Share Immanuel

(book review)

Wilder, E. James, and Coursey Chris M. 2010. Share Immanuel – the healing lifestyle. Pasadena, CA: Shepherd’s House.

“Share Immanuel” is the latest publication from Shepherd’s House in Pasadena, CA. It was written in collaboration by Jim Wilder (director of Shepherd’s House) and Chris Coursey (www.thrivetoday.org)

The booklet has only 21 pages but is an excellent introduction to and summary of the Immanuel approach, which was developed by Dr. Karl & Charlotte Lehman and is part of the Life Model teaching at Thrive! conferences and Thriving recovery classes. It has already been used successfully in several different countries and cross-culturally situations.

The healing lifestyle of “Share Immanuel” includes only three simple steps:

• Sitting with God
• Sharing minds
• Speaking

1. Sitting with God means spending time in God’s presence, so to say “on the hill top.” This works much better as starting point for working through painful memories, than sitting in your pain, waiting for God to intervene and trying to “climb uphill.”

A good starting point is either remembering a situation where we experienced an interactive time in God’s presence (called the “Interactive memories seat”) or remembering things that fill us with appreciation (called the “Appreciation memories seat”). The later can include thankfulness for God’s gifts, or just special moments like a sunset or the smile of a child.

2. Sharing minds means synchronizing our perspective with God, understanding how he sees things, and thereby making sense of things that trouble us. This results in “God peace” – a peace that is so perfect that you can’t improve on it.

This step often includes a “question time” with God, where we can ask him, for example, where he was in the painful moments, what keeps us from seeing him in the painful memory, and what we need to know about a certain situation. Once we have received his perspective on things, we can share the joy with others.

3. Speaking refers to telling the Immanuel story you just experienced to others. It helps us to consolidate the new perspective and it creates hope in others.

We can tell the story from two angles: the “Once I lived in thorns” version has the bottom of the hill perspective, elaborating on all the pain we experienced – this will trigger similar memories in our listeners and depress them; while the story “What I appreciate about Immanuel” is told from the hill top perspective and encourages both story teller and listener.

This is the basic idea of “Share Immanuel.” The booklet includes of course much more, such as more details on how to tell the story, explanations on how we process pain, a chapter on solutions when you get stuck in the process, frequently asked questions, and links to more resources. I found that the booklet explains the process very well and in a way that anybody can understand, even without knowing the Life Model.

It is exciting to hear how the booklet has already been used in workshops in different countries and caused a snowball effect – participants who learned the basic steps, then shared their Immanuel story with others, and through this helped others to start “sitting with God” and experiencing Immanuel.

The booklet is a great summary and tool to share the Immanuel process with others.

I found one phrase in the booklet especially descriptive:

God offers hospitality!

Let’s accept the invitation – come and sit with Him!

The booklet can be ordered here.

Does God still speak today?

In one of our last Bible studies we discussed another chapter of Tozer’s “The Pursuit of God.“ It was on the spoken word of God.

We read a whole series of verses about God’s word and suddenly I realized that we usually assume that these refer to the Bible, even though most of them do not necessarily say that. It’s so easy to hear “God’s word” and think of “God’s Word” as if it was the only word of God.

This reminded me of a book that I had read two years ago, and it motivated me to do a little summary of what I learned through it. The book is Hearing God, developing a conversational relationship with God, by Dallas Willard (1984)

Willard starts the introduction with a story of his wife’s grandmother: When somebody in her house group mentioned that God had spoken to him, she remarked “I wonder why God never speaks to me like that.” She is in good company. Maybe you have had the same question. Many believers like her have a rich interactive relationship with God but are unfamiliar with God’s voice and the possibility of having a conversational side of a relationship with God.

“Our failure to hear God has its deepest root in a failure to understand, accept and grow into a conversational relationship with God, the sort of relationship suited to friends who are matures personalities in a shared enterprise, no matter how different they may be in other respects” (29)

He defines this conversational relationship as telling God what is in our hearts and hearing and understanding the “still, small voice.”

In the following chapters, Willard treats different aspects of this question, misconceptions and arguments why God cannot, would not, and does not want to speak to people. These arguments are partly influenced by “naturalism,” leading people to believe it is unscientific to think that God speaks.

(If you don’t have time to read a long post, jump to the end of the post for the summary.)

Willard is very clear on the question that the Bible is the primary manner of communication. However, the second way as expressed in Ps 32:8 is guiding us with his eyes. This means an awareness of what the other person is thinking. This is what Willard calls the conversational relationship, an outworking of Jesus living in us and his presence in us (Col 1:27, Gal 2:19-20).

Jesus promised us that we can hear his voice (Jn 10:1-16). One aspect of hearing his voice is to receive guidance. He can use dreams, visions, voices, the Bible, extraordinary events, etc but the most important one is the “still small voice” or “gentle whispering” that Elijah heard. It is easily overlooked and disregarded. It can be audible, or a human voice, or through messengers including angels, but most often we will hear it inside our spirit.

Willard addresses some common misconceptions:

- “a message-a-minute view” – every movement needs to be ordained by God, and people are unable to act without clear guidance from God even for daily tasks.
- “it’s all in the Bible” view – leading to the assumption that we do not need to hear his voice today. He also call this “Bible deism” – similar to the Sadducees, there are those that believe that God stopped speaking, but this is a wrong way of honoring the Bible.

When the Bible refers to the “word of God” without further qualification it usually means God’s speaking, communicating, his thoughts and his mind (Ps 119:89-91). God’s word is powerful and in speaking God created the universe (Gen 1) and through it he rules the kingdom. In the same way that the word of a king is powerful and can have big effects (including heads rolling), the same is even more true for God’s word. This is what the centurion recognized (Mt 8:10) – “just speak a word and it will happen.”

The reality in the kingdom responds to the spoken word! God also gives power and authority to people (e.g. Num 20:8-12). God handed over power to Jesus, and Jesus handed over power to us, “as the Father has sent me, so I am sending you” (Jn 20:21, Mt 10, Lk 9)

There are different degrees of power – sometimes we are called:

- to ask for God to speak a direct word (pray)
- to speak on his behalf (Acts 3:6; 14:10)
- to take action on his behalf (Acts 9:40)

We need to keep in mind that THE word of God is Jesus (Jn 1:10-11).
And the Bible is God’s Word, his written word, and one result of God’s speaking.

Willard makes it very clear that:

“the Bible is the written Word of God, but the word of God is not simply the Bible” (141)

When we examine Bible passages with this in mind, we will discover that

- the Bible is the Word of God in its unique written form
- but the Bible is not Jesus Christ who is the living word
- neither is the Bible the word of God mentioned in many Scriptures passages: e.g. Ps 119:89, Ps 19:1-4; Acts 12:24; Mt 13 – in comparison to 2 Tim 3:15-17 which refers specifically to the ‘sacred writings,’ or Scriptures or 1 Pt 1:23-24 where both are mentioned next to each other.

All of these are God’s word, including when we hear from him individually!

God’s word is portrayed in the Bible, and available to every person through the Bible, but it is not limited to it. God uses the Bible to renew our mind, but it is mainly through his speaking to us that we are transformed in a character for whom listening to God’s voice is natural. This is what our union with Christ looks like (Gal 2:20, Phil 1:21).

In chapter 8, Willard provides detailed answers on how to recognize God’s voice. It is a learning process. We need to learn to discern his voice, both while reading the Bible and when listening to the “still small voice” because even Satan can abuse the Bible. In this learning process it is good to have help from others, who have a close relationship with God. But first we need to accept that God does speak, and wants to speak to us, then we can grow in experience and ability to hear his voice.

On the question how to distinguish God’s voice from our subconscious voice, Willard cites E. Stanley Jones who points out that the subconscious voice argues with you, tries to convince you, but the inner voice of God does not argue, it just speaks (175).

When God speaks we can sense the weight of its authority. This is combined with a spirit of peacefulness and confidence, which is similar to the godly wisdom mentioned in James 3:17. We should test it because it has to be consistent with God’s character and the principles of his written word, e.g., fear motivation does not come from God.

It also helps to accept that there is no guarantee for perfection, or infallibility of discerning God’s mind. It is impossible to never be mistaken and nowhere promised, but maintaining a close relationship to the Bible helps. Willard warns us that this is not the same as scholarship.

“Scholarship does not replace experiencing the living voice of God.”

Concerning fear of not being able to discern God’s will: “God is not a mumbling trickster” (191) – when we are willing to listen, he can make himself understood and is able to communicate plainly.

God can direct us mechanically, without speaking, like driving a car or directing a robot, “but when he guides us with conscious cooperation, he speaks to us.” The necessary conditions are:

- our willingness to listen
- asking him to speak
- being still

We should not be anxious if we don’t hear from God, but trust that he gives us a lot of freedom to determine our life, and sometimes he wants us to make our own decisions.

Concerning the “perfect will of God”: when we follow God’s general counsel of his written word, we are right in the middle of God’s perfect will, and if there is any specific word, we should be obedient to it.
Beyond that we have a huge freedom, because God does not always have a specific plan for each moment – “no ideal, detailed life-plan uniquely for each believer.”

Two final thoughts:

- Hearing God does not exclude risks or suffering.
- The greater goal of listening to his voice is to move beyond it to living in the kingdom (211).

Willard summarizes the book with the following steps (213)

A) Foundational steps

- having entered into an additional life by the additional birth, including the commitment to find out more what is morally right and commanded by God
- seeking fullness of the new life in Christ at the impulse of the spirit of God, growing in faith, moving beyond living in our own strength

B) Steps to hearing God

- meditate on God’s principles of life in the Scriptures
- be alert and attentive to what is happening in our life, mind and heart
- pray and speak with God about all matters that concern us
- listen carefully and deliberately for God’s voice
- if God does not speak

o ask him about possible hindrances
o seek counsel from other believers who live in close relationship with God
o correct whatever comes up
o if nothing comes up, act on what seems best to you.

Transforming Worldviews

I wrote the following book review for the The Cultural Mandate blog:

Paul G. Hiebert (1933-2007) was a pastor and missionary in India, and later professor of missiology and anthropology at Fuller and Trinity, authored many articles and books, of which Transforming Worldviews: An Anthropological Understanding of How People Change. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic, 2008 was the last one, which he just finished before his death. The book’s thesis is that if the gospel aims at a transformation that is both individual and corporate, it needs to touch all levels, including the deepest level of worldview in order to be radical and total.

In the conclusion of the first chapter, Hiebert explains the model on which the rest of the book is based and presents as preliminary definition of worldview in anthropological terms as “the foundational, cognitive, affective, and evaluative assumptions and frameworks a group of people makes about the nature of reality which they use to order their lives” (p 25-6). They can also be called “people’s images or maps of reality” (p 26). The building blocks of his model include among others Opler’s themes and counter themes but significantly modified, and Redfield’s seven themes not as imposed etic categories but as suggestive themes to be explored.

Hiebert’s book is an excellent summary and clarification of the model of worldview at a time when main stream anthropology seems to move away from it. He makes it clear that it includes the cognitive, affective and evaluative assumptions and frameworks or maps of reality to organize our lives (p 25). It needs to combine synchronic and diachronic approaches without reverting to reductionism or compartmentalization. The often used term “deep structure” is misleading and Hiebert makes it clear that the causality goes both ways (p 32). In chapter four (p 89ff) it also becomes clear that “worldview” is not a method in itself but that other methods are needed and that any result will only lead to an approximation of a culture (p 90).

Interestingly, Hiebert contradicts the often heard claim that there are several worldviews in the Bible. Despite the diversity of contexts in the Bible, Hiebert points out the underlying unity of the biblical story (p 265) and suggests a tentative list of underlying worldview themes that are cognitive, affective, evaluative, and diachronic. His argument is that Abraham’s understanding was only a starting point of biblical revelation and others built on it until it came to its climax in Christ and to understand biblical worldview, we need to start with him.

I found this book to be a great treatment of a missiological theme from an anthropological view point, including and integrating many topics Hiebert has written about over the years. It therefore gives an excellent overview over many anthropological concepts related to worldview. It does seem to respond to some major critics of the worldview concept. Hiebert proves again to have excellent insights into the dynamics of conversion and spiritual transformation and what we need to understand about other people’s maps of reality if we want to see their lives transformed through the gospel.

Culture change

Books & Culture brought an interesting book review of “The Art of Public Grovel“:

Confession Run Amok – How to look like you’re taking responsibility while you’re actually asking for sympathy

“The confession of sin and the confession of faith have always been interrelated in Christianity, with sin typically being confessed in private and faith in public. That relationship is exactly backwards today. The confession of sin has become increasingly publicized and the confession of faith increasingly privatized. Confessing your faith, as President Bush famously did in a televised debate, can lower your public status, while confessing your sin, as President Clinton demonstrated, can raise your ratings. Let’s all admit it: our culture is hyperconfessionalized.

…

“The trick to a successful confession, according to Susan Wise Bauer’s very entertaining book, is to look like you are taking responsibility while you are actually asking for sympathy. In other words, start off confessing your sin but end up showing how you have actually been sinned against.

…

“Bauer’s book, however, is more than a seminar in how to cringe with dignity. It is a lesson in how religious rituals, no matter how old they are, never die—they just leave the sacred and enter the profane.

Read the rest - including a historical overview of how confessions changed over time.

I found it highly interesting and informative. I wish I had the time to reflect and write on it but I need to get back to my own writing. My deadline is on Friday.