Trance State Consciousness in the Bible and Today


Part Two: Welcoming Expanded Consciousness/Spirit Into Into Your Life

The New Testament describes two of the first followers of Jesus entering expanded spirit-consciousness as "falling into a trance," an awakened subtle state of spirit/consciousness. 

In a trance state, Peter heard a message that was to radically shape the emergence of early Christianity from Judaism. Paul received a message concerning his personal safety from harm by those who were persecuting him. We can learn from both these experiences of expanded awareness.

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Welcoming Expanded Consciousness/Spirit Into Your Life

Part One: States of Consciousness in Integral Christianity

What do you think of when you read and hear the term " Spirit"? (Traditionally written with an upper case "S" to make sure (wrongly, in my opinion) that we are thinking about God's spirit and not the human spirit.) 

What do you think of when you read or hear the term "consciousness?" Consciousness is what allows you to be aware of reading this sentence. It has been defined as a complex and multifaceted concept that refers to our subjective awareness and experience of the world and ourselves. This dimension of being human is crucially important because it encompasses our ability to perceive, think, reason, have self-awareness, and connect with spiritual realities. 

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Everyday Consciousness Beyond the Ordinary

Part Three: Whole-Body Mystical Presencing

We have our everyday “ordinary” consciousness, and then we have times when we move into other states of elevated or “more spiritual” consciousness.

Whole-Body Mystical Presencing is a practice to help us to shift from having these peak/peek experiences of mystical awareness we remember or look forward to, and create a new everyday/every moment experience of enlivened consciousness. This “continuously renewed immediacy” is a regular attunement that begins to move our everyday consciousness, our “default” state of being, into a new reality. Into a new way of being.

But it doesn’t happen just by realizing this or learning this concept. We have to re-train and re-pattern our “ordinary” consciousness.

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Is It Possible to Pray Continuously?

Part Two: Whole-Body Mystical Presencing

Whole-Body Mystical Presencing is a practice to enter into the everyday, every moment reality of Christ consciousness. It is a way to welcome and invoke holistic presence at all times, not just in “spiritual” settings or “sacred” places and times. All of life and every moment is sacred. We can presence into this way of being at any time.

Before we get into the specifics of this practice, I want to draw upon some of the Christian heritage for this way of being, along with sharing some of my own story coming to this practice.

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Can I Get (More Than) a Witness?

Part One: Whole-Body Mystical Presencing

You are not a spectator.

One of the great spiritual evolutions today is the rise of the mystic. And by that I don’t mean an increasing number of spiritual superheroes. The mystic is rising in us all. It is the longing for more than we have been given, and coming to embrace the spiritual power that is naturally within us. It is moving from the spiritual sidelines and into the joy of the action.

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God as Energy & Light

New Images of Jesus and God – Part Three

I went to visit my niece, Meredith, in Lawrence, Kansas, when she was a student at Kansas University. Since we both were following a spiritual path, the topic of conversation quickly dove into the depths of spiritual understanding. Thinking of the subject of what God looks like to different people, I asked her, “What does God look like to you?” Without hesitation she waved her hand in the air in an undulating motion making energy waves.

“You think God is like energy waves?” I asked, just to clarify what she was saying. “Yes!” came the immediate, emphatic reply.

I began contemplating this image of God and found it to be extremely helpful in understanding the essence of God and how God works.

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Jesus the Energy Healer

New Images of Jesus and God – Part Two

To focus on Jesus as an energy healer is to assert that he is not just using his own energy but is so connected to God, that it is God’s energy within him, flowing out of him, that heals people. It is his expanded consciousness, that we refer to as being filled with the Holy Spirit. The term” Spirit-filled” expounds on the experience of a person being connected to and empowered by the energy of God. 

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New Images of Jesus and God

Part One: Who Was Jesus?

God has been seen interacting with humans in human form. It is difficult to get away from personifying God, seeing God as human form. As we explore some images of God and Jesus, I invite you to ask: How do we see God this way? How would we interact with God this way?

Open your mind and heart to some new ideas, new thoughts, new images of God. See how we can understand God in new ways and, therefore, interact with God differently. Perhaps we can experience God in new ways since God is not limited by body, by time, by space. Consider these different images.

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Transmitting Awakened Spirit Consciousness

What, in the World, is Holy Spirit?
Part Four

When we define spirit as awakened consciousness, we can then see there are many avenues to it. A sudden transforming experience, as we see in Acts. We see the slow work of contemplative prayer in mystics down through the ages. The Enlightenment found in Eastern traditions. Some Eastern traditions transmit spirit-awakening in a way similar to what Jesus, Paul, and Peter did.

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