STAR WARS: Jesus Christ vs.
The Neo-Gnostic Empire
by George Scipione
". . . And the times, they are a changin'!"1
So sung Bob Dylan. Too bad he was right. Western culture, impregnated with the illegitimate
satanic seed of Enlightenment rationalistic pride, came to full term amidst cataclysmic
contractions, a paroxysm of psychedelic passion. Pushed out of the cultural womb
into the light of the 1960's-1990's came the twisted twins, the malevolent monsters
of the hedonistic, self-centered Baby Boomers and the nasty, nihilistic Generation
X. The seed was bad; it also was bizarre. These twin cultural catastrophes bear fruit
that is very bitter. The whole world's teeth are set on edge by American culture,
Coke and cowboys.
White European males--dead or alive (preferably dead!)--are not wanted; bring on
the lesbian witches. Deconstructionism destroys every dignified cultural standard,
pedagogical or popular. Christianity replaces communism as the most despised and
denigrated world and life view. The culture wars replace the cold war. Stanford students
shout, "Hey, Hey, Ho, Ho, western civ has got to go"2 as they
parrot their required courses in non-Western thought that are aimed at stamping out
racism, sexism, ethnocentrism and homophobia.3 They can hardly keep up
with the academic Joneses on the Bay at U.C. Berserkly4, who have ingested
and now intone their Leary-Cal5 lessons, the standard politically correct
tunes. This is the sweet and sour generation, a whole generation (or two) that has
tuned out God's created world and has turned inward and tuned in to the virtual universe
within. The bread and wine of communion are replaced by drug-drenched cakes and booze.
Suckled on satanic lies, they are sour and sullen. Monistic mantras rearrange reality.
Ironically, as new age thinking and therapy sweep over a dying and decaying culture,
the American Psychological Association approves of therapists who do "past lives
therapy" or worse, but rejects Biblical counseling outright.6 Like
a swarm of lusting locusts, post-modern historians and psychologists deconstruct
any living cultural value in their path. Ah yes, we must have devolutionary "progress"
at Christianity's expense. A Darwinian creature must sprout legs from a Christian
Ixthus. This ancient enemy of the living triune God, His Christ and the gospel7
rises vampire-like from its cultural coffin. Who summoned this damned, dead Dracula
to life? C.S. Lewis' Screwtape Letters8 would point us not only to saffron-robed
monks soliciting in airport lobbies, but also to men in three-piece suits buzzing
in and out of the oval office. The President and his pot-smoking advisors have solicited
more than contributions for the Democratic National Party; they have summoned up
the demonic hosts of hell via their new-age, neo-gnostic channelers who pose as putative
intellectual advisors. Clinton claims to be a Christian statesman, but resembles
a Roman emperor replete with all the immorality and corruption.9
What is happening? What does this have to do with you as a Biblical counselor who
ministers God's word? Peter Jones, professor of New Testament at Westminster Theological
Seminary in California, tells us in his two books: The Gnostic Empire Strikes Back10
and Spirit Wars.11 These stand as lighthouses in the darkness of our cultural
cauldron as the true Church battles to be salt and light, the pillar and foundation
of truth.12 If you are to understand your counselees, their cultural context
and the milieu in which they marinate daily, then you must read these books.
The Gnostic Empire is easy reading and triggers the alarm against the neo-gnostic
dark age. Jones' chapters are: Getting a Handle on the New Age, The Gnostic Empire
Strikes Back, All You Really Need to Know About Ancient Gnosticism, the New Age--the
Return of Ancient Gnosticism and Perspectives for the Planet and for the Church.
Listen to these comments:
"...essential reading... Dr. Jones does a masterful job... I highly recommend
this work". R.C. Sproul
"...a remarkable work... these findings throw a flood of light on a dark subject."
Jay E. Adams
On the back cover of Spirit Wars you read:
"In just one generation, Judeo-Christian America has become an incubator of
revived paganism. Behind the dazzling diversity of pro-choice culture--abortion rights,
the homosexual agenda, radical feminism, the new spirituality, goddess worship and
witchcraft--lies a coherent pagan spirituality bent on absolute control, intolerant
of any truth but its own.
The Gnostic Empire Strikes Back sounded the alarm of the New Age Threat. This
volume demonstrates that at the dawn of a new millennium, two world views (the only
two) collide: pagan monism and theism--the earth goddess or the God who made heaven
and earth. At the heart of our culture wars are Spirit Wars.
Also on the back cover you read:
"In this courageous book, Peter Jones rips the masks off several of the most
powerful spiritual influences assaulting our society. ... No wild-eyed conspiracy
theorist, Jones is a scholar who makes his case in a carefully reasoned fashion.
Clearly written and powerfully persuasive, Spirit Wars is essential reading...
----John MacArthur
Jay Adams says13
"This is a landmark book, prophetic, stating for our times what Machen did for
his. It is essential reading for every pastor, elder and serious Christian. I do
not like what I read--not because the book is poorly written; it isn't. But I am
deeply concerned about the future of our country and church. Perhaps it is the one
book that can stem the tide. It is a clarion call to action."
As a former president of NANC, I have no authority to give you an assignment for
these books. But if I could, I would say buy them, read them and report back to me.
May our God grant that true Biblical Christianity and counseling may cover this neo-gnostic
empire as the waters cover the sea.14
Endnotes
1. Dylan, B., Album, The Times, They are a Changin', 1964.
2. Quoted in Journal, May 1991, p.8 (Summit Ministries, P0 Box 3207, Manitou Springs,
CO 80829).
3. "New Courses in ethnic diversity, sex roles - to be required at Stanford",
San Diego Union, Dec.13, 1990, A-3.
4. A humorous name given to the University of California at Berkley, which stems
from the free speech movement days.
5. A play on the word "lyrical". Combination of Timothy "Leary"
famous for introducing LSD induced trips to campus life at U.C. Berkley and other
campuses, and "Cal", short for California.
6. Kilpatrick, W. K. "The Brahmin in the Bahamas: the Psychology of Selfishness"
in The Emperor's New Clothes: the naked truth about the new psychology (Westchester:
Crossway Books, 1985).
7. Psalm 2; 1 John.
8. Lewis, C.S. The Screwtape Letters (Grand Rapids, MI: Fleming H. Revell, Lord and
King Assoc., 1976).
9. The president, vice president and staff could learn much from the life and administration
of Frederick Chiluba, the president of Zambia. Videotape, "Zambia: Breaking
the Chains" (Christian Vision, P0 Box 3040, W Bromwich, W Midlands B7OOEL, UK).
10. Jones, Peter The Gnostic Empire Strikes Back: An Old Heresy for the New Age (Phillipsburg,
N.J.: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1992).
11. Jones, Peter Spirit Wars: Pagan Revival in Christian America (Mukilteo, WA: Wine
Press Publishing, 1997).
12. Matt 5:11-16; 1 Tim 3:15.
13. Publicity Release.
14. Hab 2:12-14.
The Weigh Down Diet
by Gwen Shamblin
Reviewed by Elyse Fitzpatrick
The Weigh Down Diet by Gwen Shamblin is currently a best seller for the publishing giant, Doubleday. IBCD has chosen to review this book due to its enormous popularity, and in response to numerous requests.
As one who has thought, written, and taught extensively about the biblical perspective on eating, dieting, and gluttony, and as one who has been trained in biblical counseling, I wish that I could wholeheartedly recommend this book. Although there are some aspects of this book that I find encouraging, there are also basic presuppositions that are very troubling to me and that I believe to be unbiblical.
First, let me draw your attention to the good that I find in the book. I rejoice that, at long last, someone is speaking in a national forum on the sin and idolatry involved in gluttony. Shamblin uses the idolatry paradigm quite forcefully, encouraging gluttons to go to God instead of food for peace and joy. In Phase II of the book, she encourages repentance, feasting on the will of the Father, and lays out a plan to overcome "desire eating." She seems to confront the self-love movement and the perfectionism so common in habitual dieters. She makes an attempt at using Scripture, and writes out each passage to encourage the reading of it. This teaching takes up a large portion of the book, and although her hermeneutics are not sound, her attempt to use Scripture (something missing in most "Christian diet" books) is commendable.
The problems with this book grow out of Shamblin's unsound and inconsistent theology. First, she has embraced the "longing, hurting heart" model so common in modern "Christian" therapy. In the chapter, Why Diets Don't Work, she writes, ". . . we realize that we can actually become enslaved to this lust, which, again, is trying to feed that longing heart."1 She doesn't seem to recognize that the longing heart itself is idolatrous and wicked. Instead of extending her idolatry paradigm to its biblical conclusion, ie. it is because we are idolators that we have longing, hurting hearts, she turns the paradigm around and teaches that we are idolaters because we are hurting. She misses the total depravity of man.
Our problems do not stem from the fact that we have "longing, hurting hearts." Our misery flows from the fact that we are, by nature, idolaters who will turn to anything (including food) rather than submit to a holy God.
Her definition of the heart is also typically therapeutic, seeing it as our "deep-down feelings."2 It is interesting that she sees idolatry so clearly and yet is so confused in her anthropology. The Bible defines the heart as the entire inner man (thoughts, volition, emotions, desires, motivations), not merely feelings.
Instead of seeing man as a rebel against God, one who continuously manufactures idols, she sees his idolatry as the result of his hurting and needy heart. Because of this presupposition, she sees God as the Great Need-Meeter, rather than Savior and King. She encourages an exchange of this idolatry in trying to get one's needs met, with relationship to God: "This old relationship with food can be transferred to a relationship with God or to a heart for God."3 Yes, we should seek to worship God instead of our idols, but the worship of God is not a means to an end.
I wonder if she has considered the implications of seeing God merely as a means to having one's needs met. In her paradigm, man (the dieter) is at the center of the universe and God is there to serve him, to meet his needs. "If you want to be rich, serve God! . . . If you want to be thin, serve God! . . . If you want . . ." She fails to see that man has a hurting heart because he is a rebel. Consider these words from A. W. Tozer,
" . . . suppose a man escapes from prison. Certainly he will have grief. He is going to be in pain after bumping logs and stones and fences as he crawls and hides away in the dark. He is going to be hungry and cold and weary. His beard will grow long and he will be tired and cramped and cold -- all of these things will happen, but they are incidental to the fact that he is a fugitive from justice and a rebel against law."4
"We do not want life's worries, riches and pleasures to come in and rob us of
this acceptance by God and keep us immature,"5 she writes. Our sinful
propensity to make gods of worries, riches and pleasures is an affront to a holy
God. We must seek to obey His command to "have no other gods before Him,"
not just so that we don't cheat ourselves or don't remain immature but so that our
lives glorify and please only Him.
Shamblin's "feelings" orientation is played out in spades through her continuing emphasis on subjectivity. "Eat what you want, even if it is all chocolate," "Get in touch with what your body is craving and then eat it," are typical examples of her advice. The most alarming reference to her belief that subjective feelings are the highest authentic authority is, "I could list a hundred scriptures that tell us that He loves us -- but I know we want something that we can feel and touch in order to know He loves us. We want some concrete evidence."6 She encourages her readers to place some sort of fleece before the Lord so that He can demonstrate His love. What about Scripture? Is the cross not sufficient concrete evidence? Isn't it enough that God demonstrated His love toward us and that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us? Do I now need to demand some sign of God's love? It seems to me that this is the height of unbelief. Of course I want some special sign. I want God to obey me and continually reassure my faithless heart. That is because I am an idolater and want to make God my errand-boy, sent to satisfy my wandering desires. This teaching flows from her "God is My Need-Meeter" theology.
Although Shamblin uses Scripture throughout the book, she demonstrates her true commitments with statements that belie this practice. She scorns a "scholarly explanation of Scripture"7 and the theologians who debate it. She writes that her barometer of truth is that, ". . . if a principle is from God, it will bear fruit."8 At heart, she is a pragmatist. In other words, truth is known, not through scholarly exegesis or hermeneutics, but only by experience. If it works, if there is "fruit," it must be truth. If her proposition is true, then the teaching of the Mormons and Muslims must be correct. No, for the Christian, truth is known by whether it measures up to God's standard -- that standard is found only in Scripture. Let's not forget Christ's words in John 17, ". . . thy word is truth."
As serious as these issues are, they are not, in my opinion, the most serious errors in the book. Shamblin's methodology for helping overeaters is to encourage them to eat whatever they want! Only in America -- the land of 10,000 supermarkets with everything you could possibly crave crammed on every shelf -- could a book like this sell!
"You will not have to measure the food or count the grams -- your stomach will guide you."9 She rightly teaches that one should only eat when experiencing true hunger. But then she goes on to say that one should eat exactly what is desired. She shuns dieteing as a fruitless exercise. The reasoning behind this methodology is that she believes that God has "programmed" the body to want to be thin and that man will automatically eat whatever is needed to attain or maintain thinness. This is an astonishing belief. Once again, she misses the depth of sin and the reality that sin has affected our entire being, including our desires. She believes strongly in mysticism and seeking after "leadings" from God to know what to eat and even how much to weigh. She believes that the body and its desires are basically good. In addition, she doesn't think that desiring to be thin is problematic. "The motivation to be thin is not vanity -- it is natural. God has programmed us to want the best for our bodies."10 I wonder where, in all of Scripture, God makes a statement like this. It seems that, when it comes to our desires, just the opposite is true.
The Bible does speak dynamically about our vanity and pride, our desire to "look good," our desire to use God for our own purposes. But the Bible never teaches us to pursue thinness itself as a goal or that God innately teaches us to do so. She writes, "I concluded that God made all people to desire to be at their right weight and that this is not greedy or vain, but rather, a healthy, innate drive programmed in us by God."11 Being consistent, she pragmatically bases this statement on the fact that she and others have been helped by this kind of thinking.
It seems that Shamblin misses the reality that God is the Sovereign, Tri-Personal King. This is demonstrated by the fact that numers of times throughout the book she writes, "God has programmed the body . . . " Is God merely some sort of impersonal programmer working in a celestial Silicon Valley? She misses the depth of our sin and the greatness and immediacy of God.
Just what is wrong with Shamblin's paradigm? What does the Bible teach about our desires? Do all people have a desire to be at their right weight? Is this something that God has "programmed" into us?
I believe that the Bible teaches that all people have an inordinate love of self. In some, this self-love results in disciplined eating, in others it results in undisciplined eating in the form of gluttony, bulimia, or even anorexia. The bottom-line that must be considered when appraising one's behavior is the motive of the heart. The biblical question to ask is, "Does my drive to eat right, diet, look good, flow out of an overruling desire to be pleasing to God and to glorify Him with my body or am I trying to please myself by garnering praise and approval from others (including myself)?" We must not forget Paul's encouragement to the Corinthians, "Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God." Another way to phrase this question would be to ask, "Does my drive to eat right, diet, look good, flow out of a heart that is consumed with the love of God and my neighbor?" (Matthew 22:37f).
Because she seems to hold to the view that we are basically good ("You are not a failure"), because she thinks that somehow we just know what is best, and because she objects to outside controls ("man-made rules"), she teaches that if we allow our natural desires free reign, we will find victory. This kind of teaching grows most recently out of the Rogerian view that man is basically good and should not have any external controls placed upon him because he will find his own good way. Historically, it reminds me of the Garden and the first time "you should be free to eat whatever you're hungry for" was uttered. I believe that this throwing off restraint is antibiblical and will ultimately result in antinomianism or lawlessness. God has placed rules on us. He does this for our good and His glory. It is not that I would embrace man-made rules (diets) as the answer either (although they are helpful when learning to eat properly). The real issue is that one of the results of the Spirit's work is self-control (Galatians 5:22f). This self-control is not natural to me. I must seek to put it on (in response to the external commands of Scripture now written on my heart by the power of the Holy Spirit) and refuse to give myself everything I crave, whether I am truly hungry for it or not. Let's remember Paul's words in 2 Corinthians,
"I buffet my body and make it my slave, lest possibly, after I have preached to others, I myself might be disqualified."
Because of the popularity of this book, and Shamblin's reference to idolatry and sin, I wish that I could recommend it. Unfortunately, her theology stops me from doing so. It may be, as she has claimed, that "thousands" have been helped on this program. Those of us who believe that the Word of God is sufficient to accomplish the work of God must look beyond success stories. We must focus on whether God is glorified and His Kingdom advanced.
Endnotes
1. p. 3; 2. p. 1. In addition, she further defines acceptance by god as a feeling. "It all boils down to the fact that we are looking for acceptance -- which is a feeling." (p. 241) 3. p.6; 4. A. W. Tozer, I Call It Heresy (Camp Hill, PA: Christian Publications, 1973), p 9-10; 5. p.240; 6. p. 119; 7. p. 116; 8. p. 116; 9. p. 7; 10. p. 4; 11. p. 21.
Letter printed in World Magazine and the Christian Times:
With increasing sadness I've watched the rise and fall of Gwen Shamblin, author of
The Weigh Down Diet. From the very beginning Shamblin consistently demonstrated
her lack of trust in the Bible as the only rule for life and godliness. In her first
book she wrote, "This has always been the barometer in my life: if a principle
is from God, it will bear fruit" (p. 115). She also wrote, "I could list
a hundred scriptures that tell us that He loves us--but I know that we want something
we can feel and touch in order to know that He loves us. We want concrete evidence"
(p. 119). Her unbiblical emphasis on pragmatism, experience, and her unashamed disdain
for the sufficiency of Scripture was obvious long before her most recent slip into
blatant heresy. I'm glad that the church is finally realizing her true leanings,
but sad that it's taken so long. When will we learn that success (as the world defines
it) is not the measure of truth? As long as we pursue the gods of this age (success,
vanity and self-perfection), in the end we'll have to face the reality that we've
welcomed their false teachers into our churches, as well.