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Holy Water and Incense

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Holy Water and Incense Holy Water and Incense Chapter One Part One—Evangelicals Discovering Holy Water Revelation and Direction As our church began to discover the beauty and truth of liturgical worship and sacramental theology in the late 1980s and early 1990s, my inquisitiveness led me to ask the Lord the question, “What is holy water?” Coming from the nondenominational Evangelical mentality, my questions included “How is holy water different from any other type of water?,” “How can holy water be used to affect the lives of people when I have believed for so long that faith is the only requirement?,” and “What references are there to holy water in the Bible, and what support for its use can be found in the writings of the ante- and post-Nicene fathers of the Church?” Most importantly, I wanted to know if the references to “holy” water found in Scripture were pointing to a sacramental tool that invokes the power of God when used in faith, or if they were simply Biblical metaphors for a “deeper” spiritual truth. Shortly thereafter the Lord began to answer my questions. It was at this same time that I read a story about the use of holy water in a book by Leanne Payne. At a girls‟ Christian camp, Ms. Payne was a counselor, and at the very beginning of the week, she discerned that not all was spiritually well with the some of the girls in the camp. This, of course, would be typical given the diverse backgrounds from which a large group of girls come. However, things rapidly began to get worse. Ms. Payne found out that one girl was heavily involved in the occult and black magic, and had begun to involve the girls in her cabin in her activities. According to the story, the girls were using a Ouija board and trying to levitate each other. As a result, the camp counselors were having a difficult time getting the girls to come to chapel, sing, and participate in Bible study; and, by midweek, the girls refused to attend chapel at all. It was then that Ms. Payne remembered the use of holy water in her church, although she was unaware of its power and effects. She then drove to a local church, obtained some holy water from the priest, brought it back to the camp, and sprinkled it all over the girls‟ 1 Holy Water and Incense cabin while the girls were on a nature hike. When they returned, the first one to enter the cabin was the girl who was involved in the occult and had introduced it to the other girls. To Ms. Payne‟s amazement, the girl immediately fell on her knees and began repenting and asking God for forgiveness. A revival then broke out in the camp, and during the rest of the week, the girls repented and worshiped God. Another incredible incident took place at St. Michael‟s in San Clemente during one of our Wednesday night services. It was then that Fr. P.J. Boardman, a CEC priest from St. Michael‟s in Middletown, Rhode Island, was preaching a deliverance service. As many of you know, there is much weeping at deliverance services, so we had sent a couple of our priests across the street to buy some tissue. As they were crossing the parking lot of the supermarket, a man came up behind them and tried to attack them for no reason (of course, they knew it was demonic). One of the two priests then commanded him in the name of Christ to stop, and the man was thrown back in the air a few feet, knocked out cold. After that, they dragged him into St. Michael‟s and positioned him over the altar rail while Fr. Boardman was preaching. Now, if there was ever a man who understood the use of holy water, it is he. Immediately, he began to douse the man with holy water, while renouncing the works of Satan. Within a few minutes, the man regained consciousness, began weeping, repenting and praising God. He then stated that he must take this message of God‟s love back to his own people and walked out of the church. We have never seen him since, but the incident surely left a mark on my understanding of the power of holy water. By reading and hearing these two stories, God began to open my spiritual eyes and ears to the message of the use of holy water for the sanctification of men. Cleansing and Purification Now, what exactly is God doing when we administer holy water? In Ezekiel 36:25-33, God says, “Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a 2 Holy Water and Incense new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.” The Lord goes on to say in verses 29 and 33, “I will deliver you from all your uncleannesses…On the day that I cleanse you from all your iniquities, I will also enable you to dwell in the cities, and the ruins shall be rebuilt.” What does this mean? The explications and implications are many. First of all, the emphasis should not be on our ability to make ourselves holy, but on God‟s means of doing it. He says that He will sprinkle us with clean water, and we are made clean. As a result, we receive new hearts and new attitudes, and we will be delivered. It also implies that Israel (the people of God) had gradually slipped into a place of apostasy and rebellion. Their thoughts, their hearts and their attitudes had become hardened against the ways of God, which brought self-deception concerning their relationship to their Creator and Redeemer. The people of God needed to be cleansed from their sinful ways and thought processes. Finally, the Lord tells us that upon our cleansing by water, civilization can once again thrive and the land can become inhabitable and fruitful. One of the truths that we hold dear as evangelicals is that the Blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all of our sins. This is a true statement, and in no way should it be altered or qualified. However, we, as evangelicals, have assumed by default of the previous statement that all of our thoughts (the meditations of our hearts) are therefore pure and clean. As charismatics, we have supposed being filled with the Holy Spirit automatically means complete redemption of our thought processes. We‟ve assumed that Satan or our flesh holds no more sway over our minds. There is an important distinction that must be made here: While our souls are cleansed through the atoning work of Christ (our sins are forgiven), our minds are still in the process of redemption. In other words, like Peter who had good intentions, we can still think on the side of Satan during various times of our walk with the Lord. The dangerous situation in which many Christians lose themselves is when those demonic paradigms (disguised as good and holy) overtake the minds of those believers. At that point, they become of no good service to the Kingdom of God. In fact, much of what they think is hostile to God and His economy. And the end result is this: whatever your mind thinks, your heart becomes. This is exactly what 3 Holy Water and Incense happened to Israel in Ezekiel 36. While they had already made a covenant with God (they were walking out their salvation), they had fallen into a place of rebellion which allowed for wicked thoughts and actions; therefore, they needed God‟s deliverance. One of the chief problems in evangelical thinking is the notion that, once a person is saved, he no longer needs deliverance. That is simply not true; we need deliverance on a regular basis because of the fact that our minds are constantly polluted from what we see and hear in the world. You must remember this: your mind is in the process of redemption, but it is not completely redeemed. And, if we are not careful, the heresies and lies of Satan can take root in our hearts if we don‟t remove them from our minds on a regular basis. What does God give us to purge our minds of those lies? I believe one of the best tools is holy water. Another interesting verse regarding the purifying effects of water is found in Ephesians 5:25 and 26. In this chapter, St. Paul is talking about the relationship between Christ and His Church, and he states Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for it, that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy without blemish. Paul is making it clear that the Church, although it is justified by Christ’s work on the cross, is in need of sanctification (the purification from sinful ways) and makes it way toward being spotless as she walks toward and with Christ. How does Christ sanctify His Body, the Church? It is through the washing of water by the word.
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