Goin' into Battle

Every now and then, I find myself slamming someone, theologically speaking. I generally know when it's from God because I really, really, don't enjoy it. Which is sort of weird, considering that I generally enjoy getting the upper hand in a debate. But I'll find myself praying a fair bit while preparing what to say, and before saying it... I guess because I hate false teaching, and hate the idea of ME leading someone down the wrong path.

Anyway, I've felt the need to do it twice in the last week. Lemme tell you about it...

The first time was when a friend lent me some reading after she heard me talking about tai chi. Now, I've done a fair bit of research into tai chi and other practices which have come to the west from eastern philosophy and religious practices. Nevertheless, I thought I'd practice humility, take the literature, read it with as close to a teachable heart as I could, and see what happened. Well, it languished a bit till she asked for it back... then I started reading. ACK. It was nasty stuff - and written by Salvation Army officers, btw. The teaching did have some truth to it, I'm not denying that. I'm not anti-spiritual-warfare, although I'm occasionally sceptical about stories that I hear. But... I followed the scripture references it gave, considered the concepts it taught, and sadly came to the conclusion that this could only be described as false teaching. Sigh. But God gave me an interesting question to ask about the authors of the 'book'. So she asked me what I thought, and before answering I asked the question - "Are these people still in ministry?". The answer? No. Their marriage broke down 'due to spiritual attack'. So, I told her I wasn't surprised, and why, and... she was incredibly gracious about me telling her that I thought it was a bunch of nasty false teaching with some truths mixed in. I still feel bad thinking about it, you know? I believe I did the right thing. But she got excited about that material, and I feel bad that I (hopefully) wrecked that for her. Thinking of that 'wounds from a friend can be trusted' proverb only helps a bit.

(continued next post)