Dungeons and Dragons, a Gateway to Evil?

“But one is tempted by one’s own desire, being lured and enticed by it; then, when that desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and that sin, when fully grown, gives birth to death. Do not be deceived, my beloved.” James 1:14-16

In a recent conversation I was asked about what influence Dungeons and Dragons had on my fall from Christianity to Satanism. Now for a lot of people this is simply an absurd question, but there are many people that remember the Satanic scare and the blame of Dungeons and Dragons in some murders and such. These things have taken hold in the mind of some Christians to the point that they can see D&D as a gateway drug to Occultism and Satanism.

For me, this was not the case. Yes I grew up playing Dungeons and Dragons and reading fantasy novels of swords and sorcery, but I don’t think that these things had that much impact in my life choices to follow the road to the Occult. There were a lot of reasons and influences in my fall from grace, if you will.

I was raised and taken to church by my mother up until I was five. We lived in Eastern Kentucky at that time and we moved to Tennessee at that time. When we moved my mother did not find a church so we stopped going to church until I was asked if I wanted to go to a Youth Group at a church when I was in 5^th grade. Mrs. Harris I thank you for that. Women English teachers have been some of the most influential people in my life.

I started going and by the time I was 11 I had been saved and baptized, but even by this time I had seen things that I didn’t talk about because people thought I was a weird enough kid as it were. I didn’t think that telling people that I have seen people walking around bridges and I knew they weren’t really there would not help my case for being normal, whatever that really means. When I was baptized things were not exactly as I had expected them to be.

I was attacked spiritually with waking visions, audible voices and typical schizophrenic activities. Of course when an 11 year old kid tried to explain this to my preacher, he thought I was telling stories or acting out for attention. Whatever the reason, I was not believed. If my preacher would not believe this spiritual thing that I was going through there is no way that my mom and friends would believe me.

So I felt isolated and alone and tried to deal with it on my own and eventually gave up. I thought at that time it was a Baptist thing. So I started researching on my own and learning what I could, but I was not going to church anymore. I was angry at God the situation and everything else about what I had gone through.  Eventually I just let go and gave up.

I would come back to it every few years but at that time I was seeking a higher understanding and enlightenment. I was changing and had a reputation for being an angry boy who would get into fights. I didn’t have too many friends and ended up reading more about Dungeons and Dragons than playing it.

My searches and studies had taken me to looking at the older religions. I was trying to find a truth among what people believed as long ago as I could find. I would look for themes and understanding and I found a few “truths” about the power that human beings have. A few of these are validated even in Christian thought. The biggest was that humans have dominion over spirits.

Humans have power of spirits. So spirits are real, and I can make them do what I want. I knew that spirits were real; I had seen them and felt them. By this time I was focused more on the power of the mind and not really concerned with fantasy stories. Then someone told me another truth that I knew but was looking for validation for. Magic is real.

This was not the sorcery magic from Fantasy novels. It was more akin to force of will and the ability to affect the world through your will. So I tested it, and it worked. I didn’t realize at that time I was already prey to demons and other energies that were leading me down the road to Satanism. The only thing that Role Playing games did for me was put me in touch with my wife.

I had studied magic and occult for a while and got involved with a few guys that practiced the darker arts, which showed me how to spot demons for the first time. Well these demons were just tormented spirits mostly, but I was still naïve. It would be years before I would be calling myself a Satanist.

What role did these games have in my fall? Not much of anything really, in fact that was the first thing to completely go when I converted to Satanism. The sinful man knows only toil. There is no rest for the wicked. All those saying are very true. I worked, lived and breathed sin. Rolling dice on Friday night and eating Cheetos did not condemn me. My actions and belief condemned me.

Video games did not corrupt my spirit. Rejection, judgment and condemnation corrupted what was supposed to be love. Isolation allowed me and the demons to do all the harm in the world to me. An abusive first marriage didn’t help things, and a lack of having time to play games and have fun certainly didn’t help. I had no release and was so obsessed with what I had become that I was blind to how stupid it all really was.

1^st Corinthians chapter 10 holds a truth I learned on that path as well. The deities that pagans worship are demons. I found that truth when I was a Satanist and it was an essential passage to help draw me back to Christ. That truth was very much needed for me at that point.

What got me on that road? Being isolated, judged, condemned, hated, outcast, different, and too smart for my own good without the wisdom to see how foolish I was. There is a whole list, but movies, video games and Dungeons and Dragons are not things on the list. Could it for someone? Yeah, but more times than not it is a collection of things.

I fully believe that it is not one thing that drives people from Christ and into any other direction they go. It is a collection of influences that draw us down into the darkness. For without the light of God we live in darkness. I am always nervous talking about my fall. I used Christian writing to learn more about demons many times. I know that temptation and curiosity can lead to further studies into the dark, and it’s dangerous.

In several movies, philosophies and stories there is a message that has led to the warning that I give now. Nietzsche I think says it best, “And if you gaze for long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.” Don’t go there… just don’t. Not for the sake of understanding. Don’t open those doors, leave them alone because each one you open lets something know who you are and gives you more you have to fight.

Spiritual Warfare is hard enough without a Smite Evil spell in our back pocket. No matter how long you play D&D you will not be able to throw fireballs. No matter how many times you read Harry Potter you will not produce the patronus charm. And if you think these things are evil, but approve of Narnia because the author was a great Christian Scholar I feel you may want to reconsider the prior. Stories, games and movies do not make people evil.

If you do not know love, you will replace it with hate. A bully will create more evil than every book that has been written. A bully can be more dangerous than the “Satanic Bible” by Anton LeVey. The story that the Satanic Bible preaches is one that we hear every day. We are in control of our lives and can do what we wish. We are an army of one.

We hold the true power, and thus our own little gods. But let me tell you friends, there is only one God, and his son died for us all. He came to tell us to love God and love others. You can try to drive the car all you want, but if you want to get where you’re going, you might want to give dad the wheel.

“D&D was a training ground for our imagination.” Vin Diesel

After the Cross

“Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently. But watch yourselves, or you also may be tempted. Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.” Galatians 6:1-2

To continue with the theme of the recent articles, I wanted to discuss what’s next. We have walked the journey to the Cross and accepted Christ and have been baptized for our rebirth. Now what?

To start I want to reflect for a moment over Galatians 6 for a moment. Each of us have been caught up in a sin that we cannot seem to break free from. Paul talks about his affliction of the flesh and Peter tells us about the things that he wishes he would do he does not, but the things he desires not to do is what he ends up doing instead.

Galatians gives us some instruction on how to help our family with this cycle, but I think of a bigger thing with this verse. I mean this verse can go down to someone that has a habit of telling white lies to allowing his thoughts dwell on sinful desires a bit too much. Many times we are able to forgive the person that is having this issue and able to take up the advice in Galatians 6 and gently restore the person.

What if the sin they were caught up in was something “more” than lust driven thoughts? What if it were as extreme as Rape? What if it was Murder? What about Armed Robbery? Can you or I gently restore that person? Well Jesus calls to us to do the same thing in these cases as well. Sin is sin, it’s black and white. There are no varied degrees of sin, you have sinned or you have not sinned.

But we have a hard time not putting these sins on a scale. Cannibalism certainly seems a lot worse to the human mind and to me than telling your friend that you were at the mall instead of at your house when they called and you didn’t feel like talking. But lying is sin. Cannibalism would certainly be a sin, and well sin is sin.

This mindset that there are sins larger than others is a hard thing to get beyond. There are so many emotions that weigh into the process. As human beings the more fear that something puts into our hearts makes whatever it is worse than something that we don’t really fear. Stealing a bottle of water is a lot less scary than a home invasion.

It’s only human, but for us to start looking at what is next for us, we have to start realizing that sin is sin, and grace is grace. If we are saved by grace for the totality of our sin, why cannot someone else be reconciled by the same God that gave you forgiveness? If he sees all sin as sin, and has informed us of this fact, how can we not accept that?

If you have committed the least of these then you have committed the greater as well. All of us have committed rape, murder, and idolatry in God’s eyes based on this one passage. Is that taking the passage out of context a bit? Perhaps, but I don’t think I am taking it too far out of context there.

Jesus was proving a point with similar things. He was proving that we cannot be saved by the Law that only Grace could save us. We all fell short of the Law, and that’s why he came and died for us. We have already accepted that forgiveness and grace from him. We met him at the cross and were baptized in his blood that washed us clean.

What’s next? Allowing ourselves to forgive ourselves and begin our walk with Christ. Before we can love others as we love ourselves, we have to actually love ourselves. For some people that will be harder than others. Some of us love ourselves a little too much and that just means we have to love others a lot more in the process.

This was something that was particularly hard for me to do. Forgive myself for all the people that I had hurt and all that I had done against Christ and his people. All the lives that I had touched in a harmful way and being a tempter, making people question everything that they thought they knew to draw them into darkness.

As a Satanist it was my goal to build up a base of followers that was able to tear down the grip that God has on the souls of the world. Christianity is the number one religion in the world, and I wanted to tear it all down. During my time as a Satanist, many people that I had worked with had committed suicide or spent time in mental hospitals.

The fact that I blasphemed God’s name daily and God said it is forgotten, I love you anyway. That kind of love is amazing. God loves us to the point that no matter how far you have drifted from Christ he will open his arms and welcome you home. That love is what drove me back into his arms and drove me to make life changes to ensure that I did not find myself back in that dark place again.

But how can someone that now has morals forgive himself for that kind of harm. I cannot help but feel that I am responsible for the suicides of people that I was teaching. How do you get past that? How do you forgive yourself for that? One day at a time, embracing God’s love and his mercy. It is through his grace and his love that I have been resurrected.

The man that I once was is long dead, but the memories are still there. My body and soul is marred with scars, scars are wounds that have healed but have left a mark. Khalil Gibran says this about scars, “Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars.” Thomas would only believe that Christ had returned from the dead after he saw the scars on the wrists of Christ.

Remember that it is not the scars that are important; it is the fact that those wounds are healed. God is a God that heals our wounds. But not every wound heals to the point that there is no scar. Through these scars you have your story and testimony. An abusive relationship leaves scars on both people. We walk around with perfect masks hiding the numerous scars that we have on our hearts and souls.

If we focus too much on that and not the fact that they are forgiven, and work daily to allow ourselves to be transformed by the Holy Spirit and forgive ourselves, then what point do those scars have? They will just be a friendly reminder of the times that you have failed.  The greatest way we can use these reminders is going back to Galatians 6. Remember your scars and use them to help someone else with their restoration.

The deeper the scar the longer it hurts and the more tender it is. You remember the pain caused by that scar and you now have strength by coming through the other side of that wound. You survived and have power in your scars if you choose to use it. Allow these wounds to heal and become scars then use these scars to help others with similar wounds.

Helping others heal and showing love to others is fulfillment of Jesus’s new commandments to us. What’s next? Many of us have a lot of healing that we have to work through. Others of us have stories to tell of God’s grace and mercy. Others of us just need to love on people to make sure they know that Christ is not point at you with a hot poker to burn you for every wrong that you have done.

What you do with your scars is up to you. If you just want to use them as reminders of things not to do again if great. If you want to use them to help others, that is great. What Jack didn’t realize in Fight Club was that he already had scars. So what can you do with your scars?

“There is something beautiful about all scars of whatever nature. A scar means the hurt is over, the wound is closed and healed, done with.” Harry Crews

http://GodForgives.Us

Fear: Sin's Greatest Tool

There is no fear in love; instead, perfect love drives out fear, because fear involves punishment. So the one who fears has not reached perfection in love. 1 John 4:18

One of my favorite movies of all time has a quote about the topic that we are looking at, “Fear will keep the local systems in line.”  This was spoken in Star Wars: A New Hope by Grand Moff Tarkin. Within the empire he was most likely the third most powerful man. This statement is one that has been quoted most commonly as “Fear will keep them in line.”

These words are words of control. How are they going to keep control with Fear. Why does this work? Charles Stanley says it this way:

“Fear stifles our thinking and actions. It creates indecisiveness that results in stagnation.”

Fear has been with us longer than nearly any other emotion that we have today. We look back to when Adam and Eve first sinned; they hid themselves because they were scared. As we have gone along humanity has learned how to use this as a tool for oppression and tyranny. If people are afraid then they need someone stronger than them to protect them.

Fear comes from many places, ignorance being one of the strongest of these places. Today we are crippled as a society in fear. We can look at the news and become terrified at how horrible our world has become. People live in gated communities to help them feel safe. People are so afraid of people that we will not extend a helping hand.

We are too afraid to answer the pleas of a woman that is escaping her rapist. We are too afraid to answer the door to a dying man and furthermore call the police and state that someone is trying to break in and hurt you. We do not answer to help anymore. We do not answer the calls of people in panic. Forget the parable of the Good Samaritan; we are so much worse than that now.  We are afraid that the man lying in the ditch is going to hurt us.

Do any of us remember what FDR was talking about when he said the quote, “The only thing wehave to fear is fear itself.”? It was 1933 we were at the end of the Great Depression. Unemployment was at 33% and things were looking very grim for the United States.  Fear is what was keeping us from coming out of it, or so FDR stated.

Fear is crippling to the spirit. It is only as strong as we allow it to be though.  Perfect love casts out fear. All through the Psalms we hear about how we have nothing to fear, well except God’s wrath if we anger him. The news has made their mark on the modern culture by scaring us into accepting what ever laws will protect us.

There is a long history of media being used by the leaders of countries to convey propaganda. It’s been happening for as long as media has been in existence. Fear has led to man-kinds greatest follies in my opinion. The Holy Inquisition, slaughters around the world. We fear our neighbors so we make war with them. You can see these themes in movies, books and in history. Well we were scared so we attacked or ran.

So I would like to focus on a couple of non-political things with this message and you can take it where you wish from there. In Charlotte there was a man who had ahorrible car accident, he was lucky to survive it. He goes to the nearest house that he could see pleading for help. The people in the house called the police and told the police that there was someone trying to break into their house. Police arrive on scene and the nearly dead man runs to them for help. The police officer panics and shoots the guy 10 out of 12 times.

Second, a rape victim escapes a car where she had been raped for a while. She runs nearly naked to a house to get help. As she pleads to the couple inside to help her saying that she had just been raped, they call 911 refusing to let her in because of fear. A representative of the police department had this to say, “unfortunately fear dictates the response anymore not knowing if you’re being set up for other criminal activity.”

The man in the first story lost his life. The woman in the second story was saved. But in both instances we were too afraid to help someone. Now let us look to God and ask if this is what he intended for us. It is not. We were supposed to be freed from the chains brought upon us by sin. Fear was introduced first with sin and with freedom of sin also comes freedom of fear.

So what else does Fear prevent us from doing? Jesus gave us two commandments which were rewrites of the original 10. Love God with all that we have and Love others as we love ourselves. If we are afraid of our neighbors we cannot love them, thus we cannot uphold the Lord’s commandments. Fear is keeping us right were Satan wants us. We are crippled in fear. Fear is an embodiment of darkness. Love is am amplification of light.

Darkness cannot exist where there is light. Fear cannot exists in a heart of pure love. We are still imperfect beings in bodies of sin, so we must tell our bodies no and stand against fear. We cannot become the people God wants us to be so long as we allow fear to dominate our lives, minds and cultures. We cannot destroy terror by weapons. Only through love will we conquer fear and terror. War is not the answer, it never has been. We cannot stand as one nation under god so long as we fight those that are different from us.

God is for Jew and Gentile alike. The love of God is for us all and we are given command to go into the world and spread the good news, not the bad news. Go into the world and love these neighbors near or far as you would love yourself. Today, if you do nothing else, say something positive or help someone just because. Love someone even if you have to start with yourself. Only then can you start shaking off fear.

If you are Christian, talk to someone that is not of your faith. Ask a Muslim to tell you of their faith ask them why they chose to walk that life. Who knows this may open a door for God to use to build a bridge in your life. If nothing else it will help you affirm your belief in God and show love to someone else who might need it. Or even more it may start changing a perception that Christians are war mongering hate machines. Funny, how many Christians would be taken back if they knew that’s what others see us as.

The thing that you fear the most, learn something about it. Do not let the voice of hell shape your worldview by creating misconceptions of what people really are. Just get up and get out… shake off the bondage of fear. So many of us are crippled and just as Jesus told many crippled and dead, “Get Up, Stand.” That’s all you have to do, stand and take a few steps for God. For all that God has done for you, how can you deny him the one thing. Spread his message and love someone. It’s not as hard as you think.

“Every adventure begins with the first step.” JRR Tolkien, the Hobbit.

Safe Salvation

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. ~Ephesians 6:10-12

I begin with a disclaimer on this topic, for it is controversial to an extent. This, as with all the topics I am writing about, is from my understanding that God has given me. So I start with a question. Do you believe Christians are safe from the Demons once we have accepted Christ? Let’s think about this from a biblical sense for a moment. Now let’s think about our lives and the struggles that we have faced since becoming Christians. Again, I ask, “Are we safe from Demonic influence once we have accepted Christ?”

I would love to say Yes to this question, but alas, I cannot. So let us begin with the rest of the passage from the quote above. It is from the Armor of God payer found in Ephesians 6:10-20. As we look over it and the target audience. This was written for the Ephesians church, it was written for Christians as an empowerment of ourselves to help us stand against demonic influence and direct assault.

So clearly if once we were saved and baptized in the blood of Jesus Christ we were safe from their assaults we would not need such powerful words and prayer.  This is not to scare you so much as make you aware. Many Christians and non-Christians walk through life oblivious to these influences. To an extent there is a protection for those that are truly innocent and blind to things, but that only goes so far.

Through my time practicing the occult, I opened myself up to learn and know things that humans were not meant to know and see. With each of these things, I opened myself up to what was hidden in this corner or that corner by cutting away the hedge of protection that kept me safe from it. A wall is only strong and safe as long as it is intact. Each one of these journeys I knocked a whole in the wall that was keeping me safe.

Demons are smart, they are cunning, so they are always looking for ways to get through these walls, and then sometimes God feels we need to learn a lesson or be tested in a way that allows something through to influence us. For a biblical truth of that all you have to do is look at Job.  This demonic influence can go all the way to possession. It is very hard for a demon to possess a Christian follower, but it is possible.

Each of us have our vices, as our flesh is made of sin. They begin with these vices and look to see if we will give in to their influences. If we slip, then they continue to push until they get in. I believe that some of the failed relationships of Christians are a direct result of this kind of influence. The flesh is weak, so our spirit must be strong.

Again we go back to the Armor of God. Each part is something that we must do. The prayer is instruction for us. First we learn why we need it. Our true struggle is not against flesh and blood, it is against the world, this dark world. The world has embraced sin as a way of life. In fact we are warned of being of the world and told again and again that the flesh that we wear is dead and filled with sin. Baptism cleanses the soul as a bath cleanses the flesh.

It does not stop there however, our enemies are in the heavenly realm as well. This passage may seem odd to a lot of people, but I must remind that Heaven and Hell are both in the Heavenly realm. They are beyond the physical world and cannot be touched by the flesh. That is the meaning of the Heavenly Realm in this passage. It is the spiritual world, the non-physical world, that space between and in-between all things.  That’s why the whole armor is important.

The belt of truth, we must carry truth with us and allow it to be spoken from us and about us. The truth is both a talk about being honest as well as being honest about what you have been through. It helps protect us from the spirit of lies as well as protects our mind. The breastplate of Rightousness, be as righteous as you can be in all you do. It is also the piece of armor that is most visible. Walk the walk of Jesus and do what was commanded of you.

This will help us from getting in situations that we will likely succumb to our fleshy weakness. Shod your feet with the Gospel of Peace; we must know the gospel and be ready to share it as well as allow it to be a marker for ourselves. Spread the word of love and compassion. And above all else carry with you the shield of faith.

The shield of faith. This becomes our symbol of protection. This is what we must use to put out the flaming arrows that are shot over the wall we talked about earlier. We must take great care in building our faith, repairing our shields and keep that with us always. Each and every day we must tend to it for it is what keeps us safe from attacks.

Upon your head the Helm of Salvation; we must believe in our salvation and know the power held within that salvation. We are saved through the blood of Christ, we must not doubt that fact. Carry with us the sword of the spirit which is the holy word of God. Read your bible, carry those words with you.

To quote Tyrion Lannister from “A Game of Thrones” the mind needs books like a sword needs a whetstone.” Reading and meditating on the word of God daily keeps your Sword sharp for when the enemy gets beyond the wall and our shield is not holding up, it is through the use of the word of God that we will defeat our foes. But we cannot go into battle naked. A sword alone will not save us.

All of this would not be needed if we were fully and truly safe from the evil spirits. Through this we are prepared to go into battle. This is part of what prepares us for Spiritual Warfare, but not all of us are soldiers. But by no means am I saying to ignore these powerful instructions.  Look deeply upon these words and their true meaning.

So how do you protect yourself from evil? I’ll quote a website that I came across this morning:

(11) How do I protect myself from evil?

Regular prayer and sharing with others in prayer, and worship that upholds the overcoming of all that is evil through the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Believing in the continuing presence of the risen Christ brings protection and peace. Also avoid occult practices that expose you to control by forces beyond yourself.

That sums things up pretty nicely. If you notice that last part, “Also avoid occult practices that expose you to control by forces beyond yourself.” I cannot stress that more. As you go through and learn about yourself and look for who you are in Christ, I urge you to avoid this, unless you feel a calling from God himself to learn about this.

I opened myself up to it and it drug me down as a slippery slope all the way to worshiping the enemies of God. There is something to be said for rites and rituals; you can find them in all branches of religion. They have great power, be mindful of them, you can use them to help and for harm.  May God be always with you, and share the Love the Christ spoke of.

Where's Your Seed?

The old parable that calls back to me on many occasions is the one about the three different kinds of soil. You have the seeds cast in with rocky soil; thrown among the thorns; thrown to the way side, and then finally you have the good soil. The parable has always been taught to me to be about the condition of someone’s heart when you or someone approaches them about the message of God. For me I get a little bit of a different message about this passage.

Something that always rang to me is how much tending needs to be done to make the soil good soil. For a long time I have seen myself to be the seed that was thrown among the thorns. It’s got good dirt, but the thorns make it difficult to grow. Looking through life that is how much of my life has been. I get a good spell right after the garden’s been weeded. Go for a while then the thorns grow right back up around me.

Let’s be clear, none of us were gifted with the perfect soil. Everyone that has started a new garden will know that no patch of ground is perfect. Things were growing there before, there are rocks in the dirt and many times it takes many years of tending before you have good dirt. Now that is not to say that it does not help to have the soil prepared for you. I see this as people that were raised in good Christian homes. That does not mean that your seed cannot fall to the wayside, and certainly doesn’t mean that if left alone that thorns and weeds cannot creep back into the garden.

The biggest issue with good healthy dirt is that it is good healthy dirt. Thorns and weeds love to grow in the same place as fruits and vegetables.  You must always tend to your soil. But back to what I’m talking about today. Each of us has inherited this plot of soil that is who we are. This is our heart, mind, body and soul. There are many things that factor into how hard, rocky, thorny or good our soil is. A strong seed can grow in nearly any condition. It’s just harder.

Why is it important to know what kind of dirt you have? Well once you know what you are working with you will know how much work will needed to be put into it. Also the more work you put into it the better it will grow. Any dirt can become good dirt. It takes TLC. The worse your dirt is the more you have to do to fix it. That is part of how we grow as Christians, and as people for that matter.

I started out with really fertile soil, yeah there were plenty of rocks in it, but it had been worked for me for a few years to start out life. The problem is, it was left untended for a good number of years. By the time I first walked to Christ, I had plenty of rocks still there and the weeds had taken over. But the dirt was fertile.

The seed took root and grew. The weeds had been cleared out enough for this one seed. That wasn’t enough. The weeds liked the dirt and grew back up. Well then I began to ignore it even more and threw more junk in the garden. Bottles, cans, distractions, magazines, people and many other things were thrown in this place. I then realized how much of a mess all that had become wanted to pave over it with something else.

Shopping around I found the thing that was as different from the garden as I could. The salesman was good, “You want knowledge, wisdom, understanding and power… I’ve got all that for you. All you got to do is add a little water, mix it up and poor it over all that and you’ll never see it again. Once you’ve done that you can do whatever you want. Risk free! Satisfaction Guaranteed! No conviction, just pleasure and indulgence.”

“Hell yeah, where do I sign!” was my reply.

Hell indeed. So now this fertile ground was covered in a slab of concrete. When I fell I hit this concrete and it did not give way. Jesus then showed up with a sledgehammer and a shovel. You’ve got the dirt down there, all we have to do is get back to it and get it cleaned up. Here I’ll help. Jesus then began breaking the concrete.

If you have read the “Grey Door” then you know this portion of the story. For 115 days Jesus pounded away at the concrete. Somewhere in there I began to help. We got back down to the soil and started clearing it out. Man it has been hard work. Still 5 years later, people still see all the junk in my garden. Those that do not know Christ says, “Man what a mess you are. I can’t help you.”

This is not my concern though… The story that I have to hear to keep my strength is with the ones that look at my garden and say, “Wow, you’ve come a long way. You’ve got a ways to go, can I help. If you need another shovel just let me know.” These people are my brothers and sisters. My garden is still a mess, but it’s a work in progress. Luckily God loves works in progress just as much as he loves the well-tended gardens.

Mark 4:3-9, Ecclesiastes 4:7-12, 1 Timothy 1:12-17, 6:12-16

Impact, a challenge to pagans

With the Lord has done so much in my life, fulfilling prophecy that was given to me years ago. Those words that I felt at the age of 11 ring out to me today. That promise he made me, “You were here in the beginning, and you will be here in the end.”

God has always had something planned for me. It does not seem to me that it is “ordinary.” I do not claim to be extraordinary or special. I have just taken a walk that, Thankfully, not so many have taken. Those that have, unfortunately, did not find their way back out, or have not yet.

The ministry, if you will, that I feel may be in my future is not an easy one. Not that ministry is easy. Taking people with Occult backgrounds and either drawing them to Christ Jesus or helping those people heal. Ironic, bringing pagans to Christ, that was the mission so many people in the bible was tasked with.

Idolotry is something that this country, nay, this world has issues with. The worshiping the all mighty dollar and those worldly possessions, however, is not what I am talking about. No, I am talking about those that worship false gods. The worship of the Great Mother, Diana, Odin, Loki, Ares, Athena etc. is for fools. These figures are like Gods as the Angles are to The God. 1^st Corinthians 10:18-19 tells us a truth that I knew even when I was not a Christian! When I was in darkness, as now when I am in the Light of the Lord, this truth is sound. These pagan gods are only Demons and Fallen Angels in guise. Lucifer’s former heavenly host.

I will not dispute the existence of beings that prey off followers of these idols. They want you to worship them to take you away from God. Many pagans are fine with this as well. They would not be pagan if they loved God. So these angels that fell from Gods grace use this void put on a mask and draw victims into dark places. They draw them to a place where they hide themselves away from Gods light. They take you to a place where they can whisper lies to you.

Brutalness is just. Might is Right! If you do this ritual, you can be with child. If you make this oath I will reward you with Power, Love, Money, Strength and/or Courage. If you let me in, I’ll give you even more! This is a Lie! These are false promises. They MAY give it to you on short term, but the damages left behind is simply not worth it. And I am not even talking about after you die and what your soul will be forced to endure.

I know this to be true, because I walked it. There is only death from the worship of idols. Pagans do not want to hear this truth. You want to believe in the Gods and Goddesses that you chose to follow. You want to be so in the face of every Christian so that you can have justification for your opinion that Christians only want to cast you aside and shun you. You want to make Christians persecute you so you can say you are persecuted.

I challenge each and every one of you to this. Give Christians an honest chance to show you love and the love of God. Do this without being argumentative and hatemongering, and you will see what you get from them. “Hate begets hate, but Love brings forth love.” The love that the one true God has for you is pure and it is just. If you allow yourself to open up to him and allow him into your heart, then you will know what Love is.

The Power of Faith

Faith, we are told, is one of the most powerful tools that we have to combat spiritual, emotional and physical conflict or strife. We are told that if we have faith the size of a mustard seed we can move mountains. For many these statements work, they sound great and life you up. For others they just see pretty words. Faith is a powerful thing.

I believe in my Lord God, and I believe in what he can do. In dark times it is challenging to faith. Why are we suffering so? Then we look to the Book of Job and see that faith will be challenged. What Job went through, in my opinion, no man should have to go through. It was horrible and awful, but Job stood true. My focus here is not about strife that one will meet in that regard. No, here I will discuss the power of Faith when you are under direct attack.

Now to get a few things in the open: 1) I am a Christian, 2) I believe in the power of God, Jesus, the angels of heaven, 3) I know that demons and Lucifer exists in as physical of a form as angels, 4) I believe in deliverance ministry, and 5) I believe in what the bible tells us about how to deal with the darkness. The path that I have walked to return back to Christ was not a pretty one, but I learned a lot along the way that I hope to share with others to assist them in life.

The darkness is not to be dabbled with. It will grab hold of you, once you look into that darkness once it will see you forever. Even worse, everything that you promise to the darkness, it will hold you to. Once you find out how bad things are and just want to leave it alone, you can’t just stop looking at it. You opened the way and it will remain open until it is shut, and to do this requires you renouncing the paths that you walked, every promise that you made, every vow you swore to EVERY being you talked with or worked with. This is deliverance ministry in a nutshell.

For the next section I will probably get a lot of criticism from my friends at church because the passage I am about to quote is not one that is in most bibles. The Catholics have this book in their bible and I feel it is a book that anyone that is dealing with demonic warfare should read. The book of Tobit is a book of the Apocrypha, and is a story about a righteous man named Tobit. Tobit was struck blind, and he begins to pray a lamenting prayer begging for death. Well at the same time a woman names Sarah begins to pray a lamenting prayer begging for the same.

Sarah, at this time, had been married seven times, but a demon killed the husband before the marriage could be consummated. So an Angel of God comes to Tobit and allows him to see again, and promises to Sarah Tobias son of Tobit. So Tobit calls in his son and instructs him to go to Gabael to get the family money. Tobias sets off and meets a traveler to go with him to assist him on the journey. So the story goes on Tobias catches a fish and the traveler tells him to keep the gall, heart and liver for they are useful as medicine. He eventually finds his way to Sarah, they marry and the Angel reveals himself as the traveler.

He tells him to use the gall and burn it in the bed chamber and it will drive out the demon.  So the question is, will burning a gall of a fish really drive away the demon, or was it the faith of the follower that put his trust in an Angel of the Lord to drive it away? That is a question of semantics. I am no biblical scholar by any stretch so I leave that to others. However I see that in this story it illustrates things that many other books of the bible do not.

We humans have the power to fight off demons and drive them away. However, our bodies are made of sin, the substance that the demons use to fight us and enslave us. This complicates things. So when things are complicated by man, we must turn to God and his angels. Between the Holy Trinity and his Holy Host of workers, and our Faith in them, the demons can be driven away.  As you are wondering what the point is, allow me to ask you a question, a few actually.

Have you ever experienced a time when more than one person in your home had bad dreams? You ever wake feeling a weight about you? You ever see an illusion of the eye that looked like a round ball in the dark? You ever get angry for no reason and words come out of your mouth that are not your own? You ever do something that is REALLY out of character that you know would hurt someone? These are a few of the ways Demons attack us, beyond addictions, bad habits, depression and lust.

You need to know what to look for; you need to know how to keep your family safe. This is not a scare tactic. I just want you to be aware of the dangers that are out there. I know many Christians out there that do not believe in demons in the physical and real sense. I wish that were true. The demon of depression or the demon of lust; well they do exist, and have names. The angel in the book of Tobit is Raphael and the demon is Asmodeus. Asmodeus is a demon of lust and not a nice guy.

So how does the power of faith help with this? It is our strongest weapon against them. Where the flesh is too weak, the spirit must be strong. And faith is how we strengthen our spirit. It will be forged by our trials and tempered by our struggles. You don the Whole Armor of God, and you pray. You bring the light of God into your home and into your heart. Where there is light Darkness cannot exist.

Once you are prepared you call to God, to Jesus Christ and you call forth their Angels. Ask for the angels to push away the darkness, evil and the demons that are trying to hurt those you love. Go through every room of your home praying this in Christ’s Holy Name. You push the spirits out and anoint the doors and windows with oil that you have prayed over to bless with God’s love and light. Ask for the angels to keep these boundaries safe and secure. Go through every room, every door, every window. Then say one last prayer to let the Love of God shine throughout this home. Welcome to spiritual warfare 201.

Keep the faith strong in the house. Let the love of God flow through it because it is true, “Where there is light Darkness cannot exist.” Sit the candle up high for everyone to see, shine as a true example of God’s love. Know your power, the power we receive through the blood of Jesus Christ. Your faith will keep you vigil. Your love will keep you diligent. Do not fight fair, use everything that God has to offer you, because the demons do not fight fair. With God’s Love and Grace.

Pefect Love drives out Fear

After a truly rough night, as part of a rough month, I will have to apologize in advance that this message is going to be one that is going to leave a bit of a sour taste in all mouths that partake. When one contemplates, what are they asking? Quite simple one is asking how or why typically, however many times one is asking questions that cannot be answered by normal means.

There are many dark things in this world, and in this I will be looking at a couple of the darker things that exist. My first topic is doubt and my second topic of the day is a revelation to many of you about what demons truly are. This will not be for the faint of heart or those that do not wish to know anything about what hell is really like.

We human have what is called “Free Will” and I assure you that sometimes that is a very bad thing. It allows us to do whatever we want and of course face the consequences for those actions afterwards. In our society it is used as a teaching tool; a measuring stick; a point of disconcert; a point of hope and destruction. We have the “Free Will” to follow whatever religion we want or do not want, as well as many other choices in life.

This “Free Will” takes us down many roads in life; we each walk our own road. It does not matter how much it looks like someone else’s road, it is your own. As such we walk this road with comings and goings of different people and things as our roads intersect or run together for a while. What happens as we grow through experiencing life is we begin to pile up learned lessons.

We learn how people can be mean; how WE can be mean. We learn how people can be good and how we ourselves can be good. We learn what we like and what we do not. We learn from mistakes that our “Free Will” granted us to make. This is life. How different would we be if one of our earlier choices had been different? As each choice leads us to another, cascading, how different would we be?

Eventually we come to a point in our lives where many of us accept life for what it seems to be. We make the choice of “Well this is my lot in life. I know the role I must play.” You accept “Fate” as it were and start using your free will to choose what would be acceptable in the current situation. For many people this ends up being somewhat of a good thing. It keeps them safe, free from harm. However, for others, life just isn’t that simple.

What if you accept your role in life and it is not the role that “Fate” had determined for you. How many times do we hear the results of such situations? It can come from a sudden change in one’s life, to an unfaithful or abusive spouse. It can come from a plummeting stock market to a natural disaster. What if Life changes on you when things were supposed to happen just as they happened for your mother or father or grandparent? With all this uncertainty in life you can easily see how Doubt can breed.

Even without that it is easy to just ask the question, “Did I do the right thing?” With free will we also are faced with a very real problem. We have to make decisions for ourselves and if we make a decision and something bad happen as a result, our upbringing tells us we made the wrong one. So we make a choice, and we wait to see if it’s going to be good or bad. In the mean time we question, “Was that the right decision?”

Now some will say that doubt is an extension of fear. I can agree with that. We are afraid that we have made the wrong decision so we worry and dwell on it. So if doubt is a form of fear, then does not perfect faith drive out fear? So if we do have that faith, do we run the risk of not learning from our mistakes? Welcome to the realm of doubt.

Doubt is a very dangerous thing, which is why we are as prone to it as a race of people. We doubt ourselves, our fellow man, our government, our society, and even our God(s) if one were so inclined. So as we come to our next decision in life, still doubting our last one, we find this next decision harder than the last. The spiral continues, sometimes we come out okay; sometimes not. That in itself does not help with doubt.

We can always look back on our lives at the “Big” decisions that we made, most of us have some really bad choices that we have made in life. It’s easy to see that those were BAD ideas looking back. So why did we make them in the first place? Chances are that emotions were blocking out logic, but what if emotion had nothing to do with it when you made the bad choice? Well we will just chock that one up to a learning experience and move along, besides you can always blame it on an emotion.

How many of us begin such things, lying to yourself to make you feel better about your bad choice. How many unfaithful men and women blame it on the person they are supposed to be faithful to? The answer is most of them. Why do we do this? Simple to make us feel better. We do not like the idea that we did something wrong; it does not make us feel good.

Humans like to feel good, thus why sex addiction is the number one addiction in the world.  That is a big reason for drugs and alcohol addiction as well. Just look at the choices that people make in life. Why would anyone in their right mind think jumping off of a cliff with only a sheer piece of cloth and a few nylon strings could be a good idea? No, it’s a fun idea. It stimulates us, fear causes a flood to our brain that makes us feel good. So extreme sports, to sex, to drugs, to God, humans are addicted to feeling good, we want to feel good.

This desire leads us to great things as well as bad things. Love, for instance, is one of the greatest emotions that we humans were blessed with. No other thing feels quite as good as pure, deep love. Jesus brings us the message of love. There is no question why Paul compares the love of Christ and the love of God as a marital affair with humans. That type of love, love that you share with that special someone, is irreplaceable.  That is why we doubt when bad things happen in our lives.

As a Christian, it makes me doubt God. As a man, it makes me doubt my society, government and myself.  Very few people who commit suicide are quite like Hunter S. Thompson, who killed himself on what he considered to be one of the most beautiful and best days of his life. Most people do that out of doubt, or deeper Fear. They doubt or fear that people love them. They doubt they are good enough to live. Or they fear that life is just not worth living.

Now that we are in this dark place, let’s go a little further shall we? I know that many Christians see demons as manifestations of doubt, fear, anger, and lust. I know that many people believe that is all a demon is. It’s part of your psyche that has manifested itself as mental illness or depression. If that were true the world would be a much better place.

If that is your belief then please stick around for the rest of the show. I tell you here and now that demons are not just figments of your psyche. They are NOT just depression, worry and concern. No, no. These are all byproducts of their work. Hateful little buggers they are. Now, I step into a space that I am nervous to go back into. However my doubts and fears in my life are not that I will succumb to these as much as just fade to a bad memory. I walk this dark path because my “Free Will” took me straight to the fires of hell.

I walked a path that I hope none are following, but I know you are. Demons are real, spiritual manifestations of all the darkness of the world. When Lucifer rose up in heaven, took 1/3^rd of the angels with him. They fell into a dark place, void and lacking form. They still remembered how to shape the void. They made areas of darkness, cold places. They made places of sand with palaces of gold. They made many things in this place. They made demons as these fallen angels were twisted by their failure. They were twisted by their doubt. They were twisted by their anger and hatred.

They are really not so different from humans. That is the scary part. Some demons were made by the fallen angels from energy that they possess. Others, well they were human once. Their souls tormented in the pit below by these angry spirits until humanity is ripped away leaving only your vices. Not all demons want to do physical harm to you. Some just want you to exploit your vices. Some of the most dangerous demons in hell just want to draw you so deep into desires of the flesh that you forget everything else.

So your grandfather, a wicked man not knowing god, did he really go to heaven? Did he go to hell? How long until he becomes a demon if he did? That is their goal. They want you to become JUST like them. Are you beautiful and love to seduce? You pride yourself on how irresistible you are? Good, they know just the job for you. Are you an angry man, hell bent on the laws and rules? You follow them to the letter? Even the Books of Law, and are stern and unforgiving? Great… we know just where to put you.

If you didn’t catch that last one, let me spell it out for you. Those who do not know the love of God are blind to the true face of God and you are going to go straight down. Some of you are great preachers and are doing such a great service to the agents of evil. Lucifer awards you with employee of the year. Westborough Baptist, this means you. Judge not lest ye be judged comes to mind.

Demons are very dangerous things. They will try to convince you that they are good, or that they can give you what you want. They whisper in your ear when you don’t think they are. Many times that you think they are whispering, they’re not, they already planted that seed. They will trade with you, work on you and try to make a place in your soul for themselves. You let them in, guess what, they now live there and can invite whoever they want to their parties.

Helping a guy out, you offer him a room. Next thing you know, there is a crack-whore having sex on your kitchen table in front of your children. Yeah, demons are like that. Sometimes humans can be worse. Some demons actually have in their mind that they are trying to help humans. They want to free us from our bondage of slavery. Their hatred for God has twisted them to believe that God is a very hateful and vengeful being that just wants to destroy us. Really nice guys huh? Place gifts at your feet, give you everything they can to get you to see the light.

I warn you, sometimes that sexy supermodel that you see in your dreams is really a demon feeding your desires. Sometimes when you dream of that cute co-worker they are tempting you to do the wrong thing, and sometimes they are doing it to that cute co-worker as well. Sometimes however, that is just your own desires of the flesh running off with you. Take ownership of your weakness. Satan will do his job. Humans have a proven track record to do the wrong thing all on our own. Sorry, but that is the ugly truth.

You cannot hate Satan for what he is doing. You should expect it from him. He’s doing the only thing he knows how to do. What you should really focus on is yourself. What can you do? Life sucks, you have yourself and all your bad habits, PLUS you have the demons trying to give you more, and you have your own temptations. How could a human walk through life and really be happy? Now there is a million dollar question.

So where is the silver lining? Why have I spent so much time beating your psyche down? I find myself asking the same question sometimes. Does any of this have a purpose? My answer is, “I hope it does.” As for this, I want you to go away thinking about your life and how trapped you may be. I want you to think if you are really happy. If you are, I am happy for you. Life is hard enough when it’s just life. Do not walk into the darkness; there are things there that will break your mind. You cannot unsee what you see. Hell is real, demons are as well, and they will open their arms to you just as fast as God.

It is a slippery slope. One step will lead to ten. Do not open that door just to peek inside, once they see you without the mask of innocence on your face, they will come running. Even death will not bring freedom from them. The only thing that can is God. The only remedy for fear is love. You cannot scare someone into love either. The only peace that I have is with the love that I share with my wife and my Lord. Its dark right now, I know God is there, I just wish he stood but just a little closer. Until then, it is the love of my wife that keeps me going.