By David Dombrowski

Have you given serious consideration that we are living in the last days? Jesus spoke of the end times in Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21. I think it is safe to assume that all three chapters are referring to the same discussion Jesus had with his disciples. In all three, as they view the temple, Jesus speaks of the destruction of the temple (that happened in 70 AD), and all three refer to further inquiry from His disciples in the evening at the Mount of Olives as to what the end times will be like.

(Note: In Luke 21, the Mount of Olives (Olivet) is not mentioned until verse 37 at the end of the chapter.)

And now, how does the prospect of living in the end times affect you? If you are watching the news (hopefully, from an accurate and trustworthy source), it may cause you to be fearful and anxious, as tensions are mounting throughout the world. Yet, in none of the three accounts does Jesus tell His disciples that they should be fearful or worried. He does mention, however, “Men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth” (Luke 21:26). However, Jesus was not a fearmonger, and Paul tells us, “God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:7). Prophecy is not about inciting fear in a believer as much as it is an exhortation to be prepared and encouraged for the Lord’s return. The book of Revelation tells us, “the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy” (Revelation 19:10).

So, how can we be prepared for the Lord’s return? To begin, we, as Christians, need to recognize that we are in a spiritual battle. As a first step, this may sound too simple, but it’s really not. Please take notice that after Jesus shared with His disciples what will be happening in the end times, He finishes with an exhortation to be awake as a church. Consider His words in the Matthew account:

Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come. But know this, that if the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up. (Matthew 24:42-43)

Apparently, Jesus was and is very concerned about our being prepared for His return because in the chapter that follows, He shares two parables about preparedness: In the parable of the ten virgins, they all fell asleep just before the bridegroom arrived, but only five of them had oil in their lamps with which to meet him. The other parable is the parable of the talents where the lord of his servants gave each of his servants talents (money) to invest in wise endeavors. This suggests an active and aware church where God has given each of us giftings of various types and degrees for us to use for God’s glory in His harvest of souls, as opposed to a sleeping unaware church.

Yet, much of the church is asleep today—even of those who think they are awake. In the Mark account of what Jesus shared on the mount of Olives, we find these words at the close of the chapter:

Watch ye therefore: for ye know not when the master of the house cometh, at even, or at midnight, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning: Lest coming suddenly he find you sleeping. And what I say unto you I say unto all, Watch. (Mark 13: 35-37)

I share these thoughts with you because at present, there is an avalanche of delusion being poured out on the world. To the discerning eye, much of it looks like insanity. Consider all of the antisemitism that has erupted following the October 7th attack on Israel. And the Jews are under attack for wanting to defend themselves. Consider the banners that have been made in Iran, beckoning for the assassination of President Trump. Consider also all the accusations that have been made by Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens, inciting hatred for the Jews and presenting revised versions of who assassinated Charlie Kirk (or even questioning that he was assassinated at all!) with the accusations of who really killed Charlie Kirk ranging from his bereaved widow to “the Jews.” Somehow, the Jews end up being blamed for any ill thing that happens in the world when, in truth, God has placed them in a position for blessing the world—and this, they have done, for centuries.

Nor should we forget all the false practices and teachings that have flooded into the church (with a sleepy church that has allowed this infiltration). Christians have been enticed by the New Age, Reiki, Yoga, contemplative meditation, Catholicism, Calvinism, NAR, and the list goes on. These are all substitutes for the Gospel. The apostle Paul always adhered to the simplicity of the Gospel because that is what changes people. “For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified” (1 Corinthians 2:2).

Please be aware that Satan could not be happier than to discourage Christians into giving up. I partially blame Calvinism for the state of apathy I often sense happening in the church, Bible schools, and seminaries. Calvinism has grown exponentially, and it is built on a false, philosophical foundation that, unlike the Gospel, places everyone in a position of fatalism. Fatalism brings about a sense of hopelessness and inability to make any positive changes in that everything appears to be locked in, and consequently, there is nothing we can do to change it.

Let us remind ourselves again of what Bible prophecy is all about. It is not about feeling hopeless because the future is already mapped out. Rather, it is about warning, alerting, and even waking up the church. Yes, all of the Bible’s prophecies will be fulfilled, but that is not a passive, fatalistic message, but a call to action—even if all you can do is pray and spiritually stay alert and awake, for the coming of the bridegroom grows nearer every day. I do realize that for many of us this is a time when it is easy to feel discouraged and like giving up.

When God showed Daniel in a vision things to come, Daniel felt sick for days (Daniel 7:15). But he also offers words of encouragement for us: He predicted with great accuracy the coming of a corrupt king who would defile the temple. We now know him to be Antiochus IV Epiphanes (d. 164 B.C.), of whom Daniel prophesied, “his heart shall be against the holy covenant; and he shall do exploits” (Daniel 11:28; emphasis added). However, Daniel then says, “but the people that do know their God shall be strong, and do exploits” (Daniel 11:32; emphasis added). In other words, those who know the Lord shall accomplish great things. I believe we can apply this to our own lives today, as Christian believers, knowing that we can make a difference; we should be hopeful that God can use us, even in the midst of all that is going on around us, in the church and in the world.

In the remainder of Daniel 11, beginning with verse 36, we are transported to the end times prophetically to a global repeat of what happened in Antiochus IV’s reign. The book of Revelation describes those days and speaks of believers who will overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony (Revelation 12:11). Even in the darkest of times, we can be comforted and strengthened in remembering that the Lord has told us, “lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world” (Matthew 28:20). This we can hold onto, come what may.

Click here to view other discernment material by David Dombrowski.

By Caryl Matrisciana

LTRP Note: Born and raised in India, Caryl Matrisciana was surrounded by a strange and mystical religion, seeing first-hand the effects Hinduism had on the people of that nation. After leaving India as a young adult, she became involved in the counter-culture hippie movement, only to find that the elements of Hinduism and the New Age were very much the same. Eventually, Caryl would discover that this same spirituality had entered not only the Western world, but the Christian church as well, unbeknownst to most people. (Caryl passed away in 2016.)

“The Age of Aquarius and a Promise of Peace”
by Caryl Matrisciana

Millions of people who are being influenced by the New Age do not realize they are being conditioned by a powerful religious and political structure: globalism is the goal, and peace is the promise.

I remember endless conversations with peers in the ’60s who were predominantly focused on hopeless gloom. With unrelenting paranoia, we discussed the inadequacies of society. “Everything,” we agreed, “is corrupt.” This included medicine, food, environment, politics, and education.

A cultivated atmosphere of fear and doom forced us to escape into our own man-made solutions, since answers could only come from us, the awareness brigade, and our enlightened alternatives. Like millions of others, we concluded that a new world order was our only salvation. Our spiritual resources, if encouraged and tapped correctly, could bring goodness, harmony and peace to the world.

The results of over fifty years of New Age infiltration into the Western world are staggering. In 1980, Marilyn Ferguson, a major New Age prophetess, wrote a veritable manifesto of New Age philosophy titled The Aquarian Conspiracy. Explaining the choice of title for her best seller, she says this:

Conspire, in its literal sense, means “to breathe together.” It is an intimate joining. To make clear the benevolent nature of this joining, I chose the word Aquarian . . . after a dark, violent age, the Piscean, we are entering a millennium of love and light—in the words of the popular song, “The Age of Aquarius,” the time of “the mind’s true liberation.”1

Although countless arguments will continue to debate the insinuation of New Age thinking into our culture, the consensus is that a widespread shift in consciousness is taking place. And this is displaying itself in our everyday lives, right under our noses!

New Age proponent David Spangler describes this hope of a New Age world:

The earth [is] entering a new cycle of evolution, which [will be] marked by the appearance of a new consciousness within humanity that would give birth to a new civilization . . . They would then enter a new age of abundance and spiritual enlightenment—the Age of Aquarius.2

This “spiritual enlightenment” can be capsulated in these characteristic points of the New Age:

1. God is seen more as a flowing energy or creative force that exists in all things rather than as a personal God who is distinct from man and creation. [see: “lie of separation”]
2. Man is seen as divine, essentially a part of God. [see: God “in” all]
3. Salvation for the soul is something attained when one becomes an awakened soul by understanding one’s divinity and oneness with all. This awakening comes about through the use of various rituals and mystical practices that help remove one’s attachment to the world. [see: mystical meditation]
4. The gap between good and evil is eradicated. In other words, there is no evil—all is divine. [see: emergent theology]

The New Age offers new ideas of peace, love, integrity, and community—all that a needy world is hungry for. It attempts to reform religious ideals based on Judeo-Christian principles with an improved formula of application. It seeks to replace age-old sentiments of patriotism and traditional moral standards with a new philosophy. All of the old-fashioned ideals are dismissed as mundane and archaic.

It also casts the more serious charge that the “old ways” only serve to impede the progress of a society bent on an upward evolution to a higher consciousness—the new power.

The conditioning of a potential New Age disciple may start subconsciously at an early age. Perhaps he is trying to find answers and purposes for his life. A difficult family environment may urge him on. Disillusionments and disappointments may create needs. Dissatisfaction with religious hypocrisy may cause him to explore other philosophies. In my case, all of these contributed to my sense of powerlessness and resultant quest.

I became deeply committed to the New Age agenda, although I must admit I did not understand the spiritual implications. I merely longed for self-improvement and hungered after some kind of peace and love. In more troubled moments, I sensed a strange recognition of New Age teachings and sometimes felt a disturbing tension to realize that some wonderful new idea of mine had originally been written thousands of years before—in Hindu teachings.

My life experiences had taught me more about India and its religious ramifications than any of my enlightened friends would have dared guess. And in my recollection, nothing to be found along the streets of Calcutta, Bombay, or Madras promised a better life to anyone.

So, in accepting New Age teachings in the 1960s, had I somehow accepted the very religion that had frightened me so much as a child? If so, had I somehow misunderstood the sights and sounds and smells of my childhood?

Endnotes:

1. Marilyn Ferguson, The Aquarian Conspiracy (Los Angeles, CA: J. P. Tarcher, Inc., 1980), p. 19.

2. David Spangler, Emergence (Delta 1984), p. 17.

(image from istockphoto.com; used with permission)

LTRP Note: A number of years ago, Lighthouse Trails received a comment from a reader regarding our topical booklets. We felt it would be worthwhile to repost our response because it explains some of the innerworkings of this publishing ministry that many newer readers may not know about. We began publishing the booklets (printed in house) in January of 2013. Since then, we have sold or given away over 400,000 copies of them and presently have over 160 titles. As our response below states, all of these titles are also posted on this site to be freely read, shared, and even printed.

“A Response to a Reader Who Thinks Lighthouse Trails Booklets Are Too Expensive”

Today, we received the following comment on the Lighthouse Trails Facebook page and would like to respond as others may share this person’s sentiments. The comment stated:

I always found the booklets helpful but they are quite expensive in my view. I purchase tracts from pinpoint evangelism and I get a stack of 100 for 5 dollars and up. I always eyed these but to pay about 2 dollars for just one booklet is a bit pricey for me. Please do not take it as an insult, I am hoping you find cheaper vendors to print making it more accessible to those of us who have been called to preach to masses.

Here is what we would like to say about our booklets—

Our booklets are not the size of a tract. A tract generally holds a few hundred words. Our booklets are book size (in dimensions) and anywhere from 3000-6000 words. That’s why we call them booklets and not tracts. There’s a lot of information and documentation in them (and hours of work that has gone into writing and creating them). Tracts are good to hand out to strangers or leave in bathrooms. The booklets are designed to hand out to friends, family members, pastors, etc – people you are acquainted with who have particular needs and issues. Each one has a different topic (e.g., Yoga, Reiki, Meditation, Enneagrams, etc.) so one can prayerfully select the right one for each recipient.

In order to give a person enough information to understand a topic (without handing him or her a 200-page book that may never be read), we believe the booklets are the perfect format and length. Any shorter, and we could not document our findings.

We have yet to see a booklet of the quality in which Lighthouse Trails produces them sell at a lower price (with the exception of some non-profit organizations who rely primarily on donations – Lighthouse Trails is not in that category). However, even though we do not have the advantage of being a 501 (c) 3 organization (a choice we made many years ago), we have given away thousands of booklets as well as pay part of the proceeds of sales to the authors (royalties). Keep in mind that while each booklet is $1.95, we have quantity discounts starting at 6 copies that go as low as $1.07 each.

Lighthouse Trails does something most publishers do not do: we place the entire content of each booklet on our blog, providing a print feature that allows any reader to print the booklet for free. You see our goal and motivation at Lighthouse Trails is not to make money. While we have a need for money to keep our doors open, we do not have a love for money or an ambition toward it. Our desire and motivation is to help others.

At the risk of sounding defensive or self-promoting, we want to close with this. Several years ago, in the early years of Lighthouse Trails, Saddleback Church (Rick Warren’s church) was sending out e-mails to people (with the hopes of discrediting our work) saying that Ray Yungen and Lighthouse Trails were “sitting on a pile of money.” It became almost a joke here for us because nothing could have been further from the truth. And all these years later, it still is anything but the truth. The editors at Lighthouse Trails work tirelessly, each receiving a modest salary for the work we do. As for the price of the booklets, when we began creating the booklet project in 2012, we purchased a good used Xerox machine that would do the printing (thus keeping our costs down by doing the printing ourselves), picked out some high quality gloss paper that would increase the longevity of each booklet, contracted with each author for a royalty rate that is higher than any other publisher we know about in today’s publishing industry. And when we figured out all our costs, we came up with a retail price that anyone could afford, then added in several generous quantity discounts. We say all this mostly for those who are skeptical and who think that Lighthouse Trails charges too much for our booklets. We have not said these things to puff ourselves up but rather to describe what goes on behind the scenes that influences our decisions.

It is always our prayer that our books and booklets will be useful to those who read them; and while they are warning about deception, we strive in each one to point readers to God’s wonderful Word and His saving grace through Jesus Christ.

Related Articles:

The Story Behind Lighthouse Trails

Are These Rumors True?

Our Topical Booklets

Our Booklet/Book Authors

By Bill Randles
Do you remember the social and moral revolution of the 1960s? The youth movement of the left was destined to break all the rules and liberate society from the dreary bondage of the past. They were going to show us how to do it the right way! As an anthem from that day proclaimed, “All the world over so easy to see, that people everywhere just want to be free.”

Isn’t it ironic that those same revolutionaries, now come of age, have created a society that is vastly more restricted than the one they worked so hard to undermine? We now live in a “brave new world” in which every aspect of daily life is hyper-regulated, speech is scrutinized to the point of absurdity, and even thought is criminalized (e.g., hate crimes laws)!

Although they have, in large part, cast off the shackles of any fear of God, they have a rigid concept of “righteousness”: they are very religious about global warming, population control, a woman’s right to choose abortion, tolerance of all religions (except of course biblical Christianity), woman’s liberation, transgender acceptance, and multi-culturalistic dogmas.

My theory is that they are so religious, although godless, because people are made in the image of God and must have some kind of religion. Furthermore, they are raised in America, where once a vast Christian consensus permeated our society and its institutions. It is for this reason that there has developed among the secular elite a “godless righteousness.”

The idea of any accountability for the sins enumerated in the ten commandments has been cast off, but they have their own tablets of stone. “Thou shalt not, ever, ever, make a moral judgment,” “Thou shalt not smoke (in public or private),” “Thou shalt support all forms of abortion,” “Thou shalt not claim any absolute truth,” “Thou shalt not think western civilization is any better than any other culture,” and so on and so forth.

It has often been pointed out that as long as these pieties are observed, it doesn’t really matter what a person does as an individual. All personal indiscretions are excused as long as these positions are held.

The real sins, which have proliferated and intensified as a result of the sexual revolution of the sixties (i.e. the rampant fornication, the destruction of marriages, homosexuality, adultery, abortion and pornography) affect the consciences of those who practice and promote them whether they believe in God or not. One cannot escape the psychological trauma of these evils by just dismissing the concept of a God or a binding personal morality.

That’s part of the reason why the left has developed an alternative morality, to try to feel good about themselves, to assuage their conscience. They have to assure themselves over and over again that they are all right, because they support Cause x, and wear the ribbon in solidarity of Cause Y. They are good people, on the good side regardless of their personal immorality.

In short, godless righteousness isn’t individual—it is collective. As long as you hold to the positions of the Left Wing, you are “in right standing” regardless of your personal failings. This is why the counter culture has always shamelessly championed people like Che Guevarra, a mass murderer, Albert Kinsey a known fraud and pervert, and other personally sordid fellow travelers. As long as they hold to the dogma, it doesn’t matter.

The tragedy is that this righteousness is a sham and will be found to be as helpful as Adam and Eve’s fig leaves on the day of Judgment. It may feel good to “be in the right” with the culture—there is no doubt a certain satisfaction in it. But there is no way that “godless righteousness” can heal the troubled conscience. Is this why this generation needs so much valium? There is no possibility that “godless righteousness” can take away the shame of sin, and it certainly will not reconcile anyone to the true and Holy God.

There is a true righteousness, a right standing that can be obtained before God, but only as a gift to be received from Him. The good news is that what God demands, perfect righteousness, God provides for us, as Scripture says, “For he [God] hath made him [Jesus] to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him” (2 Corinthians 5:21).

By Roger Oakland
Founder of Understand the Times International

Carl Sagan was a strong believer and promoter of Darwinian evolution. He was also an advocate of taxpayers funding the technology required to scan the heavens for intelligent beings. Although Sagan believed that one day this technology would discover signals that would show we are not alone in the universe, science has not yet announced they have made contact with our cosmic cousins.

Sagan once stated, “Civilizations that are hundreds of millions of light years beyond us should have sciences and technologies so far beyond our present capabilities, they would be indistinguishable from magic.” [1]  

Or as a colleague in extraterrestrial research, Robert Jastrow, once said, “Life that is a billion years beyond us may be far beyond the flesh-and-blood form that we would recognize. It may be in the form of a silicon-based intelligence, or more likely, it is disembodied and has escaped its mortal flesh to become what old-fashioned people would call spirits.” [2]

So, here is the question: If these extraterrestrial superbeings have evolved beyond the physical dimension as Sagan and Jastrow claimed, how would they try to communicate to mere Earthlings who are so much lower on the evolutionary ladder?

Carl Sagan had an answer for that question, “Perhaps the messages are already here,” he said, “present in some everyday experience that we have not made the right mental effort to recognize. Their messages may lie in quite familiar circumstances.” [3]

Since Sagan made this statement, a lot has changed. The New Age has brought about the dawning of the Age of Aquarius. Mankind is on the verge of taking a great leap of consciousness, and a “new breed” of human is emerging, we are told. New Age proponents continue to claim they are able to make contact with these further evolved beings in the spiritual realm. It’s only a matter of time that the whole world will get in tune, they say. Then we and our space brothers will realize, because of evolution, we are all one.    

Who would have ever believed that religion and science would have joined hands? The religion, of course, is not based on a belief in a personal God or Savior. The religion is an eastern worldview that assumes that everything is God – including ourselves. How interesting this is in light of the Bible. The message New Age mystics say they are receiving from the stars is the same message that Satan used to trap Eve. Only this time the message is not just for a single person at the beginning of history – it’s for all of mankind at a period of history the Bible describes as the end times.

Is the rising interest in extraterrestrials just one more of the signs we are in the last days? The Book of Revelation foretells a time when extraterrestrial demonic beings will invade the Earth as a part of God’s wrath. Is the world being prepared right now?

1. Carl Sagan, The Cosmic Connection, page 222.
2. Robert Jastrow, EO Magazine, February 1982, page 14.
3. Carl Sagan, The Cosmic Connection, page 224.

(Image from istockphoto.com; used with permission)

Dear Lighthouse Trails:

Thank you, Mr. Oakland, for your article [see above]. Of course, it is timely!

We’ve all grown up with the idea of creatures from another planet as a probability that must be considered. It never dawned on me until the U.S. wanted to release the alien files that what we’re really talking about here isn’t creatures that God made who just happen to live at another address in the Galaxy, but rather are demonic beings sent by Satan himself, to simply saunter in the door that we have left open for them. We are so intrigued with the possibility of the idea of alien beings (and some of them sure have been cute, eh?), that we don’t give the idea deeper thought – we just roll along for the ride.

At the time of the initial distractions and the excitement of so many about finally seeing what the government has been hiding from us for so long, then it hit me! This is a STRATEGY of Satan’s, some of the early stepping stones leading toward unbelief in Jesus. When I shared the idea of “strategy” in a comment online, someone responded with a question: “Strategy?” I didn’t answer the question – I let it sit – to ruminate. Then, along came Disclosure Day by Spielberg, who made the claim that his movie would shatter our faith in God. Having already begun to think that all of this alien business has been the devil’s handiwork from the start, I just shook my head and felt profoundly sorry for Mr. Spielberg, who has not yet grasped the magnificence of his own ancestry, nor considered the Universe itself to be the handiwork of GOD.

Our earth is a beautiful jewel in the midst of cosmic dust and barrenness – no air to breathe, no water to drink, no life at all – out there. The stars are beautiful from our point of view because they reflect the sun. The moon from a distance is beautiful too. But the earth is visually beautiful close up and from far away. It is the LORD’s special creation, perfectly made just for us with whom He desires relationship to bless us forever with joy unspeakable, full of His glory. And as beautiful as it all is now, it will be even more splendid when all is made new. I hope Mr. Spielberg gets to see the earth made new. We need to pray for him and all those who are putting their hope in a deception which will disappear before their very eyes. May they see Jesus and finally realize how much He loves us that He would create this beautiful ball of wonder just for us. And further, how this amazing universe speaks of the LORD Himself as the loving Creator of all that we see.

Our God is an AWESOME God!

Susan

LTRP Note: After you read what Larry DeBruyn is saying in this article below, consider how many of the contemplatives promote this idea that we  (man) are also “I AM” (God). See below Larry’s article where Ray Yungen discusses Brennan Manning in relation to this.

By Larry DeBruyn
Guarding His Flock Ministries

Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me.—(Isaiah 46:9)

One of my seminary professors stated in a theology class, “God created man in His own likeness and image, and man has been returning the compliment ever since.” Again, like one pundit put it, “Man is the ape that wants to be God.” In many ways, shapes, and sizes, the “man-is-God” teaching still comes to us.

Though contemporary Mormons now disavow his statement, Lorenzo Snow (1814-1901), the fifth president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, once said, “As man is, God once was; as God is, man may become.” Pretending to be within the pale of Christendom, some Word of Faith teachers boldly tell their followers, “You are gods.” [1] Helen Schucman (1909-1981), a New York research psychologist, authored volumes which now comprise A Course in Miracles (ACIM). Over a period of seven years, Schucman claimed to have received the contents of the course by a process of “inner dictation,” the dictator being Jesus, an “ascended master” and spirit guide. Though using Christian terminology, ACIM is founded upon the fundamental premises of Eastern-metaphysical-mystical religion. In one of the course’s lessons, Schucman stated, “The recognition of God is the recognition of yourself.” [2] Among a host of other believers, authors and teachers, Schucman-like spirituality is widely being disseminated into American culture by various New Age gurus like Marianne Williamson and Eckhart Tolle, and their publicist, Oprah Winfrey. But I will, in this article, address this question: Does the Bible teach anywhere that man is not God?

Other than the obvious, that God is One and not many (Deuteronomy 6:4; 1 Corinthians 8:4; Ephesians 4:6), and that God is the Creator and man is the creature (Romans 1:18-23), there is a revealing prophecy that demonstrates that people are not gods, and that God, and God alone, is God. Click here to continue reading.

Related:

Brennan Manning and His Trustworthy Guide and the “I AM”
by Ray Yungen

In his book, Ruthless Trust, Brennan Manning mentions that Sue Monk Kidd eventually came under the mentorship of Dr. Beatrice Bruteau who authored the book What We Can Learn From the East. Since that title is self-explanatory, it’s easy to understand why Dr. Bruteau would write the preface to a book like The Mystic Heart by Wayne Teasdale. In the preface, she touts that a universal spirituality based on mysticism is going to save the world.

It seems that all these people want a better world. They do not seem like sinister conspirators like those out of a James Bond film. Yet, it is their niceness that rejects the reality of the fundamental separation between Man and God. It is their sense of compassion that feeds their universalism. It is idealism that makes Manning so attractive and causes him to say [in his book, Abba’s Child] that Dr. Bruteau is a “trustworthy guide to contemplative consciousness.”

The irony of this is that Manning is completely correct in his statement—Dr. Bruteau is a reliable guide to contemplative awareness. She has founded two organizations, the Schola Contemplationis (school for contemplation) and the very Christian sounding Fellowship of the Holy Trinity. With the latter, she is promoted as “a well-known author and lecturer on contemplative life and prayer.” Both of these organizations incorporate Hindu and Buddhist approaches to spirituality. This should come as no surprise because Bruteau also has studied with the Ramakrishna order, which is named after the famous Hindu swami Sri Ramakrishna. Dr. Bruteau states:

We have realized ourselves as the Self that says only I AM, with no predicate following, not “I am a this” or “I have that quality.” Only unlimited, absolute I AM” [A Song That Goes On Singing – Interview with B.B.].

When Brennan Manning says she is trustworthy, does he mean we can trust her when she says we are all I AM?

SUPPORTING LIGHTHOUSE TRAILS: For those who would like to support Lighthouse Trails, we always appreciate both your prayers and your giving. And for those who have faithfully done that over the years, we thank you with all of our hearts. We know that some people may have the impression that Lighthouse Trails does quite well financially because we sell products that we publish and because our resources have had such a far reach; but, the truth is, it takes everything made through sales to keep Lighthouse Trails operating. Publishing, at least for small presses such as ours, is rarely a high-profit business. It would take a best seller to see that, one that the masses of people love. And because we are not just a business, but even more so a ministry, we keep our prices as low as we can, give away many resources, and have also made much of our material available for free on the research site and blog. That's not how big corporations run things as that would hurt the bottom line (profit), but we see the needs out there, and we trust God to keep us going as long as He sees fit.

We thank you in advance for seeing the value in a ministry like Lighthouse Trails and coming along side us with your prayers and support.

It is our prayer that we will faithfully be humble servants of the Lord’s work for years to come should the Lord tarry. If you would like to donate to Lighthouse Trails, you may send a donation by mailing it to: Lighthouse Trails, P.O. Box 307, Roseburg, Oregon 97470. Or you may call 866/876-3910. There is also a donate option on our store website.

Lighthouse Trails is not a non-profit 501 (c) 3 organization, so your donations will not be tax deductible.