Who Said That?
Monday, February 19, 2007 at 06:23PM 
OK, who said that?
"If you retake the throne of your life through sin -- a definite act of disobedience -- breathe spiritually. Spiritual breathing (exhaling the impure and inhaling the pure) is an exercise in faith and enables you to continue to experience God's love and forgiveness.
1. Exhale -- confess your sin -- agree with God concerning your sin and thank him for His forgiveness of it, according to 1 John 1:9 and Hebrews 10:1-25. Confession involves repentance -- a change in attitude and action. 2. Inhale -- surrender the control of your life to Christ, and appropriate (receive) the fullness of the Holy Spirit by faith. Trust that he now directs and empowers you, according to the command of Ephesians 5:18 and the promise of 1 John 5:14, 15."
You know the drill! Leave your answers in the comments section. Please, no cheating (google searches). The fun is in the guessing. For some of you (who have already learned the art of spiritual breathing) the answer will be easy.
Okay everybody, on the count of three, one . . . two . . . three . . . exhale, inhale.
Kim Riddlebarger
Many of you guessed this one. This comes from the infamous "Blue Book" put out by Bill Bright's Campus Crusade for Christ (page 284, to be specific).
For some Reformed Christians, spiritual breathing is closely tied to the enjoyment of certain fine Dominican tobacco plants, finely rolled and cut and sold by a certain Arturo Fuente.
Reader Comments (35)
BILL BRIGHT
i tried it once in college...
but i didn't inhale
funny thing how good reformed confessionalism is what actually allows one to exhale. of course, i have always been partial to the balloon under water anaology when comparing the pietism most of us tried to do before finding the gospel through the aformentioned system (sorry, sibert, there i go again with that nasty reference to reformed confessionalism). trying to do popular pietism was always like trying to keep a balloon under water.
zrim
It's not from the Spiritual Laws, though, it must be from some Training Guide - Leadership Training (LTC) or the 'Follow-Up' series?
Frankly, I had no idea Bill was this misguided. When I was reading the above quote I honestly thought to myself, "who can you picture in your mind saying this?"
I came up with Benny Hinn, Ken and Gloria Copeland, James Robison, Peter Lord, Paul Crouch, Paula White".
Then I read you folks stating it is Bill Bright. Wow. Shocking me today, aren't you!
Perhaps someone who knows, can inform us where Bill Bright was influenced toward such silliness? Who were his friends in ministry? Who was he reading, quoting etc?
Danger: "Christian TV Station inside your TV; run for your life!"
Oh, wait, I already knew this one. It's not Bill Bright, but it is somebody in Campus Crusade for Christ's organization. But, then again, with the amount of plageurism going on in evangelicalism, it was probably M'hatmabinedad.
Bill Clinton of "Depends what your definition of "IS" is? Oh... he was breathing in something else, but he didn't inhale.
I tried this breathing technique once when my wife was next to me and she elbowed me and told me to go take a cold shower. Anyone know what she meant by that? :-)
I was thinking though (an unusual exercise for me) that if we combined this technique with Luther's technique for ridding oneself of the devil, then we might be on to something.
Maybe it was the Dali Lhama?
Izzy
Anyway, with Izzy, I'd like a little analysis too. My assumption on reading it carefully is that the exhale part -- confession and repentance -- is just fine; the questionable theology is on the "inhalation of the Holy Spirit," rather than receiving by faith the imputed righteousness of Christ ...
But please, when you conclude this one, give some commentary too.
So, Kim, it's your blog, your swipe, please provide some sound teaching if it is so erroneous...