Channeling? Nope... not THAT kind!

The "new age movement" seems to have lost a bit of steam, but some of the lingo still lingers. One example of this is the term "channeling". The definition I've found for "channeling" is "the act or practice of serving as a medium through which a spirit guide purportedly communicates".

When I was in college, I played around briefly with seances and got the you-know-what scared out of me. I made a sincere promise to God that if he got me out of that situation, I'd never mess with anything even vaguely occult. And I've kept that promise. Talk about "channeling", and I'm outa here.

But it occurred to me that Christians are supposed to be "channeling" the Holy Spirit. Here are several verses that support this viewpoint:

• “I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. - John 15:5
• I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. - Galatians 2:20 
• We know that we have come to know him if we keep his commands. Whoever says, “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in that person. But if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did. – 1 John 2:3-6
• You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.- 1 John 4:4
• The way we know we remain in him and he in us is that he has given us of his Spirit - 1 John 4:13. 
• In him we live and move and have our being - Acts 17:28

So my plan is to continue to avoid anything even vaguely reminiscent of the occult. But I also pray to be a channel for the Holy Spirit.

Saint Francis de Sales had a beautiful way of expressing the process:

A honeycomb, struck by the burning rays of the sun, melts and loses its original form to flow toward the part that was touched by the sun. So the soul of this lover melts and flows in the direction from which the sun of its delight comes, losing its natural form to follow Him Who is speaking to it.

Let us "pull toward the light"!