REFLECTIONS ON FAITH, HOPE,
COGNITION, PNEUMATOLOGY,
TRANSFORMATION AND PERICHORESIS

By Mark Downham

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The prayers herein have been edited in Sacred Name form

Hi. We are re-engaging a discipline that all christians practice and this is a call of loving grace and mercy - a rallying call to come higher up into the loving intimacy of his presence to all Christians.

We have an emerging "grass roots" movement in the Evangelical Wing of the Church of England, which is the practice of Cognitive Pneumatology, which may be of interest to you - because we certainly understand the full and ever unfolding implications of being seated in the heavenly places within the Koinonia (Communion, Community) of the Trinity (Ephesians 2:6,7) and we are determined to engage this work in the context of spiritual formation, progressive sanctification and pastoral ministry - all our ministries are interconnected in the Koinonia of the Trinity and are always reaching far beyond our immediate horizons to the whole body of the Lord Jesus Christ (Genesis 15:5, John 10:15,16, Romans 12:5) - there is no greater calling for all Christians - it is simply becoming more like Jesus, he really is the kindest person I know.

We are all - everyone in the Lord Jesus Christ - going further in and further up, from shadow to substance (2 Corinthians 5:1- 5, Hebrews 9), from coping strategy to transformative encounter - there is a moment when you first see the heavenly country, it never leaves you - in being and becoming more like Jesus.

Hebrews 11:1 (KJV) Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen - the movement from hiddenness to manifestation, shadow to substance - a crossing over - (from Definitive to Progressive Sanctification, Serenification and Substantiation) (Joshua 3).

We will naturally engage in a heuristic search which is why in Genesis men began to search after God (Genesis 4:25) - we are all trying to find our way "home" and it is why Jesus said "I am the truth, the way and the life, noone comes (home) to the father except through me" (John 14:6) - an expression of Messianic, Incarnational, Sacramental Reality - we actually and literally pass through the 'Last Supper' (Holy Communion - the Eucharist "Thanksgiving") into his real presence and substance (Matthew 18:20, John 6:33) - this goes way beyond an act of Anamnesis (Recollection, Remembrance), from temporality to the simultaneity of the eternal now (Luke 23: 42, 43, Ephesians 2:6,7) - we need to constantly re-read the book of Hebrews and re-engage our primary purpose which is to become more like Jesus through the powerful inner life and work of the Holy Spirit in our spirits (Romans 8) - as Evangelicals we engage in an act of symbolic reification - but what we reify in our life '! in and with' the Lord Jesus Christ through taking Communion is our progressive sanctification in and through him in the Father (John 5:19-21, Romans 6:4) - that outward and visible sign - which is actually a prophetic act - prophecy is expressed substance - of an inward and spiritual work of grace - the movement further in and further up, from shadow to substance in becoming more and more like him - we are literally becoming more substantial - (Hebrews 10:20) - we are all crossing over beyond the veil through the Lord Jesus Christ (Romans 6:8) - through the work of the Cross. The more substantial you become, the more full of light you become.

For us, Epiclesis ("the calling down") is 'calling down' the Holy Spirit on all of us as the 'Congregation' , as a 'Corporate Anointing' - on our giftings and attributions - and so we return to Pentecost, the "new wine" of the Spirit and Acts 2 - we actually hold that we are calling for - calling forth in faith and expectation - a fuller release of the Holy Spirit - an intensification of his presence in and through the Koinonia of the Trinity - Jesus is the broken bread of heaven (Exodus 16:4, John 6:27-35, Luke 24: 30-32) the bread of life and we are his body. The light of the world hung on the cross and carried all our darkness (Isaiah 9:2,3, Isaiah 53: 4,5, Isaiah 58:10, Isaiah 60:1-3, Luke 23:44,45, 2 Thessalonians 2:8) and we have been filled with his light (Ephesians 3:19, 1 Peter 2:9) - when the temple curtain was torn in two, from top to bottom, the light of the glory of God streamed forth from the pierced side of the Lord Jesus Christ (we have been baptised through water (reviving - purification) and blood (cleansing - sanctification)) and we have seen his glory (John 1:14, Philippians 3:10,11).

David Ruis - Lily of the Valley

Lily of the valley

Bright and Morning Star

Fairest of ten thousand

You are.

How can I perceive Your beauty?

I long to see Your face

Jesus.

Holy Lamb of Heaven

Perfect son of man

Acquainted with our suffering

Broken for us all.

How can I perceive Your mercy?

Help me find Your grace

Jesus.

Desire of the nations

The risen coming King

Holding the sceptre of justice

You reign; You reign.

How can I perceive Your coming?

May You find faith on the earth

Jesus.

More of You and less of me

Jesus.

Everyone has a heart cry of "how do I engage and relate to the Holy Spirit" and that burning sense that "there must be more than this" - which is a heart cry for communion and 'beingwithness' in and with him and him in and with you and how do I know that I am engaging the Holy Spirit and becoming more like Jesus. We have the 'Holy of Holies' in us (Leviticus 16, Hebrews 9:11-14, Revelation 3:20), in each one of us there is a place that cannot sin - through the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit - the work and presence of the Cross - simultaneously in us (Luke 17:21) and on "that green hill far away, outside a city wall, where our dear Lord was crucified, who died to save us all" (Psalm 22:14, Romans 6:6, Galatians 2:20) - and we are all going back there some day for his judgement seat, his mercy seat (Exodus 25:17-22 KJV, Exodus 26:34 KJV, Isaiah 11:12, John 12:32) is the Cross and mercy triumphs over judgement (James 2:13) - do you know that his words are no longer carried on stone in the Ark of the Covenant but on and in our hearts - we carry his words and Jesus as the word within us (Deuteronomy 6:6-9, Ezekiel 36:26, Psalm 119: 9-11, Proverbs 3:1-3, 2 Corinthians 3:2,3) - we are the embodied Covenant through the work of the Cross - the Covenant is the Cross - there is a point in our lives when we will meet the Cross and like Pilgrim in John Bunyan's 'Pilgrim's Progress' find that all our burdens are lifted at Calvary (Isaiah 53:4-6) - this is a continuous experience throughout our lives - we will always hit a line of total dependence where we meet the work of the Cross in our lives - changing us from glory to glory - when you stand in the shadow of the Cross you are crossing over into increasing substance.

John Bunyan - 'The Pilgrim's Progress' - "Now I saw in my dream, that the highway up which Christian was to go, was fenced on either side with a wall, and that wall was called Salvation. Isaiah 26:1. Up this way, therefore, did burdened Christian run, but not without great difficulty, because of the load on his back. He ran thus till he came at a place somewhat ascending; and upon that place stood a cross, and a little below, in the bottom, a sepulchre. So I saw in my dream, that just as Christian came up with the cross, his burden loosed from off his shoulders, and fell from off his back, and began to tumble, and so continued to do till it came to the mouth of the sepulchre, where it fell in, and I saw it no more.

Then was Christian glad and lightsome, and said with a merry heart, "He hath given me rest by his sorrow, and life by his death." Then he stood still a while, to look and wonder; for it was very surprising to him that the sight of the cross should thus ease him of his burden. He looked, therefore, and looked again, even till the springs that were in his head sent the waters down his cheeks. Zechariah. 12:10. Now as he stood looking and weeping, behold, three Shining Ones came to him, and saluted him with, "Peace be to thee." So the first said to him, "Thy sins be forgiven thee," Mark 2:5; the second stripped him of his rags, and clothed him with change of raiment, Zechariah. 3:4; the third also set a mark on his forehead, Ephesians. 1:13, and gave him a roll with a seal upon it, which he bid him look on as he ran, and that he should give it in at the celestial gate: so they went their way. Then Christian gave three leaps for joy, and went on singing."

It is worth briefly commenting on Martin Buber and the book "I and Thou" which he wrote in 1923. Buber thought that we are capable of placing ourselves completely into a relationship - an act of total identification -, that we can truly understand and "be there" with another person, without masks, pretences, even without words. He called such a moment of relating - "I - Thou", a form of existential affirmation - the Germans call it "Einfuhlung", literally 'feeling oneself into' a thing - an experiential-empathetic category - the capacity in your spirit for Communion - they then believe that "Gestaltung" 'shaping' takes place - Progressive Sanctification - you start to become more like Jesus under the indwelling influence, direction and work of the Holy Spirit - Galatians 5: 22,23 - the 'fruit of the Spirit' - again the Germans call this "Mitdasein" - the choice of 'to be-together' - the Orthodox Church call this the practice of "Synergy" - when we ask Jesus to come into ou r lives we are choosing 'to be together' - Revelation 3:20 - when Jesus comes in we are engaging an act of Conversion - receiving our Justification through Faith in the work of the Cross and being declared 'sanctified - Definitive Sanctification - "our lives become open - progressive openness - progressive sanctification - to engaging the progressive and deepening work of the Holy Spirit, who shines forth within us - progressive serenification, substantiation and sanctification - Philippians 2:15 and so dwells with in us as a being with his own meaningfulness and purpose - who is revealing himself through us. The core of our relationship with the Holy Spirit has to be understood as an 'Encounter' which moves from existential shadow to pneumatological substance - from coping strategy to transformative encounter. For Buber, God is the Eternal Thou of the Old Testament - what he did not see was that the "new is in the old concealed" - firstly that God in his Trinitarian fullness is present in the old testament and if you really engage the 'Shema' - "Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is One" - what you are really saying is - "one in nature, communion and purpose" - but expressed in three persons who are present in every book in the old testament. We need to understand and engage the shift between pneumatological-sacramental (prophetic) imagination (Definitive Sanctification) and pneumatological -sacramental (prophetic) formation (Progressive Sanctification).

It is not enough to simply hold to 'Election' (Declared or Definitive Sanctification) - there has to be an individual and corporate outworking of the Church as a "forerunner" with eschatological purpose - a progressive social engagement - progressive Transformation, Serenification, Substantiation, Sanctification - there has to be Synergy which engages the drive towards social justice, social apostolicity (setting things in order, releasing ministries, transferring mantles), social transformation - there has to be an outworking - this is the social purpose of the Spirit and what I am really saying under Radical Reformission (literally individual and corporate "re-formation" and mission) (below) is that John 17 is us in the Social Trinity and the Trinity in us - the Trinity expressed in a simultaneous movement from Transcendence to Social Immanence - Incarnational Reality. Let’s look at how we engage the Corporate Anointing in Sacramental and Pneumatological terms:

Leviticus 6:13 "The fire (the Holy Spirit - pneumatological) must be kept burning (the anointing) on the altar (the Lord Jesus - the surrendered, the sacrificed life - sacramental) continuously (the movement from definitive to progressive sanctification) it must not go out (the Corporate Anointing - the heart of the Father - "human bodies in communities" - Ephesians 2: 19-22 and 1 Peter 2:5).

Acts 2:3 "They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire (Holy Spirit - pneumatological) that separated and came to rest ( The Lord Jesus as the prophetic forerunner of the Altar - the surrendered, the sacrificed life - sacramental) on each of them (the Father - the Corporate Anointing) ".

Matt Redman - 'Let worship be the fuel for mission's flame'.

There is a movement between John 12:23 -24 - the single grain of wheat (Jesus - the prophetic embodiment of the fire burning on the altar - he was filled with the Holy Spirit) and Pentecost (Pneumatological - Easter Sunday - the Resurrection Life in the Holy Spirit) (the festival of weeks or the Harvest festival) - gathering in all the grain - Acts 2:41 - Three thousand were added to their number in one day (the outworking of the Corporate anointing and the Incarnation of the Church on the Cross).

So it becomes clear that all systematic theologies and all commentaries converge as an engagement of three things:

1. A heuristic search (the prodigal son - human freewill) and revelatory self disclosure (the running father - divine prevenient grace) in convergence. (Conversion - Purgation) - you see this in every book in the Old Testament and the New Testament in multiple expressions and contexts in simultaneity with each other and it moves from shadow to substance when it engages the social.

2. The yearning and the appeal to engage the possibility of individual, corporate, social transformation - the transformative encounter. (The movement from Definitive to Progressive Sanctification - Illumination) - the Church has to become visible - it has to move from being a metaphysical, mystical entity to be an incarnational reality and increasingly substantial, healing and revelatory entity - the highest and deepest expression of incarnational (sacramental, messianic, prophetic) reality is social engagement -the healing of the nations .

3. The "chief end" - the pursuit of eschatological purpose. (The "chief end", the marriage celebration - Unification) - the new society - the new Jerusalem - the redemption of cities (Cain built a City - call it London, New York, Berlin, Babylon, the Tower of Babel - "let us make a name for ourselves" ) - in this you see the Ancient of Days, the Thrones descending in Daniel (Daniel 7:9) and the final redemption and re-formation of society - "the hope of glory in us" (Colossians 1, Revelation 3:12).

The Westminster Catechism is fascinating because the first question in the Catechism is:

"What is the chief end of man (human beings")?

The first answer in the Catechism is:

"Man's chief end (eschatological Purpose) is to glorify (transformation) God and enjoy him forever ( the embrace - the hug between the running father and the prodigal son - the convergence of the heuristic search in the pneumatology of religions and the divine self disclosure of a loving father who runs to meet us).

There has to be a movement from imagination (shadow) to formation (substance).

The embodied participation of human beings in what God is doing is the movement from pneumatological-sacramental imagination to pneumatological -sacramental formation.

To have a pneumatological (prophetic) imagination is to engage in pneumatological (prophetic) formation - you cannot imagine in the Spirit without engaging in an act of "Gestaltung" - 'shaping' - prophetic declaration (Definitive and Progressive Sanctification) - speaking things into being - the things that are not as if they were - I Corinthians 1:28 - do you see him - a man alone in the wilderness (an everyman in the Lord Jesus Christ) - Jeremiah in Jeremiah 22:29 - crying out to the wilderness -"Earth, earth, earth hear the word of the Lord" (KJV) to things that are not as if they were - an act of prophetic declaration - the releasing of a dynamic between heaven and earth (Sacramental, Incarnational, Pneumatological) - a man crying out in his pregnancy - pregnant with the word - Mary was pregnant for all of us - we all take part in her pregnancy - do you know that - we are all pregnant with the word - we are all God bearers - we bear his presence, we proclaim his presence!

and wherever we go we break open his presence - and the birthing, the fulfilment in Matthew 28:19 - the Great Commission (Sacramental, Incarnational, Messianic Pneumatological) - which must have a social and corporate context. If you speak to the nobility in things they become noble - whatever you speak to in a person will rise up and emerge - so speak life.

Cognitive Pneumatology

Julie Miller - "Sun and moon will be replaced with the light of Jesus' face and I will not be ashamed for my Saviour knows my name".

William Cowper - "Behind a frowning providence God hides a smiling face."

Os Guinness - "There is more to Christian knowing than we know".

The spiritual discipline we use is called Cognitive Pneumatology because we want to distinguish this work from Cognitive Psychology (Psychology of Cognition, Intention and Perception) and Phenomenology ( Philosophy of Cognition, Intention and Perception) - "Pneuma" as you know is the Greek word for 'Spirit'.

Lets start with the Roman Catholic and Russian/Greek Orthodox contemplative practices which require the descent from Mind to Spirit:

Apophatic Contemplation: The aim of Apophatic Contemplation is to engage the Holy Spirit with the most intense intimacy, in pursuit of a moment of "mystical" union through suspending all beliefs and disbeliefs. They aim for an empty mind and an open heart and seek to cross over into union with the perichoretic community of the Trinity. This involves crossing into the state of complete surrender - which is called the apophatic way - the emptying/opening of spiritual being.

Kataphatic Contemplation: The aim of Kataphatic Contemplation is to engage the Holy Spirit with the most intense intimacy, in pursuit of a moment of "mystical" union through the use of images, thoughts, liturgy and symbols. They aim to reify the symbolic into the practice of the real presence of the perichoretic community of the Trinity - the practice of the real presence of Jesus.

Ok, so...

Cognitive Pneumatology: This is a discipline of Evangelical Spirituality. We hold that a human being is made up of Body (Senses, Appetites, Instincts - "Tactility", "Sensation"); Soul (Mind/Psyche - Rational Cognition, "Meditation/"Contemplation", "Soulishness", Imagination, Memory, Subconsciousness/Unconsciousness), (Will - Volition, "Intention"/"Intentionality") (Emotions - "Expression", "Evocation", "Feelings") and Spirit (Heart - "Being") - Thessalonians 1:5 v 23.

We further hold that the Human Spirit has three attributions - Conscience (Witness, Moral Energy, "Understanding" - the ability to engage and speak to the rightness and wrongness "in things in themselves" as opposed to normative abstraction); Intuition (Intuiting, Spiritual Discernment, "knowing", "knowledge") and Communion (Hebrew: Yarda - Heart Knowledge, "Wisdom" - knowing gained through relating - relationship - the being "in and with" one another as ultimately expressed in our hypostatic union with the perichoretic community of the Trinity) - this is Proverbs 2:1- 6, Proverbs 4: 23, Proverbs 20: 5 and 1 John 4:13.

As Christians with a prophetic anointing (Revelation 19:10) we are engaged in Pneumatic Cognition (Spiritual Knowing), Cognitive Inspiration through the Knowledge (Yarda) of God (in the Holy Spirit) or Cognitive Pneumatology (Pneumatic Epistemology) - whereby the Holy Spirit is speaking directly to our spirits - through our capacity for Communion - which then involves an ascent - or a movement from substance to shadow - to our Minds - through an engagement of our Volition (Intentionality) and this then informs our Rational Cognition or Mind and this a trans-rational transformative encounter which is a pneumatological process rather than purely a cognitive process as in Kataphatic Contemplation or mystical process as in Apophatic Contemplation.

So we receive dreams, visions, words, epiphanies, thoughts, impressions which are directly imparted to our spirits by the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit acts as the Cognitive Agent (we are the Cognitive Recipient) in line with 1 Corinthians 2: 6 -12. Our engagement - all prophetic intercession, declaration and action is a trans- rational 'Cognitive Pneumatological' process which precedes Rational Cognition, although informs and directs Rational Cognition in the way we process wisdom, revelation and direction from the indwelling and sanctifying presence of the Holy Spirit. I am actually doing less thinking with my mind and more listening with my heart - John 3: 30. The renewing of the mind in Romans 12:1,2 literally is a spiritual process of revelation and revelatory insight as opposed to a rational cognitive process of engaging abstract truth - Christian thinking literally is thinking spiritually.

Our task has been to deal with Longeran and abstract cognitive metaphysics based on categories of psyche and not pneuma - and shifting Christian Knowing from Apophatic and Kataphatic categories - effectively speculative, metaphysical and mystical theologies to the engagement of continuous and unfolding revelation - from opacity to translucence, from shadow to substance, from the 'cloud of unknowing' to the radiant brightness of his presence (Isaiah 60:1, Hebrews 1:3).

We have the Holy Spirit dwelling in each one of us - so we are God's tabernacle (Hebrew word - "to dwell with") - an expression of hypostatic union (footnote 1) - which is why each one of us is an expression of the Church on earth (what Stephen, who was filled with the Holy Spirit, prophetically called the Church in the Wilderness) - where did John the Baptist come from - the wilderness, the Desert and what did he bring with him - the proclamation of the kingdom - each of us has a fore-runner anointing by simply being the church. Given that Hebrews 12 describes the Church in Heaven, that great cloud of Witnesses - even if you are alone - even in silence and solitude - you are not the power of one but of many because the Church on Earth and the Church in Heaven cannot be separated - they are bound together in Jesus - another expression of Perichoresis (footnote 2) - Incarnational Reality - binding Heaven and Earth together in Jesus - what do symbols do - they tie different le!

vels of reality to together - what are real Christian symbols - prophetic expressions of a more substantial reality - and you know what he said about "where two or three are gathered in my name...who said just on earth.

Andrew Moore - 'Perichoresis is the eternal infinite loving flow of person, idea and virtue that exists between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, each fully receiving and giving of the other. Co-inherence is the fact that all three members of the Trinity inhere or exist within each other'.

Radical Reformission:

My "Rule of Faith" (Latin : Regula Fidei) - my rule of life - was given to me in the Church of England when Isaiah 58: 6 -12 was spoken over me prophetically. I spent two years working in an area of Central London, UK called Earls Court - an area still renowned for lawlessness, crime, prostitution, homosexuality, beggars, the dispossessed, broken, crushed, disenfranchised, lost and those on the run from the police - I worked in the Earls Court project - (a joint YWAM/Church of England project) in the street outreach and witness ministry in the late 1980s - I sat with the hurting - what society calls human detritus, discards, junk - they were each full of beauty and inexpressible worth - like Ezekiel with the exiles at the Kebar River - I believe that the Radical Holiness expressed in the Community of the Trinity moves from hiddenness to full manifestation when we engage in Social Outreach, Social Justice, Social Mercy, Social Righteousness (Love, Faith, Hope, Humility, Redem!

ption) and Social Witness.

Moses said to God show me your glory and he placed him in a cleft in the rock - the saviours side - rock of ages cleft for me let me hide myself in thee - we used to hold these people and bring them broken as they were to the saviours side at the cross and you know what - they entered in (2 Samuel 22: 31) - his glory, the power of his resurrection and his suffering - sharing in the fellowship of his sufferings - cannot be separated.

Tears:

For us Tears are transformative . The Lord Jesus Christ was incarnated through our tears. When we cry we are in the midst of Lamentations - something is being birthed in us and simultaneously in the heart of heaven - tears are a form of binding and loosing (Matthew 16:19) - they are a form of prophetic intercession, declaration and action - we are binding and loosing what has already been bound and loosed in heaven - everytime Sandy Millar, the Vicar of Holy Trinity Brompton (the Founding Church of the Alpha Course) told John Wimber he had planted a new Church - John Wimber cried right there and then - can you imagine that - he just cried - it was the most beautiful anointing and blessing a man can give to an act of birthing - Jeremiah was the weeping prophet but everytime he cried, God caught his tears (Psalm 56:8) - they were so precious - every tear a prayer capable of transforming and healing some part of the world - Jesus was incarnated through our tears - do you know !

that - they overcame the devil by the word of their testimony (tears) and the blood of the Lamb- all revivals, including the Welsh Revival are birthed through weeping - prayer as weeping - tears are a river of life.

'Jesus wept' (John 11:35, 38 - 44).

Isaac the Syrian -"Tears are to the mind the border, as it were, between the bodily and the spiritual state, between the state of being subject to passions and that of purity'.

We use Heart Prayers in our spiritual discipline - they can be prayed as a whole, in sentences or in two or three word clusters - as Lou Reed observed, people often hear the lyrics and improve them - so if they are of use, please alter them as you choose - they are at the heart of our approach to the christian discipline of spiritual formation through Purgation (Catharsis) (Malachi 3:3, 1 John 1:9), Illumination (Photosis) (Luke 24:45, Romans 12:1,2, 1 Corinthians 2: 6 -12 ) and Unification (Theosis) (John 17, Ephesians 2:6, Philippians 3:8 -14, Colossians 2:12).

David Holdaway - "Whatever captures your heart will control your life and determine your destiny".

Heart Prayer 1 (Based on Ephesians 1: 17 -19):

Father, my all consuming passion, my burning desire is that I receive more of the fullness and release of the Holy Spirit in my life, the Spirit of wisdom, insight, knowledge (yarda), understanding and discernment and that you draw me further in and further up, from shadow to substance, that you draw me deeper into our love relationship, which is your opening of your self to me and my submission to you.

Lord Jesus Christ, less of me and more of you, cover me with your grace, rock of ages cleft for me, let me hide myself in you and experience you manifesting more of yourself in me. Please draw me further and deeper into the reality of your presence and into the transformation of your likeness so that my love may be complete! Through your presence Holy Spirit in my spirit, I commit myself to be governed, taught and led by You as You are the Spirit of increasing and unfolding Revelation, who is at work in my life, changing me from glory to glory.

Holy Spirit, I welcome you, I call to you, I am reaching out for you, I am on fire for your fullness and release in my life, sweep through me Breath of God like a mighty rushing wind, I want to be caught up in your slipstream - please remove any influences, obstacles, hindrances, strongholds, barricades, barriers, thoughts, mindsets, worldviews, beliefs, attitudes, intentions, motivations, behaviours that may resist you Holy Spirit from consuming everything, filling me totally and dwelling in me, from flowing in, through, around, over, under and out through my life - let your fire fall right now and purify me, sanctify me.

Please grant this to me by your shed blood Lord Jesus that I may be supernaturally equipped, enabled and released to know you beyond mere rational abstract informational knowledge - open my heart, your word is truth, pour your self into me and enter in as I enter in to you, as I am with you and in you in the Jordan in the presence of the Trinity. I want you to grab hold of me Lord Jesus Christ and pull, so that I may know you in an ever deeper relational way as my closest friend, just as I am known by you and deeply loved by you. Holy Spirit be my counsellor, be my comforter, be my paraclete - throw your mantle of fire around my shoulders, this eternal weight of glory, let it be all consuming, but not consumed - do not let it fall to the ground.

Now I ask Father that in your loving tenderness, you open the lens of my heart and through the Lord Jesus say let there be light as the Holy Spirit fills my "inner man", my inner being, my spirit with your love, your word, your presence and your increasing revelation as I draw closer and closer to you. quicken your word in me, Lord Jesus, you are the word become flesh at work in me, help me to grow more like you.

Fill my heart with your loving kindness, your glorious presence, Lord Jesus, let your glory pass by through me, so that I can know the hope, the testimony, the witness and promise of your goodness, power, humility and strength - your calling, purpose and destiny in my life. Thank you for the increasing joy of your presence as you sing and call to us - grace me now, as I shout back grace, grace to you the cornerstone - I want to be plunged into your mighty river flowing through me.

I declare that I will have an ever deepening relationship and receive the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in your face as I see you face to face - Lord, I am the jar of clay in your hands, the treasure is within - this wellspring, this fount of wisdom, insight, understanding and discernment - well up, fill me and overflow - pour your self through me, Holy Spirit and pour me out in your service, make me a living well of revival.

I also pray that the light of your word, Lord Jesus will flood my whole being - my "inner man" and my "outer man" - so that I may know and experience the surpassing greatness of your power towards me. Lord give me a powerful inner life and make me a believing believer. I call this forth in my life, as your servant and witness and I declare I will follow the Lamb all the days of my life and win for the Lamb the rewards of his suffering, for the honour, glory and greatness of your name, in the earthly and heavenly places, as it is all being summed up in you Lord Jesus Christ and you will fill everything."

Amen.

Heart Prayer 2 (Based on Ephesians 3: 16, 17):

'My dear Father, my dear Heart, my dearest loving Dad, out of the depths of your loving embrace, your centre, your substance, your abundance, the very life of your glory, your very self, please hug your life into me, please breathe your life into me, please pour your life into me, please give me your fathers blessing, I need more of you, please give me your heart. My ever loving Dad, please grant me your inward strength, your inward passion, your inward wisdom, your inward vision, your inward righteousness, your inward holiness, your inward purity, your powerful inner life (of the Trinity in me and me in you), your infectious and explosive laughing leaping joy, your ever present presence.

Through your abiding presence Holy Spirit in me, through the faith I have expressed, through the grace and mercy I have received, through the unquenchable yearning for the desire of nations, through the calling on my life, through the words spoken over me, I am grabbing hold of you, I am holding on to you, I am clinging on to you, I am being made just like you, I am becoming just like you - be the eternal flame of love in me, be the sacrificial aroma of love in me, be the paracletal burning heart of love in me, be all things summed up in love in me.

Lord Jesus Christ, dwell in my heart in ever increasing and unfolding love, in your incarnational presence love, in everything love, in every way love, in every blessing love, in every answered prayer love, in every judgement love, in every act of justice love, in every cleft opened for me love, in your ever abundant provision love, in my total and absolute dependence love, in my hiddenness love, in manifestation love, in the silent praise of reversed thunder love (footnote 3) , in the shadow of the cross love, in every life laid down love, in every fiery trial love, in every temptation overcome love, in every intention love, in every thought love, in every purpose love, in every inward conviction love, in every burst of insight and discernment love, in every ray of light love, in every impartation love, in every quickening love, in every breaking and yielding love, in humility of spirit love, in every stronghold demolished love, in every chain broken love, in every word spo!

ken love, in every heart healed love, in me in you and in you in me love, in us in each other love, in unconditional love be love in and through me.'

Amen

1 Corinthians 13: "1If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing. 4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 8Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. 11!

When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 12Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. 13And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love."

Saint Simeon the New Theologian - ' 0 Holy Love, - i.e., the Holy Spirit of God - he who knows you not has never tasted the sweetness of your mercies which only living experience can give us. But he who has known you, or who has been known by you, can never have even the smallest doubt. For you are the fulfillment of the law, you who fills, burns, inflames, embraces my heart with a measureless love. You are the teacher of the prophets, the offspring of the apostles, the strength of the martyrs, the inspiration of the fathers and masters, the perfecting of all the saints. Only you, 0 Love, prepare even me for the true service of God'.

Fr. Thomas Hopko - 'God who is Love enters into union with man through the Son of His love by the Spirit of love. To live in this divine love is the spiritual life'.

There are Angels on the earth (Genesis 32:1, Matthew 4:11, Mark 1:13, Hebrews 1:14) - Jacob had "a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on the earth, with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending (first) and descending (second) on it" - Genesis 28:12 - and when Jesus said "I tell you the truth, you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man." (John 1:51) - he in that moment expressed himself as the "Ladder of Divine Ascent" - it is all through Jesus - John Climacos who wrote the 'Ladder of Divine Ascent ' in the 7th Century was ascending the Ladder of Divine Ascent - the Lord Jesus Christ - you ascend the Ladder through the work of the Cross and the highest rung of the Ladder is Love.

May you always be used to close the mouths of lions, subdue kingdoms, reduce strongholds to rubble, work righteousness, offer mercy, receive the promises and release the captives - all Christians are lights in the Kingdom (Philippians 2:15 - this is what it is to be filled with the Holy Spirit, to be a living Temple of the Lord, to have the Lamp of the Lord burning brightly in the sanctuary) and the saints who died can see it (that great cloud of Witnesses in Hebrews 12, the Church in Heaven), the angels can see it and the demons can see it - you are very dangerous to the satanic and demonic realms because the Lord is using you to destroy the works of the devil - this is engaged progressive serenification (becoming like Jesus in our faces, the Morning Star, the Shining One, the Light of the world - "the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ" - 2 Corinthians 4:6, Revelation 2:28), substantiation (becoming increasingly substantial as God Bearers, Lif!

e Bearers and Light Bearers in our bodies - the Levites bore the Ark of the Covenant which symbolised and embodied the presence of God and through the Holy Spirit in us we bear and embody his presence - we wear mantles of fire - which like the burning bush are not consumed but all consuming) and sanctification (becoming more christlike in our hearts and the overflow of our hearts).

St Seraphim of Sarov - 'In spite of our sinfulness, in spite of the darkness surrounding our souls, the Grace of the Holy Spirit, conferred by baptism in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, still shines in our hearts with the inextinguishable light of Christ (Revelation 2:1) ... and when the sinner turns to the way of repentance the light smooths away every trace of the sins committed, clothing the former sinner in the garments of incorruption (mantles of fire), spun of the Grace of the Holy Spirit. It is this acquisition of the Holy Spirit about which I have been speaking'.

Be like Paul in Philippians 3:12, who summed up his entire ministry in three words: "Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me." The Church is a great light in Postmodern Culture, whom the Lord is reviving and raising up again to lift up his banner over and for the healing of the tribes, nations and racial groups - we are all one in Jesus - the ministry of the Church is to exhort, encourage and stir us up to live out the call to live the wholly consecrated live, the completely surrendered and yielded life, the fully laid down life to and for the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ - the Holy Spirit is hovering over us, moving among us, and filling us for this purpose - we are the visionaries, the dreamers of dreams (Joel 2:28-32, Acts 2:17-21), the body and where the body is the Eagle of the Lord is hovering. What younger men and women are looking to and for in those w!

ho are saying imitate me as I imitate Christ are those exact qualities - men and women who have heard Jesus say "I am the resurrection and the life" (John 11:25) - men and women who like Paul (Philippians 3:12) are standing up and saying "I press on" and have let go of everything that hinders to follow the Lamb - "to win for the Lamb the rewards of his sufferings" - we have to keep pressing on and building the Church (Matthew 16:18) , we all have a glorious ministries in the Church and it is literally moving mountains. Through this 'wholehearted' approach, the ministry of the Church to the nations (Numbers 14:24, Romans 12: 5) is being transformed and the world is being healed.

May our gracious Lord and loving heavenly Father deepen the channels of your heart and enlarge the borders of your spirit that you may be filled with all the fullness of Him who fills all things in everything. May you, by faith, touch the edges of His glory and skirt the crest of His infinitude, and quietly sink, melt, and disappear into the wonder of the glory of the love of His limitless heart. May His grace and peace softly consume you, enfold you, and infuse you; and may you come to the eternal rest of Jesus Christ, assuredly knowing the sweet silence of His still and calm presence, which is His eternal light, and our everlasting joy.

Our ministries in the Church are the leaves of the Tree of Life for the healing of the nations (Revelation 22:2). The Tree of Life is the work of the Cross (Acts 5:30, 1 Peter 1:20, 1 Peter 2:24, Revelation 13:8) and we are his faithful servants and witnesses (Proverbs 11:30, John 15:5, Galatians 5:22,23 and Revelation 2:7).

The Johnny Cash song 'Redemption' pulls it all together:

'Redemption' - Johnny Cash

From the hands it came down

From the side it came down

From the feet it came down

And ran to the ground

Between heaven and hell

A teardrop fell In the deep crimson dew

The tree of life grew

And the blood gave life

To the branches of the tree

And the blood was the price

That set the captives free

And the numbers that came

Through the fire and the flood Clung to the tree

And were redeemed by the blood

From the tree streamed a light

That started the fight 'Round the tree grew a vine

On whose fruit I could dine

My old friend Lucifer came

Fought to keep me in chains

But I saw through the tricks

Of six-sixty-six

And the blood gave life

To the branches of the tree

And the blood was the price

That set the captives free

And the numbers that came

Through the fire and the flood Clung to the tree

And were redeemed by the blood

From his hands it came down

From his side it came down

From his feet it came down

And ran to the ground

And a small inner voice Said "You do have a choice."

The vine engrafted me

And I clung to the tree

Go to the following weblink - <http://www.exploringthevision.org/> - click on writings and scroll down to "Transitions and Personal Growth" - click on "Deserts, Caves & Purposes" ( or go to Google - type Fizer Deserts Caves Purposes and the stuff will register) - read it through - this is for your ministry in the Academy - may you and each of your colleagues simultaneously receive the mantle (2 Kings 2:13) and may the Spirit direct to whom your mantle will pass.

In the love of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Mark Downham

Footnote 1:

Fathers/Mothers are kenotic, sons/daughters are submissive - this is a prophetic expression of the "hypostatic union" of the Divine and Human natures in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Divine is Kenotic (Philippians 2:5 -11) and the Human is submissive (Luke 22:42).

'Hypostatic Union':

The union of Christ's divine and human natures in one divine person.

Christ, the divine Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, includes in Himself a human nature.

Christ's divine will (kenotic) is separate from His human will (submissive). Luke 22:42 "Father, if thou art willing, remove this cup from me; nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done. However, both wills are always in perfect harmony because His human will always aligns itself with His divine will.

At the Council of Chalcedon, 451 AD, the Church declared that Christ's two natures are joined "in one person and one hypostasis."

Hypostasis means an individual, complete substance existing entirely in itself. A human person is a hypostasis endowed with spirit and soul - a LIVING soul (Hebrew - 'Nepesh' - God breathed on Adam and he became a LIVING soul.

The phrase "hypostatic union" was adopted by the fifth general council at Constantinople, 533 AD. That council declared that the union of two natures is real (against Arius), not a mere indwelling of God in a man (against Nestorius), with a rational soul (against Apollinaris), and that in Christ's divine nature remains unchanged (against Eutyches).

Now put the hypostatic union of Jesus in the perichoretic community (Greek: Koinonia) of the Trinity and engage what it means to have our humanness in a "hypostatic union" with the perichoretic community of the Trinity - we have the Holy Spirit in us - so we have the son and the father in us and we are in the Father and the Son and the Spirit - and you have the beginning of Cognitive Pneumatology - Jesus who was filled with the Holy Spirit said in John 14:11 - "the Father is in me and I am in the Father".

All father/mother - son/daughter relationships involve kenosis and submission. they are a prophetic expression of the interfused act of kenosis (Divine Nature)and submission (Human Nature) with reference to the purpose and act of "sonship" within the perichoretic koinonia of the Trinity which acts as a call to us to come further in and further up - there is something in the quality of us "being in one another" which we need to bring to the Chalcedon formula and ask so...

Footenote 2:

'Perichoresis':

The Trinity have a state of "perichoresis" - we are in this through John 17.

"A complete mutual interpenetration of two substances that preserves the identity and properties of each intact."

"In an attempt to describe the relational structure and unity of the Trinity, John Damascene and other church fathers employed the concept of perichoresis to signify the mutual interanimation and dynamic reciprocity of the divine persons. This relationship can only be understood as an irreducible relational dynamic that simultaneously affirms both individuality and mutuality."

"Perichoresis expresses the idea that the three persons mutually inhere in one another, draw life from one another, "are" what they are by relation to one another. Perichoresis means being-in-one-another, permeation without confusion."

"Perichoresis contains the image of intimacy and of pure reciprocity that does not result in confusion or loss of identity."

"The whole dance, or drama, or pattern of this three-Personal life is to be played out in each one of us."

"God is not some faceless, all-powerful abstraction. God is Father, Son and Spirit, existing in a passionate and joyous fellowship. The Trinity is not three highly committed religious types sitting around some room in heaven. The Trinity is a circle of shared life, and the life shared is full, not empty, abounding and rich and beautiful, not lonely and sad and boring."

Footenote 3:

Eugene Peterson in his 'The Message' translation of the bible translates Psalm 65:1 as "...silence is praise to you...". He also has a commentary on the book of Revelation called "Reversed Thunder" based on a poem by George Herbert - a contemporary of John Donne - both in the literary category of "The Romantic Poets".

Prayer

Prayer, the Church's banquet, Angels' age,

God's breath in man returning to his birth,

The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,

The Christian plummet sounding heav'n and earth;

Engine against th' Almighty, sinner's tower,

Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,

The six-days'-world transposing in an hour,

A kind of tune, which all things hear and fear;

Softness, and peace, and joy, and love, and bliss,

Exalted manna, gladness of the best,

Heaven in ordinary, man well dressed,

The milky way, the bird of Paradise,

Church bells beyond the stars heard, the soul's blood,

The land of spices, something understood.

I meditated on the relationship between silent praise and reversed thunder in the context of the silence in Heaven for ½ hour when the 7th Seal is opened (in Hebrew, Seven is the number symbolising completion, perfection, unity), which deals with the work of the Cross (John 19:30), in the Book of Revelation and I had an epiphany.

Mark Downham BA(Hons) MPhil MRICS, Banking and Corporate Consultancy, GVA Grimley

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