Buddhists at Bethel University – Crosstalk Thursday
What were Buddhists doing at Bethel University? Why did a professor from Bethel, the only Christian on the symposium panel, say that he uses Zen-style meditation that he learned in Japan? The questions will be explored with Pastor Bob DeWaay, someone who attended the event, on Thursday’s edition of Crosstalk, 2pm Central.
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Pastor DeWaay and Jan Markell (Olive Tree Ministries) have discussed this at length on Markell's program last Saturday. They had an hour-long discussion with Dr. Jim Beilby, Professor of Theology at Bethel, which began with his confronting Ms. Markell's misinterpretation and misreporting of the session at Bethel.
Even to begin with “why are they trying to find common spiritual ground with Buddhists” is implying that this is in fact going on. It's not. Read the refutation of these charges on the Bethel website, at http://www.bethel.edu/bethel-news/inter/2009/no....
Proverbs 16:28: A perverse man stirs up dissension,
and a gossip separates close friends.
A little Buddhist leaven leavens the whole Bethel lump.
Sorry RJS, your spin is not going to cut it. What in the world were Buddhists doing at a spiritual event at Bethel. The word Beth-el, literally means sacred place, holy place. The term common ground WAS used. Bob DeWaay and Jan Markell have proved their integrity in ministry and would have NO reason to make things up and lie. They were both there, are you forgetting that?
Amen Ingrid…
These zen buddhist afficianados would have been personna non grata in every Biblically Christian venue prior to the infiltration of mysticism and change agents pushing mysticism over the last several decades. Now the faculties of these hatcheries are as spiritually confused as any sweat lodge in Sedona. Yet , uninformed parents are footing the bill for their kids to get demonized in the name of spiritual diversity and commanality with pagan mysticism.
Maranatha
Item #2 of professor James Lewis' letter of explanation is sufficient proof alone that Bethel has and supports the contemplative, if not outright sympathy and/or accord with what is defined as common ground with Buddhist meditative techniques, which they interpret as more or less identical to ancient “Christian” techniques. However, the question arises: Is the aim of Bethel to restore common ground with Catholicism AND Buddhism and to brainwash students into believing this can be acceptable for Bible believing Christian students? I don't think so, since worship for the Christian is always Christ and Word focused, not experiential.
Correction: I do believe the aim of Bethel is to brainwash under the cover of allegedly teaching comparative religion and/or sociology.
The Christian who knows Truth, and that Truth is The Word of God..and that WORD is the Truth that sanctifies…as plainly recorded in The Holy Scriptures..John 17:19 “Sanctify them through Thy Truth…Thy WORD is TRUTH.”
The idea that alleged spiritual growth or sanctification could or should come from adding meditative altered states of consciousness is a demonic reversal of Gods Word and its sanctifying role in the life of a believer. The less than subtle admonition for Bethel students was to devilishly add to Gods prescription for Gods sanctification via mystical Altered states of consciousness , which inexorably leads unsuspecting students to make contact with the forbidden spirit world where every lying demon waits to push their masters teaching that ” all is god” ..therefore..”you are part of all that is god”, and by implicatiom, you ARE god. Same lie as in Genesis 3; …only this time embaced by nearly the whole planet.
If Bethel sees no spiritual role in protecting the students from this age-old lie encountered via altered states of consciousness as was so openly endorsed by their symposium panelist, then tuition paying parents should take note that Bethel now apparentlly beleives that spiritual protection of Gods flock is something only OUR GOOD SHEPHERD and Loving God does..but is plainly beneath these lofty PHD's and scholars m in their lofty role as educators, as they now have “evolved”long ago past what they would describe as the foolish and uneducated role as mere protectors of Gods flock.
Parents and students beware. Wolves among the sheep.
Why do you have such a hard time admitting that this “symposium” is an attempt to assure the participants (and themselves) that new age “enlightenment” is as legitimate and holy as the Blood of Christ? Your never-ending: “Ms. Markell's misinterpretation of this event” is sounding pretty desperate. You challenged us to listen to the actual audio as if we were going to change our minds and join in your defense of this “religious harmony”. The introduction alone was creepy enough for ANY born-again Christian to recognize the demonic trap that was being set. I've got news for you, buddy. You can quote “Ms. Markell stirs up dissension” scripture here all day long, but you're not going to convert a single Blood-bought believer to your religious oneness. Do yourself a favor and confess your preference for eastern religion over the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It's obvious to everyone but you.
Perhaps I'll make another quick attempt here to clarify just one point, after having listened to the audio of the Bethel symposium. Ingrid states above that the term “common ground” was used in the symposium, which is correct. But it's not the whole truth, because the term was used as part of a _question_: IS there common ground between what gets called “meditation” in both traditions. The idea of the symposium was to try to answer that question. The answer that the symposium gave to the question “is there common ground” was a resounding NO–both the Christian and Bhuddist participants agreed that there was, in fact, NO common ground between Christianity and Bhuddism in terms of the goals of meditation.
The only similarity mentioned in the symposium is that both traditions have historically used/talked about a practice called “meditation.” I think perhaps one mistake folks are making is thinking that the _term_ “meditation” is automatically linked to Asian traditions like Bhuddism, and that, therefore, any reference to a practice called meditation is a reference to an Asian religious practice. But if you think about it, this kind of reasoning doesn't make sense: Christianity, for instance, shares a practice with amost all other religions, that Christians and all others term “prayer.” But when a Christian engages in prayer, we don't automatically assume that that Christian is doing something non-Christian because non Christians also do something they call “prayer.” We just see it as a surface similarity that differs greatly in content. That was the point I heard made about meditation at the Bethel event: that both traditions have something they call “meditation,” but that the content and goals of the respective practices are fundamentally incompatible.
Perhaps I'll make another quick attempt here to clarify just one point, after having listened to the audio of the Bethel symposium. Ingrid states above that the term “common ground” was used in the symposium, which is correct. But it's not the whole truth, because the term was used as part of a _question_: IS there common ground between what gets called “meditation” in both traditions. The idea of the symposium was to try to answer that question. The answer that the symposium gave to the question “is there common ground” was a resounding NO–both the Christian and Bhuddist participants agreed that there was, in fact, NO common ground between Christianity and Bhuddism in terms of the goals of meditation.
The only similarity mentioned in the symposium is that both traditions have historically used/talked about a practice called “meditation.” I think perhaps one mistake folks are making is thinking that the _term_ “meditation” is automatically linked to Asian traditions like Bhuddism, and that, therefore, any reference to a practice called meditation is a reference to an Asian religious practice. But if you think about it, this kind of reasoning doesn't make sense: Christianity, for instance, shares a practice with amost all other religions, that Christians and all others term “prayer.” But when a Christian engages in prayer, we don't automatically assume that that Christian is doing something non-Christian because non Christians also do something they call “prayer.” We just see it as a surface similarity that differs greatly in content. That was the point I heard made about meditation at the Bethel event: that both traditions have something they call “meditation,” but that the content and goals of the respective practices are fundamentally incompatible.