What Are You Yoked To?

Matthew 11:28:30, “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”

Have you ever thought about what you are yoked to? What you have tied your emotions and spiritual well being to? There is a movement among Christians and Churches to integrate yoga into their programs. They rationalize it by saying it is for health, and we use a different name, but they do not truly understand the trappings of yoga then. It would be like holding a Christian séance, and saying we were just trying to talk to angels or Jesus.

Yoga is a very spiritual ritual used by the Hindu religion and every aspect for it is for their particular religion/philosophy. And yes, even the stretches they have you do are for particular purposes.

Yoga literally means to be yoked to another, or to be united with another, and what they want to do is to unite the mind and the body. This will help them free from the enslavement of this world and reach moksha, or their salvation. The goal of yoga is to be free from your body and be one with God again, meaning to them that you are God and you have just actually realized it. “In Yoga proper the question of God is irrelevant; those who believe in God can use Him as one of the means of spiritual advance. Man remains the centre of his own interests and efforts. God is just a ‘a distinct Purusha, untouched by the hindrances of affliction and fruition” Matthew Vekathanam, Indian Christology: Perspectives and Challenges, 169-170.

Purusha for the Hindu is the spiritual self of man. It is pure consciousness and never changes and it is also self-illuminating. The Gita, one of their holy books, says that the Purusha is a distinct God that is untouched by affliction, meaning then that if you are a spiritual Purusha then you are just going to figure out that you are God, pure consciousness. Galatians 6:3, “For if anyone thinks he is something when in he is nothing, he deceives himself.” Paul continues on in Colossians 1:13-14, “For He delivered us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption the forgiveness of sins.” Not from ourselves. It is not inward as Yoga says, but outward. How can we be compatible and take in their practices?

Many in the states practice Hatha yoga, or Bhahiranga yoga, and this is what is also brought into the churches under another name, and saying it is good exercise. The goal here is to do these external exercises so that you awaken Kundalini sakti at the base of your spine, which will then go up through your spinal cord and awaken the lotus. This is where you then attain transcendental states and you are free from time and space, hence you are then becoming infinite, which is who you are truly. As you are just a part of God. This is called henotheism, as Indian scholar M. Dhavamony puts it, “The predominant idea of henotheism is that various gods are only different forms of a single divinity. The Rgveda says: ‘What is but One, the wise call by diverse names.’ And again: ‘Him with fair wings, though only One in nature, wise singers shape, with songs, in many figures.” You and I are gods, as we are part of the One true God being manifested in these bodies right now.

If you yoke yourself to yoga instead of the word of God then you are heading down a dangerous road. It does not bring religions together, as it denies everything about other religions, because they believe that we are all unrealized gods, which is gained through these practices of yoga and learning their Vedas.

If you want to stretch then stretch, but do not go to a yogi to show you, because he/she will teach stretches meant for their faith, which is a type of worship. We all had gym class in school and were taught how to stretch. It would take a whole other blog to cover the breathing aspect of yoga as well. It has many spiritual implications. It would be the same for a Christian to go to a Muslim Mosque and worship as if they believed the Muslim faith to be true, or vice-versa. When in fact they differ on many areas of each other’s faith.

Hindus believe in reincarnation, Christians do not. Hindus believe your soul is eternal and always has been; Christians believe we were individually made. Hindus do not believe in Heaven or Hell, as we do. They do not think Jesus is the Son of God as Christians do, and believe He is dead and did not rise from the grave. They say we all worship the same God. How can that be when all our faiths have very different ways of attaining salvation? Muslims must perform the 7 pillars and even then they are not guaranteed, as God may still banish them. Jehovah witnesses are by works for Heaven and do not believe in the trinity. Wiccans worship nature and do not believe in the same gods at all that we do (some no gods at all), or the Hindus. Would you also bring in some of these other faith’s practices? What if they said doing a séance would heal you? Would you do it when the Bible is against it?

Why do we worship with them then? Yoga is their worship, spiritual practice to attain salvation (Moksha). You can call it Christian yoga if you want, but know that Hindus are smiling, as you are incorporating their worship into your life and that is opening you up for spiritual attack and a slippery move away from the faith. It turns the church back into the Corinthian church, where we want to bring all these pagan ideologies within the church. “Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness? Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God. . .” (2 Cor. 6:14-16).

Galatians 5:1, “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.”