Hi everyone,

Today I received a comment and question from a minister named Andrew Strom, who many of you probably know of. His comment was posted on my article about Todd Bentley and Guided Visualization:

Brother - it is Andrew Strom here. I certainly appreciate your warnings on the Guided Visualization of Todd Bentley.

However, I am concerned that you seem to support a kind of "self-guided" visualization to enter heaven. This seems utterly unscriptural to me. Can you please tell me the difference from Astral Travel or other New Age techniques?

God bless you,
Andrew Strom.

I thought it would be good to move this into the main blog because I feel it is a very important issue for us to dig into. Here's my reply:

Hi Andrew,

I really appreciate you giving me the opportunity to explain my position on heavenly encounters. I really aim for nothing more than what is clearly revealed in the Bible, and I welcome scrutiny because it helps keep me in check.

First of all, I'd like to point out something I said in the article in question: "Guided visualization is when a human being or an evil spirit tries to induce an experience that God is not authorizing." This includes trying to induce the experience yourself (as I mentioned in the last paragraph).

I DEFINITELY do not condone self-guided visualization, so I'm glad you pointed out that I was coming across that way. It wasn't my intention.

But I should also say this: just because guided visualization and self-guided visualization are wrong does not discredit the reality of Godly visions, dreams, and other such experiences. (I know you're more than aware of this--I only say it for the sake of others reading this reply.) In a truly pure encounter of this nature, it is initiated by God alone. We can make ourselves available to God by spending time in His presence; but we should not try to conjure up an experience or try to help it along with our imagination.

Quick teaching here for those who may not realize this: Your visual imagination does have a spiritual purpose. This is the part of you that God designed to operate in pictures. And He has the capacity to speak to us with pictures in this part of our mind. So if you're praying for someone, sometimes a picture will pop into your mind--it might be from God, so ask Him if He's communicating with you and what you should do with the picture going through your mind. These mental pictures are what many people call "visions."

For some reason, the Lord has been gracious enough to let me have visions of heaven (always with a clear purpose). In most cases, it has been simply a vision of the mind during a time of prayer--seeing a mental picture of something in heaven while here on earth (like I just described). No "astral-projection" there or anything like that...and I wasn't seeking an experience; I was simply seeking God.

But there were also two occasions where I felt like what was described by the apostle Paul:

2 Corinthians 12:2-4--I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know—God knows. And I know that this man--whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows--was caught up to paradise. He heard inexpressible things, things that man is not permitted to tell. (NIV)

The two encounters I had were much like this--more real than dreams, and full of many things that I'm not permitted to tell. It was as though I was actually there even though there were other people in the room who saw me still laying on the floor as it was happening.

To be honest, I really don't care whether I was "in the body or out of the body" (to use Paul's words). Most importantly to me was that these two encounters resulted in enhanced ministry regarding the salvation of souls. In one case, twenty people came to Christ within the week (not because I told them about the vision, but because I acted on what the Lord revealed and preached a clear message of repentance). In the other case, I had two divine appointments in a Denny's restaurant within two hours of the experience, and later was used by God to raise two cats from the dead (directly related to what happened in the heavenly encounter). That's how I know they were real, genuine, God-ordained experiences--there was genuine spiritual fruit by which God confirmed His hand in what I saw.

I should also point out that I've only ever been allowed by the Lord to share parts of one of these experiences and also two of the visions I've had--the rest have been holy experiences that I feel to share would be to cheapen them and be a poor steward of intimacy with my Father.

I try to avoid boasting in visions because I believe they do not define me, and I don't want to gather a following of people based on something like that.

Unlike Todd Bentley, I do not say that "everyone has a right to these things and you're missing out if you're not seeing heaven." Rather, I feel the Lord gives me visions like these because He knows my faith is often limited by what I can see. Maybe this is a misapplication of Scripture, but I'm reminded of Jesus' words to Thomas: "Blessed are those who have NOT seen, and yet they believe." I counsel people that they do not have to see visions in order to be a strong Christian. On the contrary, a lack of such visual experiences may just be an indication that God sees you have a faith that doesn't need such things! I could be wrong on that stance, but I hold onto it becuase it sincerely keeps me humble among my brothers and sisters.

Moving right along, I'm not a student of the New Age, but I have read in the past about astral travel and things like that. With astral travel, a person is trying to separate spirit from body, which I've seen to be a form of "sinning against yourself." It leaves a person spiritually vulnerable and open to intense deception. It also is typically done for the sake of personal gain or access to restricted information. This is wrong and demonstrates an intense spiritual pride.

However, the Bible is full of God-induced experiences, like when John said, "On the Lord's Day I was in the Spirit, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet..." What followed was a rather intense vision in which Jesus spoke clear messages, and then a door was opened in the heavens and a voice said, "Come up here!"

Was John physically in heaven as he saw the things going on there? Was he experiencing some sort of God-ordained "astral travel" (for lack of a better term)? Was he just seeing things in visions of the mind? Frankly, I don't worry about it--all I know is that he saw the throneroom of God just like Isaiah and many other prophets (even ones who didn't write books of the Bible, like Micaiah in 1 Kings 22). And I know this is a clear indication that such a thing has Biblical precedence.

I don't believe John was sitting on the Isle of Patmos thinking, "Hmm...my time is short--maybe I should work myself into a trance and pursue a vision about the end of time." The very fact that John heard the trumpet-like voice behind him implies to me that he wasn't pointing himself in some spiritual direction or trying to "astral travel" towards heaven. Rather, God saw a dearly-loved child of His upon whom He saw fit to bestow these revelations. It was a God-induced encounter, and such things are clearly supported by Scripture.

I've probably raised more questions than answers with my readers by posting this reply, but I believe it does us good to discuss the things of God and separate the true from the false with clarity. I welcome those questions and will be posting this correspondence in my main blog so the conversation can be kept more on-task.

Thanks, brother Andrew, for your comments and questions that granted me the opportunity to clarify my stance. If you or anyone else can show me where I've not been faithful to God's Word in this reply, please do so because I'll gladly repent. Otherwise, I hope this answers your question.

God bless!
--Art--

Guided Visualization

Several years ago, before many people knew who Todd Bentley was, I ordered his teaching set "Open Heavens" (this was so long ago, it was a set of cassette tapes!). I listened to these teachings intently. I actually remember having an awkward feeling in my gut as I began to listen, but I ignored it because I was so hungry for what Todd had to say. To be honest, much of what he said was perfectly accurate to the Word of God. And I will also say that the possibility of entering into Heaven is certainly real, biblically supported, and able to happen today. In fact, it was because of the truth in these teachings that I was able to understand the visions the Lord was giving me and why He was giving them.

Then some music started on the tape. I began to feel as though the Lord was raising me up, and in my spirit I could see all sorts of brilliant, bright light. But suddenly, Todd Bentley chimed in and tried to verbally guide the experience. I felt like I had dropped out of bed and landed harshly on the floor. Nevertheless, in trust I kept listening, believing that Todd was a man of God and wouldn't lead me astray. I began to feel a darkness coming over me, and I knew this was an evil spirit, but I wrote it off as if it was the devil trying to distract me from what God was doing. Little did I know at the time that God was not in it at all!

The year that followed was one of the darkest times for me emotionally. I constantly felt distant from the Lord. I suffered from depression. I would weep at the slightest onset of emotional discomfort. I had no self-control. This condition didn't go away until finally my girlfriend, Robin (young though she was), discerned that I had an evil spirit and cast it out of me in the name of Jesus. I've actually come across several testimonies online of people who had encounters almost identical to mine, and they also suffered from spiritual defilement after engaging in Todd's guided visualization.

Guided visualization is when a human being or an evil spirit tries to induce an experience that God is not authorizing. Satan tried things like this with Jesus. As our Lord fasted and prayed in the wilderness for 40 days, the devil approached Him three times. Each time, the devil used scripture to entice Jesus into performing a miracle, gaining authority, or having a spiritual experience with angels that Father God had not authorized. Jesus didn't resist the devil in those matters because the Scriptures being quoted weren't true--He resisted the devil because He only wanted to do what He saw His Father in Heaven doing; and He only wanted to do it according to His Father's plan.

By practicing guided visualization in his conferences, seminars, teachings, and ministry, Todd Bentley has been usurping God's sovereignty. Many of the people involved are actually having encounters in heaven, but many others are being deceived by lying spirits!

A few months ago, I was invited out to a prayer meeting in Grand Rapids, Michigan, by a man who knows Todd Bentley. This man taught for an hour on Heavenly encounters, and I really didn't have much of a check in my spirit as he did so. Then he said, "Who wants to go?" He invited me up to play piano while he went to each of the seventy people in the room and "guided them" into a vision. He would take them by the hand and start sharing things that he was seeing, and then they would take over.

At the end, he asked, "How many of you saw something?" Most of the room raised their hands. "Okay," he continued, "that's a little hard to count. How many of you would be willing to say that all you saw was the back of your eyelids?" About five of the seventy people raised their hands. Then he began to ask people what they saw. Many of them shared visions of things that resonated with me in my spirit--in fact, some of them had visions of places in heaven that I had personally encountered in previous years. Like I said, this sort of thing is real! But there were also those who were making things up, and there were also those who were being outright deceived by demons.

In my heart, though, I struggled to rejoice about even the true experiences people had as I drove 3 hours back to my house. Actually, I felt a little grieved. It took me a while to figure out why, but it finally occured to me that these were not all authorized experiences. God did not initiate them. He allowed them, yes; but He did not approve. Rather than God getting all the glory for the encounter, people raved about how this man had led them into it. This is one of the pitfalls of guided visualization.

Feel free to seek the Lord and allow Him to carry you into visions, dreams, and trances. Allow Him to give you genuine encounters in the spiritual realm! But don't try to induce it yourself, and don't rely on someone else to guide you there. Let's be like Christ and ONLY do what our Father is doing. If He initiates the encounter, you can be certain that you are in the right place at the right time! If not, you are opening yourself up to demons and spiritual defilement.

Be discerning, friends!
--Art--