Maybe from a Lutheran Scholastic viewpoint, mysticism is "bad", but Lutherans have written about mysticism (Rudolph Otto) and there have been Lutheran mystics (Jakob Boehme, Emmanuel Swedenborg, being the most well-known). But institutional Lutheranism itself has mostly marginalized them.
Howard Thurman was a well-known African-American Baptist theologian and mystic, and he's been generally overlooked. He was influenced by the Quaker theologian, Rufus Jones, and the 17th century writings of the Lutheran mystic, Jakob Boehme. Thurman met with Gandhi and then experienced a vision at the Khyber Pass in northern India, where he was inspired to set up an interfaith, desegregated church in San Francisco. He was influential in the early Civil Rights movement, writing the book, Jesus and the Disinherited. There are still many of his sermons on Youtube.
I like Thurman's religious thought because he sees Jesus' mission as speaking to people who are marginalized, to help them find dignity in a world that denies their personhood. I was reminded that yesterday with the Gospel reading of the woman at the well.
