The Dangers of Manifestation & New Age Practices (Biblical Truth Exposed)

Manifestation, horoscopes, psychics, crystals, “Christ consciousness,” and New Age spirituality are more dangerous than most people realize. In this episode, we expose counterfeit spirituality, discuss spiritual warfare, deliverance, demonic open doors, and how true freedom is found in Jesus Christ alone. Learn how to discern truth from deception through Scripture and the Holy Spirit.

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 Manifestation Warning

02:27 Recap Dying to Self

05:10 Open Doors to Demons

06:33 Counseling New Age Mix

09:41 Common Practices Breakdown

10:58 Manifestation vs Kingdom

12:59 Self Control and Habits

19:49 Psychedelics vs Jesus

22:27 Church and Supernatural

25:17 Healing Builds Faith

30:02 Making Deliverance Accessible

32:52 Functional Cessationism

40:57 Spirit Soul Body Diagram

46:43 Counterfeit Spiritual Messages

51:04 Renewing The Mind

56:41 Gods Timing Frequency

59:43 Psychics Mediums Dangers

01:02:54 Fruit Of True Prophecy

01:06:18 Identity Horoscopes Crystals

01:07:57 Agreements Repent Renounce

01:13:41 Deliverance Prayer Finale

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Manifestation is dangerous because it puts your will above God's will. I've met the top dogs. I've seen the people who are like these manifestation gurus and the people that you see who are major influencers. I've talked to them. They're all miserable.

SPEAKER_05 0:13

The way we do one thing is the way we do everything. And any source in our life that is not Jesus is one of the source that will not lead to life. Whether it's manifestation or any other thing, if it's producing more of me, it's producing less of it.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

There's a clear demonic agenda that perverts what's already from God and uses it in a free will.

SPEAKER_05 0:36

The devil cannot create. He is not a creator. In lieu of being able to create something or make something, he has to distort something that's already been created.

SPEAKER_00 0:46

Father, in the name of Jesus Christ, I come to the heart without in humility. I confess that I have participated in things that grieve your spirit, such as witchcraft, sorcery, divination, magic, the occult, and you make factors. But today I make a decision to turn away from every dark path and return fully to you. From this day forward, I declare that I am a child of light and I will never go back. In Jesus' mighty name. Amen.

SPEAKER_04 1:18

Amen.

SPEAKER_00 1:34

But I think God has designed us with almost like a void, but really more an innate drive to seek the supernatural and really to seek Him.

SPEAKER_03 1:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:44

But then people who unknowingly or sometimes knowingly fall into the uh disillusion of the power, quote unquote, of things like New Age and the Occult. And they experience real experiences. They experience real power, even though it's counterfeit. And they're operating under real spiritual laws, but it's divorced from God. And today, what I want to talk about, as someone who has unfortunately, but also fortunately extensive experience in New Age, in the occult, I want to talk about the dangers of it and what the authentic version of spiritual reality, spiritual truth, and spiritual technology looks like. In the last episode, we stayed with this trend of seriousness, which I think is going to be the underlying um theme throughout all of these episodes on the fifth gospel. But we talked about uh dying to self and what it means to have been crucified with Christ as a past and also current reality, not necessarily as something we are continuously pursuing because we already have an identity in Christ. We're already a new creation, um, and we've already been crucified with him. Now comes the dangers that we often slip into when we mix sometimes scripture with some of these new age uh philosophies and teachings. Um like I said, as someone who's come from that world, I think this episode, I know this episode is gonna shine a very bright light on uh both the practical implications and the spiritual implications of dabbling with the wrong things. So um let's before we before we get into the the meat of this conversation, um, what stood out to you about our last conversation in the last episode, and not necessarily that has a transition into this one seamlessly, um, but what do you think was the core message from from last time we chatted?

SPEAKER_05 3:38

Yeah, I love the passage, Galatians chapter two, verse 20. I have been crucified with Christ. It's no longer I that live, but Christ that lives within me. And so immediately we become aware of a supernatural reality, which is that it's not just my own understanding, it's not my own experiences that dictate how I now walk in life, but it's now the life of Jesus within me. And that is supernatural. That's beyond our natural understanding. And so I do actually think that there is a great connection between what we spoke about last week and what we're going to be speaking about here today, which is that there is a supernatural reality that the more we become aware of it, the more we recognize it does have power in our lives. But we have to make sure that it is the Spirit of God that we're being led by. Because emotions, they're very powerful, they can lead us very easily. But being led by our emotions very often can lead us into the ways that are not necessarily Christ-driven. And so the Holy Spirit needs to be the one who is leading us and guiding us. And the way that we continue to stay locked in on what he's doing, the way that we have uh a litmus test, a standard is by trusting in the word of God. And that's why we continue to return back to the truth of scripture and everything we're talking about.

SPEAKER_00 5:01

Yeah, and you and you mentioned the truth of God, that's what we're meant to seek. Yeah, we're not meant to seek power, we're not meant to seek uh self-righteousness or materialism, which is the problem, primarily uh from a practical perspective, uh, with manifestation, with new age practices, which uh with what you might call witchcraft, even um, it breeds materialism, it breeds pride, it breeds self-righteousness, and uh all of those things have both uh practical and physical implications as well as spiritual implications. I know without a shadow of a doubt, because I've seen it in my own life, unfortunately, I've seen it in people I've worked with. When you dabble with these new age arts and these philosophies, it opens you up to uh the demonic. It opens you up to being oppressed, it opens you up to torment. Um, and this is not to say that every single time you sin or every single time you do one of these things, that demon's gonna come right in. But it's like it's like leaving your front door open in the middle of the night while you go to sleep. Yeah. The skunk may not come in, but there's a much more likely or higher chance of that skunk coming into your house if you if you leave the door open.

SPEAKER_05 6:10

So these are gonna make a mess.

SPEAKER_00 6:11

It's gonna make a mess. And so we're gonna talk about those open doors today and how and also how do we how do we like fumigate the house? How do how do we do some some spiritual uh uh pest control, if you will? Okay, because I think there's a fine line between between taking this topic serious, but also not giving demons more power than they deserve.

SPEAKER_05 6:32

Yeah, right. I agree with that.

SPEAKER_00 6:34

Um have you seen like in in your pastoral uh counseling at all? Have you seen um congregants or people come to you that have struggled with um something spiritual that then then was revealed as uh a manifestation of something from New Age or the occult? Like whether it's psychics or or mediums or even some of these like uh formal witchcraft practices, has that ever come up in counseling?

SPEAKER_05 7:01

Yeah, on a practical level, I would say that belief systems can often be influenced by what we have allowed as authority in our life. And so in in previous experiences, individuals may have gone to psychics, they may have used tarot cards before. And what happens, unfortunately, is that there is a mixture of the spiritual realities that they've experienced and then God himself. And Paul actually, you know, in encounters this as he's ministering in various places where the people that he's speaking to, they are so familiar with the spiritual realm that they start to take their belief about, let's say, Zeus, because that was one of the gods that they worshipped. They start to take the ideas about Zeus and they project them on Jesus. And so there's this mixture that occurs and it dilutes the truth of who he is. And so when that happens in the lives of people that I talk to, they've brought in these wrong belief systems, they've incorporated it into their Christianity, and as a result, they've opened up doors to demonic influence instead of the Holy Spirit. It's produced belief systems that now have to be rooted out, they have to be removed and then replaced with the truth of scripture. So, yes, to answer your question, I've seen it. Um, and often it's just based off of this is what I knew at that time. I was searching for something and going to a psychic or calling this person, they seem to have the answers. So I went to them, but eventually they came to Jesus. Now we have to denounce, we have to remove ourselves from all of that previous experience because it was based in the wrong kingdom, which at best, the wrong kingdom will always be a counterfeit of the true kingdom, which means it'll look similar. It may actually have some level of what we would call power, but the end result of it is more of us, it's more self, it's more flesh, and it's not who Jesus has called us to be.

SPEAKER_00 9:03

Yeah, because we even we see in the Old Testament it was the Egyptians, right? Performing miracles. Yeah. And uh the sorcerers, right?

SPEAKER_05 9:11

The sorcerers, they they do their magical acts, and it's not until uh Moses throws down his staff, Aaron is part of this as well, that it turns into the snake and it eats the other snakes, right? This is this very interesting interaction, but yeah, they're performing mystical arts and they're producing a demonic result. It wasn't just the children of Israel that had the power the ability to walk in power, there was a lesser power being practiced by the Egyptians.

SPEAKER_00 9:41

Absolutely. And I and what I want to do uh with this episode today, it'll probably actually maybe be even a little bit more casual, still rooted in scripture. We're gonna go back to to verses and whatnot. Um, but I would like to kind of systematically go through some of the common new age practices, yeah, get your take as a pastor on it and look at it through the lens of scripture. And then also I can give my take on um the the danger of it as someone who used to actually practice some of these things. Um, and so the first one that comes to mind is manifestation. That's actually how I rose to TikTok fame by teaching practical manifestation. Now that got me to a million dollars, and you can probably assume that with that quote unquote fame and quote unquote financial gain and not quote unquote but literal financial gain, it probably put a little pep in my step, probably made me place my faith in those things that I was talking about because oh, all eyes are on me, it's making me money. There is the slippery slope. Um, so my question to you is uh when you hear the word manifestation, what is that what does that like bring to mind? Yeah, maybe not just from a new age perspective, even from a biblical perspective, like where is the danger in manifestation specifically?

SPEAKER_05 10:58

Yeah, I mean, there are spiritual principles in the kingdom of God that what we focus on, what we give our attention to, that is what the direction that we're gonna move. What we focus on grows. And there also is a reality that in the kingdom of God, that when we seek first the kingdom of heaven and all of its righteousness, the word says, this is Jesus speaking in Matthew 6, 33, that all of these things will be added unto you. And so there is this mindset of, oh, if I seek first his kingdom, then there is a result that comes by putting my focus in the right place. That's the kingdom perspective. But these principles that have been hijacked by new age movements, they're spiritual principles. They've just been now been used for incorrect uh usage, for building up myself, for being able to produce something in myself through my own effort. And that's where we see if we go all the way back to Genesis, there were two trees in the garden that were of substance that were that were significant, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And one was a reliance on God as the source, the other one was on the reliance of a lesser reality, our own understanding. And we still have that choice today. Which source are we going to? So godly source or sources of this world, of myself, of my flesh, of the demonic realm. And we have to be very careful which tree we're eating from.

SPEAKER_00 12:30

So it sounds to me, correct me if I'm wrong, manifestation is what I might call spiritual technology that has some um biblical uh basis, but when divorced from God is when it becomes a problem, which is exactly what I have come to learn is manifestation is dangerous because it puts your will above God's will.

SPEAKER_04 12:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:56

Right? It makes you your own God. And you know, we talk about self-control, and he says, you know, I I I I did not give you a spirit of fear, but of power, of love, of sound mind, i.e. self-control. But what I've realized is that it's self-control insofar as I have the control to relinquish the control. Right. We don't really have self-control outside of our ability to surrender the control. Yeah. And that's an important nuance there because what I've realized through my research in neuroscience, this is just a very practical neurological truth, is that over 90% of our thoughts, feelings, emotions, and actions on a day-to-day basis are habitual.

SPEAKER_05 13:39

Okay. They're like involuntary.

SPEAKER_00 13:41

They're involuntary, they're automatic.

SPEAKER_05 13:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:43

And the example I I give sometimes is like if I asked you to order a pizza right now for us, what kind of pizza would you order?

SPEAKER_05 13:50

Something to do with chicken on it, chicken parmesan.

SPEAKER_00 13:52

Okay. And so you think in that moment that I ask you that you're making a conscious decision to order.

SPEAKER_05 13:57

My appetite is making that decision. Exactly. My taste, my taste, my history of that. Your preferences, right?

SPEAKER_00 14:01

Yep. So this is the same concept with our subconscious programming, our mental programs that we have, our beliefs, our habits, our thoughts, et cetera. And so where manifestation, I think, really is dangerous is that it says, hey, you are the God in the equation here. You have all the control to say, hey, I want this thing. I'm going to get that thing. Um, but that's clearly not the case biblically. And the analogy, going back to the analogy that I give, it's like a knife, right? A knife is just a tool. I can use it to prep a nice dinner for my family, or I can use it to kill somebody. Yeah. Manifestation is it to me is similar. It's just a tool. However, how this analogy has uh transformed for me, this knife has been tainted. This knife has already hurt people, it's already killed somebody. So if I said, hey Sam, here's a knife that you can prep dinner with, but you know what, it's killed a couple people, you probably wouldn't want to use that knife anymore. Right?

SPEAKER_05 14:56

It's been contaminated.

SPEAKER_00 14:57

Exactly. That's the same thing with manifestation. I we see, we see the the theme of you reap what you sow. As a man thinketh, we see, and and these things are often cherry-picked as well, out of context, uh, out of scripture, um, to to reinforce the idea that manifestation is okay, but I'm here to tell you it is extremely dangerous because of what it leads to, and it also opens us up um to the demonic when it's outside of the authority of God.

SPEAKER_05 15:22

Yeah. And I think about it this way, based off of what you just said. We desire as Christians and believers in Jesus to overcome the flesh because we know that what is produced out of the flesh is more flesh, separation from God, sin. But we cannot overcome the flesh if we are in submission to the flesh. We cannot disconnect from the flesh as our source if we are serving the flesh, if the flesh has dominion over us, meaning that our emotions and our feelings and all those things are in the driver's seat. And so we have to recognize what our pursuit of anything that builds the flesh up is actually doing. It's actually producing more disconnection from God. And so whether it's manifestation or any other thing, if it's producing more of me, it's producing less of God. If it's producing more of my desires and the things that I think are best, separate, separated and divorced from who Jesus is, then I'm creating a greater master of the flesh. And it's going to have a result one way or the other. More of God or more of me. And so we have to be very aware that anything that we're using as a tool should be bringing us into our new identity and new reality and not into places of greater reliance on myself.

SPEAKER_00 16:45

Absolutely. And that's where most people start with manifestation is their own desires, our hearts.

SPEAKER_05 16:49

I want to get rich. I want to do that. I had a friend, I'm not going to name him, um, but he would tell me in Los Angeles, oh, I've got this notebook of all these things, and I know there's a higher power. I and he would just keep saying, higher power, higher power. Um, and he knew about God and he he said he had a relationship with Jesus. But like, I have this notebook, and every day I say, I'm gonna have this and this and this and this. It didn't work. And I know for some people there is, you know, uh a good result that comes out of it, or at least a favorable result as far as they're concerned. But like this higher power, this belief in just some abstract thing, it's such a counterfeit.

SPEAKER_00 17:29

Or the universe, the universe, exactly. It's like saying I'm gonna prey to this can, it's just a container. Yeah, you know, there's a creator of the universe, you know.

SPEAKER_05 17:39

It's the byproduct of an infinite God. When we lessen the reality of creation, when we lessen the reality of intelligent design, we are removing the incredible nature of a God who designed it intentionally, and we're putting it on a counterfeit. And Paul says this very clearly in Romans chapter one that they had the ability to see the truth, and yet they exchanged the truth of God for a lie. And what was the result of it? This is very important, I think, in anything we're talking about here today. What's the result of the new age pursuit of the counterfeit? It says they didn't honor him or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened, claiming to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal men and birds and animals and creeping things. And God gave them over to the desires of their flesh. He allowed them, hey, this is what you want. You want to be your own God? Here, go for it.

SPEAKER_00 18:39

Well, and everybody's really searching for a few things: control, power, love, purpose, purpose, self-worth. Yeah. And what I have found, because I have I have an intimate um and extensive uh relationship with that community. I've met the top dogs, like I've met with them one-to-one. I've seen the people who are like these manifestation gurus, and and the people that you see who are major influencers, I've talked to them. They're all miserable. They may not put that out there, but it's not good for business. It's not good for business.

SPEAKER_05 19:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:14

But I got into this. I was like, oh, let me buy the fancy car because I can use that in my marketing, and I'm this big shy, and I can manifest things. Like it, it it is it is so detrimental to the soul, and it becomes like it becomes these handcuffs to the world. Um, and then that's not even considering the demonic torment and influence and oppression that comes because you've now gone around, right? Which he tells us not to do. Yeah, he is the way, he is the door, he's the gate. When you go around, you're a thief. Yeah, um, and too many people are trying to access the supernatural around the outside, over the fence. Yeah, they're doing it through the new age practices, witchcraft, psychedelics, which we'll talk about this later in the episode. What really grinds my gears is that someone will pay thousands of dollars to get on an airplane, yeah, to be dropped off in the middle of the jungle, yeah, to then drink some tea that was concocted by some hippie in a robe to have some psychedelic experience, but they won't take 30 seconds to get on the hands on their hands and knees in their living room and give their life to Jesus. Like, where have we gone wrong?

SPEAKER_05 20:23

It's become too familiar, it's become too common, and it's been watered down by religion that doesn't produce change. Because everybody's been to church. Most people I know they grew up Christian in some way, shape, or form, but it didn't produce any change, so that didn't work. So I gotta do something else.

SPEAKER_00 20:43

You know what I think though? I think it's accountability, it's it's ownership, it's responsibility, and it's easy, not easy necessarily, but there's no real self-accountability and say, hey, I'm gonna go take this drug or I'm gonna do but like when you surrender your life to Christ, right? The obviously the responsibility was on him and is on him, but there is a responsibility for us to live out that message.

SPEAKER_05 21:06

But why does anybody not choose Jesus? On some level, it's because they feel that either the cost is too high or something else is going to work better. Yeah. Right? Like they diminish the power of who he is, and so there has to be another answer. Or okay, maybe he is, but I got to give up too much in order to get it. An experience, though, experience sounds a lot more exciting than following Jesus. An experience sounds more exciting than going to church, than reading a Bible, than following a religious tradition of that so many people have put forth that doesn't bear any fruit. So there has to be a recognition that the reason why people go after these other things, in my opinion, without being hypercritical, is because Christians haven't done a good job of living authentic Christianity that produces a life of love, joy, peace. Patience, kindness, self-control. We're not producing the things that are like, oh wow, that's that's what I want. And so there has to be another answer. So there has to be an experience. And there's just maybe there, it maybe not anymore, but there is this sexiness to like, hey, I'm gonna go manifest my destiny. Yeah, I'm gonna be able to have all the things that I want. And uh it doesn't require death to self.

SPEAKER_00 22:26

I don't think people are finding the supernatural in church, though.

SPEAKER_05 22:31

I know that's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_00 22:34

But I think that's why they're seeking it elsewhere.

SPEAKER_05 22:37

They're they're not seeing the fullness of what we read about in scripture.

SPEAKER_00 22:41

So is that a pastor problem, a church problem?

SPEAKER_05 22:43

Is that a it's an all it's an all of the above problem? Yeah, um, if it's not being taught as an expectation, but not just because this is where I've just in full transparency, I think I have gone wrong in my teaching in the past. It's great to set an expectation of what Jesus said. I want you to go out, I want you to heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the leper, cast out demons. It's great to set that as an expectation because it's what Jesus said. But in order to get to that place, Jesus first led them through discipleship. He first led them to, and they didn't do it perfectly, but he gave them the example of what it is to submit their lives to the one who is Lord and to follow and to walk out what it is to have death the self, like to lay down their own desires, their own pursuits, and to give themselves to this. And so we could say, yeah, yeah, we're supposed to do all these things. Yes, we are. That's absolutely the truth. But if we start to seek the supernatural and to seek the gifts more than the giver of the gifts, we will engage in our own new age practice, our own pursuit of the supernatural when it's only meant to come as a result of following Jesus. And so, yes, it has been missing in the church. It has been missing the things, and not every church. There are churches that are operating in the supernatural on high levels. There are churches around the world that are seeing healings and deliverance and people being set free. But my personal conviction is that it all stems from discipleship because the truth is that we can walk in supernatural power and never be changed by it. We can experience healing in our bodies, but if we haven't submitted our lives to him and engaged in discipleship, we can end up in the same place that we were before. We can receive deliverance. If we don't become disciples of Jesus, pursuing him with our whole lives, there is an actual change. And I'm convinced that God is so much more convinced in us becoming more like him than he is in us being able to experience some supernatural power. And that is not for one second to diminish the power at work within us. Yeah, it's just that the order has to be placed in the correct, the correct place. Like the priority is Jesus, pursuit of him. And now let's let's expect and ask for and experience his power.

SPEAKER_00 25:17

So can I push back on this a little bit?

SPEAKER_05 25:18

You can.

SPEAKER_00 25:20

You know, we see time and time and again in the in the Bible is that people did not follow Jesus until they experienced some healing or deliverance, and then they were compelled to follow him. There were there was power in the power, right? In experiencing the power. Um, and we also see that the equipping of the disciples, they were not taught to evangelize without also being equipped to do things like deliverance and healing. And I'm sure there was, I'm sure there's some practical how-to's that we don't see outlined in the in the Bible that Jesus was walking them through, you know, both your example parable, but also these kind of checklists, if you will. Um I think it's a yes and, right? It's like yes, discipleship first and foremost. And also it's like, let's let's bring the supernatural power of Jesus into uh routine deliverance uh services or healing services or things like that. So and I and I see that with like you said, some churches you see, you know, they post it online all the time. Um I get I and I guess you kind of answered this already. How how necessary is that? If it is necessary, is there a frequency to it? Do you think churches should be doing more like you know, bring peeping up and laying hands on them and the congregation praying over someone to to be healed? You know, I and I and before you answer, I I just think about recently I run this uh Wednesday call Bible study sort of thing, and uh another person in the group prayed for someone else's uh he was having blood sugar issues for for weeks, and he said for the first time in like five years after she prayed for the past two weeks, his blood sugar has been normal. Yeah, and and you can just see the faith in him at the and so his experience bolstered his faith. Yeah, and I just I just get excited about this because I I I've seen the power of the supernatural in my life through Jesus, and it has only served to like make me want to disciple more, you know.

SPEAKER_05 27:12

So so the temporary pushback on the pushback is that the proximity to Jesus was the thing that precipitated the miraculous power. Yeah. And when we understand that we do have Jesus living inside of us, that is great proximity. But there is a giving of ourselves to him. We've said this before. Recognizing that he is savior and recognizing that he is Lord can be two different things. And there needs to be a submission in our lives to him as our Lord. And that proximity and that recognition that the power comes from him does open up the supernatural. And so please hear me again. I'm not downplaying the supernatural. I've experienced it as a kid. I don't know if I've shared this testimony on here before. Lincoln Continental. I may have the first time we talked, hand got smashed, broken bones for sure, black and blue. My grandma comes and prays, lays hands on my hand, and it's healed. Like that was an actual miracle that I saw as a child. Uh, we've prayed for people to recover from cancer and sickness. We've seen it take place. I've been in the room where various healings have taken place, where metal in bodies has been replaced by by bone, right? So we've seen miraculous power, and I believe it's so important. I just because I've grown up with in a Pentecostal charismatic environment my whole life, I have come to a place where I have such a higher priority for the change and transformation, which is just as much a miracle as the healing of a body than I have for chasing after a sign or a wonder. Not to say that we shouldn't be in pursuit of those things. I just want the order to be correct. Yeah. I just want the pursuit first to be of him and then to know that as a follower of Jesus, I am meant to recognize someone has sickness in their body and through the empowerment and the leading of the Holy Spirit to go and lay hands on them, lay hands on the sick, and they shall be healed. Yeah. That's still the expectation. It's still the standard. It's just the way that we get there has to be through reliance and pursuit of him.

SPEAKER_00 29:23

Absolutely. And we even see that in we were just talking about the story of uh the woman who was bleeding for 12 years in our men's group, right? Yeah. She had she pursued Jesus, yeah, right. Gyrus with his daughter who was ill, he pursued Jesus. The the the men who dropped their friend down through the ceiling pursued Jesus in some format. I know it's deeper than that, but there is this, it seems like first there's this act of will, this conscious pursuit of him leads to this faith, which ignites the miracle, the healing, the deliverance, but it's only like we've we've talked about, it's the sufficiency of the power of Jesus, first and foremost. Absolutely. I think maybe the word that comes to mind as we're talking about this is accessibility. To me, it hasn't felt as accessible in the modern church, the churches that I've I've been a part of, not that I'm a big church hopper, but you get what I'm saying. Um so where do people go? What if someone like if if someone, for example, goes to the gathering or church and thinks they're being tormented by a demon? Is there is there uh like an inroad to be able to deal with that?

SPEAKER_05 30:28

Yep, every Sunday after the service, if you need prayer for anything, please come to the front. We've seen deliverance, we've seen the demonic oppression come off in times of prayer and ministry. Uh, it doesn't always have to happen on a Sunday in a church, it's happened outside of there as well, but also through pastoral care that we offer. There's times of counseling that in those conversations the Holy Spirit will reveal belief systems, but also demonic oppression. And to take authority in the name of Jesus, by the blood of Jesus, over the demonic principalities is something that often has to be done. And it shouldn't be downplayed because we see it throughout scripture, and we see that there is a demonic realm and there are places where, like you said, doors have been opened, things have come in, and now they've got to be dealt with.

SPEAKER_00 31:21

I'm gonna share a prayer at the end of this. Um that when I read I read in a book, um the book was called Posture. Um and it was talking about it was it was all rooted in Christ, um, but it was talking about repenting for uh involvement in the new age and in the occult. And it was a prayer of deliverance. Um, and I read it out loud, and I'll I'll I'll share this story towards the end of this episode. Um, it was the first time in my life that I ever physically manifested what I think was a a demonic uh influence, power, whatever it was, right? Yeah. Um, so I've seen firsthand in my own life. I also seen have seen deliverance in other people for things in reference to the occult and new age um that were keeping them in bondage demonically. Yeah. Um, and and I I've said this to you before in previous episodes. I would love to in the future do a full episode on deliverance. Um, but once again, I I I appreciate you pointing that out that you guys do make it accessible at the gathering, which is also a good time. If you are in the New York area and you want to travel to the Hudson Valley, the gathering with uh Pastor Sam here is amazing. I started going there because I recognized the depth, my own discernment when I went there for the first time, even after, of course, I met you before that, but I've realized there's a depth there. I don't know another word to use, but that's really what I felt in my spirit going there, and and that's why I've chosen to stay. Um, and also now that you make it accessible for healing, for deliverance, is is is a wonderful thing to do.

SPEAKER_05 32:48

I appreciate that. And I would love uh for anybody that wanted to come. And um, I I just wanted to touch on on this because you're talking about how it's not operated in the church. And I I had this term that I used in a message not too long ago, and it was the term functional cessationist. A cessationist is one who believes that the the gifts of the Holy Spirit are no longer in operation after the book of Acts, after the apostles died, that the works of the spirit uh actually came to a conclusion because they were no longer necessary. And so that's cessationism. But even there are times where we do believe that the Holy Spirit, which is what I believe, a continuationist, I believe that's the right term, um, believes that the Holy Spirit is continuing to work. But if we so downplay what he can do, we can say we believe in the outpouring of the Spirit, but we can be functional cessationists in which we don't make any room in our lives for the Holy Spirit to operate through us. And that's really dangerous, and that is not how the body of Christ is meant to operate.

SPEAKER_00 33:51

Absolutely, absolutely. Yeah. I and maybe I get a little excited about this or high energy. And I don't know if it's a a wrongful level of of pursuit of it. Um, but I, you know, I just I just see like one, I see the power of the supernatural outside of God's uh will, and I know that if that's true, if the evil demonic things are that apparent and real, yeah, then how much more real is I love that perspective.

SPEAKER_05 34:17

I think that's so good because I don't have that experience growing up in the church, even being a pastor, we have conversations about those kind of things, but ultimately I haven't been in the realm where I've seen power at work outside of Jesus. And so to know that it is taking place outside of the church, absolutely. We we know that true power comes from God Himself. And so I love that perspective that you have and even the hunger that it's produced to see that at work within the body of Christ as well. So I think it's a beautiful thing.

SPEAKER_00 34:47

Yeah, and I've also seen the power of deliverance in my own life when other things didn't work, when you know, as a guy who was involved in things like hypnosis and mindset change and full transparency, I I had uh an issue with food for a long time. And that's really why I got into the mindset space and specifically hypnosis is because it was for the first time a way that I was able to change my mind from a neurological perspective. And after using some hypnosis to change my mind to some of these neurological patterns, I did eat better and I went to the gym more, and there wasn't willpower involved, and I lost over 80 pounds in a very short amount of time. And so it what that did do, what the blessing was, is that it did it made the power of the mind very obvious to me. Okay, but there also lies the problem because that once again leads to self-reliance, self-righteousness.

SPEAKER_05 35:39

But of course it does. Yeah, because who created the mind?

SPEAKER_00 35:42

Exactly.

SPEAKER_05 35:42

Yeah, so so if we are tripart beings, spirit, soul, and body, all three, when in alignment with God, are meant to be used for his purpose. Yeah. But when the mind, the will, the emotions, when they move into that place of authority in our lives, now they're subject to the world, to the flesh, and they've come out of order. Yeah. But when in submission to God, the mind is used as a powerful tool and an instrument to be able to comprehend the goodness of God. So yeah, the mind is very powerful. It's meant to be, it shouldn't be demonized, but it has to be in the right order.

SPEAKER_00 36:20

Well, here's the problem, though. What I realized, you just mentioned it. We're soul, body, and spirit. When we use things that are only geared towards the mind, we leave out the spiritual side of the equation. And I I've never I've never shared this publicly, I'll share it now. Um obviously, I'm not the epitome of health. And for a long time after I had lost the weight, I started to regain weight. And I and I would even do hypnosis and I would do these alternative mode days. I'd go see a therapist, and I would still struggle with my weight. I'd struggle with emotional eating. Even up until relatively recently, the past 12 to 18 months, I had put on a lot of the weight that I had lost. And here I was the manifestation guy, the the peak performance guy. Yeah um, and this is the part that I have not shared was uh about 12 months ago, I actually decided because nothing else was working that I would try to get on one of those GLP ones, one of those weight loss medications. Yeah, I was on it for six to eight months. I gained weight, did not lose even titrading it up. And so what I realized was this is a spiritual issue. Yeah, wow, and so I started looking into deliverance, I started looking into uh demonic oppression and how that can affect us physiologically, mentally, emotionally, etc. And I kind of put together my own, not my own, it's biblical, like a like a self-deliverance process. And this is a little TMI, but like I for some reason I did it in the shower one day and um I just I just like rebuked and and cast out whatever came to mind, whatever the spirit revealed to me, like it is even the spirit of emotional eating, the spirit of death came to mind. Like I realized that in some way I was probably I don't know, trying to take my own life or someone that was trying to kill me through this these eating patterns. And one of the craziest parts is as I'm doing this, this sounds so bizarre because I'm such a like practical, like if I can touch it, it's real type of guy. Yeah, but I something was telling me to like bash my head against the wall. I didn't do, I did not do it, but it was like that urge, like yeah, to like, and I've never had that why I'm in the shower, but as I'm praying this and doing this deliverance process, and then finally when I get done with everything that came to mind into spirit and rebuking it and renouncing it and repenting for it, I just felt this peace. That week I lost 10 pounds, all the inflammation was gone, nothing else had changed. And ever since then, I haven't had an urge to binge eat. I haven't emotionally ate um things that what I would normally be compelled to eat prior, just like out with friends or to drink, totally gone. And it was it was that day, yeah, that deliverance process. Um, and so that I just share that testimony because all the therapy in the world, all the weight loss drugs in the world, all the hypnosis or subconscious reprogram in the world, yeah, um, will not work. Yeah, especially if there's a a spiritual uh route.

SPEAKER_05 39:18

Yeah, because I'm really big on what we call it pastoral care, because counseling is a very specific term, very protected term. So we don't use that word, but pastoral care of going down and diagnosing what's at the root of some of the belief systems that are that are being experienced. And I believe that's so important. But there also has to be a recognition of the spiritual element of these things because if we are dealing with and engaging with things on one level, but the the battle's actually taking place on another, in another arena, then we can be fighting in vain. And there needs to be a discernment in the spirit of how we go about doing this. Um, and I think in everything we're talking about, this passage is really uh appropriate. First John chapter 4, verse 1 says, Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. There is this uh necessity for Christians to walk in discernment, to not believe every teaching, to not believe every Instagram uh reel that comes up. Um, Colossians chapter two, verse eight, Paul says, See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ. Discernment in what he's saying and doing. And if that is, if you're dealing with some level of demonic oppression or influence, to be able to have the discernment to take authority over that is so important. Yeah. I wonder if it's if it's helpful for us just to maybe see kind of how the the makeup of the human body would be. Absolutely. Um, and so if we if we look at the human body as being these three parts, the the core part of what we're talking about today would be the soul. And so the soul being the mind, the will, and the emotions. And so let's see if we can do this in in red here.

unknown 41:29

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 41:31

So if we look at the difference between the three parts of who we are, so let's start with the soul because we've been talking about this. The soul is the container for the mind, the will, and our emotions. And a lot of what we're talking about in the new age realm and in this realm is contained in here. It's what I can think about, it's what I feel, it's what I choose to do. And so when the soul is in the primary spot in terms of our faith, when it's at the highest level, then what will naturally happen is that we will be led by things that speak to the mind, the will, and the emotions. But what happens when we say yes to Jesus in our lives is that the spirit becomes alive and the spirit becomes that primary force. It becomes what we're focusing on in terms of our source. And then obviously, our body is the third component of this, and our body is the place where we see the manifestation in the world around us. And so, what we have to do is we have to make sure that we have this in the proper order and the proper perspective. And so when the soul is in the lead, what I see happening is that there is a direct connection being pulled from the supernatural realm, just not the realm of the spirit, not God's realm. And we open ourselves up to thinking and belief systems that are not of the Holy Spirit, but of the Bible calls the enemy the prince of the power of the air. He's the one that controls the airwaves, if you will, in the spirit. And so if we are being led by the soul, we're actually pulling information from the soulless realm, from that place where the enemy has dominion.

SPEAKER_00 43:23

Is this is this the second heaven?

SPEAKER_05 43:25

The second heaven. So if we if we look at how Paul describes it, he says there was a man and he got caught up to the third heaven, and the third heaven being where God was, that means that the second heaven has to exist. There is a place in between and the first heaven being where we exist. And so that place of the second heaven is that place where the prince of the power of the air, Satan, operates. If we read in the book of Daniel, it says that Daniel prays and a messenger comes from heaven to bring him an answer to his prayer. And that uh when the messenger arrives, he says, Hey, I came. As soon as you prayed, I had an answer from the throne room, but I was held up by the prince of Persia by a spiritual force of darkness. And I had to battle, and finally Michael showed up, and he brought the ability for me to be able to come here and to deliver this message 21 days later. So if the soul is tapped into the spiritual realm, then we are going to be influenced by the Prince of the Power of the Air. When we, however, move into a place of submission to the Holy Spirit, where we're receiving our wisdom from, our information, is from who He is. It's from God. That means that our soul now comes into a place of submission to the spirit. It means that my thinking, my emotions, and my ability to choose are now in alignment with the spirit. And now my body, what I choose to do in the physical realm, is in the proper order.

SPEAKER_00 44:57

This sounds this sounds uh like evidence to why sin is obviously so dangerous. Uh it keeps us in the body. And if you think about whether it's porn, whether it's overconsumption of food, drugs, those are all very carnal, fleshly, yeah physical things.

SPEAKER_05 45:14

That feed emotions.

SPEAKER_00 45:15

That feed emotions. Um, and this is also why I think or know that the power of uh prayer, fasting, meditation is is so high, is because that now allows you to interface with the spiritual side of things. Yep.

SPEAKER_05 45:31

It takes the flesh out of the driver position.

SPEAKER_00 45:33

And I think it's tough too because I know for me, the times that I've turned towards things that I thought I could control, even outside of like new age, just like general personal development practices and stuff, it was usually because I felt distant from God. Um, and it wasn't until I returned to the intimacy with Jesus that I realized I didn't need all of that stuff, which can be easier said than done. Because if you sometimes we do feel distant from God, we feel like we're he's not speaking to us. And then when we get a tangible result from this technique in a book that we read, that feels more real to us. And we see we even see we see this with uh with Saul, right? And we see this in the book of Samuel, where he asked the Lord what he should do, but the Lord refused to answer him, either by dreams or by sacred lots or by prophets. So what does Saul do? He turns to witchcraft. Yeah, that's that's a dangerous place to be.

SPEAKER_05 46:26

Yeah, um, and I and I just want I just want to such a good that's such a good thing that you just said. Uh when you feel that you don't have the answer from God, when you feel that disconnection, it forces you to go do something in the flesh to try to accomplish a supernatural result. And that's exactly what Saul did. You're absolutely right.

SPEAKER_00 46:43

Well, and that's what the devil's been so good at is using things of this world, yeah, and you even using spiritual things and perverting them, creating counterfeit counterfeit versions. We see this throughout the spiritual realm and also in in marketing and in politics, like my body, my choice.

SPEAKER_04 46:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:59

Jesus said, This is my body. Yeah, you know, yeah. Um, we see this in the no kings. There is a king, there's one king. Yeah, why do you think they're using that message? It's not, it's not coincidence. They don't want to submit. Yeah, there's a reason why they took the rainbow, and which was originally the the symbol of covenantal relationship with God, and now it's pride month. Yeah, listen, I'm not getting into a conversation about that, but I'm just saying there's a clear demonic agenda that perverts what's already from God and uses it a free will.

SPEAKER_05 47:32

Yeah, you're absolutely right. So I get hyped up on this stuff. No, but but that is a really good indication of how the enemy operates. I've heard it said and I believe it's true. The the devil cannot create. He is not a creator, he is a created being. So, in lieu of being able to create something or make something, he has to distort something that's already been created. So he counterfeits and he maligns and he perverts truth to make it sound good, but it's not truth, and it's based off of something that does actually have truth, but he's he's used it to play into emotional desires and fleshly pursuits.

SPEAKER_00 48:11

I'm gonna sound a little bit like a conspiracy nut here, but I think we you and I might be on the same page. I mean, this this is the danger of AI and technology, yeah, because the devil would love to be God, but he can't be everywhere all the time.

SPEAKER_03 48:24

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 48:24

But I don't know, it's looking a lot like he has access to I take a picture and there's a little piece of information in the background. Yeah, now AI can determine your location. Yeah, we're constantly taking pictures, it's constantly recording us, we're putting our life on the internet. I don't know. That seems a little bit like a tool from the end of it.

SPEAKER_05 48:47

Yeah. Yep, that's pretty scary. I think the podcast is over. We're uh signing off now.

SPEAKER_00 48:55

Well, let's let's get back on track here. Um, and we'll we'll wrap this up momentarily. But I want to encourage uh you, the listener, to return uh to intimacy with Jesus, pursue him, get useful for the kingdom, keep your hands busy. And I don't say that to be funny. Like this is a big thing when I when I talk to guys um about like uh pornography. Uh they think it's funny to keep your hands busy. But I is I'm I'm I'm serious. Like keep your hands busy, get useful. Um, and if there is, if you feel like there's something in your spirit that's like pointing to uh demonic oppression or something that's outside of your control mentally, you know, seek deliverance, seek healing, go to your pastor, go to your church. Um, but with that, I want to talk about something, a topic here that we see uh throughout social media is this idea of Christ consciousness. Okay. This is a big new age thing. Um, this is another thing that's been perverted. It's like yes, we have the mind of Christ, but you are not Christ. No, this Christ consciousness crowd is really trying to be their own their own God. Um what danger do you see in this idea of Christ consciousness that's different than having the mind of Christ? And and maybe you want to start with what is what does it look like for us to operate in the mind of Christ or to have the mind of Christ? Because it's my understanding that the mind of Christ is not something we download or or that we have to go out and get. We already have it when we're a new creation, and really it's like an uncovering of of the mind of Christ and that identity. So I don't know where the question is in that, but how do you feel about Christ's consciousness and this idea that we are our own gods?

SPEAKER_05 50:38

Yeah, I have to just admit that I am a little bit ignorant about Christ consciousness because on some level um it would feel like the term Christ consciousness would be a good thing, right? I'm being more conscious of Christ. But if we are operating under the understanding that that I, that my thoughts are somehow um whatever they are, are sanctified, then then that's a problem. So let's just you know turn to the scripture to see what it says about having the mind of Christ. Paul says in 1 Corinthians chapter 2, verse 14 the natural person does not accept the things of the spirit of God for their folly or their foolishness to him. And he's not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. That verse alone is it speaks to so much. We can understand the things of the spirit only through the spirit. The only ability that we have to perceive what God is doing is through the Holy Spirit who is God. So we need to be awakened spiritually in order to understand what He's what He's saying. We we joked about this earlier, but we talked about the fact that some terms within Christianity they make sense because we understand their meaning, because there's been a spiritual discernment. Um, I want to die to my flesh is not something that sounds appealing to anybody unless you understand the spiritual reality of what we get to achieve through the death of our fleshly desires. So we have to understand it through the spirit. Verse 15 the spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ through the Holy Spirit, once again, and in submission to the Spirit of God, we have the ability to allow even our mind, which is not by its very nature, by its own devices, a wholly sanctified element of who we are. When it's submitted to Christ, the Holy Spirit then gets to bring revelation to our mind and to our thinking. That's what it means to have the mind of Christ. We're not thinking in accordance with our own experience, with our own know-how, with what someone else has told us. We're being informed by the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, and He's giving us the ability to understand something that we never could in our natural ability.

SPEAKER_00 53:06

So, what do you think about things like um what I might call subconscious reprogramming, right? Being able to reprogram the mind. Because it sounds to me like we have access to the mind of Christ, but we also have our own mind, right? Or do, or do we have, is it just the mind of Christ? Because we still have our own mind. We still have our own mind, right? Should we be actively and intentionally reprogramming it? Because in uh this is where I come around. It's like, well, if I want to get bigger, faster, stronger, God's given me the ability to go to the gym and follow X protocol and do this thing over these many reps over this amount of time, and I'm gonna experience this um level of performance increase. Same thing with my health. I can track my macros and eat a certain diet, and it will have a practical physiological effect on me. I look at the brain as the same way. The mind is a facet of the brain, I guess kind of an intangible manifestation of it. But also we see neurologically that what we classify as just the mind in this intangible thing is actually rooted in structure and in the way the brain fires with different neurons. And my understanding is that we can intentionally reprogram those neurological connections. We can change belief, we can change thought patterns and emotional programs. Um, and we can do that, but we can also do it in alignment with the truth in the word. Like reading the Bible is rewiring our mind to some extent, right? Meditating on the word is rewiring our minds.

SPEAKER_05 54:26

That was going to be my answer. Romans chapter 10, verse 17 says, but faith comes by hearing, and hearing comes by the word of God. Yeah. Romans 12, 2 says we need to be transformed by the renewal of our mind that only happens with the introduction of truth.

SPEAKER_00 54:41

But is like visualization okay? Like what I'm trying to get is like, can we have an intentional process? Uh maybe even something we find in like a neuroscience and personal development book, that's not really it's not, it's not new agey. It's just like, no, this is a practical neurological process. Is it okay to follow those things?

SPEAKER_05 54:58

If they don't violate scripture. Okay. But first we have to know what the scripture says. Yeah. In order to be able to discern what is good, acceptable, and perfect, our minds have to be renewed. Our minds can only be renewed by scripture. And so if we know what the word says, that means that we then have the ability to hold any other concept, modality, or tool up to it and say, oh, is this in alignment with what God says? Because if it is, great, apply it. But if it's not, then we have to question its validity. Yeah. Um, so first it starts with knowing the truth. And we want to get a couple steps ahead sometimes. Yeah. We want to fast forward the process when the old and the Bible calls them ancient pathways, are the important foundational pieces. It's the disciplines, it's the taking the time of reading the word, of prayer, of meditation, of fasting, of taking place, uh taking part in communion in the sacraments. Those are the ancient pathways that are of old, is what the word says. That's what we follow first. So I know that there are some overachievers, and it's like, hey, I found Jesus, I want to give everything. I want to that's great, but make sure that you've got the first things first. Yeah. Because the renewal has to happen, the transformation has to happen. When that happens, then you are in the right position to be able to move forward and to discern what is God, what is not. And if you get the order wrong, it's probably because you feel like you should be farther ahead than you are, you're comparing yourself to others, or because you're not getting the results that you want as fast as you want. These things can't be uh, they can't, there's no shortcuts. Yeah, it's a process that God leads us through.

SPEAKER_00 56:41

You mentioned timing. It's always an interesting word to me because we see two words in the Bible, right? There's there's Kairos and Kronos, Kronos being chronological time, Kairos being this divinely appointed moment. Yeah. I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, when we talk about God's timing for our life, it's not like, hey, we have to wait X amount of months for God's timing. It's like, are we in alignment with his timing? This his his heavenly beats, his divine cadence, right? It's like a song. Are we matching that in our obedience, in our walk, which then consolidates time and space? And this sounds a little mystical and woo-woo, but I think you know what I'm saying here. It's that alignment, that frequency, which is another woo-woo word. And and the the example that always comes to mind, and I shared this on a previous episode with another uh guest that we had on. Um, it's like a radio station. You, you know, K104 or the sound of life would probably be a better example for us here. 89.7. Yeah, it's playing all around us right now. Those those radio waves are in the air right now. If we had a uh uh a radio, we could tune into that frequency and we would instantly be able to access that information, that song, that music. And I and I and this is the thing I want you to correct me if I'm wrong, is like that that that seems like our relationship with God. It's like when we're in alignment with him and his timing, which is not chronological, it's a divinely appointed moment or beat or cadence. Yeah, that's when the intimacy is felt, that's when the supernatural is experienced.

SPEAKER_05 58:04

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 58:04

Does that sound crazy?

SPEAKER_05 58:06

No, there I think no. I've called it the frequency of heaven before. Oh, cool. And it's it's that tuning into tuning into what the spirit of God is saying. I'm convinced that at any given time that we can quiet the other inputs in our life and we can hear what the spirit of God is saying in the middle of the night, first thing in the morning, before bed, at work, whenever it is, if we would pull ourselves back from the other things, that we would definitely be able to tune into the frequency of heaven and to hear what the spirit of God is saying. It's available at any time. Are we taking the time to do it? Are we so distracted with other things? Are there other pursuits that have taken the priority? I would say for myself, this happens too frequently. And yet every time where I stop and I pull back and I focus back on the Holy Spirit, I'm like, oh, why wasn't I doing this the whole time? Yeah. This was available, this was readily available. If I would just tune into it, and the more that I tune into it, the stronger that signal gets, the less static I hear. And it is that once again, that principle, my sheep hear my voice. When they hear it, they know it, they will not follow the voice of another. That's what we should be in pursuit of above all else, trusting that as we do that, everything else that needs to be in alignment, everything else that needs to, uh, we need to receive to be able to walk through whatever the situations are, that they're available to us in the spirit.

SPEAKER_00 59:34

Well, now I know what our next episode is going to be about how to hear from God. I think that'd be a good one. Um, I'm glad you used the word frequency. I feel a lot better uh being able to use that now. Um, okay, let's let's wrap this up with uh some other common uh new age or cult practices. Uh psychics and mediums. I'm guilty of this. I've been to psychics, I've been to mediums after my uncle passed away. I went to see a medium. She was dead on. So I'll give you, and I don't want to give any any testimony to it. I'm just saying it's real. Yeah. Demonically, of course, I realize now. Uh my uncle had passed away, took his own life in 2011. Um, we obviously, uh, from a carnal, fleshly perspective, wanted closure, whatever the heck that means, right? Um, on the phone with a medium, she was in some other state, it was on speaker phone, and she's talking uh to my grandmother, and she's basically describing like ancestors and things, and all of a sudden describes someone who could be perceived as my uncle. Tattoos, big guy. He was a personal trainer, very, very muscular. Long story short, this medium says he wants to say hi to Tony. Didn't know us, didn't even know I was in the room. She she didn't know I was present.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:46

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:48

So my grandmother first goes, she goes, Oh, well, he was friends with our with uh my other my other uncle whose name is Uncle Tony, my uncle Tony. My uncle Don was friends with my uncle Tony. So she goes, No, how about the one in the room?

SPEAKER_03 1:01:01

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:02

And obviously at the time, I'm I don't understand what's going on. I'm crying because I'm like, oh, my uncle sees, you know, but then as I as I research all this biblically, like this is all communication. One, you're not supposed to do with the dead, but there's demons literally communicating to these people, revealing to them real information that's accurate. But the main problem is that it could steer you one degree off. This is definitely with psychics, is like they may sound so accurate and so precise, but it's because they've had familiar spirits that they're communicating with that have been around your entire life, and then they use that accuracy to push you a little off course. Yeah, you know. So talk to me real quick about the dangers of psychics and mediums specifically.

SPEAKER_05 1:01:44

Yeah, essentially it's another kingdom principle. They have tuned in as well, they've tuned into a different frequency. It's a frequency of the soul. And there also are spiritual giftings that God gives. And one of them is the gift of prophecy, the gift of being able to hear and to discern the voice of God. And these psychics and mediums, I can't speak for all of them or for any of them, but there is probably an element where they have a gifting that has been given by God. That there is, if they were in a place of Christianity devoted to Christ, that he would be using that gifting to be able to hear and to communicate his heart for humanity. And so when the Bible says that the gifts of God are without repentance, they're irrevocable. I I know this to be true that God has given each one of us giftings. But are they submitted to him or are they submitted to the flesh? And so there can be accuracy, and that really can steer people away. Like, yeah, they they knew the name, they saw the face, but they're tapped into a spiritual reality, to the demonic realm. And the thing is that it will never actually produce life and lasting peace. The fruit of what we engage in should always be what we're focused on. What's the fruit of it? What's the what's the outcome of it? Is it bringing me closer into relationship with God, or is it bringing me into a place of emotional distress or fear or self uh effort and being driven by the things I now have to do? Or is it bringing me back to a place of what God is saying? And what for me, when I hear prophecy, it's kind of gotten a bad reputation at times because there's been those that are like, or I have a prophetic word from you, you're doing this wrong and this wrong and this wrong, you need to repent. And there can be certainly that revelation from the Spirit of God of things that need to be corrected. But far more often than not, that it's revealing the heart of God. It's revealing the goodness of God, it's revealing more of his spirit and more of his character and nature. And so the fruit of it is the goodness of God that leads us to repentance, it leads us to change, and that's the godly side of it.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:55

You probably see me smiling over here because this is actually a divinely orchestrated moment right now, and I'll tell you why.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:01

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:01

We started recording at like quarter after four at 4.05. I'm looking at this message right now from a former client of mine who haven't talked to in months. Wow. She's a medium. And I've always known, yeah, I've I I've realized, and you confirmed this through saying that it can be a gifting, right? And a calling on, and I knew that like she has a gift, but it needs to be used for the king, and I haven't said it to her. Yeah, this is confirmation I need to say because what are the chances that we're recording this episode? Yeah, you confirmed what I've thought about her. Wow. Um, and she reaches out. So I'm I I I'm gonna probably share this episode, but I'm definitely gonna reach out to her after this call.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:36

Holy Spirit's so good.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:37

So oh man, and even if it even if like the podcast was just yeah for this and it ended after that, and I could reach out to her and hopefully these moments are happening all the time.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:46

Yeah, these Holy Spirit connection moments. I shared with you the testimony the other day. God it was able to divinely orchestrate me meeting somebody who had just watched our live stream, didn't know who I was, and my son was the one that led us into that conversation, which resulted in them being invited to church and having a uh ability to respond to Jesus as their Lord and Savior. The Holy Spirit was just orchestrating these things. So the spiritual realm is so real, and there's probably moments in all of our lives where we're like, that's too crazy to be coincidence. Yeah, it is. The Holy Spirit's trying to get your attention because he's doing things, he's working things on your behalf, and they're happening before you even get there, whether you're aware of them or not. So, how much better is it to be tuned into what he's doing so that you can partner together with the Holy Spirit? And that's this expansive kingdom idea. That's that, yes, the the path to righteousness in the kingdom is narrow, the gate is is narrow, but when we walk into it, it's expansive. There is so much in it that God wants to do through our lives.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:54

Amen. Yeah, and it's just it's all here. It's like all like it's all it's all if you're searching for the supernatural.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:00

natural like I think we're gonna we're gonna get to heaven one day and we're gonna be like oh it was so clear it was right there how come I didn't how come I didn't engage in it in a greater level well that's and I think a lot of these things will will seem like child's play yeah and that's to me like all this stuff that I used to work in and use is like child's play compared to the real power that's in Jesus and even something like horoscopes yeah it's like where's your identity rooted? Yeah who is it rooted in the month you were born in the position of the stars because you or the one who created the stars.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:27

Exactly you read a paragraph in a newspaper and you and that described you come on you know like and I think I say that kind of flippantly but like seriously like if you're if you're using horoscopes or even some of these like uh enneogram things and I I think those can be dangerous too because you're placing so much of your faith in what a system or what uh even a fake prophecy if you will if you take your identity from it.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:49

Exactly right there are some that can be used for for good because there's a recognition of some of how God's made you to be but if that becomes oh that's who I am and it becomes the excuse well I acted that way because I'm a a Virgo, a Leo, a Libra, whatever they are, you know um then that becomes part of your identity. A personality test, right? If it reveals some of your motivations and those kind of things, it can be used for good, but still not to define you.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:16

Absolutely. Yeah and I think too is is where's where are you attributing the power to if you have crystals on your desk because you think they're gonna help you heal yeah no if you have if you like some gems or whatever crystals and they look cool and it's for whatever you know don't give any power to it. Same thing with the horoscopes same same thing with the other let me be clear I I wasn't giving any credibility to horoscopes but to there are some personality tests that I would say could be beneficial but never to this other yeah I and I've done disc profiles and things like that but there's clearly yes this is not an all-encompassing uh statement but specifically things that are yeah I agree with you completely like horoscopes yeah um okay in ending here what what is the the true danger uh that you see in all of this and and what do we do about it?

SPEAKER_05 1:08:05

True danger simplified the tree of life the tree of the knowledge of good and evil anything we're going to to empower us to bring us greater spiritual realization to be able to do that what we are focusing on is what is going to grow in our life and we might think it's only just in this area I'm only pursuing it in this area the way we do one thing is the way we do everything. And any source in our life that is not Jesus is a counterfeit source that will not lead to life. It will not lead to lasting results. It may bring temporary benefits but it ultimately will bring an opening and access potentially worst case scenario to the demonic realm to have influence in your thinking and in your belief systems. And then there are agreements that can be made that are not just present in your life but can be passed down to the next generation to those that come after you because you've made this covenant you've made there's biblical covenant that we see that there has to be bloodshed in order for the covenant to be made official. In these covenants that are made in agreement in the demonic realm there is a part of our life that's being given to it and it means that it becomes a part of who we are and we reproduce more of it. That's the danger in all of this it's not oh I read a horoscope and I made a decision based off of a newspaper clipping or whatever it is. It's I've opened myself up to the demonic realm.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:31

I've chose a source that is not found in Jesus and any source outside of Jesus leads to death yeah it's it's who are you giving the credit to right um and I I will say you mentioned the word agreement if you have anything in your home that's from the occult books Ouija board I mean this I don't get too legal on these things but I think I think you are still in agreement with it uh even if kind of flippantly you have it so I would I would throw all those things out and practically what I would say that's really helped me and I've seen help other people biblically um first and foremost repent. If you have gone to a psychic or medium uh if you've been involved in the new age of occult uh witchcraft the first thing you need to do is repent yeah then you need to renounce it um and you need to replace it with the truth yeah right he tells us if if if the house is clean right and it's not filled with the Holy Spirit demons come back with seven more stronger than the first yeah and that's a very real um uh consequence of not continuing in your faith and uh pursuing intimacy with Jesus and once again it's through this filter of does it align with scripture and does it glorify God or does it glorify me? Because even even a vision board right we see this a lot like the girls love to have a little vision board group get together. It's like your vision board divorced from God is idolatry. And so you might have to throw out that vision board yeah and you might have to go back and create a whole new one where and I don't think it's bad to have a vision board but consult God first get his opinion on it.

SPEAKER_05 1:11:06

Yeah right I was thinking of James chapter four verse four and it says don't you realize that friendship with the world makes you an enemy of God if you want to be a friend with the world you become an enemy of God. That is a very sobering statement and the other thing that I want to say is this being aware of the places of repentance are so important but repentance is what leads us back into God being the one who overcomes and so I never want to instill fear. Yeah maybe you've uh you've dabbled in the occult you've gone to mediums and to um psychics and those kind of things there is in repentance and turning away from those things there is the grace of God and so I don't want there to be a fear about what the outcome of that is there needs to be a reliance on God. I receive your grace and your mercy and your forgiveness in this I'm just choosing to renounce and to disconnect from those things. And if there's any part of this that has become a part of my thinking, my belief system if I've given access to the demonic realm in any way I know that I am covered by the blood of Jesus I come out of agreement with any thought, perception, lie of the enemy I break the assignment of the enemy over my life and I come into agreement with the scripture that says that those who have been set free are free indeed and to walk out that reality. And you said it before we at our church we are happy to pray for those who have been afflicted by any of these things. And if that's anybody listening we can pray certainly at the end of this but also find a Bible believing church that believes in the power of God and receive prayer step into agreement with them to come out of alignment with the the assignment of the enemy in your life.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:51

Yeah. And I think too to to back up what you just said it's not about fear but I think urgency is probably a good word right like I want people to feel an urgency to like uh to address these areas of their life where there might be some demonic oppression or or torment because of things that they've practiced. But also like we started the top of this episode with it's it's not to give this too much power yeah but to to acknowledge the fact that it does have influence when it goes unchecked.

SPEAKER_05 1:13:18

Maybe this brings peace. Yeah. Maybe the recognition of oh I've been battling battling against some things and it's not just because I didn't try hard enough that there might be other factors at play here. But greater is he who lives in me than he that is in the world. Yeah. We have been given authority over the enemy over unclean spirits over the demonic realm and it comes through Jesus. So that should be an encouragement for everybody today.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:41

Yeah and I and and normally we have you pray us out of here but I would like for me to pray us out of here with the prayer that helped me um break free from uh from the occult practices and and from what I think or what I know was oppression due to what I was involved in. And uh before I before I read this prayer and we can always edit it out if you don't agree with it, but I think it covers pretty much everything we've talked about here and it is biblically aligned as far as I can tell. When I read this prayer out loud it was one of the other times that I've manifested physically and what what happened was I was I was praying like this with my hands open. I was I was reading this and closing my eyes kind of read a line say it and all of a sudden my hand started going I can't even replicate it physically my hand started going like this faster than I could do like it was not humanly possible how fast it was going and it kept going until I got to the end of this prayer and then I felt that peace.

SPEAKER_05 1:14:36

I felt that freedom and once again someone listening to this might think I'm making this up or someone watching okay I mean I'm not what do you have to gain from exactly being transparent about that.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:47

Yeah but I I just know me because the old me would be like oh that's that's yeah that's weird that's not true like you know um but that's what happened to me and it was through reading this prayer. So I would encourage anybody and I'll put it I'll make sure it's in the show notes um that I'll pray this uh I'm gonna read this and uh you can read it through the show notes or you can follow along here even um and just to recognize who you are in Christ like we do have a power and authority in him um and I always look at it like a like a police officer right we have the power and authority because we've surrendered to the one with the power and authority. Yeah if we don't we lose our authority and power. So this starts with seeking him seeking his kingdom and in doing so through our obedience is how we exercise his power you do you can't just rebuke something you can't just renounce something without the power and authority to do so right yeah okay so I'm gonna pray for everybody uh and I encourage you to to follow along so Father in the name of Jesus Christ I come before you with a heart bowed in humility. I acknowledge that I have walked in darkness knowingly or unknowingly and today I ask for your mercy. I thank you for drawing me to this moment. By your grace you have opened my eyes to the truth and it is not by accident that I have found this truth. It is your love that has reached for me and Father I believe that you love me. You proved your love by giving your one and only begotten Son Jesus Christ to die for my sins and rise again for my freedom I confess that I have participated in things that grieve your spirit such as witchcraft sorcery divination magic the occult and new age practices. But today I make a decision to turn away from every dark path and return fully to you. By the power of the blood of Jesus Christ I renounce reject and break every covenant agreement or attachment I have made with Satan, demons, familiar spirits or any force of darkness whether knowingly or unknowingly let every legal right of the enemy over my life be revoked now in the name of Jesus. I declare that I am no longer bound to darkness. I am no longer tied to the lies or illusions of the enemy I belong to Jesus Christ and through him I am made clean. Father wash me, purify me deliver me. Let every chain of bondage be broken off my spirit, soul and body. Let the fire of the Holy Ghost consume every residue of the enemy in my life let your blood speak a better word over me cleansing, redeeming and restoring me into full fellowship with you. Holy Spirit fill me afresh fill every empty place restore what was broken heal what was wounded teach me to walk in truth and righteousness and in your presence daily I surrender completely to you. Thank you Father for hearing my prayer thank you for forgiving me and restoring me and calling me your own from this day forward I declare that I am a child of light and I will never go back in Jesus' mighty name amen