[This little article is more important than you may think. In fact, I believe that its implications determine the difference between the true faith and a wholly new faith which is essentially false (and not so ‘new’ really as it is tied up with all manner of occult-gnostic-style manifestations in the visible church down the centuries since the ascension of Christ). In this way, we can see parallels between the New Age Movement and the Charismatic Movement which are both rooted in the idolization of subjective experience as a litmus test of spirituality. So please read on…]

INTRODUCTION

The Following Statement has been said to me in one form or another on many occasions over the past few decades: “If I believe something because of my experience, who are you to tell me that I should believe otherwise? My beliefs are my business. So mind your own business. As long as I believe in Jesus, does it really matter what else I believe?”

Short answer: Yes it does. Because if what you believe is not compatible with what Jesus and His Apostles taught, then your belief in “Jesus” is utterly meaningless. It should not be your subjective “experience” which determines your beliefs but your beliefs which guide your experience. Please read that again. Unfortunately, most of what passes for so-called “Christianity” today is based on what people’s subjective experience has imparted to them rather than what has developed out of their grasp of objective truth. Put bluntly, most people calling themselves “Christians” today are not genuine disciples of Christ but idolaters of subjective experience. Why should this be, and how has it come about?

In the first place, the development of most people’s religion or spirituality is all about them and a feel-good factor based entirely on their subjective experience rather than finding comfort and faith in the purity of objective truth. This is true whatever one’s professed religion or spirituality. It is just as true in so many of the churches of today as it is in the New Age scene. Subjective experience is idolized. “If it is happening to me, then it must be real; and who are you to say that it isn’t? It is my truth”. That is the thinking. It has taken a few decades for this way of thinking to infiltrate the churches to the huge extent that it has today (and also to be validated by a plethora of hypocrite hellbound pastors), and I have been (un)fortunate enough to span all those decades and see this degeneration happening.

The interesting thing is that those who idolize subjective experience over objective truth will become angry and get nasty and can even tell lies about those who point out this discrepancy in their profession of faith, whereas those who extol objective truth over subjective experience will feel vindicated and relieved to be presented with such facts. When the demonic realm has got you by the short and curlies, you are only one breath away from metamorphosing from a happy-clappy, smiley-smiley, lovey-dovey blue-eyed “Christian” to a fire-breathing, weasel-faced zealot. I’ve seen it so many times.

So let us look at some typical examples of this phenomenon in some archetypal case studies. Here is our first case-study concerning the cult of subjectivism vs the truth which sets you free:

CASE #1: “As I entered the vast cathedral, a choir was singing the Miserere by Gregorio Allegri and I was immediately overcome by a sense of the presence of God”. Here the person imagines that the understandable awe at the architectural achievement of the edifice and the audio-reverb of the choir echoing around the rafters signifies the presence of God. There is no doubt whatsoever that a vast cathedral can be awe-inspiring and Allegri’s Miserere is a very beautiful piece of music (with its famous note of high C) which can instill a sense of peace in the listener. But neither of those things are in themselves exclusive indicators of ‘the presence of God’. Of course, God is surely present in that cathedral, but He was also present in that muddy puddle which you stepped in (and bitterly cursed) on the way to the cathedral, for God is omnipresent. You do not have to visit a cathedral or listen to Allegri for God to be present. You are confusing the release of dopamine, oxytocin and endorphins in your body with the presence of God. For those are all released when listening to music (and even more so when singing it). Essentially, your quasi-religious experience in the cathedral was based on pure subjectivism rather than objective reality. When you can laugh instead of curse when you step in a muddy puddle, knowing that God is right in there too, then you will have a better understanding of the presence of God — one which is rooted in objective truth rather than in mere subjective experience, as I will show below.

How easily bewitched professing ‘Christians’ are today when there is an inducement to artificial peace! However, it is not on any subjective physical or emotional experiences that a disciple should base his or her sense of peace but, rather, on the objective fact of having been reconciled to God through the work of Christ. There is a vast difference between ‘feelings’ of peace and actually knowing that peace has been made. The first is an artificial peace based on subjective experience, while the latter is a true peace rooted in the objective work of Christ on the cross and beyond. The world will offer you an earthbound peace which is either the space between two wars or the illusion of bliss. But Christ will bring about an actual condition of peace which is permanent and spiritual — a state which persists, even in times of affliction, and regardless of how ‘good’ or ‘bad’ we may feel  (cf. Gospel of John, chapter 14, verse 27). As some wise words written in a former era put it so well:

“While we must fight together throughout this life under the cross, our condition is harsh and wretched…. For this reason we ought to know that the happiness promised us in Christ does not consist in outward advantages such as leading a joyous and peaceful life, having rich possessions, being safe from all harm, and abounding with delights such as the flesh commonly longs after. No, our happiness belongs to the heavenly life!”

Understanding this mighty fact is the key to true Christian growth, which does not come through psychological catharsis in a ‘hot’ meeting, but through obedience to God’s word (First Letter of Peter, chapter 2, verses 1‑3), and the hard road of suffering and adversity (Letter to the Romans, chapter 5, verses 3-4). Disciples of Christ are exiles in a hostile world, but their joy comes through knowing that they have an abundance of heavenly treasures. If your peace and joy comes from a mere psycho-religious experience involving an altered state of consciousness, then you have no conception of the heavenly life, and are laying up for yourself vain treasures on earth. This is why I say that a vast number of those who call themselves Christians today are not genuine disciples of Christ.

So many today tell you that if you come to church you will come into “the presence of God” and this usually means that you will be in a trancelike state with your arms in the air, eyes closed, and feeling ecstatic after having sung along with a multitude of soppy, effeminate, repetitive songs, while probably muttering the pagan gibberish which has come to be a counterfeit of the biblical gift of languages among deceived professing “Christians” today. That is a total misconception. The stark truth is that the presence of God, when truly experienced, would not make you feel blissful and spaced-out but you would instead be utterly mortified with fear and dread (as we see even with the Apostle John in Revelation 1:17). This is precisely why we need Jesus as the intermediary between us and the Divine, and why our worship should be Christ-centred rather than trying to get-off on a dose of what we imagine to be the Holy Spirit. We would be utterly blown-away with fear and dread if we truly came into the actual presence of God in our present human condition. So please do not mistake hormonal secretions for the presence of God or you will delude yourself (or, rather, be deluded).

Here is another case-study concerning the cult of subjectivism vs the truth which sets you free:

CASE #2: “As the pastor tapped my forehead with his hand and spoke in tongues over me, I felt the Holy Spirit enter me and my knees went weak and I collapsed in a heap on the floor as if I were drunk. From then on, I believed”. I can assure you that this had nothing whatsoever to do with the Holy Spirit entering you, but was simply the result of hypnotic suggestion. You had seen the pastor performing this trick many times and watched all the people go down like ninepins under his hand. You knew what you had to do. So you were already primed like a clockwork toy for this to happen to you, too. In short, you entered an altered state of consciousness which so many confuse with a beneficial spiritual experience. I have seen exactly the same trick (known as Shaktipat) performed by Eastern gurus such as Bhagwan Sri Rajneesh — a hedonistic charlatan who changed his name to OSHO, and whose ashram was known to have been infiltrated by the CIA which has long specialized in manipulating cults and religions for it own purposes [see https://indiafacts.org/religious-crusades-cia/ ]. [See the photo attached to this piece comparing the charismatic “Christian” practice of being “slain in the spirit” and OSHO’s administration of the same devilish initiation]. And, no, that was not a ‘counterfeit of the Christian experience’ as until the charismatic movement came along no God-respecting pastor would entertain such stupidity with the people in his care. These are satanic tricks to inculcate the illusion of genuine spirituality, yet they are taken as normal in so many churches today. It is merely one more example of subjective experience being used falsely as a yardstick to trounce the objective power of God.

You say that from that phony experience onward you believed. Believed what? That a pastor can ‘zap’ you into imagining you have been indwelt by the Holy Spirit of God? The Holy Spirit is described as the One to “whom God has given to those who obey Him” (Book of Acts, chapter 5, verse 32). Being ‘zapped’ by a huckster pastor (like in the attached image) does not constitute obedience to God but conformity to a cult. The same idea of preliminary obedience is present when Jesus said to His disciples, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments. And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Advocate to be with you forever — the Spirit of truth” (Gospel of John, chapter 14, verses 15-17). So, keeping His commandments. There is yet another preliminary element as well. It is what is conveyed in the Koine Greek word μετανοέω, metanoeó, which is often translated as “repent” but in the Greek it fully means vowing to live a totally different life, with a completely transformed mind, turning your back on your former ways (Book of Acts, chapter 2, verse 38). That vow of transformation, coupled with obedience to Christ and keeping His commandments, are what gives rise to the Holy Spirit coming into a person and ‘taking up residence’ there. That is objective truth in action. I do not see any of that present in your unfortunate subjective experience at the hands of that impostor who laid his filthy hands on you. So now you know what to do if you are serious about being Christ’s disciple and wanting to receive His Holy Spirit: Obey God, love Christ and keep His commandments.

Whether it is Shaktipat or the Pentecostal/Charismatic ‘slain in the Spirit’ routine, it is all pure Mesmerism — the generation of hypnosis and trance through powerful suggestion. Nowhere is this deception and manipulation more apparent today than in the theatrical ritual performed at Charismatic gatherings which is referred to as being ‘slain in the Spirit’, in which a person will fall backwards to the floor in an induced swoon, often after being ‘touched’ (some would say pushed) by an influential teacher. It is worth remembering that in the Bible it is only God’s enemies who fall backwards when confronted with His naked spiritual power (e.g. Gospel of John, chapter 18, verse 6; cf. Book of Isaiah, chapter 28, verse 13). Whereas the Lord’s true people always fall forwards on their faces in awestruck adoration and worship (e.g. Genesis 17:3; Joshua 5:14; Ezekiel 1:28; 44:4; Daniel 8:17; Matthew 17:5-6; Book of Revelation 7:11; 11:16). But true spirituality is not something which can be sought out by simply going to a meeting and plugging into an experience. It is in this sense that the Charismatic Movement can be said to be very much a part of the New Gnosticism, with its mysticism, superstition, elitest ‘higher life’ teachings, disdain of the intellect and emphasis on the development of ‘extraordinary’ mind-powers, along with the practice of phony miracles and healings. [To know much more about all this, please read my free-to-download book, “Signs, Wonders & Divine Revelation: The Gifts of the Spirit and their Abuses in the Church Today”, which can be found here: https://diakrisis-project.com/2023/05/13/new-book-signs-wonders-divine-revelation-the-gifts-of-the-spirit-their-abuses-in-todays-churches/ ].

“Coincidentally”, just today, I received an email from a man who was zapped in a Charismatic church at the tender age of 14 but who later realised that it was all part of an empty profession of faith. Here is part of what he wrote:

“Yesterday I stumbled across your two lectures on the “Toronto Blessing” on YouTube and wanted to thank you so much for putting them together all those years ago. Your godly boldness and courage to speak the truth was just what the church needed at that time and still does today. I was raised in a well-known Pentecostal/Charismatic church in the UK. Like many kids, I made a false profession of faith when I was young and lived a copycat Christian life until I left the church in 1990. I can’t remember who but someone from the church went to Toronto to bring back the “blessing” and our entire church was zapped on their return. Throughout those many weeks I did question what I was seeing but as I had no Biblical foundation to test it against Scripture, I said nothing and went along with the crowd (I was 14 at the time). At the age of 20 I left Christ and His church to live a life of worldly indulgence that ultimately lead me to complete ruin. By God’s mercy and grace, He called me to confess and repent of my sins and gave me a new and proper regenerate heart. But this time things were different. The Word of God was central to my knowledge of Him and His ways from the outset”.

My friends, the experience of this guy in a Charismatic church with a false profession of faith is extremely widespread — and it has nothing whatsoever to do with the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. It is made-up religion. The Charismatic Movement is a counterfeit of Christian faith created by Satan to lead people away with the fairies into what amounts to an occult experience with “Christian” trappings. When he came to realise that the Word of God was central to his faith rather than all the subjective nonsense which had gone beforehand, that was the sign of his regeneration in Christ.

Perhaps, at this point, you will want to ask me this question: “If being ‘slain in the Spirit’ in a Pentecostal or Charismatic church or undergoing similar pyrotechnics is not really a Christian experience but an occult one, how come I had such a great sense of peace when it happened to me?” The fact that a person has a general sense of wellbeing after an experience in no way proves that it is ‘from the Lord’, or that it is conducive to spiritual growth and discipleship. The objective validity of an experience can never be measured by the subjective feelings associated with it. Please read that again. Psycho-religious activities often create what is known as an ‘alpha-wave’ brain state, or a major release of endorphins or oxytocin (the “love hormone”), in which a person will experience great euphoria. But this does not prove that one is ‘resting in the Spirit’, to use the cliché, because this same state of mind can be reproduced through Yogic meditation, occult rituals, an opium den, a romantic attraction, a love-making session, or even in the pub, if one drinks the right spirits!

The pleasant sensations which occur in the wake of the Pentecostal/Charismatic ‘slain in the Spirit’ experience cannot possibly have anything whatsoever to do with the workings of the Holy Spirit, because God does not bless disobedience. Such phenomena not only have no biblical pedigree, but they have been entirely absent in gatherings of genuine disciples down the ages, having only ever been practised among mystery religions, mystical orders, shamanistic cults, and pagan sects. It was not until the revivalist excesses of the so-called ‘Holiness Movement’ in the latter half of the nineteenth century, and the influential and delusional Azusa Street event in 1906, that such phenomena began to seduce professing Christians en masse into their powerful wake. Now, it is all taken to be normal. This is apostasy in action, in which the visible church is involved to a major degree.

The fact that you feel so high after having indulged in antichristian psycho-religious experiences merely shows that Satan has performed a consummate work in your life by which you were deceived. For that is his aim with the millions upon millions of gullible folks who claim to be ‘Christians’ in the world today: To give them a ‘hands-on, feel-good’ experience while introducing them to a welter of ‘Christianised’ occult techniques and practices reinforced by a heady altered state of consciousness which can be replicated in any religion or cult. What so many today fail to understand is that when Satan determines to deceive professing ‘Christians’, he comes as an angel of light rather than the prince of darkness (cf. Second Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 11, verse 14). When you understand how Satan really operates, you will realise that an occult or demonic experience need not be one of spine-tingling horror at all but is much more likely to fill you with feelings of bliss, joy and wonderful release. Satan is the master of the ‘buzz’ – the religious and psychological high; and he is exercising his craft today in the churches on a massive scale — and so many just lap it up like little robots.

Here is another case-study highlighting the cult of subjectivism vs the truth which sets you free:

CASE #3: “As I listened to the Tibetan sound-bowls ringing out, I felt a sense of deep relaxation and amazing things happening inside my body. The vibrations resonated with my energies and I felt myself align with my higher self, my Divine self”. I am sorry to tell you that what you experienced was mostly the placebo effect coupled with a reduction in your stress-inducing cortisone levels and an enhancement of the same hormones I mentioned above in relation to music-listening, which brings feelings of relaxation that those hooked on subjective experience mistakenly translate as a higher spiritual phenomenon. New Age practices are predominantly emotional/ hormonal highs involving autohypnotism to induce an altered state of consciousness, making the experiencer confuse that with some kind of spiritual occurrence. Getting ‘blissed-out’ has nothing to do with true spirituality. It is instead a narcissistic, self-indulgent practice which has been mistaken for spiritual advancement, whether in the New Age scene or in the realm of modern so-called “Christianity”. The demonic realm uses subjective experiences to deceive you into imagining that you are advancing spiritually and to deflect you from discovering the objective truth which will set you free. And your ego just loves being stroked like that. Like the ‘slain in the spirit’ experience of “Christians”, New Age folks have been programmed about what will happen when they undergo various ‘therapies’. It is entirely subjective, which is the axis on which all New Age workshops and experiences turn. New Age religion dines on a smorgasbord of subjectivism, which is just another form of narcissism (not to mention being a form of psychological and spiritual bypassing to avoid the fallout from various issues resulting from earlier experiences interpreted as “traumatic”).

CONCLUSION

I could share many more case-studies, but I hope the point has been made. It is not on any subjective physical or emotional experiences that a disciple should base his or her sense of peace but, rather, on the objective fact of having been reconciled to God through Christ, exactly as promised in the sacred texts to those who align themselves with the will of God. There is a vast difference between ‘feelings’ of peace and actually knowing that peace has been forged in your life. The first is an artificial peace based on subjective experience, while the latter is a true peace rooted in the objective work of Christ. The world will offer you an earthbound peace which will either be the space between two wars or the illusion of bliss (cf. John 14:27). But Christ will bring about an actual condition of peace which is permanent and spiritual — a state which persists even in times of affliction and regardless of how ‘good’ or ‘bad’ we may feel. Subjective experience is not a litmus test of spiritual truth. As Jesus said to His disciples, “Do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you [subjective experience], but rejoice that your names are written in heaven [objective truth]” (Luke 10:20). That sums up the difference between subjective experience and objective truth!

The visible “Church” is now in the throes of a major time of sifting as a result of Divine judgment, in which there is increasingly a visible separation into two distinct kinds of gatherings — one true, the other false. The true Ekklesia consists of disciples who are naturally and effortlessly obedient (and love to be so) to the teachings of Christ (for they are in-lawed to Christ, 1 Corinthians 9:21) and the Apostles, who establish their gatherings through healthy teaching, who base their salvation on what Christ did in space, time and history, and who are willing to lay down their lives in order to defend the truth. The false ‘Church’, on the other hand, consists of those whose ‘Christianity’ is based on personal revelations, fashionable ideas, and cleverly manipulated subjective religious experiences — altered states of consciousness (which are the province of the demonic realm). The one is obedient to the revealed will of God, the other is manipulated by the forces of darkness.

Furthermore, it has to be said that these false experiences which people imagine are a sign of their spiritual advancement are counterfeiting the genuine progressive sanctification in the true disciple of Christ. The true disciple of Christ has to work hard in terms of improving and developing and growing in grace and a knowledge of the truth. It takes hard work. They have to do the work and they love to do it. Whereas Satan’s way of making you think that you have become super-spiritual is to provide you with some blissed-out experiences. These ‘easy-ride’ experiences take the place of the hard work of the genuine disciple of Christ. Only a false professor of faith could want to take that easy route and get so hooked on it. Whereas those who are genuine disciples, even if they initially fall for all that stupidity, will quickly tire of it and seek something deeper and more real, which will be the difficult but rewarding pathway of true progressive sanctification.

So I hope you now know why I have entitled this piece, “The Cult of Subjectivism vs the Truth which Sets you Free”. The false ‘Church’ indulges in the former, whereas the true Ekklesia rejoices in the latter. When Jesus wanted to finger some people who had falsely claimed to believe in Him, He uttered these all-important words: “If you continue in My word, you are truly My disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (Gospel of John, chapter 8, verses 31-32). Those people then went on to show their true colours. Objective truth, spiritually speaking, involves knowing the truth which sets one free; and the only way to know that is to live your life according to Christ’s word and thereby to truly be His disciple. When you live according to Christ’s word, you know for sure that He cast out Satan from his usurped rulership of the world when He died and rose again and ascended to heaven. It is recorded… objectively. That is it. All your subjective experiences are meaningless spiritually — mere shiny dross on the stinking carcass of life in this corrupted fallen world. But living in the knowledge that Christ, through His death, resurrection and ascension, has cleared the way for you to overcome spiritual death and to be freed from living a life of moral failure is the truth that makes you free. This is in complete contrast to the prevailing cult of subjectivism (and it IS a cult!) which is not only the basis of New Age and other merely religious experience, but has now also become the dominant yardstick in so many churches and why so many (maybe the majority) of those who profess to be “Christian” are anything but that. You will certainly have feelings of deep joy but they will be the result of your objective knowledge of salvation.

Finally, we cannot ignore the fact that the visible church has become a hotbed of infiltrators and even ‘spooks’ (as I have shown in my book, “Discerning the Signs of the Times”) who have crept in, influencing people with phenomenal, entirely subjective experiences to distract them from ‘the simplicity which is in Christ’ and what should constitute the true regeneration (and, ultimately, resurrection) of a human being. What we mostly have now representing “the Church” in the world is a hotch-potch of crazy subjectivist ideas which have initiated movements, megachurches and ministries influencing millions upon millions of gullible folks with fantasies and fallacies that beggar belief. During the coming years, or however long remains of this present evil age, that ‘hotch-potch’ of crazy subjectivism (which is essentially a lie) will massively increase and the love of truth will decrease commensurately, climaxing in the time when they will have “refused the love of the truth that would have saved them” (2 Thessalonians 2:10). Until people learn the difference between the cult of subjectivism and the objective truth which sets them free, they will continue to be inveigled by strange teachings and practices which are very far removed from truth.

I realise that what I am teaching in this piece is not popular and cuts across what most professing Christians have been brainwashed to hold dear today. So popularised has subjective experience become as a litmus test of Christianity that this piece will be regarded as heretical and “lacking in the Spirit” by those who peddle it. The prevailing notion that “As long as I believe in Jesus, does it really matter what else I believe?” is one of the most profound ignorance and it will have eternal consequences. “Believing in Jesus” is not enough. Even the demons believe in God (James 2:19) and they know that Jesus can chuck them in the Abyss as the Son of the Most High God (Luke 8:26-31)! So you must not only “believe” in Jesus but obey Him too: “Whoever has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me” (John 14:21). Fooling around with altered states of consciousness which masquerade as Christian experience does not constitute obeying Jesus but plays right into the hands of the forces of darkness.

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© Copyright, Alan Morrison, 2023
[The copyright on my works is merely to protect them from any wanton plagiarism which could result in undesirable changes (as has actually happened!). Readers are free to reproduce my work, so long as it is in the same format and with the exact same content and its origin is acknowledged]