The book uses ‘kything’ to put forth a very basic communion-between-persons skill that can be used to establish spiritual presence between and among people. [The word was used in A Wind in the Door by Madeleine L’Engle, who got it from Jamieson’s Scottish Dictionary of 1856] In the 18th chapter, ‘Kything and Jesus Christ,’ direct quotes are used from the places in the New Testament where ‘agape’ is used on the original Greek, so quotes start there then expand to other quotes where ‘love’ used in a spiritual way is changed to ‘agape.’
“Nor does Jesus exclude from the indwelling anyone who has agape for him and believes in him. ‘Any who have agape for me will be true to my word, and my Father will have agape for them; we will come to them and make our dwelling place in them’ (Jn 14:23). John’s First Epistle is also filled with assertions of this mutual indwelling: ‘No one has ever seen God; but as long as we share agape with one another, God will live in us and God’s agape will be complete in us.’ (1 Jn. 4:12-13)
"In his book The Descent of the Dove: A Short History of the Holy Spirit in the Church’, Charles Williams recognized the permanent mutual indwelling of God in us, us in God, and us in each other (in Christ). Williams called this mutual indwelling 'co-inherence,' and saw it as the central reality of Christian life.
"This spiritual and sacred presence enables the person to know and have agape for God directly and immediately. Williams asked the next logical question. Is there also a spiritual and sacred way for believers to know and share agape with each other directly, spirit-to-spirit?"
"Kything is a beginning of the ‘discovery’ Williams called for, the development of a technique not only to make this indwelling of God in persons and persons in God more conscious, but also and perhaps more importantly for our day, to facilitate the exchanges of agape in mutual indwelling that Christians are called upon to make with each other in Christ. “I give you a new commandment: Share agape with each other. Just as I have shared agape with you, you also must share agape with one another. By this agape you have for one another everyone will know that you are my disciples” (Jn 13:34). The world will recognize the presence of Christ by his followers’ ability to be present to each other, spirit-to-spirit.
"Jesus showed his agape by indwelling in his friends, making his spiritual home in them. In turn, he wanted his friends to share agape with each other by co-inhering in each other as well as in him. Ultimately for the Christian, to kythe with agape is to participate in the divine life.
"Agape urges us to live for all the members of the Body of Christ (2 Cor. 5:15), and to please the Lord in all things. In this common agape sharing, available to conscious experience through kything, we are willing to put ourselves in another’s place, to suffer for them, to console them, to rejoice with them, in a word, to live in them.
"Mystical prayer is essentially an experience of unity with God and God’s creation. Kything is a gateway to mystical experience and can certainly foster deeper prayer states. When you kythe you transcend separateness without losing your identity. When you kythe you enter into a state of agape and spiritual union.
"As a spiritual energy agape is the ability to be unconditionally loving. In this sense, agape is a prerequisite to deep kything, for the conditions and expectations we place on others or ourselves when ordinarily we love often keep us or distract us from the depth of communion of which we are capable."
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