LTRP Note: We have taken extra precautions with this Letter to the Editor to preserve the identity of this writer per his request. We post this with his permission.
Dear Lighthouse Trails:
Over the last few years, your mailings, blog, and books have been a steady and consistent voice while I have disentangled myself from deep involvement in contemplative practices, which I now know to be profoundly destructive. It has been a lonely and confusing process as I have discarded cherished ideas, commitments, and friends, but I am convinced that your critique of the contemplative movement squares with biblical testimony and answers questions that were tearing me apart for several years.
A bit of my history: I became a Christian in [the 90s], in a highly charismatic new church in _________. As personal problems surfaced, I took “pastoral direction” from a charismatic individual who promoted mystical practices. In 1998, I was involved in starting a new church based on these practices. In 2000, I moved from _____ to _____ to champion these practices while doing an MA in Theological Studies at __________ Seminary. . . . I graduated in 2002 and returned to [my home] whereupon my life fell into crisis as I could not understand what had gone wrong. By 2005, I was discovering the scale of deception I had been operating in, and since then I have slowly extricated and distanced myself while rediscovering the Gospel of grace and the supremacy of Scripture as God’s revelation.
My observation is that you are a voice in the wilderness, and that many who should know better will regard you with disdain. I sincerely hope you will persevere, because I am convinced that enormous numbers of well meaning Christians are being hoodwinked by occultic deception. It seems to me that you are spearheading a very small group of writers and thinkers who are raising the alarm over very serious problems, while so many in the wider church seem either oblivious, or worse still even contemptuous of those who cry foul.
I have no religious ambitions left, I hope to live a quiet life and walk humbly before God, and have lost all appetite for the vanity of religious success. But I feel prompted to say that if I can be of any service then I will offer the best I can at your disposal.
In the meantime, I thank you once again, and bless you in the name of the risen Lord Jesus Christ.
____
