Or
in still other words - union with God means nothing for us on this
journey without union with people via self-emptying love. There's
nothing more cathartic than giving all you have to another. In that
self-emptying is where we find the Spirit, ever present to shine her
light on the situation. This is all a positive form of mimesis.
I Feel Good

Much of the problem with religion today is its insistence on feeling

bad. Suffering is a touchy subject, and especially within the
church. This will not suffice for a succinct theodicy (doctrine of
evil and suffering), but I do believe in him (the Father) is no
darkness at all must be our starting point. Anything that cant pass
that test is likely not him. Having said that, our inability to accept

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the good and bright things of life shows our commitment to feeling
bad. Simple pleasures like a walk through a park or growing your
own food have been replaced by video games and movies, items
that in and of themselves are harmless, but have been allowed to
become our sole means of escaping a reality we no longer want
any part of.

Much of the reason we no longer want a part of our own

reality is that weve become so complacent feeling bad. Religion
has taught us to abhor anything that makes us feel good, largely
due to medieval asceticism, the people weve read about who
starved themselves to the point of digestive problems, whipped
their backs until they bledyou know, the fun side of faith. Weve
even transferred the word metanoia (repentance) from its Greek
roots to change your mind into the Latin word for penancea
word that means outward self-punishment. If we apply the
understanding about who works from insidemind changeand
who works from outsideself-punishmentwe see where this

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false notion comes from (more on this in chapter 2). To repent is to

let go of the human way of doing things and to take hold of the
divine way. The human way excludes and uses force to conquer;
the divine way includes and reveals power in powerlessness.

There is nothing more joyful than inclusion. There are a

number of heartwarming videos crawling the Internet showing
stories of radical inclusion. From the football team rallying around
their team manager to stop bullying to the Down syndrome young
lady getting her promised prom date with the football captain,
stories of inclusion and acceptance touch the deepest parts of us.
Why? Because this is the Spirit that binds us, and when weve
touched the divineor to put it another waywhen something has
become a sacrament for us, our hearts open to the beauty that is the
connectivity of the human race. In those moments, our hormonal
release combines with the sense of the divine and we feel the
presence of the Spirit.

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The temptation then is to turn that feeling back into the

Spirit, thereby missing the point. Celtic Christianity references
thin places, places where it seems as though the temporal/divine
realms overlap in such a way that they can be accessed. That seems
a little too Stargate-y to me, but I like the idea. Instead of places,
Id say what we have are thin moments, where something
physical becomes, in that moment, a sacrament for usmediating
the presence of the divine within us. That moment is not only
transcendent, but simultaneously immanent. Any escape from
reality is only so when it is firmly grounded within the reality it is
trying to escape. In other words, transformation is far more
important than escape, and the two often work in opposition to
each other. In that respect, we arent really trying to escape
anything, were looking for transformation. To be transformed, we
have to be grounded in the reality that were trying to transform. A
life lived denying their current situation is insanity, but one that
embraces what happens and looks for the great physician to begin
his work is peace.

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In light of that, feeling good ought to be something we

learn to do a little differently.

Philippians 4:11-13 - Not that I speak in regard to need, for

I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content: I know how to
be abased, and I know how to abound. Everywhere and in all
things I have learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to
abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ who
strengthens me.

Weve all used Phil 4:13 in virtually every circumstance

that hits us, I can do all thingsusually defeat an enemy human,
either in battle or in sportthrough Christ who strengthens me.
But wait, Paul used this as a follow up to the two previous verses.
Paul says two things that I think need their own focus. In whatever
state I am...and...I have learned to be content.

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In whatever state I am means in this state or in that state.

He literally meant at any point of life. In sickness or in health, in
riches or in poor, for better or for worse! He even says in the next
verse I know how to be abased (devoid or in pain) and I know how
to abound (to be over or to excel). I have learned to be content.
Learned here means to learn by use and practice. Its not a simple
thing. Its a process, and one that requires us to be patient. We
have to learn contentment, and it will take time. However, this is a
learning that has a promise of a reward, because godliness (which
we all possess due to Christ) combined with contentment is great
gain. Theres a mistaken idea that because Christ imputed
righteousness to us, everything is effortless. Its not. Anyone with
a breath in their lungs will tell you that life is not effortless.
However, we can learn to be content.

In contentment well find what weve been looking for.

Rest is only found here, because its only when we are content with
our life that well be at rest, in a position where were not

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constantly pursuing upgrades and at peace with those around us.

Competition with one another is born of discontentment with our
own lives. This is hard for some, I know it. It was for me as well.
Weve been so engrained with the idea that we need to be
discontent with anything but the best, but what if Gods idea of
best is a little different from ours?

In Timothy we read having food and clothing, with these

we shall be content. Food and clothing? Not even a shelter? Not
the latest gadget, the most recent version of the nicest car, bike, or
leer jet? Not a mansion with a swimming pool? Not a 100 million
dollar building? No, simply food and clothing.

Does all this mean that God does not want us to prosper?
Not necessarily. What Im getting at here is that weve been so
trained to be discontent with life. Weve been trained through
commercial activity, keeping up with the Joness, false prosperity
gospels (not real biblical prosperity, but rather this ideology that

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says get all you can, can all you get, sit on the can), competitive
ministry techniques (you know, pastors conferences where we all
get together and brag on our church size) and various other
ministry manipulation techniques (give to me and God will bless
it). Weve been engrained that unless we are the best, the top, the
brightest, the winner, we cannot be valuable.

Its no wonder our children are in utter dismay over

appearance, over ability, or over application. Theyve been taught
that unless theyre in competitive sports they arent good
enough. Theyve been taught that unless they look like the girls in
the magazines, they arent pretty enough. Theyve been taught that
unless they get straight As they arent smart enough. Weve got to
get this; weve got to understand the power of contentment. When
we can learn to be content where we are in life, well see the great
gain we want.

Finally, I want to say that contentment is not complacency.

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To be content is to be ok with where your life is now, knowing that

you are deeply loved by the Father, in whatever state youre in.
However, to be complacent is to be insensitive to the suffering
around you, both your own and others. We are called to be
content, but never complacent. Contentment says I am content IN
my present state, even when circumstances arent what they should
be whereas complacency says, I am content with the suffering of
others. We are never to be content with the suffering of others,
but always be content with the state of liferegardless of
circumstance. To be content in sickness isnt to allow it, but its to
not allow it to steal our peace. Whenever something steals our
peace, that thing has just become our God, for Christ has said that
He himself is our peace. Contentment follows Jesus model of
looking at the plank in our own eye by being content with our
lives. Complacency is the direct opposite of the commands for
caring for the least of these, and follows the serpentine model (as
well as sin of Sodom) of ignoring the outcast.

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This is why contentment is so paramount to our growth.

Jesus himself has promised us his peace, the peace that he gives
which is his own life. To be discontent is to be without peace. I
certainly dont speak these things from a standpoint of having
achieved anything; rather Im still learning to be content. In some
areas, Im fine. In others, Im miles away from ok. We can all learn
and grow together, and we can all encourage one another in this
realm.

What is it to be at peace? Thayer says this about the peace

that Jesus said He gave to us: The tranquil state of a soul assured of
its salvation through Christ, and so fearing nothing from God and
content with its earthly lot, of whatsoever sort that is.

So how do we learn to be content? The first step would

have to be being assured of our salvation through Christ, and so
fearing nothing from God. Until we understand theres nothing left
to fear here, we cant be content. If we cant even trust our

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heavenly Father, how on earth are we supposed to live this life?

This is why its so important to understand this truth of no fear. At
the end of the day, were eating from one of two trees. Either the
tree of separation (the separation of good and evil, which leads us
to believing were evil, if Hes good), which bears all sorts of sin
and strivingor we can eat of the tree of life, the tree that says
weve nothing to fear, the tree that says we dont need an upgrade
because we have Christ. The tree of life is the tree of contentment.

Chapter 2

Who?

WHO THE SPIRIT IS MIGHT BE a more important question to

try to deal with firstafter all, this is what we do with the other
parts of the Godhead. We talk about who the Father is, who the
Son is, but then for some reason when we hit the Spirit, it becomes
an it, or a he or a what.

I remember being in a meeting with a youth group when

someone noticed a bit of fog building up in the room where we
were meeting. Whether that fog was condensation from the fervent
prayers of youth desperately wanting to renew their commitment to
God, or (to put it in charismatic vernacular) the shekinah glory

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of the Lord I dont know, and I dont really care to know. My

logical mind says its the former, but my committed believer side
says its the latter. So I let it be both. My mind gets to think its
right, and my Spirit gets to feel it is. Both can be, and both
probably should be. We need not belittle our minds for not being
able to comprehend something incomprehensible. Our own Spirit
doesnt need to be in constant conflict with our minds. It doesnt
make us double minded to allow our minds the freedom to
explore logic and reason. I firmly believe faith doesnt defy
logicit empowers it.

But a cloud doesnt tell me who anyone is, so whatever that

was, it wasnt the Spirit. At least not if were going to be faithful to
call the Spirit a person. The working of that person? Sure, or
maybe not. Either way, I think were missing the point if we focus
on what is happening around us rather than on what is happening
inside us. I think that might be key.

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Focus on whats happening inside. Thats how God works

after all, from the inside. He enters in, becomes a part of what
were doing, and begins to transform it from the inside. In fact,
when we see Jesus say in this world you will have tribulation, but
be of good cheer for I have overcome the world we should read it
this way you will have pressure applied from the outside, but rest
assured, Im inside exerting the necessary force to keep that which
applies pressure from the outside from hurting you. I believe
thats why we can say we are pressed but not crushed, persecuted
but not abandoned, pressed down but not destroyed. In that light,
Jesus didnt overcome the world-your neighbor, He overcame the
world-that which applies external pressure.

Theres this question we still need to answer though. Who?

In the Old Testament, the various authors refer to the Spirit,

using rwh (pronounced rach). In the second verse of the bible we
read: And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the

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waters. However, rwh is a feminine noun, so the text can just as

well read The Spirit of God, she hovered.

This is exactly the reason I refer to the Spirit in the

feminine (see, I told you it wasnt offensive). I often like to ask
people when I am accused of just trying to be argumentative when
I refer to the Spirit in the feminine form - am I just trying to be
argumentative by referring to God as he? No. I believe we do no
harm, and indeed remain more faithful to the Fathers heart, and to
the text of the bible to refer to her as feminine. After all in the
image of God he created them male and female so there must
be some feminine aspects to the Godhead right? And where do we
think those come from? Even one of the ancient names for God (El
Shaddai) means many breasted one so weve got to have
something feminine there, or were left with a pretty awkward
vision of God. If I can belabor the point, even things like he and
she carry the same anthropomorphic flavor, and so long as we

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understand theres really no male or female (sexually) within the

two non-human persons of the Godhead, I think were fine.

Before we go too far and start saying, The holy Spirit is a

woman I am not asserting that. Im simply saying that there is
femininity to the godhead. Just as each of us have feminine traits
and masculine traits. Over and over God says I am not a man that
I should and yet Jesus tells us He is Father. If we go too far
with this, well end up in full modalism (the belief that the father
son and Spirit are expressions of the same monadic deity) or at best
in some tritheistic stance (three separate gods). This is why we
must understand who the Spirit is to us, what shes here for, why
Jesus tells us he is sending her, and what all these gifts and fruit are
all about. Yeah, fruitsingular. Well get there too.

When we read the common doctrines spread across most

church websites, theyll have some form of one of two creeds.
Either the Nicene Creed, or the Evangelical Tenets of Faith. The

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Nicene Creed will start with We believe in God the Father

while the Evangelical creed will begin We believe in the bible
(A commentary on its own about the foundation of much western
theology - i.e. sola scriptura rather than how the Nicene Creed
begins with the Fatherhood of God). The Evangelical creed
redeems itself pretty quickly though, with We believe in one God,
existing eternally in Three persons. There it is. Three persons.
The Nicene creed adds And in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and
Giver of life, who proceeds from the Father, who with the Father
and the Son together is worshiped and glorified, who spake by the
prophets. (Ca. 381). Whats the point then? The point is that
historically the Spirit has been viewed as a person and somewhere
along the way, weve depersonalized the Spirit of God (while
simultaneously overpersonalizing other Spirits) and opted for a
strictly mystical form of interaction with her. Well talk a bit about
mysticism in later chapters (Im all for it) for now, lets keep on
with who this Spirit is.

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Jesus talks a bit about the Spirit in some of his teaching,

and if anyone were going to be an authority on all matters
concerning the third person of the godhead, Jesus would be it. I
know, Im charismatic too. Everything in me says to begin with
Acts chapter 2 to talk about the holy Spirit, I mean come on, thats
when the good stuff starts happening and people start being able to
get drunk without having to spend a dime on liquor! Dangerous
stuff if youre a commercial camel driver. Ive been drunk. Ive
been drunk in the Spirit too, Ive laughed and rolled around and
shaken and quaked. Ive seen visions, Ive prophesied over people
(I mean real stuff), Ive had mystical encounters with the Spirit of
Jesus (including one while high-I was a user in my past life), and
Ive experienced the rush of peace of the Spirit. The Spirit raised
me from an overdose-induced death, I know what happened and I
fully affirm that. Ive also experienced every fake version of all
those things, had them forced upon me, and was subjected to a
complete attitude of control and manipulation all under the guise of
the Spirit told me. Somewhere in there lay the truth. Just

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because some person abuses something does nothing to negate the

truth behind that thing. In the case of the Spirit this is of utmost
importance.

Because of what I now consider to be merely the mimetic

behavior of people around me, I nearly rejected this third person of
the godhead, nearly wrote her off all together. I certainly hadnt
come to a place to be able to understand mimesis as sacrament as I
discussed in the last chapter. It was only because of a particular
teaching of a man named Ken Blue that I maintained my personal
sanity regarding the Spirit. I cant tell you everything he taught, but
one particular quote has stuck with me, and I use it all the time. He
said (paraphrased) Were so busy sticking our heads in the
refrigerator looking for our favorite leftover (gift) that weve
forgotten to take a step back and realize whos kitchen were in.
Powerful stuff. True of me, and true of us all if were honest.

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Why? We love the sensational. It excites and makes our

brains release endorphins, causing euphoria in our brains and
bodies. Its why people get addicted to drugs. Addicts arent weak,
theyre strong. It takes incredible strength to endure the horrors of
coming down every time. I know, Ive been there. Much of what
we believe and experience regarding the Spirit is nothing more
than Spiritual heroin. And that stuff isnt good for anyone. Sure it
feels good, but in the end we come down, and that horrifying
feeling is something I wouldnt wish on my worst enemy. The
terror of wondering if well get up againthe realization that if
what we just experienced was up then our current status is down is
deadly. Its depressing. Its also not the Spirit of Jesus. Weve lost
our minds regarding the holy Spirit, largely because in an effort to
experience the next Spiritual high, weve gone chasing something
that was promised as a fruit if wed just abidepeace.

Who is this Spirit? Jesus in a couple places reveals her to

us. The first time though comes a little before Jesus begins his

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ministry. I know, my internal charismatic meter is going red too.

Before Pentecost?! How dare she! But here we have it. Jesus goes
out to be baptized by his cousin, in the middle of the desert no less.
Theres so much we could talk about regarding the baptism of
Christ, but lets stay on point here. After the baptism happens,
Jesus comes out of the water and immediately this light shines on
him. And then that line we all know comes booming out: this is
my beloved son affirming (and I believe confirming within the
Son) Jesus identity. Forget the dove, the words are like a dove not
in the form of a dove. It meant something about the softness with
which she embraced the Son. Light does that. It wraps all around,
softly. Remember dove is really just an anthropomorphism
anyways.

So this first happening in the text has nothing to do with

power, with gifts, with languages or fruit. Its about one thing,
making center stage of the (re)union of Father and Son. All else
goes dim when she sheds her light on that union. It still happens

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that way today to when we reunite Father with sons and daughters.
Yeah theyre fully reconciled, inside the home, but theyve got
blank stares on their faces. They need something more to really get
the party going. Enter the hostess. Not unlike concert lighting, she
sets the stage for whats about to happen. In a moment the Father
embraces the Son, the Son embraces the Father, and all are
embraced by her. And then we hear it you are mine, beloved, and
you make me happy. And the Spirit has done her first job. Her
role in our lives is first and foremost to make Father and Son center
stage, to draw us into that light and envelope us in her glow. The
next thing that happens is actually the next time we see her appear
in Jesus words.

In Johns gospel Jesus tells us that the Spirit is the Spirit of

truth. He tells us that the Spirits job is to guide us into all truth,
and that the Spirit is the Spirit of comfort. We arent even into all
that weird stuff yet, and were already starting to see a few things
about who she is to us. Comfort. Truth. Peace. Hope.

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Mimesis as a Sacrament

A sacrament is a means of mediating the presence of the divine in

our midst. We are probably all aware of the standard sacraments
things like the Eucharist (communion), marriage, baptism, and
prayer for healing. Those things are means of mediating the divine
presence in our lives. We experience the divine through them, and
while they are means of that experience, they are not the presence
themselves, neither are they the only means to that presence. For
example, the meal shared between believers commonly called the
Lords supper or the Eucharist is typically bread and wine/juice to
mimic the meal shared between Jesus and his followers before the
crucifixion. The fact that some churches have opted for juice in
place of wine gives a small hint at what I mean. Weve understood
the elements themselves can be changed when circumstances
dictate the needwhen we have a conviction about minors
consuming wine for example. Theres nothing wrong with

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adjusting what is used to mediate this presence, its about

something else.

I remember being in a small college group earlier in my life

and after a time of music and prayer, we felt it was a good time to
do communion. There was no bread and wine in the house, but
we did have beer and pizza. What followed was a solemn time of
experiencing the presence and power of the cross, through the
elements we chose to use for this time. Ive come to the point in
my journey where I no longer feel like the Father cares if we get it
all right.

In that fashion, mimesis can also become a sacrament, a

means of mediation of the divine among us. Paul says in 1
Corinthians 4 that his audience should imitate him as he imitates
Christ. Certainly Paul had no idea of mimesis or the mimetic
theory, but the elements are there. He understood imitation of one
who is imitating Christ to be the next best thing to actually

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imitating Christ. In that, mimesis has just become a sacrament for

Paul and his audience. As they imitate the one imitating the Spirit,
the presence of the divine is mediated in their midst. Paul was a
Jewish mystic (even after his Damascus road experience) and as
such would have been used to mystical experiences mediated
through various sacraments. It is likely he knew that imitation
albeit the highest form of flatteryis what helps us learn and
grow.

From the womb, we learn by imitation. We come out into a

new world of things to see, and studies have shown facial
imitations as quickly as 15 minutes after birth. We learn to walk,
talk, and do nearly everything we do by imitating others, so it
would stand to reason that mimicking another could also be a
sacrament in the right settingthat being, the imitation of Christ
(in another). Best to imitate Christ, but second best would be to
imitate someone like Paul.

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Paul may have been a Jewish mystic, but he all but seems
to avoid talking about his experiences, vast as Im sure they were.
There are a few verses where he references things like being
caught up into the third heaven and having a vision of Christ, but
they are not the bulk of his message. What makes up the bulk of
Pauls message largely depends on which audience hes
addressing, as each letter is a pointed response to a particular issue
in one of his ministry areas save one, Romans. Romans is about as
concise a systematic theology Paul offers us, and even there, he
seems oddly silent about his mystical side.

I believe it goes back to the beginning of this chapter. Paul

knew, as any mystic knows, that any experience that becomes our
identity has just become our God in itself. Having the experience is
one thing, making it the pursuit of life is another, and Paul
succinctly addresses this with his imitate me as I imitate Christ
speech.

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This was the same issue dealt with by Jesus when he says
I only do as I see my father do. He imitated the Father, thereby
revealing Him. When people tell me theyve had an experience, I
always ask them to pass it through the Jesus test. Is it something
that looks like him? Or was it a vision that somehow has the Prince
of Peace marching up and down continent after continent drenched
in the blood of his enemies exacting revenge on the infidel? I think
if it is the latter, not only should I check what Im eating before
bedtime, but I could probably safely say, thats not the spirit of
Jesus with whom I came into contact.
Oxytocin as Sacramental Wine

I believe much of what we dress up as the Spirit is nothing more

than mimesis. We think the individual experience trumps the facts
of life, when the truth is, theyre both right. Experience
transcendsrather than trumpsrule. But it doesnt change the
rule, the rule remains the rule. For example. When large groups of
people gatherfor a sporting event, a religious event, a political

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event and so onthere is a release of oxytocin in the brain.

(Oxytocin is the chemical that makes us feel good during an
orgasm, what is now being called the bonding hormone.) It is a
hormonal release aimed at unifying us into a group. This is why
solitude is the fiercest form of psychological warfare. No
oxytocin=no feel good.

Now we could stop there and youd think Im totally

against everything that happens in the world of the Spirit. But
that wouldnt be right. So lets continue. God works from within
remember, and hes certainly not going to create a new element
every time you experience the Spirit. So why cant oxytocin be the
physical, temporal response to the metaphysical, mystical
encounter with the Spirit? It can. I believe it is. In that same
fashion, every experience we have with the Spirit will be able to be
proven naturally, which makes each experience empirical.
Empirical, like mimesis is not an inherently bad word. It simply
means based on, concerned with, or verifiable by observation or

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experience rather than theory or pure logic. In fact, in the realm of

the Spirit, Id say virtually everything is empirical. It is immensely
personal, unique to you or I, and not necessarily anything we can
fully wrap our logic around.

And thats ok.

The ways we encounter the Spirit are meant to be purely

empirical, otherwise it can become formulized into some sort of
magical incantation meant to conjure up the very ghost were
trying to give up here. A physically measurable response to the
inward working of the Spirit seems both empiricalbased on my
experience, as well as a theoreticalbased on my logic, and
doesnt need to detract from what happened. Neither is exclusive
of the other, rather I believe they are dependent upon one another.
That being said, what happened has no authority to trump the truth
of who we are. In other words, any experience that renders us as
anything other than children of God is not the Spirit Jesus speaks

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about when he says shell bear witness within your own spirit that
you are the children of God.

Just as we take the cup and drink of the Lords blood

metaphorically, we have taken the cup of the Spirit when our
brains respond and release what they release in those moments.
That feeling that comes over us isnt the Spirit, and it is. It isnt if
we mean that our physical response to the physical release of a
hormone is the Spirit. It is if we mean that the hormone itself was
primed for release by her presence within us and our awareness of
her presence increased. I dont claim to know how this all works,
but I have to believe that the one the biblical authors give credit for
all life to somehow knows and set up a system that wed one day
be able to observe. I have no qualms giving credit for the beauty of
human design to the Father of Jesus.

Chapter 3

What?

IF WHO THE SPIRIT IS TO US IS THINGS like comfort, peace,

hope, truth and guidance, then what the Spirit is must also be
something of importance. I remember sitting in a meeting hearing a
man talk about all those extra-normal happenings we hear about in
the extremities of charismatic Christianity. Things like gold dust,
diamonds and angel feathers. Something in me thinks those things
are nice, and that if and when they happen we should just
appreciate it for what it is and move on. I think we fall into
problems when we begin formulizing our experiences and
confining the Spirits actions to our personal experiences. She
moves differently than that, so lets allow her the freedom. If the

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gift of Pentecost was hearing, then maybe all that empirical stuff is
about seeing. Im not willing to make a concrete statement on it
these days. Id rather believe theres some mystery there that we
just dont understand.

That dust and feather stuff may be something to discuss,

maybe not, but either way its not the substance of the Spirit. Shes
beauty and grace, sure, but gemstones and minerals that have
earthly value are hardly building materials for the third person of
the Godhead. I am unsure of some of the things Ive seen happen,
but I know the only time the bible records anyone being drug out
of a church meeting, it was Ananias and Sapphira.

I mentioned in the last chapter that I was in a meeting once

where people had been singing together corporately and a manifest
thing was felt. Some called it the glory of the Lord or the
shekinah, others said it was a glory cloud. To me it could have
just as well been condensation from well over a thousand people

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singing in a humid, warm room for well over an hour, I didnt care,
it felt like peace. And any time Ive felt that kind of peace, its
always her. It may be completely mimetic, or it may be some mix
of mimetic and supernatural, but either way, the Spirits involved.

In this discussion of what the Spirit is, I think it necessary

to look at a few of the biblical instances where we find the Spirit of
God getting involved with humanity.

In the desert with the

Israelites, the Spirit appears as a pillar of fire by day and a cloud at

night. We see the Spirit as tongues of fire over the heads of the
disciples at Pentecost. The Spirit appears like a dove (the Spirit is
not a dove, this is a way of saying the Spirit rested on Jesus in a
tangible way), and lights the union of Father and Son.

So at least in a biblical way, the Spirit appears to be fire

and light, at least metaphorically speaking. I would venture a guess
that the authors were simply attempting to describe the brilliance
when she lights someone else up. God is Spirit, and so theres that

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part we need to understand too. Wherever we stand on this issue of

the baptism of the Spirit and all (which well talk about in a few
chapters) we can never simply dismiss the ethereal, immeasurable
and mysterious parts of God. Spirit is breath, wind, movement,
life, hovering, peace, wisdom, joyare we starting to see what she
looks like?

When I was (fairly radically, and certainly miraculously)

plucked from a pretty nasty drug habit, it started like many youve
probably heard, only mine immediately spun a different direction. I
didnt willingly go up front. I was drug. Kicking and screaming.
I fought the whole way up, but seemed to hover (though I know I
walked) to the front. Whether that was emotional subconscious
conditioning or an actual encounter with the living Spirit of God, I
cant debate. I believe it to be the former, largely because of that
same overwhelming peace that was attached to it. I saw some
things, things I used to talk about, but dont any more. Not because
I dont believe them but because I believe they were mine alone.

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More on visions and gifts later, but I should say that those things,
treated incorrectly, stand to actually steal the most joy from us. We
ought to understand what theyre actually for, and how they should
operate before just running around acting like we know everything
there is to know.

So I had an experience of overwhelming peace, what I

believe to be the peace of God, brought by the Spirit, against my
will, without my permission, and apart from my belief. She wooed
me, but only after knocking me down and dragging me like the
proverbial caveman back to the cave. Thats a bit like how it was
for Saul when he met Jesus on the road to Damascus. Knocked off
his horse, thrown to the ground, blinded by the light, converted,
and had his name changed. Pretty forceful situation.

Paul would have likely been labeled a new ager if he

were around today. He believed Jesus to be the end of the age
had a mystical encounter with him, and left his historical

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orthodoxy because of it. He started a new religion for Christs

sake! (Pun definitely intended). Ok, maybe it wasnt that extreme,
Paul did remain a Jew. He just changed his name to celebrate the
fact that a Spirit man hovering in the sky knocked him from his
horse, and all the while his companions mustve been struck blind,
dumb and deaf. At any rate, Pauls encounter was with the risen
Christ, but the risen Christ appeared in the form of the Spirit. I
hope that nobody expects me to unpack the Trinity perfectly, there
remains mystery there that I think we dont do anyone any good to
try to figure out. My friend Steve McVey says the Spirit told him
once that God isnt a puzzle to be figured out, Hes a mystery to be
enjoyed. Figuring out what or who the Spirit is really fails us. We
can get a good image from looking at how Christ talks about her
but something ethereal that is also a person? How do we begin to
describe that?

Because of the images of fire and smoke we like to imagine

the Spirit as a fire, igniting us for ministry and causing us to want

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to be pastors! (Shes not unkind!) Or worse yet, the Spirit might

ignite us for Africa, and wed have to leave everything behind. We
have so much superstition regarding this third person of the
Godhead that weve let superstition overtake realitythat she is
our helper, our comforter, and our guiding light. If Jesus is the way
(lit. the road) then the Spirit is the vehicle. We can walk the road of
Spirituality all we like, or we can hop in the vehicle and drive it.
Sometimes we go off road and bump around a bit. Any good
navigation system will find the road for us again though if well
just let it, and listen.

In this journey of faith (a journey, never a destination) we

have a choice to hop in the vehicle, walk the road, drive the road,
or go off-roading. I dont think the Father cares too much about
which one we pick. I think that if well just allow the guidance
system of the vehicle to point us in the right direction, well find
our way home. Its ok to go off road once in a while, it can be

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exhilarating to feel the loss of traction and support, the vehicle can
take it and the road certainly isnt going anywhere.

I had a vision, or a dream, or too much scotch or not

enough coffee, I cant remember which, but I saw something in my
head once and it went a little like this: I saw a desert. And in the
middle of the desert was dry, cracked ground. I began taking these
sticks of dynamite that the Spirit was lighting and handing to me
and throwing them out into the barren land. As they exploded and
the dust settled, I saw new life where the dynamite had blown apart
the crust. Now, how to interpret that? I could take it as all the
verification I need for ministry, but I rather decided to take it as a
colorful (albeit powerful) commentary on how the gospel brings
new life to dead areas of our souls. It goes in like that, with
explosive force, clearing away the dead dry land, and springing up
into new life. Im sure I couldve made it all about my ministry and
how this was the authorization I needed from God, but instead I
decided to take it as a personal revelation of the power of the risen

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Christ. Well talk more about gifts soon, but I have learned to
simply take these events (more of which we will discuss in coming
chapters) when they come as the Spirit doing her best to help me
enjoy my life, enjoy my Jesus, and enjoy the fellowship Hes given
me to share with them.

I have learned to not overplay these encounters. All too

often, we can allow things (especially these types of supernatural
feelings) to come and rob us of our identities. One of the things I
love about reading the writings of the ancient mystics is that they
never seem content to have a mystical experience with God unless
it transformed them into more of Jesus in the process. Many
practiced Ascetism, a strict religious form of abstinence from
nearly everything, but they would continue their work with people.
I believe that the genuine Spirit of Jesus will always drive us
towards others rather than off on our own. Ive said it this way,
that God created man, and said it wasnt good for man to be
aloneand at the time God said that, man had: nature, God, and

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his animals. What did God want him to have? Other humans.
Thats the point of all this. Anything that drives us towards loving
the other, is most likely the Spirit of Jesus. Anything that drives us
(at least semi permanently) away from loving the other, is likely
something else. Dont fret, Im not talking about some evil Spirit
(light and dark cant dwell in the same place you know, and the
Light of the World is in you) Im talking about self-centeredness
and mimesis.

Sometimes we need to be self-centered. I know that may

contradict everything youve ever been taught, but I think theres
something poignant here. We all need a little time to ourselves,
where we can be self-centered for a bit. Lord knows in this day and
age if we arent centered on self once in a while, likely nobody will
center on our self and well dry up. The problem is when we
make a lifestyle out of it. Self-preservation can become full blown
narcissism if were not careful, but a desert time can likely do us
all some good.

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Mimesis is a simple way of talking about how we work as

humans on our most basic of levels. I use my children as an
example of what mimesis does for us as we grow. We dont
teach our children to talk or walk. We show them what to do and
they imitate us. We say da da da and they say daddy. Or we
make faces and they make faces back. Thats mimesis in its purest
form. We are beings created to mirror, and as such, we will mirror
something. When God made people, He did so in His image, and
in His likeness. I like to think of in like when Im standing in a
mirrors view. I can see myself. When God created (male and
female) in His image, He set them in front of His mirror.

Sometimes we need a time of reflection, self-preservation,

and (for lack of a better term) self-mimesis. We just need to
understand that when that time is over, if weve really encountered
the living breathing Spirit of Jesus, well likely find others to love,
have a firmer grasp of our own identity (rather than the oft

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overused phrase in ChristGod loves individuals and doesnt

want them becoming indistinguishable in the family).

Test the Spirits

Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether
they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into
the world. - 1 John 4:1

In time past, when someone had a mystical encounter with

the Father, we see something take place. Whether it is the desert
fathers, the medieval mystics, or those post-dark ages, it has
always led to two events in the life of the one having the
experience.

First, it caused them to withdraw from public eye, to spend

time alone with the one they had encountered. We see this in the
Apostle Paul (Gal 1:16), in Julian of Norwich, the desert mystics,

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as well as various church fathers and various others. They were

drawn away from the public in order to spend time learning more
about that which had so radically grabbed their heart, soul, mind
and strength. Second, after a time alone, the experience always
caused them to want to go back to the people. Whether it be a time
of feeding the hungry, clothing the poor, or selling all that they
hadit always led to a life lived toward the outcast.

We could say it this way: that the mystics were in no way

comfortable experiencing God unless it transformed them to Jesus
in the process. This is the heart of theosisa journey toward a
greater experience of the image of God in our lives. A mystical
encounter always brought the one who experienced it into a better
recognition of their union, and that recognition in turn always
moved them to bring that same union to those around them. This is
that kenosis/theosis/kenosis pattern I described earlier.
Where we find ourselves today however, is many who
claim to have such mystical experiences are using them as a means

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to "trump" learning more about the one they are experiencing.

Jesus was a Jewish mystic, he had encounters with the Spirit. He
went alone at times to encounter, but those encounters always did
what? They stirred him to minister to the poor, the broken, and the
outcast. In his own announcement of his ministry, he said the
Spirit of the Lord is here and has anointed me to preach good news
to the poor. His encounter with the Spirit birthed in him the
understanding that this is first and foremost about those not given a
fair shake.

The Apostle Paul, arguably the most notable of all

Christian mystics" did just the opposite. He retired to the desert to
learn first hand from the spirit the mysteries he was charged with
revealing. We then see him teaching above all else, and often using
his previous (Jewish) education as both backing and fodder for his
message. He didn't disregard learning, he simply recognized when
to use it, and when not to use it. He also seems to all but refuse to
talk about his mystical encounter in a public forum. Less than we

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care to acknowledge does Paul ever mention his experience, and

when he does so, its seems to be almost in passing because he
believes his theological/pastoral message to be of more importance
than his personal experience. Luke speaks about it in Acts for Paul,
but the voice isnt Pauls.

So how then do we "test the spirits" as John tells us in his

epistle? If we feel we've had some encounter with the spirit, we
should understand that if it is indeed the spirit of Jesus, it will look
exactly like him. How do we determine if it "looks like Jesus"
though?

Does the encounter with the spirit stir in us a desire to

preach good news to the poor?

Does it move us towards feeding the hungry?

Does it move us towards clothing the naked?

Does it move us towards our fellow human?

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Does it lay waste to walls of separation between

male/female, Jew/Greek, believer/unbeliever?

If the answer to these is yes, then there is a very good

chance that we have indeed encountered the spirit of Jesus, and we
can enjoy that encounter for what it is.

We also need to ask ourselves the following questions however.

Does the encounter "reveal a government conspiracy"?

Does the encounter cause us to retreat to our homes and

ignore the broken?

Does it move us deeper inward?

Does it move us to say things like "education and learning

are of no value"?

Does it cause us to begin following a particular speaker like

hes on the final leg of the final tour your favorite rock
band ever did?

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Does it build walls of separation between our fellow people

and us?

If the answer to these is yes, then there is a very good

chance we have not encountered the spirit of Jesus, but rather had
some bad pizza the night before, had too much wine, or are sleep
deprived (or some variation/combination of these).

We need not think every mystical encounter we have is an

encounter with the spirit of Jesus. This is the very reason we are
told to test the spirits, the very reason Jesus tells us that they will
know us by our loverather than in how we pander to the
masses in our speech as though we need to sugar coat everything
in how our experience moves us to a deeper love of our fellow
humans. I believe this to be the very reason so many are so
skeptical of the movement today.

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Paul's dissertation on love reveals to us that "if I speak with

the tongues of men and angels, if I prophesyif I ________
(insert activity here) and have not love, it is nothing, I am nothing.
If what we are experiencing does not cause us to have a deeper
care for the hurtingof which many in the church are a part
then:
Its.
Not.
The.
Spirit.
Of.
Jesus.

We need our experiences. They are good for us. But they
can become not only a crutch, but also a drugand like addicts,
we will chase it at all costs. What we should collectively
understand is that if the experience weve had doesnt move us
toward those who are unlovely in our natural eyes, then theres a

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high likelihood it's not an experience with the Spirit, Person, or

Abba of Jesus.

Chapter 4

Close Encounters

ONE OF THE THINGS IVE LEARNED about the Spirit is this:

she tends to transcend our labels anyways, so attempting to throw
one around her will likely only make her shed the label more
quickly. If we only gather and grasp that the Spirit is a person and
not a what an it or a feeling. The third person of the Godhead
(which implies theres a first and second-in case youve never put
that together) has been so mistreated and misdefined. Most of this
is due to mankinds constant need for more. You say Jesus took the
worst humanity had to offer? So what, did He raise too? He did?
So what, I need to feel it for it to be true.

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Maybe not in that exact language, but something similar.

We tend towards the superstitiousok we dont just tend toward
it, we run into it headfirstwhen we talk about God. God has
become the cosmic-cause-all of everything that happens to us from
floods to famine and the solution to all of lifes ills (if youre in the
right camp and believe the right things). God is the means to a
better life, a more prosperous career, and a life more than 99% of
the world could only dream about. God is the silent answer to the
you and what army questions lobbed at us by our accusers, and
the justification for any hate we feel like having. Want to hate the
gays? Go ahead, God authorizes it. Want to hate those from
other religions? Go ahead, God says he does too.

Theres only one problem with that.

That God is dead.

Or more accurately, that god (lower case g) is a figment

of our imagination. He was never alive to begin with. If we take

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Jesus seriously, his teaching and his miracles, we find that he

believes his Abba to be altogether different from the YHWH and
ELOHIYM of the texts hes grown up studying. We could almost
say Jesus replaced YHWH with ABBA, switched their translation
a little bit as it were. I know, Jesus didnt actually remove God the
Father, but I believefirmlythat he bound the sacrifice
demanding, child murdering, world flooding, threat making deity
the Jews mistook for YHWH and sacrificed him on the altar once
and for all. You can say that Jesus showed us the definition of
YHWH, and that definition is Abba.

What does this have to do with the Spirit you say? Im the
author, Ill take any rabbit trails I like! Only partly serious, listen if
were going to get at this Spirit, I mean really begin to understand
her, its necessary to take a good look at the other two persons of
the Godhead. The nature of the union that the Godhead shares
(called perichoresis and it means mutual indwelling) is categorized
by a couple things. It is first and foremost mutually humble. The

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reason Jesus could only do as he saw his father do was this

mutual humility they share with each other. Jesus perceives that
sees the Father act in a certain manner, and acts in that manner.
The results speak for themselves, but lets touch on how Jesus
saw his father.

We dont have any records of Jesus falling into a trance,

spending days fasting and praying, attending a seminar to increase
his power, worshipping, going to church, ok you get the point.
Jesus really just said something we glaze over at first glance. Lets
read it like this:

I only do what I see my father do. You know, that

invisible guy up there that we all pray to and only a few have seen.
Oh by the way, nobodys actually seen him. They think they have
but they got it all wrong-hence, me. I see him do something, and I
do it too.

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Jesus was out of his mind. Maybe. Or maybe theres

something else going on there that we didnt really look at. When
Jesus was baptized, the Spirit lit him up for the fathers grand
pronouncement. This is my beloved son. The Spirit was the
catalyst for the fathers revelation. This is exactly what Jesus is
referring to when he says the Spirit will bear witness within our
Spirit that we are the children of God. The Spirit will be the
catalyst for the confirmation of our identity. Its that confirmation
that I want to focus on for a minute. I feel theres something
powerful to an internal confirmation of your identity as a child of
God. It might just be the most important piece of information you
or I ever hear. It also might just be why so many are so confused
about God. Theyve been handed a vision of a nameless, faceless,
unmoved mover who rarely says a thing unless some guy from
one of the fringe elements of the faith decides to say thus sayeth
the Lord. Maybe remedying that vision of God will help us
understand the Spirit a little better.

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When I was struck, well, speechless and unable to walk, by

(what I believe to be) the presence of the Spiritand that presence
resulted in peace, there was a phrase that kept playing in my head.
I have chosen you. Now, I dont believe that was a random
thought, quite the opposite, a friends song had just been playing
with that very line in it. Nevertheless, the line played over and over
in my head and whether the unfortunate result of football and too
much drug use or the manifest presence of the Spiritthe fruit
remained: my identity had been restored, or rather reconfirmed.

This is what happens inside Jesus when the Spirit does her
job. He feels that confirmation of his identity inside, then he hears
it from above. I suppose when youre claiming to be the son of
God, the messiah, the chosen one, or any other such grandiose title,
you probably had better have your confirmation come audibly. I
think were never told that were anything we havent already
heard from our own hearts. Our heart tends to know us better than
our brain and will often speak out. Shame we dont listen to it

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more often. Most people Ive come into contact with will say
something like Im just trying to get it from my brain to my heart,
then Ill know it. Id suggest it to be exactly the opposite. Our
heart has a harmonic resonance with the truth. When someone
begins to confirm your identity as a child of God, the string begins
to vibrate within you. That vibration is the Spirit doing what she
does best, confirming you.

Sure, I believe Jesus had mystical encounters with his

father (something well discuss in future chapters) I just believe
those things were private, for him alone. He certainly didnt
advertise them when they happened, and rarely did he have the
time. He was too busy healing people to spend his days pursuing
the presence or caught up into this, that, or the other heaven. Now
hear me out, Im not against any of those things, I think they have
their place (when theyre legitimate). I just think we can get too
caught up with the experience and forget who were experiencing.
Especially when it comes to things that look like power. Heres the

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issue in that. Power is not how God asserts authority.

Powerlessness however, looks a lot like Jesus. All authority was
given to him as he lie dying on a cross. That is the sort of power
God uses.

Lets rephrase all that. Any genuine encounter with the

Spirit will be supernatural, rather than either supernatural or even
worse, supranatural. The supernatural encounter looks like using
the things of this world as the avenue of delivery. Here Im
thinking of the release of oxytocin when large groups gather. To
the biblical authors, this is when two or more are gathered, there I
am. Why cant it be both? The natural response to a work of the
Spirit is in fact, measurable naturally. The supernatural response
looks like too much focus on the power and too much focus on the
gift itself rather than the one who births it (the Spirit). The
unfortunate supranatural response is that which transcends all
physicality in its application. Im not one to say things are or are
not the Spirit necessarily, but to me anything that requires a

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creation of something previously unknown is highly suspect. Jesus

healed with dirt, spit, water, all things that are temporal in origin,
and a part of our physical makeup.

We really only see Jesus perform any miracles of note after

his time getting baptized, at least this is when his ministry really
takes off. I dont believe, as it has been purported, that Jesus
ministry began because now he was baptized in the holy ghost.
Thats a modern invention, and has very little to do with the actual
baptism of the holy Spirit that the biblical authors referenced.
Nevertheless, Jesus ministry begins in force after this time. I
believe it to be because his confirmation was complete. He had
likely already thought to himself thats me about some of the Old
Testament texts, and needed only hear the confirmation. Once that
confirmation was complete, out come the beatitudes and the
sermon on the mount. Blessed are the meek, the peacemakers, the
hungry, the thirsty. Blessed are all of you who dont have all your

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shit together. Blessed are you when youre in darkness. Blessed are
you when things dont look too bright

Because Im the light of the world.

You can only say the kind of stuff Jesus said with supreme
confidence, and not the kind that comes from sheer arrogance, the
kind that comes from knowing, really knowing inside you that
youre right. That kind of confidence only comes from
confirmation of your rightness. And that confirmation comes in
the form of the Spirit, working within us, bearing witness within us
that we are the children of God (as opposed to becoming the
children of God).

When youve heard the Spirits subtle whispers, and go

ahead and allow yourself to become fully settled in what it is shes
saying to you (hint: itll always confirm your divine lineage) then

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everything else becomes a little smoother. Or at least in part. We

were promised tribulation in this world. We were also promised
that someone else had overcome the world. Interesting thing about
that particular passage too, when we look at what Jesus is actually
saying, I mean really look at it, it reads a little differently. When
Jesus says world, the word he uses there can be read as that which
applies pressure from the outside. Hes talking about our
environment, physical and Spiritual, and promising us that well
make it. Why? Because hes on the inside, exerting the necessary
force to keep us from being crushed. We are pressed, but never
crushed. We are living and breathing and carrying on about our
lives today because of the indwelling presence of the breath of life,
the Spirit of the Living God. Replicated into us mystically and
mysteriously by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, the
Spirit now calls from within things like be reconciled child,
never changing our identity, and always wooing us to the fathers
hand.

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If we want a primer on the gifts of the Spirit (which well

discuss in full later), we need look no further than Jesus parables
in Luke 15. At the pinnacle of the story, theres a party going on
and the older brother sits lost in his misery outsidealthough still
within the fathers home. This is where we find the Spirit at work,
in the phrase uttered by the father to his son, My son, you have
always been with me. That is how you know when the Spirit is
speaking. Itll always begin with my daughter or my son.
The Spirit isnt interested in robbing you of your uniqueness, your
identity, or your sense of self. She wants to confirm those things,
not remove them!

I suppose thats enough about who, what, when, and all that
jazz. The who is probably the single most important thing to grasp
about the Spirit. Shes a person, first and foremost. Everything else
must come from there.

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Between ing and ed

Something occurs to me in our pursuit of various spiritual things.

Somewhere between ing and ed is a journey. Let me explain. When
we are engaged, we are marrying, but come the wedding day, we
are married. Between the engagement and the wedding feast lies a
journey. Those looking for healing want to move from healing (on
their way) to healed (docked in port). Whether searching in
religion, medicine, or some other form of treatment, the journey
between is trying to be shortened. The nature of human
development is self-preservation. What many of us have grown up
with however is a belief that ed is to be achieved, many timesat
all costs. This is specifically poisonous when applied to the term
blessing. What were searching for is the understanding (and
subsequent proof) that we are blessed, but were doing so by
looking at the ing.

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And the problem is, our ing is largely contingent upon our
understanding of what the Spirit is. If our God (thereby our Spirit)
is not personal, standoffish, not concerned with those the group
rejects, then our idea of something like blessing will correlate to
social hierarchy systems and the enshrinement of individual
encounter, individual wealth, and individual freedomoften times
at the extent of those around us. All of this stems from our
misunderstanding of the journey. Were so conditioned to be
discontent that we abhor anything that looks to be too dark, too
painful, or too much work, save one areaphysical fitness. No
pain no gain is a motto for physical exercise but the very thing we
try to escape in our spiritual exercise.

Lets apply that to the person of Jesus and move from

savingsomething he was working towards, to savedthat which
was accomplished. While a teacher and prophet in flesh and blood,
Jesus was saving humanity. Leading them on a journey toward
completion. At the cross, he saved humanity, starting the journey

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of completion. That journey is a never-ending one. It is not meant

to be a one-time, event based theological stance. That is what gets
us locked in empirical spirituality, what I call narcimysticism. This
is that spirituality that says my experience is the only correct
experience, so imitate me. It is dangerous, and opposed to
sacramental mimesis in its fruit. Where the imitation of Christ
leads us toward peace and wholeness, the imitation of selfmysticism is a spiral of never measuring up.

Now lets use healing as our framework. We can say that

the space between healing and healed is affected by how we
approach that space. If we come to the space with the
understanding that Jesus is somewhere on the other side of our
problem, desperately trying to reach us and pull us through it,
while simultaneously not getting wet with our issues, we will hate
the space. When we hate the space, when we hate the journey, we
lose site of wholeness. Wholeness isnt perfection. Quite the
opposite. Ive written elsewhere that the proof of the variations in

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our vision of wholeness and the writers of the gospels is that Jesus,
post-resurrection, still bears the scars of his suffering. It seems as
though the early Christian writers had an understanding of the
journey and its purpose in us. All of that brings us to a place of
bitterness about our healing, that it hasnt happened yet, or that it
has delayed. That feeling of bitterness takes hold and seems to
never let go. In those instances, it is often a miracle that is needed
rather than a physical healing. Im not talking about changing their
water into wine, though that may help too, but rather a metanoia, a
rethinking of the space.

Were products of a world of instant gratification and selfsatisfaction. In a climate such as this, it is almost impossible to
explain the importance of this journey. Insinuating that something
might take 10, 20, or even more years is worse than an all cat
chorus of Handels Messiah for some. The very idea that I may
have to wait for something I want now (based on all my perfect
judgments about what I need) is abhorrent, and I will go to any

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length to make it appear to not be so. This is the reason we see the
explosion of the mega church in many respects. Promises that cant
possibly be upheldsuch as the famed 100 fold return promise
on financial giving, and promises that are unfortunately made out
of ignorance and good intentionsuch as God will heal you only
serve to widen the gap between religion and reality. Nowhere have
I seen a church motto Take a seat, this is going to take a while,
but I have to say if I did, I just might join, if for no other reason
than their candor.

My God, My God

Learning to move beyond instant gratification and self-satisfaction

can be painful. Many of us never fully move beyond the dynamic
duo of self-soothing, at least not in every area, but the hope is that
we can be transformed. We often want to jump to the next spot in
line, forcing ourselves through verbal confession to believe Im
blessed and nothing less, when in reality, we havent felt the

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presence of God in years and long ago gave up the dance. Part of
this move involves learning to doubt your certainty and question
your own answers. Rather than responding with trite religious
phrases in the face of adversity, I wonder if we could fully wrestle
with the darkness and despair associated with the words of Jesus,
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?.

Certainly there is validity to the stance many take regarding

the words of Jesus being a prophetic utterance of Psalm 22.
However, I dont fully believe Jesus to have been merely
prophesying. I believe he finally understood what the Psalmist
meant when he penned those words. In a moment of darkness, of
humiliation, of rejection by humanity, Jesus searches for God,
looks for his Father and seems to see nothing. It is only in the fact
that he sunk into this unknowing, into this darkness that he found
the resolution on the other side. This is where saving went to saved
and Jesus once and for all rendered the powers of the age null and
void. But it had to come to that point. In that moment of My God,

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My God we are at the precipice of ing and ed, at the port of our
journeys end. Many turn and run from this moment, fearing what
lies beyond. But what lies beyond is not to be feared, Jesus has
demonstrated for us what happens after a moment of desperation,
asking the Father where he has gone.

Resurrection.
Resurrection happens after all hope is lost.
Resurrection happens after death is eminent.
Resurrection happens after feeling forsaken.

Chapter 5

Scripturally Speaking...

MANY CHRISTIANS LIKE TO SEE things in the bible. Now

this is neither the time nor the place to get into all the various
nuances of textual criticism and with which method we will
interpret the text. So rather, what Ill do is go ahead and discuss
what the bible has to say regarding this third person of the
Godhead with as flat a reading as possible. Sometimes well need
to look a few things up, but for the most part, I think we can stay
basic. If youre not one for proof texts, keep reading, I dont proof
text. If you are, please, with everything in me, I beg you to keep
reading.

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We get to see glimpses of the Spirit of God throughout

the Old Testament texts. Ive already mentioned the first
appearance in Genesis, and that the Hebrew word is feminine. But
lets go ahead and look at some of these times when the Spirit is
recorded as having appeared. Aside from the Spirit being called
the Spirit of: wisdom, counsel, might, understanding, knowledge,
and the like, we need to know how the Spirit appears to those in
the biblical accounts.

Lets go to Job. Purported by some (erroneously) to be the

oldest book in the bible, Job is one of those books that many
people would do best to just tape the middle chapters shut. Job
reads more like a play than an actual piece of history, but I digress.
In Job 27:3 we read as long as my breath is in me, and the Spirit of
God is in my nostrils. ESV Ah yes, the Spirit dwelleth in our
nostrils. WaitWhat? Without going too far into this, we should
understand that a lot (and I really do mean A LOT) of ancient
theology/religion/cultish behavior/societyok you get it, involved

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a belief that no matter what happened, the gods were the cause
(or more specifically in the case of the biblical text, Godand
even there, it is sometimes YHWH and sometimes ELOHIYM).
Whether good or bad, it was the will of God. We see this
throughout Job when his friends approach him blaming God for
Jobs peril (something by the way God makes them repent of in the
end). So when we read Job saying something like this, what hes
getting at is the very breath he breathes is the Spirit.

Later Job gives the Spirit credit for making him, and the
breath of God for giving him life. Whether we read Job
parabolically or not, what the author is getting at is that theres
something else tangible to this God. Something that looks and
feels a lot like breath. Breath is tangible, but uncontrollable. Well,
controllable to a point but at some point, the system will take over
and force it to happen. Yes, force it to happen. When the mind is
insistent on stopping something, the system will kick into salvation
mode and save itself.

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Isaiah puts it a little differently, saying: The Spirit of the

Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to
bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the
brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening
of the prison to those who are bound (61:1 ESV).

So Job seemed to think (or at least the author of the book

thought) that the Spirit of God is what made us, and the very breath
in our lungs, and the passage here in Isaiah says that the Spirit is
upon Isaiah. So both in and on are biblical counsel. One is
preexisting, one has conditions, at least exegetically here in Isaiah.
The Spirit is on him because. And whats the why to the because?
Because this chap has been given good news to the poor, the
broken hearted, the captive, and the bound. That is the why. We
want to have a power ministry then all we need to do is proclaim
what Isaiah proclaimed. Proclaim the freedom of the bound
through the binding of Christ. Proclaim good news to the poor
because through his poverty they have become rich (please dont

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read that as an endorsement of the prosperity messagePaul

wasnt making fiduciary claims about Christ). Proclaim healing to
the broken hearted through the breaking of His heart. Proclaim
liberty to the captive through the captivity of His liberty. This is
what its really all about. The Spirit is on that kind of stuff. Why?
Because she loves the outcast, the broken, the excluded. Often I
feel people arent buying our power message because the message
is supposed to be good news to the poor first and foremost. Most
power demonstrations dont help too much with abject poverty and
systems of segregation that keep people from earning their fair
share.
Now for the sake of ink, and to save at least one sapling in
the rain forest, lets just go through the other things this Spirit is
called throughout the biblical text. Shes called a free Spirit, good
Spirit, holy Spirit, eternal Spirit, and the Spirit of: wisdom,
counsel, might, understanding, knowledge, grace, prophecy,
adoption, truth, holiness, revelation and glory. Yes, I see that
hand. Might is a word used to describe the Spirit, but all well

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need to do to show that it isnt power in the way youre thinking

right now is quote another verse quickly. Not by might, nor by
power but by my Spirit declares the Lord. It would seem as
though both might and power are diametrically opposed to the
actual working of the Spirit within us. There are a lot of titles to
choose from here, but the one that I think sums it all up best is the
comforter. Comfort always looks like peace. Comfort never looks
like power. Comfort speaks softly to our hearts and doesnt try to
overwhelm us with oddities.

Jesus refers to the Spirit as the Spirit of comfort in the

Gospel of John. Lets just allow that to be where we dwell with
this Spirit that seems to be taking shape as a person more and
more. Rather than just a feeling of bliss, ecstasy, transcendence (all
fine experiences in their place), the third person of the Godhead
comes to us as wisdom, counsel, comfort, truth, and adoption.
Through the person comes the bliss, and without the person there
can be no transcendence. Sounds a bit like the incarnation doesnt

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it? With the person however, bliss and joy are a part of the
package, because the fruit of the Spirit (which we will discuss
later) is love and joy, peace and patience, kindness and gentleness,
goodness and self control, you know, all that stuff that makes
people feel good about who they are, who you are and who God is.
Thats the Spirits job, sort of like a mother

I wonder then why we have consigned her off to the corner

to only be called upon when we need something more from our
relationship with the Father. It strikes me as odd, and has since I
was a child, that the Spirit seems only active in the manner we see
in the average charismatic church on Sundays, Wednesdays, and
sometimes one other night, after worship, before the offering, but
not too long because the preacher still needs to preach, while half
the church participates and the other half sits there awkwardly
because they dont feel anything but dont dare act like they dont
feel anything. Phew, that was a long sentencegood thing you can
breathe while reading silently.

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Ive been on both sides of that three-way fence too.

(Laughter is expected). Ive been in the ministry position,
delivering prophetic words to people, singing songs Id never
learned, sitting in the crowd faking it until the service is over, and
mimetically participating in the events of the evening. Ive done it
all, and its all served to grow me, soit is what it is. But I wont
be so foolish as to say anything like it was ALL God. Of course
not. Nothing this side of eternity is. To declare that our theology is
somehow validated because the Spirit decided hanging out with us
was more important than correcting us doesnt really stack up in
light of Jesus statements about those people who had done all
these things in his name. Signs and wonders are great, needed
even, but they dont really validate anything.

I remember watching my dad pray for a lady once who

would glance to wherever he was catching and fall out in his
direction. I never thought my dad was that handsome. Attractive,
sure, but fall worthy? Only for mom If only this poor girl could

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have been taught what she was doing. Its not evil, or even
heretical, its simply mimetic. Monkey, or in this case, influential
young girl, seewell, you know the rest. Others fell, so did she. Is
it her fault the cosmos aligned and her fall was directed at my dad
(who by the way didnt catch her)? Is it her fault she found an
attraction to the man up front (mimetic)? She desired what he had,
even more than what he looked like. The gospel is attractive, and
were often so caught up in power and demonstration we forget
that theres a very natural thing happening in the lives of the
hearers. Namely, theyre coming under the power of suggestion
and (hopefully unintentional) hypnosis. Again, we dont need to
divorce all that from the Spirit, but we should learn to recognize it
when its happening.

Well, now Im way off track, but I suppose were having

fun. The top holy ghost moment of my life came when I was a
young, only-attending-church-because-the-blonde-cheerleader-did,
man. Hearing a preacher prophesy the birth of this womans

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child, and everything he would do for the kingdom of heaven, only

to quietly hear her reply into the microphone Im not pregnant
was the highpoint of my young Christian life. I still find it funny,
then again, Im not too far removed from that mindset. It proved to
me at an early age that often, even people who are full of the
Spirit seem to hear her wrong, which begs the question, are we
supposed to be giving those types of words (prophecies) to other
people?

What can we say then about this Spirit, scripturally

speaking? Well, virtually anything can be proof texted, so if were
going to cherry pick and proof text, why not look at ones like
these. This Spirit is all about comfort and calm, all about peace and
grace and love. Thats something worth proof-texting. Thats also
something vastly different from what has been presented in many
circles. If shes first and foremost the Spirit of truth, then
everything we experience might better serve us if we start
searching for the truth shes trying to confirm within us. Its not

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about the activity, even if that is whats used to grab our attention.
Its about what, or more specifically who, the activity is meant to
point us towards. If it points us to Jesus, and transforms us even
more into his likeness in the process, its likely the Spirit. If not,
its probably something a little more mimetic, which is fine
maybe thats what we need to get us out of the way so she can
speak those words to our hearts you are my beloved child in
whom I am well pleased. In whom. Shes pleased to be in you.

Bored with Jesus

Jesus has become boring to many, and it's evidenced in many

different wayswhich I'll outline in a minutebut first, let me
explain what I mean.

The simplicity of Christ is found in three simple words

(with a tip of the hat to my friend Michael Hardin)Jesus exegetes
Papa (and for the purposes of our discussion, Jesus exegetes the

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Spirit). Everything else is commentary at best, foolishness at worst.

When we become bored with Jesus, when we quit caring about
how he reveals and redefines his Father (the "God" the Jews know
as that deity who is every bit as tribal, nomadic and warring as they
are) we quit caring about the message of the gospel. That message
that speaks radical inclusion and forgiveness to the most despicable
of human beings.

It is the gospel of the success of Jesus, his success in

revealing his Father, his success in redeeming humanity, and his
success in revealing our violent tendencies that is the power of
God, not the gospel of eschatological debate. It is that gospel
which inspired the Apostle Paul, not a "hatred for the law" or some
gospel of "grace" that somehow consigned Jesus to the old
covenant. The message that inspired Paul was the complete and
utter success of Jesus. It consumed his life, to the point that he
realized that the "love of Christ compels" to the point that he was

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able to "judge that if one died for all then all have died - and one
did die for all (so all died)".

It was the love of Christ, the one who exegetes his Father
that compelled Paul. Not a hatred of the law. Not a desire to get
people to stop tithing. Not a desire to convert people away from
Judaism, but a desire to reveal the Son in them. A desire to see all
as utterly and hopelessly bound up in the one who holds all things
together. Paul saw us bound up in Christ (as penned "grafted into
Israel") and the natural revelation of "and so all Israel shall be
saved" was what followed. "All Israel" being saved because Christ
in his vicarious humanity fulfilled any and all obligation necessary
to "enjoy" this life.

Paul saw us bound up in Christ, and resolved to know one

thing - Christ (his deity) and Him crucified (his flesh). Paul was no
more "against" the law than he was "against" the Gentile. He
simply saw the law for what it wascomplete, and in its

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completeness unable to save. He pitted the law, not hated it. He

saw this thing he had loved as unable to save, and Jesus as the
Savior of the world. He was driven by the success of Christ.

How can we tell when we get bored with Jesus? How can
we know when we've gotten tired of his revelation of his Father?

When we turn God into the architect of the atonement

rather than the recipient of it.

When we turn humanity into categories of "regenerate" and

"unregenerate".

When we tell people they are "born in sin".

When we separate the trinity with doctrines of the "flesh"

When we spend our time at eschatology conferences.

When we obfuscate Trinitarian love with ideas of free will

that supersedes their ability to rescue.

When the pursuit of a particular manifestation of the Spirit

takes the place of the Spirits abiding presence.

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Do you see what happens when Jesus stops being the focus
of all that we are? We create doctrines, force feed them to a world
that by-and-large doesn't care any more, and wonder why nothing
happens. We preach daily that the definition of insanity is doing
the same thing over and over again expecting different results, and
then participate in insanity weekly in our pulpits, bible schools,
and "missions" trips (many times otherwise known as Christian
vacations). Maybe its time to stop the insanity. Jesus exegetes
papa. Not Calvin. Not Zwingli. Not Luther. Not Athanasius. Not
Barth. Jesus. We should surrender everything to himif it cant
pass the test of how Jesus reveals his Father in thought, in deed, or
in word (thereby revealing the Spirit as well) then it is not the
Spirit were talking about.

Itd be best if wed stop being bored with Jesus and let him
be the hermeneutic, the lens through which everything must pass,
and the high point of all that is human history.

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All that Glitters

Not all that glitters is gold is a phrase weve all likely heard. We
usually subscribe to the understanding that lies behind it toothat
snake oil promises to work wonders. Thats nice, but ultimately it
disappoints. If a man were to stand in front of us and proclaim that
he had the one pill to cure all our ills, we would shake our heads
and walk away. So why haven't we with the modern gospel?

Why haven't we let go of the snake oil, the flash, and the
pomp and returned our focus onto the one this is really supposed to
be about - Jesus? We run around, chasing down this-or-that
manifestation of the Spirit, all the while ignoring the fact that the
Spirit is a person of the Godhead, not just some mystical, twilightzone-esque heavenly elixir or narcotic. If we want to dive in deep,
to really understand what the Spirit is all about we should throw
away our "gifts of the spirit" or "fruit of the spirit" books and
teachings (except this one of course), and go straight to Jesus about

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the whole situation. He is, after all, the expressed image of the
invisible God.

The Spirit has become the means by which many within the
movement escape the "evil clutches" of institutional learning.
Personal revelation has trumped group interpretation. Thats not
always a bad thing, but Jesus didn't tell us the Spirit would tell us
all thingshe said the Spirit would tell the audience (his disciples)
all things, whatever He had told them. It had nothing to do with a
divine excuse to ignore your mind. It had everything to do with
keeping his radical message of peace and forgiveness fresh in their
minds. This is what friends dothey keep us in their minds. When
the Spirit comes to us (shes always with us, but when she
approaches us for relationship) it is always in this light. She will
come as a friend, to remind us of peace and forgiveness.

And that's the point of all this. Peace and forgiveness. Two
things we all need more of and can never get enough of. It's even

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what Jesus kingdom is calledpeace. Peace is what it's all about,

not feathers and dust, not rainbows shooting out of my eyes, not
tongues or wiggling around on the floor. If those things turn you
on, do them, fine, but please don't consign the Spirit over to the
corner. She's not a barfly, she is wisdom and peace. Jesus tells us
the Spirit is here to comfort, to guide us into all truth (Jesus-the
way, truth and life), and to bring to our remembrance the things He
said. That's all the counsel Jesus gives us on the third person of the
Godhead, and yet we have so convoluted what the trinity is all
about that we have completely lost the primary objective of the
Spirit in our lives.

To draw us in.

When we find the author of Revelation talking of the "end

of the end, their counsel and understanding is this; that the Spirit
and the Bride stand at the (forever and ever open) gates of the city
and beckon all outside to come. They will continue the draw and

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continue the beckoning until they are satisfied. After all, he is

faithfuleven when we are faithless.

The kingdom has been sownand it is peace and

forgiveness. All the other "stuff" is simply thatstuff. Not bad, not
necessarily good in and of itself. What matters is what weve done
with it. Is it a means of sacrament or a means of self-elevation?
Anything we do that manages to place a specific individual
repeatedly on the same pedestal is typically human in origin.
Again, thats not necessarily a bad thing, but it helps to recognize
the genesis of our current situations.

Chapter 6

Madame Jesus

IF WERE GOING TO DISCUSS POWER, and specifically the

kind of power the Spirit of God would not only contain, but
unleash, then theres going to be some of those embarrassing
moments. You know, those ones where theres no other
explanation for whats going on than they must be faking it.
Probably not what you thought I was going to say, but there it is.
Growing up, in addition to my several experiences with the Spirit, I
was able to (largely because of our nomadic existence as
preachers) take part in several experiences that were, shall we say
less than holy?

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Ive already talked about the story my dad told us of the

young woman who was slain in the Spirit (falling over
backwards as an apparent sign of the Spirits presence) who was
continually slain towards him when he was a catcherwhich
was always a crowd pleaser. Poor girl actually fell to the wrong
place one time. Then theres the multitude of pushing preachers,
and even the one who used to tell the youth group they needed to
fall when he prayed for us so people knew he had the power of
the Spirit on him. Me being the type of rebel I am, Ill just push
back. Of course, maybe the Spirit will still meet us there, but thats
just me.

Or the man who prophesied over me that [sic] my

sexual attraction to my mother would influence my worship (and
it was meant positively!) Or the multitudes that said things like
fame and fortune. Or the ones who said world famous. Or the
various this will happen when you _____ words.

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I dont know about every reader of this book, but Ive been
subjected repeatedly by the charismatic church to Madame Jesus
moments. These are moments when well-meaning people
essentially tried with all their might to read my future as a
prophetic word. Not that I have anything against the Spirit showing
us the future, but I just dont see things working that way. There
are too many variables that end up pigeonholing the Spirit into
some sort of formulaic response person if we do that, a means to an
end rather than a person. Clairvoyance isnt listed as one of the
fruit or gifts, and somehow the one gift that looks like that has
been consigned to it. Prophecy, which well cover in a couple
chapters, has very little to do with clairvoyance. Am I saying some
people arent clairvoyant? Im not sure. I think generalized
statements about the future dont carry much weight, and anything
specific is more of a direction maker than a direction confirmer in
most cases. Having said that, Ive had times where I felt like I
should or shouldnt go somewhere that day. But nothing so grand
as 20 years in the future.

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Madame Jesus came out in conferences, church services,

private prayer meetings, virtually anywhere a number of
Christians were gathered. What the church has become is a place
where Christians serve Christians, even in the realm of these
(wildly misunderstood) Spiritual gifts. In addition to Madame
Jesus, the continual cycle of power gifts (usually things like
growing out legs or back pain) are things that in my short time
in the church (36 years) Ive seen cycle as many as 6 times. We are
literally so bored with Jesus that were going back to things that
have been disproven just in case theres something more exciting
there. Ive found that most prayer meetings within charismatic
circles very quickly digress into psychic readings and future
divulging. That is what Id call Madame Jesus. Anything that cant
heal my right now issues, and instead focuses on something off in
the future. Jesus never did that. He just healed the issue of the now,
and left the future to fend for itself. I believe he understood what
would happen if he gave the Spirit her reign.

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I could literally write a book just about bad experiences,

funny ones too with the Spirit during these meetings, but it
would leave out the more important parts of my life. Bad
experience is something that serves to turn us from the truth. I
believe the enemy would rather we go to a bad church than not go
at all; that will certainly serve to ruin our taste for all things God
before long. But not everything was bad. Not everything was even
faked, misunderstood or misapplied. There were genuine times too.
Empirical as they may be, they happened. Empirical doesnt
change the event, it just makes sure we dont know how or why.

These are the moments when Madame Jesus was nowhere

to be found and the genuine Spirit of Jesus was present in the
room, bar, or wherever I happened to be.

By far, the clearest in my mind was the overdose on heroinlaced ecstasy. I died. I saw my body sitting against the nightclub
wall, got overwhelmingly warm, and woke up. That was it. No

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light, no voice, no command to go preach the gospel. Just life. And

life that was granted knowing full well that the following 30
minutes would include an ingestion of drugs large enough to kill
an elephant. And yet, survival and life happened.

This one usually throws people for a loop because the Spirit
did this for me, yet doesnt seem to for many. In explanations, Im
lacking. All I knowto quote one of Jesus healingsis I was
blind, and now I see. How, why, or what actually happened I dont
know, but that it happened I am sure. If it pleases you to call it an
NDE, go ahead. If it makes you more comfortable to say I was just
sleeping, thats fine too. It doesnt change my life or what
happened. I tend to shy away from titles like NDE mainly because
of the gross identity crisis that comes from people having them.
Anything we build a full conference out of, which includes much
within the realm of Christianity is usually something weve built
an identity out of, sadly.

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Ive seen someone (at least to my untrained eye) raised

from the dead, blind eyes from birth opened, and (by my own
hand) several life long skin conditions healed. Healing was a
normal part of our upbringing at home, I can remember maybe half
a dozen sick days in school. We were instantly healed most of the
times my parents prayed over us, and yet, my own children seem to
be sick more frequently. Did the Spirit withdraw? No, again,
theres just no answer (no matter how good someones explanation
may be) to why healing happens when it does. If there were an
answer, thered be no sick people. Im somewhat convinced that
the biblical accounts of Jesus post-resurrection give us a little more
insight into his thoughts on physical healing. Namely, his wounds
are still open, and he doesnt seem too interested in healing anyone
any more. This was what his ministry was all about prior to the
cross, and now, its suddenly gone?

I once ran a 6-week health class at our church about

juicing, eating more consciously (local, organic etc.) and cutting

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out some of the excessive things we do in our diets. One gentleman

asked me why I was doing a health class instead of a healing class.
My reply was that people seem to run around looking for the magic
doctrine to cure all that ills them, when all along weve been given
what we need to make our bodies work correctly. Most of what
kills us in America (and the west) is completely controllable
through diet and exercise, but as Westerners conditioned towards
instant gratification, those things make little sense to us, especially
when God can just heal us and make us not fat, lazy or sick any
more. The problem is, thats just not how it works. We keep crying
out for healing of our physical bodies while shoveling mass
amounts of poison into our bodies via the food we eat. Thats a bit
like tempting God is it not? Throw yourself off this cliff in
modern speech could very well read eat that lard fried chicken
daily..

We could spend a lifetime on healing and only scratch the

surface. I am convinced that healing, like every other thing weve

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turned into a destination of the Christian faith, is something that is

meant to be a journey that we forget were on. I believe we are
meant to look back at our lives and see moments when we were
healed, divinely, miraculously, or through the hands of human
beings. Those terms dont have to be inherently independent of one
another.

There are countless horror stories out there of people

manipulated into sexual misconduct, abusive situations, and the
like though Spirit led leaders and services. Those are not my
concern, except to say that the moment any leader tries to use the
Spirit to control you, they are using a Spirit for certain, but it is not
the Spirit, and you have full assurance and permission from Jesus
to walk away. Ive learned that in many arenas Spirit led giving
is often tantamount to manufacturers double coupon giving
(read: as little as possible with the full confirmation that the
Spirit told you to give this little). That may make some hairs raise
up on the backs of some readers necks. It probably should. If

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were really serious about Spirit led giving, the only type of
giving she does is ALL, so unless youre emptying yourself
completely every time you give, it likely isnt Spirit led.

What we should focus on is the good. The times when there

is no other explanation than some sort of miraculous intervention.
We hear daily that things like this dont happen, and for the authors
who write these things, they may not. But for those of us who have
experienced something unexplainable, no amount of explanation
suffices. Be skeptical of anything claiming to look like power, as
Jesus was pretty gun shy of anything power related. His miracles
were nearly forced each time (his mother had to beg him to change
water to wine, the disciples had to beg him to feed the 5,000, etc.).
Jesus wasnt about spreading his fame on YouTube, growing out
legs and handing people cash, though I think he may have
participated if he had come today-more just to have fun than prove
anything. The boxes we create are often what we can handle, and I

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believe the father willingly climbs inside them to play with us, but
they certainly wont bind him.

I have found that Jesus, and thereby the Spirit is far more
concerned that we live in peace and happiness than in worrying
whether or not we ever give him the credit for it. Hes so unselfish,
he allows our selfishness to be the means in which he speaks to us.
That then is power, a life submitted to making others be more than
us. I suppose if were going to make any headway with this, we
should begin to address another of those big wordsour
Pneumatology (how we talk about the Spirit, specifically
doctrinally and scripturally).

All that Power

Nothing grabs the attention of the Western Christian like the

promise of power. The very reason we have seen so much
explosion in certain arenas of Christianity is that very promise. The

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allure of power is like nothing else for many people. The issue is, if
we really take Jesus seriously, take his revelation of his Father
seriously, and take his message seriously, power looks more like
powerlessness. I touched on this briefly in the last chapter, but Id
like to make the point a little more seriously now. His power is
revealed in powerlessness, his light revealed in darkness, and his
grace revealed in sin. This is how he works. The dying Christ, the
Lord of Glory, is the fullest revelation of the "authority and power"
of God. If you want authority, if you want power, that's fine, but
realize what it looks like. It looks like the loss of one life for the
gain of another. It looks like the final breath. It looks like
unwillingness to respond. It looks like refusal to be retributive. It
looks like something we've not seen on this earth except for in the
person of Jesus.

Thatll damage our theology regarding this whole power

thing we see crop up. Its all cyclical, Ive only been in ministry a
short time by most standards, and Ive seen certain power

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expressions cycle through the church three and four times. Its all
just silly really, the product of people who have good hearts and
good desires getting bored with Jesus, looking for more than just
him.

Am I saying the Spirit is powerless? By no means! Its just

that the power we think we want, the power that is in the Spirit
isnt really power at all, its more like control, and thats not how
this works.

Maybe we should back up.

How does God work?

Thats a big question, and honestly theres 2000 years of

church history trying to answer that one question. For me to think I
can answer it in one paragraph, chapter, or book is ridiculous. But
Im going to try anyways. And youre going to endure it, because

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you did pay good hard earned money for this book after all. Ok,
just kidding. But I think youll enjoy it.

God works like this: from within.

Ok, maybe not too ridiculous.

What we see play out from the creation narratives, (yes

s), to the incarnation is God working from within the worlds
systems and life forms. He puts his image (male and female) into
the land that was prepared. Theres this verse in the bible where
Jesus tells his disciples in this world you will have tribulation, but
be of good cheer, I have overcome the world. The word world
here literally means that which applies pressure from the outside.
Its not like Jesus is warning us that people will persecute us for
our beliefs, that doesnt happen in human behavior. Hes certainly
warning us about evil Spirits and demonic stuff, otherwise, why
the miraculous stuff Jesus?

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What Jesus is letting them in on, is that Hes inside,

exerting the necessary force outward to keep that which applies
pressure from the outside from overtaking us. And all the while the
Spirit is here comforting us. See, Jesus is the strength guy. The
Spirit is more the comfort gal. Much like a woman (my wife
anyways), shed rather have a good conversation any time. When I
say Jesus is the power guy, dont read that incorrectly. I didnt say
Jesus is the force guy. Theres a big difference. True power
comes from absolute submission not dominance. Subversion is
what wins the day, because its done not by might, nor by power
you know the rest. Subversion is absolutely how Jesus worked in
the Jewish context of his ministry, undermining their authority
with their own texts and so on.

Ok, but what do we do with all the seeming power stuff in

the biblical text? Certainly theres merit to textual criticism in
dealing with some of them, but for the average reader, thats just
too much work. I often joke that for the Christian stream from

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which I hail (charismatic) the bible begins in Acts 2, at Pentecost.

It seems as though Jesus is a footnote to the Spirit to much of the
movement, but that is neither here nor there for this book. Since
Acts 2 is where my bible began for a long time, I like to just hop
right in there.

Ok, so there sit the disciples, post ascension, laboring and

toiling for the Spirit. Think about it, these guys are the ones who
couldnt even last an hour with Jesus in the garden, Luke certainly
paints them in a better light here. It seems none of us have escaped
the draw for power, well tarry for power but fall asleep at
powerlessness. Well claim we dont know that guy because he
doesnt look like the powerful messiah we thought he was, but
well stay up all night for a gift. At any rate, the Spirit finally
descends, and in a non-consuming, kid-friendly flame no less. Ok,
just as it was with Jesus, this is as a dove, as a fire, etc.

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Good thing these guys didnt use hair product. The result
may have been vastly different. At any rate, the Spirit happens on
them, and all of a sudden they start praying in tongues. Only its
not nonsense, at least not to everyone. People start hearing the
good news of Jesus Christ, and coming to faith. Man, and all that
time the disciples just sat up there trying to slay one another in the
Spirit. No, I have to think they likely knew what they were
seeking; a way to convey the success of Jesus over the darkness of
the human experience. And they got what they were looking for. In
power. With tongues of fire reminiscent of the tongues of Babel
descending on people we see a gathering rather than a dispersing.
Its about radical inclusion rather than separation.
Then we have stories like Paul, being knocked from his
horse and having this huge mystical experience with Jesus. Paul
would have likely been labeled a new ager today. He had a
mystical experience and left his orthodoxy because of it. Of course
it was with Jesus, so theres a prerequisite here, but I digress. What
I find most interesting about Paul is his seeming unwillingness to

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even talk about his mystical experience except for in passing. It

seems Luke is far more interested in telling it than Paul is, which is
a lot like us isnt it? Tommy gets a new bike and we want to show
everyone Tommys bike, and all Tommy wants is to ride his damn
bike in peace.

Thats the (and I hesitate to use this word) inherent

danger in mystical experience. We tend to allow the experience
to become our new identity. My experiences, good and bad, are not
who I am, they are a part of the experience of life Im having, but
who I am lies much deeper than experience. Who I am lies at the
heart of the one who holds all things together. That defines and
defies experience. Experience is like the wine, remember. Nobody
is served by just dumping it all over the floor and acting like thats
the final word on the matter.

There are countless books about ancient mystics, new

mystics, people connecting with God on a very real level and one

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of the thing that seems to be the common thread with most of

them; none are content with any experience with God that doesnt
transform them into a clearer image of Jesus in the process. Oh
now we could spend another whole book talking about what the
image of Jesus is, but lets just say it looks a whole lot like radical
forgiveness and love for the other.

So a basic rule of thumb for me when Im having some

experience is this: is it giving me a sense of my connection to
others, and causing me to love them at a deeper level? If yes, then
its likely the Spirit and I having some fun. If no, then its likely
my own mimetic manifestation. The Spirit never leaves us, so both
can be enjoyed without guilt, but theres nothing wrong with
recognizing when its us, and when its the Spirit.

If we want to see what real power looks like, we need look

no further than the cross. Real power looks like absorbing the
worst people have to offer and offering it back in one whopping

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ball of forgive them rather than retribution. Scholar Marcus Borg

refers the justice of God as distributive rather than retributive. That
is the heart of the cross. It is the distribution of Gods grace upon
all humanity, not as an exchange or transaction, but as a gift,
requiring nothing in return. That is real power, distributing grace in
the midst of darkness and death.

Essentially, we find power when no power is able to do

anything about our situation. The victim of rape finds power not in
making the rape not happen, but in forgiveness of her assailant.
The victim of abuse finds power not in retribution (however good
that may feel for a moment) but in the forgiveness of the other
(from a safe distanceas a side note, God never authorizes abuse,
as in, never for any reason).

So it is with the sapling. It finds power in breaking through

the old, not hating it, but moving beyond it. With every new
centimeter of growth the old is shed. This is where many of us find

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ourselves, shedding the old and embracing something, someone, a

little different than weve likely been taught. This is the peace
thing I keep talking about. Its overwhelming, and its the most
genuine thing I think Ive ever felt, mimetically or Spiritually.

In reading this chapter, you might think Im saying theres

no power at all to be found in following Jesus. And youd be right,
if you mean the kind of power that exerts its selfish will upon
others to do something to them, however well intentioned, as
members of the same darkened race. This is the issue lying at the
heart of humanity. We are blind. All of us. Without exception. We
see little glimpses, through the Spirits joining us on our journey,
but by and large we remain blind. Were also terribly immature.
Were children really, especially in the light of the heavenly trio.
Yeah, were mature sons and all that, but the nature of the thing
demands that one more mature make the declaration of maturity.
Its all relative. Next to Him, we look like kids. Good thing Hes a
Father.

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However if you mean the kind of power that overcomes

darkness through subverting and dispelling it, then yeah, thats the
kind of power that is to be found. Its the kind of power that
surrenders itself over to our desire and deceit to radically and
inclusively deal with the problem of pain once and for all. Another
thought on power comes from the early, and I mean very early,
church. There are records of groups of people who were ministered
to by Jesus directly already having small communities crop up. Not
so much churches, but groups where power things were
happening. Now, at the death of Christ, these people would have
likely been too far away to really know what was going on, and
news took some time to travel. My question would be, was there a
moment when the switch dimmed for the groups out away from the
city?

It necessitates a rethinking of power to address power in the

realm of the Spirit. The Spirit is peace, the kingdom is peace, and

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the reign of Jesus is peace, so itll have to look about like that. And
lest we fall prey to over realized theologies of glory, God does not
demonstrate power in the way we think. Power for God looks like
the powerlessness of the cross. We would do well to remember that
when thinking of things like the gifts.

Chapter 7

Grabbing at Gifts

I SUPPOSE IN A BOOK ABOUT THE Spirit, we should address

the biblical topics of gifts and fruit. So this next bit will be about
those topics. Well likely be using a little more formal language,
though I never stray too far from my comfortable vernacular.
Theres a lot of very well thought out, very scholarly debate
around the existence of the gifts of the Spirit today. I am under
the assumption that the Spirit is still active in the lives of the
people she loves on a daily basis. If this is not your paradigm,
consider how you are breathing this moment

That being said, all of the experiential stuff is nice, if thats

your thing. I know people who could care less whether they ever
felt anything from the Spirit but are committed to social justice

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and radical inclusiontwo things I think the Spirit is all about.

That is a sort of spoiler alert for what I believe the Spirit of God is
doing, saying, and how shes moving in our presence today. Lest I
get too far ahead of myself however, lets just jump in to the fun
stuff. A word of warning, this chapter is longer than the others.

In what is known as the Charismatic Movement of

Western Christianity, weve often so whittled the Spirit down to a
mere gift-giving, strange-acting, tongue-talking being, that weve
somewhat lost the plot. In our very definitions of the gifts of the
Spirit created a being that works from without and ignored the
ever-important aspect to the inward working of the Spirit. Let me
say that another way. Weve already discussed that God works
from inside, from within, rather than from outside, applying
pressure. (Please dont over analyze what Im about to say, I dont
believe in double-procession). If the Spirit is the revelation of
Jesuswho is a revelation of the Fatherthen everything she does

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will look like them. Simple enough? Well go into that deeper in a
bit.

For now, Im going to address these gifts of the Spirit in a

little different light. Namely, as gifts that work from within us
rather than from outside us, to minister not only to us, but to the
world at large. The typical approach to these gifts is limited to the
shortlist penned by the Apostle Paul in one singular letter to the
Corinthians.

This is a rather long passage, but we need to read it in its

entirety to get proper context about the gifts of the Spirit as listed
in the bible.

1 Corinthians 12 (CEB) - Brothers and sisters, I dont want you to

be ignorant about Spiritual gifts. 2 You know that when you were
Gentiles you were often misled by false gods that cant even speak.
3 So I want to make it clear to you that no one says, Jesus is

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cursed! when speaking by Gods Spirit, and no one can say,

Jesus is Lord, except by the Holy Spirit. 4 There are different
Spiritual gifts but the same Spirit; 5 and there are different
ministries and the same Lord; 6 and there are different activities
but the same God who produces all of them in everyone. 7 A
demonstration of the Spirit is given to each person for the common
good. 8 A word of wisdom is given by the Spirit to one person, a
word of knowledge to another according to the same Spirit, 9 faith
to still another by the same Spirit, gifts of healing to another in the
one Spirit, 10 performance of miracles to another, prophecy to
another, the ability to tell Spirits apart to another, different kinds
of tongues[a] to another, and the interpretation of the tongues to
another 11 All these things are produced by the one and same
Spirit who gives what he wants to each person. 12 Christ is just
like the human bodya body is a unit and has many parts; and all
the parts of the body are one body, even though there are many.
13 We were all baptized by one Spirit into one body, whether Jew
or Greek, or slave or free, and we all were given one Spirit to

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drink. 14 Certainly the body isnt one part but many. 15 If the foot
says, Im not part of the body because Im not a hand, does that
mean its not part of the body? 16 If the ear says, Im not part of
the body because Im not an eye, does that mean its not part of
the body? 17 If the whole body were an eye, what would happen to
the hearing? And if the whole body were an ear, what would
happen to the sense of smell? 18 But as it is, God has placed each
one of the parts in the body just like he wanted. 19 If all were one
and the same body part, what would happen to the body? 20 But as
it is, there are many parts but one body. 21 So the eye cant say to
the hand, I dont need you, or in turn, the head cant say to the
feet, I dont need you. 22 Instead, the parts of the body that
people think are the weakest are the most necessary. 23 The parts
of the body that we think are less honorable are the ones we honor
the most. The private parts of our body that arent presentable are
the ones that are given the most dignity. 24 The parts of our body
that are presentable dont need this. But God has put the body
together, giving greater honor to the part with less honor 25 so

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that there wont be division in the body and so the parts might
have mutual concern for each other. 26 If one part suffers, all the
parts suffer with it; if one part gets the glory, all the parts
celebrate with it. 27 You are the body of Christ and parts of each
other. 28 In the church, God has appointed first apostles, second
prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, the
ability to help others, leadership skills, different kinds of tongues.
29 All arent apostles, are they? All arent prophets, are they? All
arent teachers, are they? All dont perform miracles, do they?
30 All dont have gifts of healing, do they? All dont speak in
different tongues, do they? All dont interpret, do they? 31 Use
your ambition to try to get the greater gifts. And Im going to show
you an even better way.

Theres a lot to process here, but Ill just focus on some of

the major points Paul is making. First, Paul affirms that it is from
the within working of the Spirit that we can even begin to utter
the phrase Jesus is lordas opposed to the without working of

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the evangelist. Then, he goes on to list what are commonly called

the gifts of the Spirit.

A word of wisdom, a word of knowledge, faith, gifts of

healing, performance of miracles, prophecy, the ability to tell
Spirits apart, different kinds of tongues, and the interpretation of
the tongues. First, note that this is in no way an exhaustive list as
though Paul had sat for months asking for divine inspiration of a
complete outline of everything we can or cannot do. Second, note
what I consider to be one of the more important aspects to this
entire passage to one, to another. You see, Paul is clearly stating
that some have certain gifts and others have other gifts. Some do
one thing while others do another thing. This is meant to be for our
benefit. It is meant to give us respect for one another, to cause us to
need one another, to partake of one anothers gifts. The very nature
of how we were created says it is not good that human be alone.
Why? Because were all a part. None of us are the whole package,
as much as we(I) might play our(my)selves up to be. We are

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unique, we are individual (rather, as Girard interdividual) and we

need one another.

Paul goes on to sayIn the church, God has appointed

first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then
gifts of healing, the ability to help others, leadership skills,
different kinds of tongues. All arent apostles, are they? All arent
prophets, are they? All arent teachers, are they? All dont perform
miracles, do they? All dont have gifts of healing, do they? All
dont speak in different tongues, do they? All dont interpret, do
they? The answer to all of these questions is understood to be
No! Again, Im not saying (just as Paul didnt say) that any of
these gifts is in any way more important than another.

In addition to the aforementioned giftswe can add

apostles, prophets, teachers, miracles, helps, leadership, and so
on. This means we can add what some call the five fold ministry
gifts into our understanding of the gifts of the Spirit. Hopefully,

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youre beginning to see a bigger picture of these gifts. Lets go

now to see what they are. I believe well see some things begin to
take shape, largely (though hopefully not only) that we have
misused these gifts out of ignorance to their proper function among
us. The definitions Ill be giving are taken from the BDAG Greek
lexicon, 2nd ed.

Word of wisdomlogos de sophiathe capacity to

understand and function accordingly - transcendent wisdom. This
has nothing to do with the teaching of prophecy (which Ill
discuss) or calling out someones sin (which is just foolishness) as
some might think. The idea carried with it is as the wisdom of
Solomon. Divine smarts you could say. This is what we could say
a visionary is using each time he or she sees a situation arise and
has the vision and wherewithal to deal with that situation. Nothing
too spooky yet.

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Word of knowledgelogos de gnosis - comprehension or

intellectual grasp of something - mystical knowledge. Again, this
would have very little to do with prophecy and more to do with the
ability to understand at what would seem to be a supernatural level.
It refers to a divine ability to learn. This is an arena where I see a
lot of problems. We havein so many circlesmade gnosis into
gnosticism that its become a bad thing to study. I cant stress
enough the importance of theology, not above anything else, but
really as a first learning. Without knowing who God is, how He
works, how He acts, and what He may or may not use, we are left
with an ideological idol rather than the Abba of Jesus.

Faithpistisin addition to the pistis that everyone

possesses, refers to a special gift of faith that seems to belong to a
select few. As an unquestioning belief in Gods power to aid
people with miracles; the faith that moves mountains. This same
faith is the faith of Christ as it were. For whatever we believe about
everyone possessing the same gift, I cant deny that there are those

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who seem to operate in some of these realms more deeply than I

might. That doesnt discomfort me, it affirms the very nature of my
being to be in fellowship with others.

Gift of healingcharisma iamaliterally the remedy.

What we usually see is someone offering up some mystical prayer,
but in actuality the word refers to offering whatever the remedy
might be. I believe that doctorsboth medical and mental health
are operating in charisma iama each time they treat a patient. I see
no greater vision of Jesus in union with humanity than that of a
surgeon who joins hands with the divine physician to heal the
other.

Performance

of

miraclesenergma

dynamisthe

exercising of power. Uh oh, I know, power. Power itself is not bad.

The issue comes in the wielding of power by those who have none.
We view power one way, God views it another. Remember, his
power looks a lot like dying on a cross. Until were ready to wield

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that power, we have no claim to make. This is inherent power,

something granted from within. Again, the Spirit is working from
within rather than without.
Prophecyprophetiathe gift of interpreting divine will
or purpose. This has very little to do with what has been attributed
to prophecy in the movements Im an alumnus of. Prophecy to
those movements looks a lot like the Madame Jesus we discussed
earlier. What is being said here is more in line with interpreting the
will of God, which were told is, that none should perish. How we
interpret that will then is directly driven by the will that none
should perish. This has many physical and Spiritual connotations,
well beyond corporate gatherings of like-minded people.

The ability to tell Spirits apartdiakrisisdiscernment evaluation of miraculous signs. It probably doesnt need to be said,
but not every miraculous thing that happens is either God or a
gift. Often times it is neither. This doesnt mean that if it is not
God it is evil, sometimes it is simply a human being performing

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something. The very nature of our being is divine, which means we

can often perform things in our own power just as we can in His.
Marcus Borg, borrowing from Celtic Spirituality calls this location,
thin places, places where the lines between dimensions are
blurred and we can, for a moment, make out the glow of the divine.

Different kinds of tonguesgenos glossavarying but

united by a single trait language - ecstatic speech. I mentioned
earlier that I believe Pentecost to be more about hearing than
speaking. If there is anything to be learned about ecstatic speech, it
is that often the Spirit is more interested in hearing than speaking.

The interpretation of the tongueshermniea glossa

the interpretation of this ecstatic speech. Again, this seems to be
more about hearing than anything else. Hearing is how we
internalize something, so Id have to say the Spirit is ultimately
concerned with the internalization of the truths of God.

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What we see from all of these is that they are really for one
purpose. The working from within to affect the without. If the
function of the Spirit is to bear witness that we are the children of
God, and to point us back to the person of Jesusthen it would
stand to say that the primary purpose of the gifts is the exact same
thing. These gifts are rest stops along the way, all pointing to
Jesus. We can all too often get stuck turning a rest stop into a
township. As Richard Rohr puts it our last experience with God
often keeps us from enjoying the next experience. That is one of
the great faults in the church. We obsess about what happened last
time, or whats going on over there so frequently that we miss
out on what were headed towards ourselves!

Ive been in numerous meetings where the gifts of the

Spiritor our interpretation of them anywayswere in effect. I
always wondered, was this all there was to it? Was it limited to just
the people who wanted to do the stuff that I thought was odd?
What about Mother Theresa? Doesnt her social justice work count

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as a gift of the Spirit? Of course it does. Even without going into

the passages were about to deal with, we can say that. Anything
that moves us towards the other, and especially the marginalized is
the Spirit.

We stopped short of dealing with what is commonly called

the ministry gifts (titled by people, not Paul). I believe these to be a
continuation of his thoughts on the gifts of the Spirit. Lets break
this passage down a bit and see what were dealing with.

In the church
God has appointed
first apostles
second prophets
third teachers
then miracles
then gifts of healing
the ability to help others

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leadership skills
different kinds of tongues

All arent apostles, are they? All arent prophets, are they?
All arent teachers, are they? All dont perform miracles, do
they? All dont have gifts of healing, do they? All dont speak in
different tongues, do they? All dont interpret, do they?

Paul, an apostle, claiming that God had appointed apostles

first? It would be sarcastically shocking if it were the 21st century,
but I dont think Paul is being too arrogant here. I think hes
dealing with something else. What hes getting at here is not a new
hierarchy, or a new identityas so many have taken onbut a
simple position or gift we are to use for the benefit of others. All
too often though, we use our gifts, or our positions simply for the
betterment of ourselves. I find it amusing that so many will throw
the title of the particular office they believe themselves to hold
on their business card as part of their namee.g. pastor so and so,

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Bishop proud of himself, Prophet puffed up. (Ive noticed prophet

is the only one given a female suffix ess). Yet we rarely see words
of wisdom giver Frank, or tongue talking Tammy. Its because in
our minds weve exalted the so-called ministry gifts above the
Spiritual gifts as though they were from somewhere different.
Weve made an unfair dichotomy out of them, and created an
office out of an operation. They all flow from the same Spirit, and
all are equal in importance. The ability to help others is every bit as
important as miracles. Teaching (systematically) is every bit as
important as tongues. We would do well to remember that.

In the last chapter I briefly covered the gifts of the Spirit,

their proper place in the body, the fact that no, not everyone
operates in all of them, and yes thats perfectly ok. This is neither a
problem nor a permanent position! Operating in a particular gift
doesnt exalt someone above anyone else, it simply means theyre
doing something that you arent. To use Pauls languageall
arent arms, all arent legs, all arent feet and so on. Yet for some

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reason weve become so uncomfortable with ourselves and who

God has created us to be that weve taken on this false idea that
everyone is exactly the same, carbon-copied person. We arent!
There are diversities of gifts but the same Spirit, and sometimes
well operate in one or the other. It also doesnt mean we only have
one gift. It may be that some days Im operating as a teacher and
other days I have a word of knowledge, hopefully those two will
go hand in hand most of the time!

We ended up with the discussion that Paul included these

so-called ministry gifts in his discourse on the gifts of the Spirit, as
though they were also a part of the plan. I firmly believe this to be
the case. I dont think Paul was switching gears, I think he was
continuing on in further gifts.

In the church, God has appointed first apostles, second

prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, the
ability to help others, leadership skills, different kinds of tongues.

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All arent apostles, are they? All arent prophets, are they? All
arent teachers, are they? All dont perform miracles, do they? All
dont have gifts of healing, do they? All dont speak in different
tongues, do they? All dont interpret, do they? 1 Corinthians 12:2830 (CEB)

We could proceed next to Ephesians where we read an

outline that appears to be about these same gifts.

He gave some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists,

and some pastors and teachers. His purpose was to equip Gods
people for the work of serving and building up the body of
Christ until we all reach the unity of faith and knowledge of Gods
Son. Gods goal is for us to become mature adultsto be fully
grown, measured by the standard of the fullness of Christ. As a
result, we arent supposed to be infants any longer who can be
tossed and blown around by every wind that comes from teaching
with deceitful scheming and the tricks people play to deliberately

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mislead others. Instead, by speaking the truth with love, lets grow
in every way into Christ, who is the head. The whole body grows
from him, as it is joined and held together by all the supporting
ligaments. The body makes itself grow in that it builds itself up
with love as each one does its part. Ephesians 4:11-16 (CEB)

Again we should note the use of the word some quite

frequently. This is ok! Its ok to not be a drummer, or a janitor, or a
pastor, or a teacher, or anything else. We all have a part in this and
all our parts are different. Can you imagine a body with 48 arms,
no legs, and no waste disposal system? It would be pretty
deformed. This is part of the issue in the body of Christ today. We
say all are everything, or conversely that only the finger is
important. Neither is true, and none is more important!

And all of this is for what? The furnishing of the necessary

equipment to the church so that they can then take the ministry we
have been given (reconciliation) to the rest of the family! Its no

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wonder the church is in such disrepair. Everything has been about

the man up front, when in reality the people up front are here
solely to support and equip those not up front to take the mystery
to the world! And how long is this supposed to last? Until we all
come to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of
God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness
of Christ. I believe it is safe to say, this is never supposed to end.

Speaking the truth in love...

This is one of those passages that get misquoted all too

often, making synonyms of Christian and panderer. The author
isnt saying that the message ought to be watered down and
palpable for all, in fact hes just finished calling them children!
This is all carried through the previous verses about what those
who operate their Spiritual gift in the form of positional ministries
are about. We are called to speak the truth in love so that none of
us are children any more. What dictates whether or not we are

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children? Are we tossed about by every wind of doctrine? Is

something like tongues our major proof of, or reason for running
away from the Spirit? Or any other gift related ministry? Those
things are not the substance, viable as they may be. Those things
are gifts for a specific time. The ministry is the mystery, and the
mystery is reconciliation, oneness, and unity with the Godhead. If
were still gift focused rather than union focused, were
demonstrating that were still children! This is when speaking the
truth (the mystery) in love comes into play. It requires love to
speak the truth, period. The manner in which we speak ought to be
seasoned with grace as well, but this and speaking the truth in love
are not synonymous! In an effort to pander to people to receive
larger offerings, too many are watering down the truth of the
gospel. If I teach that all are included, people will think Im a
universalist and stop giving to my ministry. Who cares? Are you
willing to speak the truth in love or not? If you believe you have
love, you will speak the truth, plain and simple! What is the end

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goal of it all? That we can grow up in all things into Him who is
the head, Christ - from whom the whole body edifies itself in love!

Just as I did earlier, Ill quickly define and comment on

each of these gifts. Again, using the same lexicon.

Apostlesapostolosone sent forward with orders usually preceding of Christ so it can be said it is one sent with
revelation of Christ. Yes there are still apostles in the sense that
people are sent with a revelation of Christ. And yes this is a
different gift, and no not everyone is an apostle. Thats perfectly
fine. None are more important, but all are part of the whole. Often
times theyll operate with a word of wisdom going into an area
with a specific message or way of applying the gospel.

Prophetsprophtswould be one who prophesies

(duh). However once again we must understand the reason for the
prophecy in the first place, to declare the divine will. There are

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several courses we could take here, but one that pops into my mind
is God is not willing that any should perish. Which would lead me
to believe that any prophecy that declares something to be Gods
judgment on the heathen would have to be a false prophecy by
nature. The message is, always has been, and always will be - love
and restoration.

Evangelistseuaggelistsa bringer of good tidings. This

is someone who proclaims the gospel. The gospel is the grace of
God manifest and incarnated in the Son. The gospel is NOT the
message of hell, death, destruction, conviction, condemnation, the
rapture, apocalypse or separation. The gospel is, pure and simple,
the message of reconciliation. Regardless of how anyone acts, and
regardless of how many hands they may have raised at their
meetings for an altar call, unless theyre declaring the message of
Gods grace manifest and pledged in the Son, and thereby
humanities total reconciliation, they arent functioning as an
evangelist. They may be teaching, they may be preaching, but

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theyre not evangelizing. Anything other than radical inclusion is

not the gospel of Jesus.

Pastorspoimna shepherd or human leader. Contrary

to popular belief, the term is not shepherd in the sense that he or
she is over anyone, but shepherd in the sense that he or she
organizes the pen, keeping it clean, and showing the flock where
the food is if they cant see it. It falls in line greatly with a teacher,
one who points to the source of food, and defends against attack.
What attack? Sickness, disease etc. offering prayer, teaching,
counsel, etc. as needed, but never as a replacement for divine
involvement. Also contrary to popular belief, yet again an area
where some are and others are not. Again, and I cant say it
enough, this isnt a hierarchical structuring, but simply an
identifying of various gifts. To me theres nothing wrong with this.
Many would be perfectly comfortable saying Im not an artist or
Im not a musician or Im not a drummer but for some reason
weve become uncomfortable saying Im not a pastor or in

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saying he or she is a pastor. We do this because in our minds we

still have the position elevated. Its ok to not be a pastor, its
probably preferred! Just like its ok to not be a baseball player.
Some are, some arent and thats just fine. I wonder if everyone is
a teacher would work in the real world. I probably couldnt just
walk into the local university and declare myself a teacher and start
teaching biology.

Teachersdidaskalosthose who by their great power as

teachers draw crowds around them. Great power as a teacher
largely comes from becoming a willing student. I see a lot of
people (myself included) who have just jumped into teaching, only
to find out that what we were teaching is not only poor exegesis,
its just poor theology. If youre one of these, and youve found
yourself stagnant or still, it may be time to further your education
and reignite the fire to teach.

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The Ability to Help Othersantilmpsishelpful deeds.

Jesus calls the Spirit our helper. This is something I think we could
all use a healthy dose of. Everyone wants to teach, pastor, be up
front, but for some reason so many stray from simply helping one
another, and yet here it is, a gift of the Spirit to do so. A private
part of the body so to speak, and yet Paul says these parts have
more honor among the body I wonder why.

Leadership

Skillskybernsisthayer

would

say

government but that isnt correct, the word means administration

with delegation. It again refers to the ability to not only cast vision,
but to enable others to fulfill vision.

Often times these ministry gifts will flow hand in hand

with Spiritual gifts. e.g. apostles and words of wisdom, teacher
and words of knowledge, prophets and prophecy, evangelists and
working of miracles, pastors and helps the list could go on. The
point is that many of the gifts often operate in tandem with one

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another, giving more influence to each other for the benefit of the
without. One thing we should note about all the gifts of the
Spirit/ministry gifts is that they are for others. They are never
simply for us to use to exalt ourselves, or just to bless ourselves.
They are for the benefit of the whole body. Im suspicious of any
group that becomes exclusive in its actions or behaviors towards
those who dont experience the Spirit in the same way they do.

If we can understand the truth of humanitys inclusion

our union with Godwe can minister reconciliation the proper
way. And those who feel called to one of the positional ministries
or called to use one or more of the gifts of the Spirit can do so by
equipping, or presenting the perfection delivered by Christ. Im
sure we can all see the overlap in many of the gifts and
ministry callings, but theyre all gifts of the Spirit. None of this
is exhaustive. Music is certainly a Spiritual gift, as is painting, but
Ive found theyll usually fall under one of these headings in their
administration.

Chapter 8

In Pursuit of Fruit

IN THIS CHAPTER, ID LIKE to discuss fruit. Its been overdiscussed that God is concerned with our fruit. If we mean our
fruit as in the gifts we manage to manifest, then I have to say
no, sorry. If we mean our fruit however as the extension of love
we become in those moments, then I agree wholeheartedly. The
former has too much focus on me, while the latter keeps the focus,
or the lighting, squarely on him. The fruit of the Spirit is often
discussed in churches, and typically so with the fruit itself being
the goal of the inhabitation of the Spirit. I dont believe that is what
the whole point of this fruit is. I dont think anything the Spirit
does in us, or to us, or with us, is meant to be the goal, but rather

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something meant to help us along the journeywhich remember is

a never ending journey into the one who started all this.

Theres a particular passage we all likely know well from

Pauls letter to the Galatianscommonly noted as the fruit of the
Spirit.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering,

kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
Against such there is no law. Galatians 5:22-23

Note first the singular (non-plural) use of fruit. Paul doesnt

say the fruits of the Spirit are: but the fruit of the Spirit is. Why
does this matter? I think weve somewhat compartmentalized how
we feel. In essence, weve said that love can be separate from
peace, but the truth of the matter is, if it is the love that is produced
by the Spirit, it will not be separate from peace, joy, and so on. In
other words, we dont get to be stationed here. We cant be

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peacemakers and not gentle. At least not in full anyways. And

dont read gentle as soft spoken, it means something different.
More on that soon. I remember teaching on this very subject when
I was a pastor and making the (erroneous) claim that these are
sequential, that until weve mastered one, we cant have the next.
Thats not what Pauls getting at here. What hes getting at tends
more towards whose fruit this is and where it is active on its own
accord.

A strawberry is a funny fruit. Especially in light of what

were discussing here. The basics are, a strawberry isnt a fruit
itselfthe little black seeds are actually the fruit with the red part
being called the receptacle. Much like a strawberry then, the fruit
of the Spirit is contained in one single dose. The receptacle is the
Spirit, and the fruit is an inseparable part of her character. Just as
people can only say Jesus is Lord by the Spirit, we can only love
because of the presence of the one who is love in us. We love
because he first loved us can be rendered in this light as well

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that we have joy because of his indwelling joy, peace because of

his peace, and so on. I want to belabor this point, because its
worth it. If we separate out the fruit of the Spirit and turn it into the
fruits of the Spirit, we necessarily make a procession of religious
activity out of it. Let me explain. If the fruits of the Spirit are love,
joy, peace and the rest, then we can act loving while not having
peace, and act peaceful while not having joy and so on. If however
the fruit of the Spirit is love joy peace patience then we have a
singular activity of the Spirit within us. That fruit is born at once,
by her.

Let me come at that from a different angle. The Spirit acts

on behalf of the Father, or just like him, or however we want to say
it. When she bears fruit in us, it is the singular manifestation of
what it looks like to be enveloped in God. That means that we
cannot have love from God and it not contain peace as well. If
it is Gods love, then it will have peace inside it, and joy, and

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patience, and so on. Hopefully thats enough metaphors, Im

running out of strawberry comparisons.

Next Id like to spend a little ink dissecting the fruit within

the receptacle of the Spirit. Again, my definitions come from a
particular lexicon, and I embellish a bit forto overplay the
metaphor even moreflavor. Keep in mind while reading this
short list that the fruit of the Spirit is more accurately defined as
love-joy-peace-longsuffering-kindness-goodness-faithfulnessgentleness-self-control. Or in other words, all one fruit. Ill skip
over love strictly because that topic could be housed in a book of
its own. What will suffice is to say here hopefully is, love is
something that doesnt go away when its not reciprocated. She
doesnt seek to be returned. That ought to give us a clue as to what
the Spirit is trying to tell us when we experience love in a tangible
sense.

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Joy is most accurately expressed as the experience of

gladness. This isnt just grin it till you win it or forcing a smile
or pat answers of Im blessed and nothing less. Its an actual
experience, something tangible. Interestingly enough, one of the
treatments a counselor friend uses for [emotional] depression is to
begin people on a regiment of serving others. The shift of focus
causes depression to fade in many cases. I dont believe this to be a
cure all for depression (neither does she), there are various types
of depression and Im no doctor.

Peace is defined as harmony, concord; security, safety,

prosperity, felicity, (because peace and harmony make and keep
things safe and prosperous); of the Messiah's peace; the way that
leads to peace (salvation); of Christianity, the tranquil state of a
soul assured of its salvation through Christ, and so fearing nothing
from God and content with its earthly lot, of whatsoever sort that
is. So many of us could take so much from this. We are in a time of
moral, religious, national, political, and social unrest. We are

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sitting by, biding our time until what we believe is inevitable is

going to happen. The fruit of the Spirit is national tranquility,
exempt from the rage and havoc of war, peace between
individualswhatever their affiliation. I think it safe to say theres
not much of the Spirits peace in the West. Interesting to me is the
phraseof the messiahs peace-the way that leads to peacesalvation. Wait....the fruit of the Spirit leads to salvation? Thatll
toy with our religious minds wont it? In some circles, were told
the Spirit isnt there until weve made our profession of guilt, our
admission of sin, and our confession of belief. But the father leaves
none of it to us remember? It is by this inward working that we
hear her voice. Next is fearing nothing from God? Well dont tell
that to the Western church, especially the more legalistic ones!
And seemingly to give us a little ammunition against the false
prosperity message, peace entails that one is content with their
earthly lot. Contentment is a topic that deserves a book of its own.

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Patience is best summed up as a state of remaining tranquil

while awaiting an outcome. It doesnt carry with it the idea of just
biding time. It has to do with the attitude in which the waiting
happens. We have likely all been taught to just be patient! Well
guess what, even that waiting isnt our responsibility. Why?
Because wethrough the Spiritcan be learn to be content. I
often wonder just how content Paul had learned to be that he could
say in whatever state I find myself. Whatever state?

Kindness is the idea of self-giving or self-emptying. It also

means benignity. This is much more than just being nice, it carries
this idea again (just as love does) of leading to self giving,
generosity. Helpful? What we will notice in all these fruit that
there are going to be hints of the gifts as well, its almost like the
Spirit knows what its doing! Benignity is tolerance toward others.
Wait, tolerance? You cant be serious! Were taught to not tolerate
the sin or the sinner, were taught to throw them out, cast them to
the devil and be done with them. But the Spirit produces in us

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tolerance for those that bother us in all of their stuff. Ive learned
that whatever I have a particular hang up with is an area that Im
not grown up.

Goodness is a positive moral quality characterized by the

interest in the welfare of others. The issues of judgment throughout
Jesus teaching are his way of turning the tables on the Pharisees,
not some beefed-up law on steroids. Most often, Jesus is
condemning them for their social injustices, rather than their
theology or doctrines. The parable of Lazarus and the rich man
comes to mind, a social justice parable. Jesus seems concerned
with how we treat the least of these, and here we have an answer to
how that plays out. By the Spirit.

Faithfulness is more accurately rendered faith. The fruit of

the Spirit is faith. Imagine if that were how we preached. Instead
weve made faith something we must work out and produce, but
here we have it in fairly clear language that its her job, not ours. I

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hope youre beginning to see whats happening. Our belief cannot

save us, or lead us to salvations door. She does that. It is the Spirit
that guides us into truth and confirms that we are children of God
(rather than saying we can be she confirms the appropriated state
of our identity).

Gentleness is the quality of not being overly impressed by a

sense of ones self-importance, courtesy, considerateness. Ive
fallen prey to this many times. Assuming that soft speech is
gentleness, but its not. It would seem arrogance is more the
opposite of gentleness than boisterous speech. Many today are so
utterly impressed by their position, title, the various letters that
follow their names, how big their ministry is, how many buildings
they own, how large theyve made the kingdom, and yet here as a
fruit of the Spirit we have what would seem to be the opposite of
this. The Spirit willif allowedproduce in us a sense of
humility. A more localized way to say this might bedoesnt
need a YouTube channel to film their healings.

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Self-Control is restraint of ones emotions, impulses or

desires. Ill never be able to control self. Self isnt yours to
master, its His. Just as faith is his, self-control is his. Then what
we could say is that its not so much self-control but more
accurately a Spirit-controlled self.

How does Paul end his discourse on the fruit of the Spirit?
Now go believe!? No, rather with Against such, there is no
law. Again, this means a little to us, but usually only insofar as we
can appropriate grace to cover our blunders and willful
disobedience. While that is certainly true, theres more going on
here. I believe Paul is saying that because of the fruit of the Spirit
and its presence in our lives, theres no code (read: law, and
additions to the law) that can ever hold us up to the light of
judgment again. The words no law refer certainly to the strict law
of the Old Testament, but also to any statutory legal system or
laweven the Christian law of belief and reception. What does

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this mean for us? Because of Jesusand the fruit of the Spiritthe
idea of judgment is out the window, so to speak, forever.

Manic to Mystic: Making Your Way Out

I realize that heading to be a bit of a caricature, but the word manic

simply means something like frenetically busy, frantic. I believe
that to be the earmark of an experience gone wrong, or something
that was merely mimetic in nature. If the kingdom of Jesus is best
described as peace, then any encounter with the Spirit ought to be
rest producing in us. In that same respect, since were told that
perfect love casts out fear, we could rightly say that any encounter
with the Spirit wont produce fear.

And yet, Christians often seem to be some of the most

fearful people on the planet.

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Something might be wrong with that. So whats the way

out? We could begin by taking a more mystical approach to life.
Mystical doesnt have to be a spooky, weird term, it simply means
transcending human understanding. There are a number of things
in our universe that transcend our understanding. Those things are
just as much mystical as an experience in a church service.
Learning to look at things through a mystical lens then is what I
believe to be the way out of formulaic, repeat after me, 9 gift
churchianity.

How can we look at things through a mystical lens? For

starters, we approach things like the bible, other sacred writings,
and the various things we partake of sacramentally. I call my
children living icons. They are sacraments to my wife and I, a way
we experience God every day. Their smiles, their laughter, their
love are all traces of the divine in human form. They are miniincarnations. A meal shared with friends becomes a sacrament the
moment self is out of the way and transparent relationship takes

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place. In that moment, the presence of the divine is mediated at the

table through open self-giving love for another. Then to approach
life more mystically, we simply stop looking for the why of our
various situations, and begin to enjoy the now. Why something or
someone is in our life may be revealed, but thats never the point.
The point is to live in the now, to put it as Jesus said take no
thought for tomorrow. In this we begin to address the needs of the
now.

What does that look like? For me, its looked like emptying
my wallet for the homeless man rather than walking by. For you, it
might look like giving the single mother a room to live in while she
figures out life on her own. For others it may look like spending
their lives working to end human trafficking. For another it may be
the devotion of an entire life to the study of theology. All of these
are gifts of the Spirit because all are working toward that great aim
of the kingdompeace on earth, goodwill toward all people.

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When we begin to look at things a little more mystically,

we stop trying to figure out every situation as though every
scenario in which we find ourselves is a puzzle to be solved so we
can progress to the next level. The journey were on is not some AZ beginning and end journey. It is a Mbius strip of eternal journey
into God. Well never pop out the other side and think Boy, that
was fun, whats next?. In that light then, taking things like
experience and lessening them doesnt cheapen them, it simply
acknowledges that each new day can, and should, be a new
experienceone that keeps us restfully anticipating what shell do
next in us.

Conclusion

Desire and the Dance

Life in its purest form is enjoyed in fellowship. From tribes to

youth groups to parties, we live in search of it. Our hearts need it
and everything we are looks for it. Where do we think that comes
from? In essence, we could say that our wills are made by the willmaker. In that respect then, our desire is also made by the desiremaker. When we desire fellowship, where does that desire come
from? In the image of God means just like him, and nothing is
more like him than desire.

The desire to be with people is what started creation, the

desire to be one of us is what drove the incarnation, and the desire

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to remain with us is revealed in the Revelation. We should all learn

to recognize that the bible verse we often proclaim as a means to
the new Ferrari delight yourself in Him and He will give you the
desires of your heart (Psalm 37:4) is talking about the desire itself,
not the object, at least to me. We dont know what our hearts
know. Our hearts desire things that we cant even imagine, because
they know whats best for us. Thats why Jesus is said to live in
your heart, though not actually, it paints the portrait of how things
work in that realm.

In that respect then, the desire to be like the other, to have

what they have, or to keep up with the Joness is what we label it,
though the process is called mimesis. Mimesis isnt inherently bad,
and it is the best way to talk about how we are as human beings.
We want what each other has. Lands, oil, energy, money, spouses,
animals, those blue and black jeans with the fancy pockets. But it
goes further. We want peace, grace, love, joy and we see that in the

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other just as much as we see the negative. Where am I going with

this?

We dont need to stop having our experiences with her. We

need to enjoy the dance. But we also need to unplug ourselves
from the grip of experience and trying to manipulate the next high
and ground ourselves back in temporal reality from time to time.
Mystical reality is half of our reality, temporal is the other half.
One day, mystical reality will be all that remains for us, but while
here, temporal is every bit as important. Theres an old Christian
saying hes so heavenly minded, hes no earthly good and I think
that fits what Im trying to say.

We need the experiences. We need to desire the good, the

other. We need to allow experience to transcend logic and come
back face to face with it in the end. Anything genuinely Spiritual
can be (though maybe not in our own lifetime) verified naturally. I
think of the creation narratives and wonder if the trite old bumper

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stickers didnt just say it the best way possible. I believe in the big
bang theory, God spoke and bang it was. Quaint, but it
illustrates my point. Often the fight between those who insist the
scientific method be able to verify everything that has happened
and those who insist it cannot becomes so loud that the point is
missed entirely.

The one who holds all things together (Paul), the breath of
life (Genesis), the unified field (modern physics), the God particle
(physics), the mimetic theory (Girard) are all ways of saying the
same thing. We are connected. Not in some ethereal if I flap my
wings sort of way, but in a very real, Spiritual all encompassing
way. The same Spirit weve been talking about throughout this
book is what binds humanity together as one, gives us our life, our
breath, and draws us towards Christ. That Spirit is a person, and
though I refer to her in the feminine, she is incomprehensible,
known only through her activity among us.

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I am a sincere advocate of giving up the ghosta Spirit of

specter and oddities, and diving headlong into the dance that the
third person of the Godhead is daily beckoning us to participate in.
If we are to respond in any way to her call, it is to take the dance
card and join in. Let go of the feelings, the specters, and jump back
inthe waters wine.

Hopefully, youve been given a new glass of sorts with this

book; something to help you along the way with your journey, to
help both explain and experience more of the Spirit. While it is true
that no box can contain God, he also doesnt keep his nature
hidden from us. That nature is goodness, love, peace, kindnessall
the things the Spirit reveals to us. We read in the last part of the
book of Philippians whatever is true, whatever is honorable,
whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is
of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of
praise, dwell on these things. NASB. It stands to reason that we
are told to think on these things because thinking on these things is

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thinking on God. This is the job of the Spirit; to bring to our

remembrance which things we are supposed to be thinking on.

This is more of a call to meditation than a moral compass,

and I believe it encompassesto overplay the metaphorthe work
of the Spirit within us. Shes here to bring to our remembrance
what is good, pure, and lovely. In thinking about the lovely, were
thinking about God. When we're thinking about him, everything
and everyone gets a little more lovely, which starts the process
over again. Call it mysticism, or contemplative prayer or positive
thinking for all I care, it's the heart of the father for us. Life is
meant to be enjoyed, not endured. We will all suffer, we will all
have pain, but the Spirit is here to remind us that at the end of the
pain comes death, and after death comes resurrection.