Local Health Institute Goes New Age.

There is a local health  institute that has done excellent work for the community here in the state of Washington. For that I commend them.

This is from from an article dated  August 20, 2009.

http://www.pnwlocalnews.com/kitsap/pat/news/53850762.html

CAPRI’s 12-week cardiac rehabilitation program helps people recover from heart attacks, angina, heart surgery including bypasses and valves, angioplasty and stent insertions, and heart/lung transplants. CAPRI also offers an eight- to 10-week pulmonary rehabilitation program that helps people manage pulmonary conditions such as COPD, emphysema, asthma and pulmonary fibrosis.

Once rehabilitation is done, many clients move on to the cardiac and pulmonary maintenance program to continue improving their health.

Their website says that this is their mission or vision.

CAPRI’s Pulmonary Programs

But it seems that some serious issues have arisen.

The director has taken it upon himself to further enlighten the participants of this program. I was given one of the handouts circulated at a June 23, 2011 meeting. It is titled, “Healthy Thinking & Positive Self-Talk.”

There are many great suggestions on the front and back of page one regarding healthy thinking in relation to stress, healthy diet, exercise, etc. The areas I disagree with here are the recommendations of meditation 15 minutes a day and hypnosis to “reprogram your attitudes, beliefs and thoughts”, as “methods of reprogramming the subconscious.”

Page two further develops how such things may be accomplished. It is titled “Notes on Thoughts, Belief and Destiny.”  My first reaction was to ask, ” Why is an exercise program delving  into spiritual issues? As a Christian I can tell you that my discernment alarms clanged loudly  at the following list of quotes.

“There is one secret, and that is the power we have in forming our own destinies.” Dolley Madison 1833

This goes against biblical thinking. There is no secret. God’s plan is laid out openly in the Holy Bible. Consider these verses in Isaiah 45:19, “I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth…I, the Lord speak righteousness, I declare things that are right”, and 48:16. “Come near to me, hear this: I have not spoken in secret from the beginning.” In Luke 8:17  we read, “For nothing is hidden that shall not become evident, nor anything secret that shall not be known and come to light.”

The buzz from the book The Secret teaches otherwise. In his review of  The Secret, Donald Whitney says, “It is not exaggeration to say that this book implicitly ( and sometimes explicitly) denies virtually every major doctrine in the Bible.” [1]

“Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.” Napoleon Hill, 1937, Think and Grow Rich

Here again we have positive thinking on steroids. False teacher Robert Schuller based  his ministry on these concepts and now faces bankruptcy for his ice palace of a church. All the visualizations of money rolling in from the visualized fat wallets of the congregation seems to have fizzled out.  

What is behind the man, Napoleon Hill and how was his philosophy created. The answer may surprise you. This is from Mike Oppenheimer of  Let us Reason Ministries.

Napoleon Hill wrote about imagery and visualization in his book, Think and Grow Rich. He writes, “The THIRTEENTH principle is known as the sixth sense, through which Infinite Intelligence may and will communicate voluntarily, without any effort from, or demands by, the individual…. Step by step, through the preceding chapters, you have been led to this, the last principle. If you have mastered each of the preceding principles, you are now prepared to accept, without being skeptical, the stupendous claims made here….”Just before going to sleep at night. I would shut my eyes, and see, in my imagination, this group of men seated with me around my council table…. After some months of this nightly procedure, I was astounded by the discovery that these imaginary figures became apparently real.” “Each of these nine men developed individual characteristics, which surprised me…. “These meetings became so realistic that I became fearful of their consequences, and discontinued them for several months. The experiences were so uncanny, I was afraid if I continued them I would lose sight of the fact that the meetings were purely experiences ofmy imagination. …. Whatever you believe that the adviser is a spirit, a guardian angel, a messenger from God, a hallucination, a communication from your right brain to your left, or a symbolic representation of inner wisdom is all right. The fact is, no one knows what it is with any certainty. We can each decide for ourselves….

Sometimes people will encounter religious figures like Jesus, Moses, or Buddha, while others will find an angel, fairy, or leprechaun. People sometimes encounter the adviser as a light or a translucent spirit…. The best way to work with this and any other imagery experience is just to let the figures be whatever they are. Welcome the adviser that comes and get to know it as it is.

Source

Also from Dave Hunt

Though he clung to the idea that it was all imagination, from what Hill wrote it is clear that visualization had opened the door to the world of the occult:

Source

Ah…so Napoleon Hill had spirit guides. The bible is clear on divination, we are not to contact spirits from the other side, because we will indeed be deceived by them.

There are  other quotes from James Allen, As A Man Thinketh, and Florence Scovel Shinn. Mixed in we have some scripture about prayer. The Bible verses just don’t fit in the New Age mix, and of course this is intentional for the new thinking involves finding your own truth. The thinking is that you can pick and choose whatever you happen to like at the moment and create your own religion and your very own God..which of course is…youself, because some entity has made you feel divine.

New Age ideas and thought do not mix with Bible teachings because they are completely opposed to each other.

In the new age, truth is found within, but the Bible teaches that we are not to trust our hearts. Jeremiah 17:9 says that “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it.” Yet James Allen tells us to seek Ancient Wisdom and that the master is the inner voice which is self. Shinn instructs that the Bible is “a book dealing with science of the mind…telling man how to release his soul from bondage.”  This person could not be more wrong about the Bible.

Jesus Christ came to release o free  us from our SIN. This is bondage we face daily. The way to everlasting life is to put your faith in Jesus as Savior, who died on the cross, taking our sin upon His sinless self.  He rose again from the dead, showing us His power and glory, as the Son of the true and living God.

John Ankerberg wrote this in his book, Encyclopedia of New Age Beliefs. It was difficult to find a summary passage in this large book. This section tells how children are being indoctrinated at an early age into hypnosis, guided imagery, visualization, and meditation.

In November of 1988 we received a letter from a couple involved in researching a program used in elementary schools in Florida and other states. This program used tapes called “Quieting Reflex and Success Imagery.” A mother had told this couple that her little girl had contacted an inner guide through the hypnotic techniques used in this program. The daughter, commented, “My wise person told me not to pray in the name of Jesus anymore.”  Furthermore this wise person was not the guide that the little girl has chosen for herself but rather someone that had appeared unexpectedly and spontaneously in her consciousness. It claimed that it resided in the corner of  a “safe place” in her mind. But it proceeded to command her to do mean and nasty things. The mother was distraught and had no idea what to do. [2]

The guidance counselor comes into the second grade class and the regular teacher leaves….The counselor turns off the lights and begins to play the audio tape. The counselor is there to enhance the children’s self-esteem…after the meditation and relaxation exercises they are instructed to picture a rabbit as a friend in the secret place.  And they are told that there is a secret and that it is believing in yourself and your self-power. With it you can do anything like magic. Answers to many things come up from a bubbling spring after watching for a white light. The answers come from the deep springs. Sometimes you will hear the words in answer to your question and sometimes you will feel it.

What you have read above is a brief induction method  for meditation and hypnosis. In fact, meditation, hypnosis, progressive relaxation and guided imagery or visualization have more commonalities than many people realize.

However these techniques are also taught by the spirit world as a means to become channelers, i.e., one who is possessed by spirits in order to allow the spirits to channel information out of them…..What these spirits encourage is no different than what New Age educators are now teaching children. [2]

Apparently these techniques and beliefs are also being taught in pulmonary programs.  I was told by the director at Capri:

 Our educational session on healthy thinking and positive self-talk draws upon the teachings contained in several highly-respected books including the Bible. Some of the material is science-based, some of it is belief-based from a variety of beliefs, and some of it is opinion. CAPRI does not subscribe to a particular religious belief, nor do we promote any particular religious beliefs. We provide material from a wide variety of sources because people approach these matters from a wide variety of beliefs and perspectives.   As part of our cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation programs, we encourage people to adopt a positive mental attitude. We trust that they will do that in a manner that is consistent with their core values and religious beliefs. We are not trying to change anyone’s religious beliefs, nor are we trying to conform to any particular religious beliefs.

1. Donald S. Whitney, “A Review of The Secret by Rhonda Byrne.

2. John Ankerberg, Encyclopedia of New Age Beliefs, pgs. 412-413