Escaping the Matrix: Setting Your Mind Free to Experience Real Life in Christ
Authors: Gregory A. Boyd and Al Larson
Publisher: Baker (2005)
Topic: Christian Discipleship/ Healing: How can we get free from strongholds in our minds?
Description: What is in control of your mind? Like the characters in The Matrix movie trilogy, our minds can get hardwired to distortions that lie so deep within us that we aren’t even aware of them. Whether it’s habitual sin, thought patterns, damaged emotions, or even phobias, we all know of something that is holding us back.
In Escaping the Matrix pastor- theologian Gregory Boyd and counselor Al Larson bring together the biblical and neurological truths behind such struggles. Their unique synthesis of insights from scripture and neuroscience make this book different from ordinary Christian self-help books. Their practical examples and exercises will help you transform your thought processes to experience a deeper life in Christ. Are you prepared to escape the world’s Matrix that controls you? Are you ready to free your mind?
Greg’s story behind the writing of Escaping the Matrix : I first met Al Larsen in 1994. I’d been referring people in my church with various issues to counselors for several years, but I noticed that the success rate for those I sent to Al was much higher than that of other counselors — especially on issues related to phobias and addictions. People would sometime come back to me weeping as they thanked me for sending them to Al. So I wanted to meet Al and find out what he was doing.
It turns out Al was using a sort of Christianized version of Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), and it was powerful. His counseling techniques matched well with a number of theological concepts I’d been developing over the years, so we fused them together, co-taught a class for a number of years, and eventually wrote the book Escaping the Matrix. Thousands of people have learned how to master their emotions — and therefore their lives — by the approach used in this book.
As for the title, it obviously was inspired by the movie The Matrix — which, in my humble opinion, is one of the greatest flicks of all time (the sequels not so much). The truth is that we get trapped because we confuse our virtual reality map (our thoughts and emotions) with reality. When you wake up to the lie, you can be empowered to fight the lies in your Matrix and be set free.