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Part One
Lesson One-
The Importance of Context.
A discussion of the effect of context on our perception of ourselves, God, and our relationship with Him.
Discusses the idea that the indewlling Holy Spirit provides us with a context through which to encounter
the world that is distinctly different from what we possessed before being born again.
Lesson Two- The Outermost Context: God as Love.
A discussion of love as a potent, upholding principle. It is the nature
shared by the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and forms the context in which all of time, space, and eternity exist.
Lesson Three- The Trinity
A discussion of the persons of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit
as the active expression of love in eternity, an expression of egalitarian, self-emptying.
To love, as God loves, it to empty yourself out on the one that you love, neither holding anything back,
or expecting anything in return
Lesson Four- Creation
A discussion of the created universe (apart from human beings) as an expression of the love
of God and a passive participant in the love that is endlessly flowing between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit
in eternity.
Lesson Five- The Human Race
A discussion of humanity as active participants in the love of God within time and space (before the fall)
and the nature of the deception that took us away from that and the underlying nature of the sin that we
experience as a result.
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Lesson Six
- The Context of Pride
In which I identify the four primary effects that arise from trying to live our lives
in the context of pride, separated from the love of God:
- Fundamental Insecurity
- The Scarcity Mindset
- The Shadow
- The Self Reference
Lesson Seven - Carnival of Shadows
- The Context of Pride and Human Relationships
In which I discuss the toxic effects that the context of pride has on
our relationships with other people on both an interpersonal and corporate level, and how the experience
of abiding in Christ and drawing our lives up out of Him can introduce life where before was only death.
Lesson Eight - Carnival of Shadows, part 2
- The Context of Pride and The Natural World
This teaching examines how the need of insecure people to "cut the world down to size"
in order to reduce the threat it poses to our shadows (or to convert it into something
that we can 'mine' to support the shadow) has influenced the development of the field
of scientific inquiry.
Lesson Nine - Carnival of Shadows, part 3
- The Context of Pride and The Divine
A discussion of the development of superstition, religion, and magic as ways to
reduce the "unknownness" of the supernatural/divine, and how thinking in these
ways hinders the development of a genuine relationship with God based on love
rather than power and control.
Lesson Ten - Constructing Illusion, part 1
- Storytelling and Selective Blindness
Having discussed the ways in which the Self-Reference (i.e. The Flesh) distorts our
relationships with God, the world, and one another, we now turn our attention to consider
the mechanisms by which our Self-Reference constructs and maintains the Shadow, or the
False Self.
Human beings are inveterate storytellers, and the Self-References hijacks this God-given
faculty in order to keep itself going. In the process, thought it creates a kind of
selective blindness which prevents us from looking out into the world and seeing where
God is and what He is doing.
Lesson Eleven - Constructing Illusion, part 2
- The Problem of Interpretation
The restless habits of the Shadow demand that we strive to understand the world in which we live
so that we can seize control of it and force it into a shape that the Self-Reference can use to
construct and shore up the Shadow. In this lesson we look at the impediments to understanding
posed by our highly subjective contexts. We also examine the practical limits on understanding
posed by the fundamental nature of the universe. We end with the question of how our obsession
with the external circumstances of our lives affects the way we experience God and how it distorts
our relationship with Him.
Lesson Twelve - Born Again
- The cure for the life of the Shadow
What the experience of being Born Again actually entails, how it is appropriated (e.g. by faith)
and the new, upwelling fountain of identity that it establishes within us, making us one with
the nature of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and providing us with a substantial source of
unity, sufficiency, and identity.
Lesson Thirteen - Abiding in Christ, Part One
- The Fountain of Identity
Being Born Again establishes a new fountain of identity in the life of the believer,
the continuous testimony of the Holy Spirit affirming that you are a child of God,
and an invitation to participate in the life of God that is shared by the Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit. Choosing to draw our identities out of this testimony
can deliver us from the wasteful habits of the self-life and make us an upwelling
fountain of the life/love of God.
Lesson Fourteen - Abiding in Christ, Part Two
- The Matrix
A discussion of the impediment to abiding in Christ presented by the
structure of the soul that has grown up apart from God, and how the
persistent selfish, greedy habits of the soul subvert our attempts
to draw our life up out of the new fountain of identity and life that
the Holy Spirit establishes within us when we are born again.
Lesson Fifteen - Detachment
- Freedom from the Prison of the Soul
"Like everyone else, you were born into bondage. Born into a prison you can not taste, or smell, or touch.
A prison, for your mind."
The flesh, the substance of our soul, is a determined enemy with whom we can neither
agree, or take up arms against, beacause all it requires to thrive is our attention.
Detachment and Recollection are the spiritual habits that will turn your attention away
from the selfish, greedy pattern of the soul and help you to focus on the one needful
thing which is the upwelling fountain of life and identity within, the ongoing testimony
of the Holy Spirit about who we are.
Lesson Sixteen - Silence
- In Praise of Silence
The Shadow is a brutal tyrant, and noise is the tool that it uses to keep you turned outward,
effectively separated from the upwelling fountain of identity that has been opened up within you
as a result of having been born again. This is an introduction to the next series of teachings
which describe the spiritual uses of silence, darkness, and contemplative knowledge which can
deliver you from the restless, compulsive habits of the soul and introduce you to a life that is
lived up out of the live of God within you.
Lesson Seventeen - The Practice of Silence
- Centering Prayer
Centering Prayer is a modern discipline which resurrects the ancient monastic practice of
focused, intentional silence. It is imageless, and therefore takes place outside of the
narrow, selfish perspective of the soul (which is to say, the flesh, or the false self).
This lesson talks about the reason for it, its practical effects in the life of a believer,
and the mechanics of how to engage in it.
Lesson Eighteen - The Practice of Silence
- The Parable of the Pilgrim
The Parable of the Pilgrim, a spiritual teaching by Walter Hilton in the 14th century,
contains an effective discpline for establishing a habit that opposes the subconcious
habits of selfishness that grow up out of the fear we feel subconsciously as a result of the Fall.
The person who practices it habitally will be established in true humility (which is to say
self-forgetfulness) and helped in honing their desire for God.
Lesson Nineteen - Contemplative Darkness
- The Dark Night of the Senses
The Night of the Senses is a well-understood transition between spiritual
childhood and spirtual adulthood. The disciplines of silence that pull our
attention away from the clamor of the world and the desires of our flesh,
providing us with a clearer, purer desire for God as He is in Himself.
They culminate in an experience in which, paradoxically, it seems that God
has disasppeared from our lives. It is analogous to the experience of the
Hebrews in the desert, who God led into the wilderness and
"humbled, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord" DT 8:3
If we are going to grow to real maturity in Christ, we must submit to this experience
of desolation, learning how to perceive God within our spirits, rather than through
the artifacts of his presence (the words of the Bible, visions, emotional or intellectual
encounters).
