One of the issues I have had about releasing is that perhaps I'm using a man-made method to accomplish something that Jesus has already accomplished on the cross. As this is a method which seems to work for believers and unbelievers alike - it does make me wonder if I am somehow employing a method which replaces God. If the Sedona Method did not exist - perhaps more people would turn to Christianity as a means of seeking fulfilment in life? Is Christianity the answer to life's problems? Yes, I believe it is. The biggest problem with Christianity is that as soon as people come to the church to seek answers - they are let loose into a maze of perpetually keeping rules, doing good works and checking for hidden sins and selfish motives and agendas. What was meant to bring peace and answers to suffering humanity seems to have brought more unanswered questions, frustration and anxiety. It is little wonder that people have abandoned the concept of Christianity as being the answer and have turned to self-help and alternative spiritual approaches, such as the Sedona Method.
I am included in the list of Christians who have been frustrated with the church and have sought to include other methods from outside of the church. I’ll admit that I used to pursue New Age until about 1997 when I had a rather scary incident with Tarot Cards. I was sort of dabbling with Christianity during that time, but this incident caused me to abandon New Age entirely and to set my focus purely on Christianity. It was a year after that in 1998 when I was rather miraculously baptised in the Holy Spirit. If you don’t know what this means let me tell you that God became real to me at that moment: I felt His tangible presence in me. This spiritual encounter encouraged me to continue my pursuit in seeking God through a purely Christian means.
Thankfully, there is a revolution taking place in the church right now. People are leaving the institutional church in their droves and finally beginning to see that Christianity is about relationship with God and acceptance by Him through belief in Christ. The new wave of “Grace Preachers” as they are called, are spreading this message all over the world (see my Christian blog The Divine Nature for some links to some really good grace teaching). Basically, you can either read the Bible through the lens of trying to appease an angry God, or you can read the Bible through the lens of God’s love for humanity.
One of the biggest differences between the Old Testament law and New Testament grace is that the law is static and inflexible. As Joseph Prince from New Creation Church in Singapore says, “The law demands righteousness from spiritually bankrupt men”. The law demands holiness from people – without proving the power to do so.
The love of God, which is the grace of God, is dynamic and flexible in comparison to the law. The Bible tells us that God's laws are no longer written on tablets of stone but written on our hearts so that we will know them and do them (Jer. 31:33-34).
Principles, which could be seen as being a subtle manifestation of the Old Testament law, are static in that they are written by other people with the intention of providing guidelines for other people to live according to. But these principles do not provide, in themselves, the means of their fulfilment: they are devoid of life and power and only serve to put an obligation upon a person. Furthermore, these principles are very much open to interpretation and are very much the product of someone else's revelation, experience, or perhaps, their assumption.
Principles and formulas are static; they are endless; it is just like entering a huge maze in which you get completely lost; you feel as if you know where you are going - only to reach a dead-end and have to start all over again on another path. When you start on that path of following principles and formulas, it can be a never-ending pursuit that just leads to a combination of frustration, lust, fear, pride and guilt.
Releasing and inquiry are dynamic. Releasing and inquiry can replace an entire bookcase full of books on principles and formulas. The only concepts you really have to learn with releasing and inquiry are the concepts of the negative emotions that culminate in the four wants, which we can let go of by either welcoming or releasing; and the concept of using inquiry with the four questions and turnaround at the end, as a means of being set free from contraction around a stressful thought. Every other concept surrounding releasing and inquiry stems from these simple, core concepts. For me, I believe that this approach to self-transformation and seeking peace, greatly simplifies things, rather than complicating them.
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