Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - June 26, 2020


REPLAY: The Rise of Millennial Witches


Episode Stats


Length

54 minutes

Words per minute

176.63113

Word count

9,578

Sentence count

552

Harmful content

Misogyny

5

sentences flagged

Hate speech

41

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode of Relatable Monday, we discuss a recent cultural trend, a controversial tweet from Richard Dawkins, and what the Bible has to say about it all. We also talk about the implications of eugenics.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Monday. I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend. So for
00:00:06.360 those of you who have missed Theology Mondays, you are in luck today. We are going to be talking
00:00:12.240 about two things that have happened. One cultural trend and then one thing that a very famous
00:00:18.120 atheist said and we are going to see what the Bible has to say about these things, what truth
00:00:23.540 has to say about these things and to analyze how we should take a look at these two phenomenon from
00:00:31.800 a phenomenon. I think that is the plural form of that from a Christian perspective and we're not 0.84
00:00:39.260 talking about the primary today. You might be wondering how can you skip on something so big
00:00:44.640 that just happened. The reason that we're not talking about the Nevada caucus or Nevada caucus,
00:00:49.540 one of you from Nevada messaged me and said that I said Nevada and that was the wrong way to say it.
00:00:54.160 So the Nevada caucus is because I'm actually recording this the week before. So as I'm
00:01:00.240 recording this, I don't actually know the results. So I don't, I'm not a prophetess. And so I don't have
00:01:07.340 the ability to be able to guess what is going to happen then. But on Wednesday, we will talk about
00:01:13.780 that. We will break that down and all that good stuff. But for today, we are going to look at one
00:01:19.000 central theme and that is the effect and the inherent nonsensical nature of godlessness.
00:01:25.780 Before we get into all of that, I want to tell you guys once again about Genesis 950. So if you
00:01:32.240 were considering replacing your carpets that are stained by your pets or just smell bad because of
00:01:37.960 your pets before you spend all of that money buying new carpets or buying new rugs, you should try
00:01:43.620 Genesis 950. It is an amazing pet stain and odor remover. With water, Genesis 950 breaks down the
00:01:50.600 bonds of stains and odors so they are gone for good. Its antibacterial component removes pet stains and
00:01:55.820 odors from carpet and padding. It can be used in a carpet cleaning machine and is green. So it's safe
00:02:00.920 for your family and it's safe for your pets, which is so important. If you are tired of pet cleaners that
00:02:05.860 just don't work and I've tried a ton. So I've got a cat, Rachel McAdams. I've got a dog, Reagan, and I've
00:02:12.620 tried all kinds of pet stain removers, all kinds of things that are supposed to get rid of odors and
00:02:18.080 they just don't really work very well. But Genesis 950, it's very effective. One gallon of industrial
00:02:24.660 strength, Genesis 950 can make up to seven gallons of cleaner. A larger ratio may be required for old
00:02:30.820 stains and odors, but it'll still work. Not just for your rugs, not just for your carpets. You can
00:02:35.740 use this in your bathrooms, in your kitchens, countertops, granite, engines, wheels, tools,
00:02:40.880 upholstery, literally everything. Not literally everything, but almost everything. Before you
00:02:46.580 purchase new carpet, you have to try Genesis 950. It is available on amazon.com, but if you order a
00:02:52.340 gallon direct at genesis950.com using promo code blaze, you will receive a free spray bottle and a
00:02:58.960 discount that is promo code blaze at genesis950.com. Okay, let's get into all this. So I want to talk
00:03:08.620 about something that Richard Dawkins, he is a very famous atheist, something that he said on Twitter
00:03:17.460 that caused a lot of uproar, not just from Christians, not just from conservatives, but from
00:03:24.280 people all across the spectrum. And we'll talk about why. So he said, it's one thing to deplore
00:03:30.140 eugenics on ideological, political, moral grounds. It's quite another to conclude that it wouldn't work
00:03:36.060 in practice. Okay. Of course it would. It works for cows, horses, pigs, dogs, and roses. Why on earth
00:03:43.100 wouldn't it work for humans? Facts ignore ideology. So people freaked out about this. Now I will say
00:03:49.740 it has a 25,500 likes and 4,000 retweets. So there were some people who thought that,
00:03:58.000 Hey, this is a really good idea. I'm so glad that Richard Dawkins brought this up, but it did get
00:04:03.440 ratioed. It got a ton of replies from people saying, why would you say this? What was the point of saying
00:04:08.460 this? This is totally just something that we didn't need to see today was one tweet that I, that I saw.
00:04:14.060 And of course I agree with that, but I'm actually glad. I'm glad that he said this because he is
00:04:20.780 saying the quiet parts out loud, which is why wouldn't we? What's, what's wrong? He doesn't
00:04:27.480 say this part and I'll get to this in a minute, but really for the atheist, what is wrong with
00:04:31.320 eugenics? So eugenics, the process of basically breeding out any kind of imperfection. So breeding 0.97
00:04:38.100 out any kind of disability, whether it be autism, whether it be, uh, you know, down syndrome,
00:04:46.900 uh, spina bifida, any of those things, trying to create a perfect human race. So people could
00:04:52.420 jump higher, could run faster, could be smarter, whatever. Obviously this was endorsed, uh, by Nazi 0.59
00:05:00.820 Germany to try to create a perfect Aryan race. And so it doesn't really have the best history, 0.52
00:05:06.440 but here we've got Richard Dawkins, his gift to us on his Twitter was to say, you know,
00:05:11.700 eugenics would probably work. Now when people freaked out and the reason why people freaked 0.92
00:05:17.120 out across the ideological spectrum is because it doesn't matter what your political background
00:05:21.820 is. Everyone knows someone with special needs. Everyone knows someone who is imperfect because
00:05:25.900 we're all imperfect in some way. And when you think about some kind of higher government
00:05:31.280 power deciding who is most valuable, whether it's based on race, whether it's based on sex,
00:05:36.580 whether it's based on your IQ, uh, some kind of other cognitive ability or personality, whatever
00:05:43.540 it is, if we get to the point to where you can even start to determine all of that kind of stuff in
00:05:48.160 the womb, um, is it possible to be able to cut out a portion of the human race that doesn't fit 0.95
00:05:54.440 this arbitrary standard of perfection that some kind of bureaucratic power, uh, decides upon, uh,
00:06:01.120 the reason why we freak out is because we all know someone, maybe even ourselves that probably
00:06:07.100 wouldn't fit into that arbitrarily, arbitrarily decided definition of perfection. So people freaked
00:06:14.800 out at him. People started replying and saying, you know, this is ableist. This is bigoted. This could
00:06:20.340 be racist. This could be sexist. Of course, all of this is true. We've seen what the one China or 0.98
00:06:25.560 one, the one child policy did, uh, in China, where you've had thousands and thousands and thousands
00:06:31.640 of aborted babies up until the point of nine months old. That's not just a, you know, a hyperbolic,
00:06:38.140 a scare tactic. That is true. You should watch the documentary one child policy. I think it's on
00:06:44.680 Amazon prime. It is extremely eyeopening. Uh, so we've seen the effects of at least if it's not
00:06:52.560 called eugenics, eugenic type thinking and eugenic type policy, uh, people don't like that. Whether
00:06:58.460 you are on the right or the left, whether you are a Christian or you're an atheist, it kind of makes
00:07:04.200 you feel icky because it is all of the things that the left says that they don't like. It is
00:07:09.260 condescension based on some inherent quality. So the color of your skin, the type of ability that
00:07:14.660 you have, uh, the sexual organs that you have and the right doesn't like it for the most part,
00:07:20.260 because we believe at least Christian conservatives believe that human beings are made in the image
00:07:25.240 of God. And therefore we are inherently valuable and not just inherently valuable, but inherently
00:07:31.260 more valuable than any other species. And so we are against the idea of eugenics. We don't believe
00:07:38.720 in some kind of perfect human race. We don't believe that people are more valuable based on their
00:07:43.620 capability, based on their talent, based on their cognitive ability. We believe that someone
00:07:48.240 who is, um, completely physically disabled and totally mentally disabled, someone who needs help 0.96
00:07:56.780 to do everything physically, mentally, uh, is unable to emote. We believe that that person is inherently
00:08:04.880 and infinitely more valuable than the most capable, the winningest horse, uh, or any kind of animal that
00:08:14.120 you find capable or majestic or valuable. Any kind of human being, regardless of their capacity,
00:08:20.420 regardless of their capability, regardless of their accomplishments, the Christian believes 0.61
00:08:25.460 is inherently and infinitely more valuable than any other member of any other species. However,
00:08:31.480 uh, if you are an atheist, although there are a lot of atheists that say what Richard Dawkins says,
00:08:37.580 you know, that's so gross. Why would you even say that? I'm completely morally against this.
00:08:42.640 Here's the thing. And here's the point that I want to make. The atheist really has no reason 0.99
00:08:50.100 morally to be against this. And Richard Dawkins, I think knows this, but he lives in this crazy,
00:08:57.900 constant state of contradiction and paradoxes in his mind where he pretends to be a moral person.
00:09:03.580 He pretends that righteousness, objective righteousness exists. He pretends that an objective
00:09:08.400 good exists. And yet he, uh, denies the existence of a standard bearer. He denies the existence of, uh,
00:09:16.940 an objective moral arbiter. And yet he purports that some kind of objective goodness and objective
00:09:22.720 badness does exist. And we see that. So he was very frustrated that people were ratioing him,
00:09:28.740 that people were saying, why would you even say this? And he said, for those determined to miss
00:09:32.080 the point, I deplored the idea of eugenic policy. I simply said, deploring it doesn't mean it wouldn't
00:09:37.820 work. Just as we breed cows to yield more milk, we could breed humans to run faster or jump higher,
00:09:42.240 but heaven forbid that we do it. So he is trying to back up and say, whoa, I'm not saying that we
00:09:49.160 should do it. I'm saying that we could do it, that we have the capability to do it, but
00:09:53.900 I'm totally morally against it. First of all, if that's true, why even bring it up? Like there,
00:09:59.880 yes, sure. There are lots of things that people could do, but we don't talk about it. And we don't
00:10:05.520 say, uh, we don't say, Hey, just FYI, everyone, this morally reprehensible thing is possible,
00:10:11.520 but we shouldn't do it. Why even bring it into the conversation? But he thought that this was a good
00:10:16.260 enough thought, not just to consider in his own mind, not just to say in private conversation,
00:10:21.000 not to, uh, you know, I don't know, talk about privately in some other way or write a article
00:10:27.800 about, he actually thought that, you know what, this is good enough to tweet and to go out there
00:10:32.440 and to make sure that people share and like, and see thousands of times. That's how highly he thought
00:10:38.300 of this consideration that he held in his mind. And then he realized that human beings, whether Richard
00:10:45.000 Dawkins wants to admit it or not, are all inherently moral because we are made in the image
00:10:50.040 of God. And so whether or not we deny objective morality, all of us as image bearers of God have
00:10:56.280 this, uh, have this instinct in us when something is wrong, when something is icky, when something we
00:11:02.820 know is, uh, corrupt or depraved, and we're not even sure why that speaks to the fact that we are made
00:11:10.160 in God's image that all of us have an objective morality that is buried, uh, deep inside us that
00:11:15.900 God gave us that when he realized that, Oh yeah, people reacting this way because they don't like
00:11:21.380 this because they have a higher view of the human race than this. He backs up and he has, Oh no, no,
00:11:26.440 no, I don't, I don't think that we should do this. This is no, this is wrong. This is wrong. And here's
00:11:32.620 the question. Why, why is it wrong for Richard Dawkins, who is an atheist for any atheist that
00:11:39.360 is mad at Richard Dawkins saying that we should, uh, or that we could do eugenics. If he said we
00:11:47.440 should do eugenics, why would any atheist be mad at that? Uh, if you believe in evolution, like if you 0.95
00:11:55.000 believe that we came from the big bang, that that is, that we are just one grand cosmic accident,
00:12:02.440 if you believe that human beings have no inherent value outside of our capability,
00:12:07.540 if you believe that we are no more important than any other animal, in fact, we are just animals.
00:12:12.760 Like if you don't believe that we have souls that give us value, if you don't believe that we are
00:12:17.160 made in the image of God, if you don't believe that there is at least at the very least a higher
00:12:22.280 power that is saying, this is the objective standard of right and wrong, then why, why do you
00:12:28.880 believe that eugenics is wrong? What, what would be wrong with it? If you believe in survival of the 0.98
00:12:34.600 fittest, then why not create a human race? According to atheist thinking, survival of the fittest thinking,
00:12:41.840 why not create a human race, um, that has the best capabilities, the largest capacity for success,
00:12:49.520 the largest capacity for health? What is, what is wrong with that? And then that just goes to the
00:12:55.740 bigger question. What is morality? What is a should or shouldn't? Because the fact of the matter is,
00:13:00.880 um, in the atheist worldview, there is no objective should or shouldn't beyond what you feel or beyond
00:13:09.140 what advances the human race. According to the atheistic thinking, everything that we feel,
00:13:14.580 everything that exists, um, exists, or everything that we do, we do because it at one time helped our
00:13:21.360 ancestors survive and carry on. Uh, if that is the case, what to you is wrong with eugenics? Not even 0.93
00:13:29.920 speaking about the fact that actually there's a lot of studies that say eugenics wouldn't work with
00:13:34.300 the human race because we're actually a lot more complex than an ape or some other animal, but that's
00:13:40.700 the question. What is a should, what is a shouldn't? What is a moral right? What is a moral wrong?
00:13:46.320 If you do not believe that there is a moral arbiter, if you do not believe, as C.S. Lewis said
00:13:52.600 in mere Christianity, a grand, a supreme moral lawgiver. And it's funny because Richard Dawkins,
00:14:00.220 obviously he famously denies the existence of God. And then he goes on to say that it's wrong,
00:14:05.580 that it's wrong, that we shouldn't do eugenics with human beings. Well, why? Why not? 1.00
00:14:09.940 Why? If you are an atheist, why not? If you don't believe that there is any inherent value in human
00:14:19.000 beings beyond what they can do, what would be wrong with creating a perfect human race? But
00:14:23.840 atheists exist in this world of paradoxes that they cannot reconcile because they are unwilling to say 0.99
00:14:31.660 why they believe in a morality, why they believe in a right and wrong, why they believe that there is
00:14:37.500 any kind of objective standard of righteousness or goodness or decency. Now they do, they do believe
00:14:45.060 in morals. They do have standards. As Richard Dawkins says, he does think that eugenic policy
00:14:49.620 is wrong, but he can't tell you why. And that's the problem with a large portion of the scientific
00:14:56.500 community and even the technological community is that the capability to be able to do something
00:15:02.480 scientifically or technologically with technological innovation grants a lot of people in that
00:15:09.740 community the license to actually do it. So it's never a question of, is this good for people? Is
00:15:16.520 this good for society? But can we do it? And if we can do it, then we will do it. And so I find
00:15:25.560 Richard Dawkins's argument very weak. That's his argument that we can do it, but we shouldn't do it
00:15:30.680 on the basis of nothing except for feelings. I just don't find that very compelling. I would love for
00:15:36.600 Richard Dawkins to give a good argument for why morally it is wrong to do what he is proposing
00:15:44.300 we can do and not use some kind of higher standard of morality that is given by a higher standard bearer
00:15:53.940 and not use that as the basis of his argument. It's just impossible. Again, if you believe
00:16:00.480 that the only standard of morality is what has ever advanced humanity, starting with our ancestors
00:16:07.620 to now, then you're going to have to answer that question. What's the reason? I actually had an
00:16:12.540 atheist reach out to me not that long ago. And he was like, you know, I am an atheist. I'm kind of
00:16:17.580 an agnostic. And I've pondered this question forever of where I get morality, why I believe some
00:16:23.180 things are right and some things are wrong. And I don't know. I just kind of feel it.
00:16:28.020 To me, that takes so much more faith. I mean, atheists laugh at Christians all the time for
00:16:34.800 having the belief in the things that we do, or they laugh at anyone who believes in God and just
00:16:39.580 says, oh, that's, you know, I get this a lot. Oh, just your sky daddy, which is just a funny phrase.
00:16:47.000 And you just believe in this fairy tale book and this fiction. Well, you, your beliefs honestly take a
00:16:54.760 lot more faith than mine do. Now, I don't know if that's objectively true, but it takes faith. It
00:17:02.040 takes faith to believe in the atheistic worldview that we're all just doing everything that we're
00:17:08.040 doing for basic survival and based on feeling. I don't believe that. I believe that we were all
00:17:14.180 made in the image of God and therefore we've all got the same instinct for morality and this all,
00:17:19.320 all the same instinct against the things that God calls bad. Now we are sinful human beings. We are
00:17:26.280 fallen human beings. And so we resist that. And without Christ, we are dead in our sin. And so we
00:17:32.660 don't know which way is up. That's how you get someone like Richard Dawkins purporting this kind of
00:17:38.200 stuff and the other crazy things that he puts forward. But I think that that is a much more,
00:17:45.320 a much more formidable idea than the idea that we're just all kind of moving along by some
00:17:52.300 accidents and figuring out morality as we go. I think that's just a little, a little bit too far
00:17:59.680 fetched for me. But this is the nature of godlessness. The nature of godlessness is confusion. Thankfully,
00:18:06.140 according to the Bible, Christians serve a God of peace, not a God of confusion. And without God,
00:18:13.740 you constantly see confusion. You constantly, you constantly see contradictions. And we're going
00:18:18.920 to talk about another contradiction that we see and another symptom of godlessness in our society
00:18:25.820 in just a second. But before we get into that, I want to tell you guys about hydrants. So top
00:18:31.580 performers in business and sports often attribute their success to their morning routine, whether it's
00:18:36.560 waking up early, setting their goals for the day, exercise, but not everyone has the time to do it all
00:18:42.020 with hydrants. You can jumpstart your mornings, avoid the morning sluggishness in that midday slump.
00:18:47.800 Make sure that you are hydrated. Hydrant creates flavored electrolyte packets. You mix directly into
00:18:54.060 your water to make hydrating your body easy and delicious. Each rapid hydration mix has the four
00:18:59.100 essential electrolytes your body needs. So sodium, potassium, magnesium, and zinc help you hydrate
00:19:04.320 quickly and stay hydrated all day. And hydrant is backed by research. The formula was developed by Oxford
00:19:09.980 Scientist to provide perfectly balanced, efficient hydration, no synthetic colors, no artificial
00:19:18.060 sweeteners. The formula is vegan. And you can choose between three different flavors or variety
00:19:23.520 pack. There's a lot of vegans that listen to this podcast. You guys message me and ask me my thoughts
00:19:29.280 about that a lot and talk to me about being pro-life and eating meat and all that good stuff. And so
00:19:34.640 hydrant is for you because it's vegan. You don't have to worry about that. Hydrant starts at just a buck,
00:19:39.660 a packet for a 30-day supply. You can save even more with a monthly subscription. For 25% off your
00:19:45.620 first order, go to drinkhydrant.com and enter promo code Allie, that's A-L-L-I-E. At checkout,
00:19:51.360 drinkhydrant.com, enter promo code Allie for 25% off your first order. Drinkhydrant.com, promo code
00:19:59.040 Allie, A-L-L-I-E. So here's a trend that I've been wanting to talk about for a long time, 0.98
00:20:03.620 and that is the upward trend of witchcraft that is very prevalent among young women. So you and I,
00:20:13.080 all the young women that are listening to this podcast, and I are the target audience for witchcraft 0.59
00:20:19.280 these days. Now, it's not the witchcraft of yesteryear. It's not the pointy hats, like hocus
00:20:25.880 pocus type thing, where people have this, like, you know, steamy cauldron, and they're putting,
00:20:32.140 I don't know, chicken feet and sawed-off fingers into it and casting spells from a spell book from
00:20:38.520 1482. That's not what witchcraft looks like today. It looks a lot trendier. It looks a lot prettier.
00:20:45.920 It looks a lot lighter. It looks a lot more fun. It looks like a bunch of celebrities that we really
00:20:51.920 admire circling up and setting their intentions for the year. And if you're thinking, oh, that's
00:20:58.960 not witchcraft at all. You are just being dramatic. Well, I want to read to you from an article. This is
00:21:05.620 the reason why I'm talking about this from The Atlantic titled, Why is witchcraft on the rise?
00:21:11.640 So we are going to kind of analyze that article and talk about what it says about witchcraft,
00:21:16.800 what it says about our society, what it says about godlessness, and then what the Bible has to say
00:21:21.340 about all this stuff. Because I think a lot of us, we're just kind of wading through culture and
00:21:25.520 letting culture happen to us. We're letting society evangelize to us. We're letting society share its
00:21:31.600 gospel with us. And before we know it, we find ourselves accepting these things without even
00:21:36.620 realizing it. Like, we don't, you know, say the prayer that society wants us to say and walk down
00:21:43.640 the aisle that society wants us to walk down and accept society as our Lord and Savior. We don't do that
00:21:50.220 in an obvious way or in a deliberate way or even all at once. But over time, it's like the frog in
00:21:58.240 the boiling water. We start to believe the things that society is telling us. That certainly is what
00:22:03.260 has happened with the whole self-love culture, with the whole trendy narcissism culture is what
00:22:08.180 I call it. That Christians have started to believe the gospel of self that is being propagated by the 0.98
00:22:15.600 world. And we have started sounding like the world rather than the world sounding like us. So when you
00:22:21.680 see churches talk about, oh, you are enough, you just need to love yourself before you can love other
00:22:26.860 people. If that sounds suspiciously like every secular non-Christian artist and non-Christian,
00:22:37.620 you know, outlet resource that you know, that you read, that you follow, that's because the church,
00:22:44.060 unfortunately, has been evangelized to by the world for so long that we have started sounding like
00:22:49.520 the world. And so as Christians, it is our obligation. It's our responsibility. It is our
00:22:54.440 privilege. It's our right to push back against that with truth and truth that is so much better than all
00:23:00.720 of that self-love crap. Sorry if you didn't want your kids to hear that word. That's exactly what it is.
00:23:07.640 It's trash. So I want to talk about how witchcraft being on the rise is actually connected to the
00:23:14.580 gospel of self, this world of trendy narcissism that is so popular, that is so pervasive in our
00:23:21.160 world today. And you might be thinking, no, no, no, Ali, at least self-love is pure. It is the culture
00:23:28.240 of self-love is about motivation. It's about taking charge of your life. At least it works. Witchcraft 1.00
00:23:33.600 is dark. It's of Satan. It's not the same at all. Well, remember what we've talked about on this
00:23:38.760 podcast is that there's no such thing as neutral ground. There's no such thing as neutral ground.
00:23:43.540 So Ephesians 2 says that Satan is the prince of the power of the air. He has real power here on
00:23:49.620 earth. And even though we as Christians know that he who is in us is greater than he who is in the
00:23:55.140 world, Satan does have real power. And so there's no such thing. Satan would like us to believe that
00:24:00.680 there's neutral ground that, okay, some of the things that aren't biblical, that the world says
00:24:06.580 they're not necessarily wrong. They're not necessarily sinful. They're not necessarily
00:24:10.600 bad. They're just neutral. We can just take them. I think self-love falls into that. It might not be
00:24:16.480 biblical. The Bible might not tell us to love ourselves, but no, it's not satanic. It's not
00:24:21.200 from hell. It's not demonic. It's not that it's just neutral. Well, again, like the frog in the pot of
00:24:27.380 boiling water, we just start to accept all the neutral stuff until we are full blown into the
00:24:32.300 world. And we sound exactly like every non-Christian friend that you've got talking about how much we
00:24:37.320 love ourselves and how we can save ourselves and all of that absolute madness. And here you get
00:24:42.720 witchcraft. Okay. So if you don't think that witchcraft has become trendy, if you think I'm
00:24:47.540 exaggerating, I'll give you some examples. So it's been, uh, it's become really cool to call yourself a
00:24:52.400 witch. So creating altars, burning sage astrology. Yes. That is part of this casting spells. They've
00:24:59.140 all become something that young girls have gravitated toward as a form of rebellion, as a 1.00
00:25:04.040 form of self-empowerment. It is very intertwined with feminism. The history of witchcraft, you can 0.55
00:25:09.380 read that anywhere is very intertwined, uh, with female rebellion. Cosmo published an article a couple
00:25:16.080 years ago titled influencer witches of Instagram. These are women on Instagram who have hundreds of 1.00
00:25:21.140 thousands of followers teaching people to be witches, um, commercializing witchcraft. And so
00:25:26.460 offering their services for some sort of payment, young women who, uh, young women on Instagram,
00:25:32.340 they, they claim that they can help you cast spells, manifest your intentions. Now that's something
00:25:38.260 that you've probably heard from people who don't claim to be witches, uh, read your future, help you
00:25:43.020 understand your Zodiac signs, your birth charts, how to cleanse your space. It sounds like witchcraft 0.86
00:25:48.620 is identical to all the new age stuff that your friend from spin classes into. That's because it
00:25:54.780 is. Uh, so here are three recent articles published by Teen Vogue. Love spells and the basics of love
00:26:00.660 magic. How to do magic and other questions you might have about being a witch, uh, a witch's guide to the
00:26:07.400 new year, practical magic, 2020. Here's one in Cosmo. How to date a witch. Now, uh, interestingly,
00:26:13.940 all of these articles that I just listed, and I just kind of went through looking for recent, uh,
00:26:20.520 witch and witchcraft articles, all of these articles are written by the same person. Uh,
00:26:24.820 her name is Lisa Stardust. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that's probably not her real name,
00:26:30.220 but that is what she goes by. Here's what she says in her Cosmo article. My parents were new age
00:26:36.060 junkies and our bookshelves were filled with bright and glossy iridescent tomes about astrology,
00:26:42.240 meditation, crystals, and ways to use spices to boost magical vibes with titles like the complete
00:26:48.580 book of magic and witchcraft, uh, crystals and healing and, uh, astral projection. I don't even
00:26:55.060 know what that is, but before this sentence, she says, I guess I was born witchy. And the reason why 0.85
00:27:00.840 she believes that she was born witchy and born into a witchy family is for the reasons that she 1.00
00:27:06.080 lists. So from a witch, she is saying that there is a connection, uh, uh, between witchcraft and new
00:27:12.580 age meditation, astrology crystals, uh, the using of spices to boost magical vibes. Okay. And so this
00:27:21.600 is not just me saying that there's a connection between all the new age, uh, self-empowered,
00:27:27.100 self-centered, self-focused stuff that we see in witchcraft. This is coming from a self-proclaimed
00:27:32.220 witch herself. So I just wanted to, I just want you to hear the words of a witch making that 0.70
00:27:38.840 connection. The episode that I did with Doreen Virtue a couple of weeks ago about the dangers
00:27:43.120 of the new age. It's extremely pertinent, uh, to the conversation that we're having today. And if
00:27:47.960 you have not listened to that, I highly recommend that you do. It's actually the most listened to
00:27:53.260 episode. It's only been out a couple of weeks, the most listened to episode of relatable dangers of
00:27:58.240 the new age with Doreen Virtue. The reason why it's the most listened to is because it is so
00:28:02.920 relevant to everything that's going on in the lives of young women, everything that's going on
00:28:07.100 in social media and pop culture. I highly recommend you go listen to that, whether you're
00:28:11.640 a young woman yourself, or whether you've got a daughter, a sister, or a friend that you think
00:28:16.140 that it would be relevant to. I really recommend it. Um, I came across the article, like I said,
00:28:21.220 uh, in the Atlantic, which really made me start thinking about all of this. Why is witchcraft on the
00:28:25.700 rise? And I found it fascinating. So we're going to go through that now and why it matters to us
00:28:31.940 and what the Bible has to tell us about all of it. So this article is by Bianca Bosker. So she's
00:28:37.440 talking to this witch influencer and someone who makes hundreds of thousands of dollars, 0.59
00:28:42.980 apparently selling her witchy, uh, services. This is what the article says. Uh, Diaz sells anointing
00:28:48.860 oils and intention infused body products in her online store and instructs more than 8,900 witches
00:28:55.420 enrolled in her online school leads witchy workshops that promise to leave attendees
00:28:59.880 feeling magical AF. Uh, in 2018 Diaz, the author of the bestselling book, witchery embrace the witch
00:29:06.460 within earned more than half a million dollars from her magic work. So what does that tell us?
00:29:12.280 That tells us that witchcraft is lucrative. Uh, but for, but over the past few years, witchcraft is
00:29:18.180 what the article says long viewed with suspicion and even hostility. It's so funny. The attitude of
00:29:23.840 this article, like all the people that are angry at witchcraft are in the wrong has transmuted into
00:29:28.800 a mainstream phenomenon. So what we see here is that is, it is pervasive. Uh, witchcraft is not
00:29:35.800 just lucrative, but it's also pervasive. 2014 Pew Research Center, uh, report suggested that the
00:29:42.960 United States adult population of pagans and wiccans was about, uh, 730,000 on par with the number of
00:29:49.360 Unitarians. I wonder if there's any crossover there. Uh, these days Diaz told me everyone calls
00:29:55.980 themselves a witch, which is so true. There are so many young women who think it's cool to call 0.99
00:30:01.440 themselves a witch. So not only is it lucrative, not only is it pervasive, uh, it's also popular and
00:30:07.900 that's a little bit different than pervasive. So it's trendy and that's all of the cool people
00:30:12.900 nowadays are calling themselves a witch. She said, being a witch, this Diaz person said,
00:30:18.460 being a witch is listen to this, an embodiment of her truth in all its power. That's how this
00:30:25.340 self-proclaimed witch describes what being a witch is. So that's the second witch that we have heard
00:30:31.380 reiterate a phrase from this world of self-help and self-love and self-focus. Uh, that is, we wouldn't
00:30:39.080 automatically identify as being witchcraft, but this is what she says. Being a witch is an embodiment 0.99
00:30:44.960 of her truth in all its power. How many well-meaning, uh, fitness gurus, lifestyle bloggers,
00:30:53.980 motivational authors, even Christian teachers. Do you hear saying things that reflect directly
00:31:01.080 what this witch is saying being a witch is? Uh, she said among other magic practitioners,
00:31:07.600 a witch might embody a religious affiliation, a political act, a wellness regimen, hot new Luke, 1.00
00:31:14.300 or some combination of the above. Uh, the Instagram's reigning witch influencer, this 0.71
00:31:21.220 article says Brie Luna has more than 450,000 followers, has collaborated with coach with
00:31:26.660 refinery 29 and smash box for which she recently introduced a line of cosmetics inspired by the
00:31:32.660 transformative quality of crystals. Now, something that Doreen Virtue and I said, and we pointed out
00:31:39.040 the same thing as essential oils, crystals, oils, God made both. There is nothing inherently wrong
00:31:45.360 with crystals. There's nothing inherently wrong with oils. Oils might have some kind of calming effect on
00:31:51.560 your life and you know, that's all good. You might like the smell of it, whatever. That's fine. God made
00:31:56.860 these things. They're not impure, uh, in and of themselves, but using them for some kind of healing
00:32:02.540 power. Of course, we know that is paganism. That is idolatry. That's some sort of pantheism thinking
00:32:08.300 that God is in everything and in everyone. That of course is not a biblical perspective. You can go to
00:32:16.160 Sephora, by the way, there is a witch, uh, like startup kit where you can buy, I don't even know what it
00:32:23.340 is. Sage, crystals, uh, oils, different kinds of things to manifest your intention. So this stuff
00:32:30.720 is very commercialized. It is lucrative. It is pervasive. It is popular. It is commercialized.
00:32:37.560 All of those things kind of, uh, tie together. So just in case you doubted that this is mainstream,
00:32:43.760 doubt no more. It is. If you are a mother and you, your daughter is on social media, she's in the age
00:32:50.800 where she could be influenced by this stuff. Just make sure that you're paying attention and just be
00:32:54.880 aware of the fact that the stores that you go to, that the accounts that you follow, that the
00:33:00.620 celebrities that you like, or that she likes, uh, they are going to try to one in one way or another,
00:33:06.540 whether it's through the elevation of the self or outright witchcraft, they are going to try to
00:33:12.040 influence her, uh, influence her in this way. The, the, uh, article also talks about the wick of faith.
00:33:19.020 And I think it's interesting that it refers to it as a faith. This is something that does require,
00:33:24.500 uh, an amount of faith and an amount of belief in absolute lunacy. The belief in witchcraft is so
00:33:30.840 widespread and so enduring that one historian speculates it's innate to being human. That's
00:33:36.200 what this article says. And I would say that's true. I would say our fallen nature, um, seeks to
00:33:43.300 distort what God has made a desire for him. So he, God made us to need something higher than ourself,
00:33:53.460 to need a power that's higher than ourself, to be in not enough inherently to, uh, desire help,
00:34:00.880 to desire salvation, to desire some kind of power, to desire some kind of refuge. And we can only find
00:34:09.340 that reliably in him. We can only find that ultimately in him. But when we reject God,
00:34:15.240 because, uh, we hate God, that's what enemies of God do. Everyone who is not in Christ is an enemy of
00:34:21.380 God. And whether they say it or not, they hate God because they are in enmity with God, which is what
00:34:26.560 the Bible says, uh, then they are going to, uh, look towards another power in order to help them.
00:34:32.860 That is what we are created to do. So this article is correct. This historian is correct.
00:34:36.940 It is innate. Witchcraft is innate. It's just a distortion of a God-given desire for something
00:34:43.000 higher than ourselves. Um, this is also important for us to note that this includes, so the latest
00:34:49.680 witch Renaissance coincides with a growing fascination with astrology, with crystals, with
00:34:54.900 tarot cards, uh, which like magic practitioners consider ways to tap into unseen, unconventional,
00:35:01.160 unconventional sources of power, which of course, that is exactly what it's about. What we just said
00:35:06.140 to tap into unseen sources of power, uh, astrology guys is not something that Christians should ever
00:35:14.740 be a part of. Like you don't need to know your zodiac sign. I'm sure we all do know our zodiac
00:35:19.220 signs. I remember when I was little, I didn't know, you know, that any of this stuff was bad.
00:35:23.280 And I was like, Oh, I'm an Aquarius. That's so exciting. But I remember my mom telling me at some
00:35:28.340 point that that's not something that we, uh, that we care about. That's not something that we read
00:35:32.920 about. That's not something that we're fascinated by Christianity and astrology does not go hand in
00:35:39.780 hand. They cannot coincide. They're completely perpendicular to one another. If we see this
00:35:45.420 in an article about witchcraft over and over again, that astrology, your birth chart, all of that stuff,
00:35:52.700 your zodiac sign, which I guess is within all of that. If we see that perpetually as being claimed
00:35:59.540 by witches, it should at least make us take a step back and say, Hmm, maybe this isn't something
00:36:04.980 that I should be a part of. Anytime you go to anything other than God, uh, for power, for self
00:36:13.280 understanding, for healing. Um, now that's not to say that God can't give us medicine or God hasn't
00:36:20.700 allowed medicine to be invented. Of course, uh, these things can be gifts of common grace, but when we go
00:36:27.640 to something outside of biblical Christianity and we go to something outside of God and the things that
00:36:33.900 are, he has given us for their intended purpose, we end up with idolatry. That's exactly what
00:36:39.600 astrology is. You're looking for some kind of power. You're looking for some kind of direction. You're
00:36:44.040 looking for some kind of wisdom, some kind of insight, some kind of self understanding that is
00:36:48.760 meant to be found in God. Uh, all of the things that we truly seek ultimately underneath them all
00:36:56.140 is a desire for God, a desire for true salvation, for true wisdom, for true direction, for true purpose,
00:37:02.880 for true meaning to truly be filled. We are going to false idols like astrology, uh, to find those
00:37:09.720 things. And you'll notice that people who are obsessed with astrology, they're very unsatisfied.
00:37:15.160 Like they're constantly looking at new astrology posts. Like they're constantly looking at new
00:37:20.660 insights. They're constantly trying to find a way to fit this, uh, Zodiac reading that really doesn't
00:37:26.880 align with their personality at all. Like really doesn't align with their life at all. They're
00:37:30.720 trying to constantly find a way to make it fit in to their life so they can keep putting their faith
00:37:36.840 in it. Because again, we are made to put our faith in something and it feels more tangible to them.
00:37:43.100 It feels more like they're able to control it. And astrology is all about you. It's all about why
00:37:48.820 you're special. It's all about your life. This is another reason why witchcraft is so popular, 1.00
00:37:53.500 because it's about you, empowering you, freeing you. Uh, and the Bible, Christianity is not about
00:38:00.680 that. It is about denying yourself, taking up your cross and following Christ. As Philippians 2 says,
00:38:06.520 it is looking at others as more important than we look at ourselves, honoring others more than we
00:38:12.920 honor ourselves, helping others at our own expense. And that is the opposite of what something like
00:38:20.860 witchcraft is for. Witchcraft is all about what can, how can you reign the powers of darkness
00:38:26.020 in to help you to manifest the successes that you want? And if you are thinking, wow, that kind of
00:38:34.700 sounds a lot like the prosperity gospel. That's because it is, um, there was a really interesting
00:38:40.800 article in, in outlet called the American interest. And, uh, it talked about AOC and AOC releasing her
00:38:49.340 birth chart. So let me read this more importantly, however, AOC's gambit taps into the way. So she
00:38:54.740 tweeted out her birth chart. That's the context, uh, taps into the way in which progressive millennials
00:38:59.180 have appropriated the rhetoric imagery and rituals of what was once called the new age from astrology
00:39:05.100 to witchcraft. So again, we see astrology associated with witchcraft as both a political and spiritual
00:39:10.860 statement of identity for an increasing number of left-leaning millennials, more and more of whom
00:39:15.720 do not belong to any organized religion. Occult spirituality, isn't just a form of personal
00:39:20.580 practice, self-care with more sage, uh, rather it's a metaphysical canvas for the American culture,
00:39:28.020 wars in the post Trump era, pitting the self-identified Davids of seemingly secular
00:39:33.360 progressivism against the Goliath of nationalist evangelical Christianity. So this really creates
00:39:41.720 an intersection of all of the things that we talk about. Now, this is not to say that everyone on the
00:39:46.080 left, everyone who's a Democrat, everyone who is anti-Trump, uh, is engaged in witchcraft. I'm not
00:39:51.660 saying that, but this is why it matters for Christians to care about politics. This is why it matters for
00:39:57.900 Christians to have a holistic worldview, why it matters for us to care about what's going on in
00:40:03.360 culture and why we should allow the Bible to inform all of these things because they are connected.
00:40:09.980 They're always connected. Our worldview, how we view God, how we view the self, it affects everything we
00:40:16.240 believe, including politics. So let me, let me, uh, read that again. So for an increasing number of
00:40:23.460 left-leaning millennials, many of whom do not belong to any organized religion, occult spirituality,
00:40:30.000 occult spirituality, isn't just a form of personal practice, self-care with more sage. It is a
00:40:34.740 metaphysical canvas for the American culture wars in the post Trump era, pitting the Davids of secular
00:40:41.360 progressivism against the Goliath of nationalist evangelical Christianity. As an aesthetic, as a
00:40:47.940 spiritual practice, this article says, and as a communal ideology, contemporary millennial witch
00:40:53.320 culture defines itself as the cosmic counterbalance to Trumpian evangelicalism. Isn't that interesting?
00:41:00.580 Progressive occultism, the language of witches and demons of spells and sage of cleansing and bad 0.64
00:41:05.620 energy of stars and signs has become the de facto religion of millennial progressives. The metaphysical
00:41:11.480 symbol set threaded through the worldly ethos of modern social justice activism. I mean,
00:41:17.340 this is just everything we talked about in this podcast. Its rise parallels the rise of religious
00:41:22.140 nuns. That's N-O-N-E-S, which we've also discussed on this podcast. And with them, a model of spiritual 1.00
00:41:28.080 and religious practice that's at once instant in intuitional and atomized. Marie Claire's, uh, this is how
00:41:35.920 real life resistance, which is say they're taking down the patriarchy and broadly is how the socialist
00:41:42.540 feminist of which use magic to fight capitalism proves exactly what this article in American 0.99
00:41:49.280 interest is talking about. Um, this stuff is connected to politics. It's connected to the
00:41:57.200 godlessness that we see rising among millennials. It's connected to, uh, the SJW movement that we see
00:42:04.080 that is so prevalent in millennials. It is this glorification of self. It has to do with the
00:42:09.060 entitlement that a lot of young millennials see. It has to do with the trust in the government
00:42:13.100 rather than God that we see among millennials. This is whether you want to call it witchcraft or
00:42:18.420 not. It's just the effect of godlessness that we are always looking to put our faith in something
00:42:24.260 and people feel that they can put their faith in magic and that it's going to help them manifest
00:42:29.060 the successes in their lives. Um, this is also something that we see with Jennifer Aniston. She talked to
00:42:36.000 the New York times about a goddess circle that she's been doing for 30 years that it's some kind
00:42:41.020 of spiritual routine that you'll probably see across your Instagram with a lot of celebrity
00:42:46.600 influencers that, you know, you sit in a goddess circle and you're supposed to manifest some sort of
00:42:51.020 magic. You've got sage burning. You've got all these kinds of rituals that are supposed to manifest
00:42:56.160 the success in your life. And of course, Jen Aniston might say that this has been very effective for her.
00:43:01.960 She obviously has a lot of success, a lot of money, but it doesn't matter whether or not this
00:43:07.180 stuff is effective, which by the way, it might actually work because Satan is real and demons
00:43:12.260 are real and the power of darkness is real. And so people might get the things that they are
00:43:17.460 manifesting. People might get the things that they have set intentions for. They might get the things
00:43:21.940 that they did a candle service for or read tarot cards for. I mean, Satan is very real and he very much
00:43:28.820 works and he might give people the things that they cast spells for or whatever or use witchcraft
00:43:34.300 for in order to get them to keep following him. But guess what? All this stuff leads to hell. It leads
00:43:40.440 to hell forever. And so, yes, it might attract some people. It might give you some success for a little
00:43:47.080 bit. It might be effective for a little bit, but the place where it leads is not a place where any of us
00:43:54.300 want to go. And so this is not neutral ground. This is not something that Christians ignore. This is not
00:43:59.960 something that we say is just harmless. We say this is a path that leads to eternity in hell and a place
00:44:06.980 where no one wants to go, a place where we don't want any of our friends to go, the people that we
00:44:12.200 love to go. It doesn't matter if people are happy with it now. People say, well, it's happy. It makes me
00:44:18.320 happy or it works or I've been successful or I've manifested these things. It doesn't matter whether it's done
00:44:23.460 these things. The fact of the matter is, is that it can't save you and in fact, damns you. It's not
00:44:28.760 that this in particular damns you. It's that your lack of faith in Christ, which has led to these
00:44:34.500 things, condemns all of us. This is what the Bible has to say about witchcraft. Deuteronomy 18, 9 through
00:44:41.000 12 says, when you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you, do not learn to imitate the detestable
00:44:46.080 ways of the nations there. Let no one be found among you who sacrifices their son or daughter in the fire.
00:44:52.220 So against child sacrifice, that's good. By the way, let me just say in Uganda, where witchcraft 1.00
00:44:57.660 unfortunately is very pervasive, they have had a terrible epidemic of child sacrifice.
00:45:06.000 There's been a very stark uptick, a very sharp uptick in child sacrifice in Uganda over the past
00:45:13.340 10 to 20 years because of these witch doctors that come through in villages and say, you know, 0.86
00:45:17.820 we'll pay you X amount if you sacrifice your child to us. And so they literally take these
00:45:22.460 children, they kill them, rip their hearts out. Well, maybe I shouldn't get so graphic.
00:45:27.140 Sorry, if you need to turn this off, you've got kids in the car, but it's probably too late for that.
00:45:31.400 Cut their limbs off, cut their genitalia off, and they offer it to whatever gods they think 0.99
00:45:37.200 they're worshiping as a form of witchcraft because they think it's going to give them good luck or power.
00:45:41.600 That's obviously not working out very well for them, but working out very well for these
00:45:45.940 evil witch doctors who are making money off of all of this. So this is the God of the universe 1.00
00:45:53.760 telling his people thousands of years ago, we're not supposed to do that stuff that's still going
00:45:58.860 on right now. So no one should sacrifice their son or daughter in the fire. There should be no one
00:46:04.660 who practices divination or sorcery, no one who interprets omens, no one who engages in witchcraft
00:46:10.540 or casts spells or who is a medium or a spiritist or who consults the dead. Anyone who does these
00:46:15.920 things is detestable to the Lord. So even though Christians don't follow all of the cleansing laws 1.00
00:46:21.460 that God has in the Old Testament, we still follow his moral laws. We can still look at the principles
00:46:26.560 that he put forth for his people in the Old Testament and say, that's the same God. That's the
00:46:32.700 same desire that he has. It's the same principle today as it's ever been. God doesn't want us to
00:46:37.340 have anything to do with witchcraft. Exodus 22, 18, you shall not permit a sorceress to live.
00:46:43.300 So it was a death penalty for people who practice witchcraft. Leviticus 20, 27, a man or a woman who
00:46:49.480 is a medium or a necromancer shall surely be put to death. They shall be stoned with stones. Their 0.99
00:46:57.040 blood shall be upon them. First Chronicles 10, 13. So Saul died for his breach of faith. He broke faith
00:47:02.500 with the Lord in that he did not keep the command of the Lord and also consulted a medium seeking
00:47:08.180 guidance. So Colossians 5, 16, 24 says this. So this is the New Testament now talking about all
00:47:15.880 the things that God has, that God has been saying since the beginning, that we should have no part
00:47:21.820 in the unfruitful works of darkness. The New Testament reiterates this Colossians 5, 16 through 24.
00:47:27.420 But I say, walk by the spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh for the desires
00:47:34.040 of the flesh are against the spirit and the desires of the spirit are against the flesh for these are
00:47:38.920 opposed to each other to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the
00:47:43.620 spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh, here we go. Now the works of the flesh
00:47:49.060 are evident. Sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of
00:47:57.760 anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn
00:48:04.780 you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
00:48:11.560 But the fruit of the spirit, and this is the verse that most of us know, the fruit of the spirit is love,
00:48:17.400 joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against
00:48:22.020 such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its 0.96
00:48:28.260 passions and desires. So typically we just extricate verses 22 through 23, say these are the fruit of the
00:48:34.920 spirit and we don't pay any attention to the stuff around it. Equally as important, maybe not equally
00:48:39.840 as important, but very comparably important, as important to the fruit of the spirit are the fruit
00:48:46.640 of the flesh, the fruit of darkness, which is idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy,
00:48:52.580 fits of anger, all of these things. And witchcraft, being sorcery, is included in all of that. And so if
00:48:59.760 you are of the flesh, Paul is saying, the Holy Spirit through Paul, you are going to have an affinity
00:49:04.880 for the works of darkness. You are going to have an affinity for things like sorcery, an affinity for
00:49:09.600 things like witchcraft. So if you are a Christian who is taking part in any of this stuff, you need to ask 0.53
00:49:18.120 God to give you the power to repent and you need to have nothing to do with it. Nothing to do with
00:49:23.820 astrology, nothing to do with mediums, nothing to do with tarot cards, nothing to do with ascribing power to
00:49:31.580 crystals, ascribing power to oils that are not inherently there that God did not intend. And any
00:49:40.200 other thing, any of us may be doing, and I'm evaluating my own life, anything that we are doing
00:49:46.080 that is giving power to things or giving power to the self in a way that God did not intend. The
00:49:52.000 through line through the new age, through the self-empowerment, self-love stuff that we are hearing by
00:49:58.300 people who did not purport to be witches, the through line between witchcraft, new age, self-help,
00:50:03.700 self-love, self-care. That's not to say that getting your nails done is bad. People always ask me about
00:50:10.320 that. But the empowerment of the self, the focus on the self, the similarity between witchcraft and that
00:50:16.620 and the new age, the way that it all comes together, the through line is the self. Anything that empowers
00:50:23.640 the self that tries to elevate the self to the place of God, whether it's through sorcery and
00:50:28.880 witchcraft and mediums and tarot cards and these intention setting candle ceremonies, whatever they
00:50:35.260 are, or any kind of motivational mantra that tells you to believe in yourself, to save yourself, to
00:50:41.640 discover yourself, to fulfill yourself. The through line is the self and that is Satan's lie. And it has
00:50:48.680 been the lie since the very beginning. That is the same lie that he gave to Eve in the Garden of Eden.
00:50:57.340 Don't submit to God. Submit to yourself and you will be like God. And he was partially right. Satan is
00:51:03.140 always partially right, by the way. Satan is always partially telling the truth. Eve did become like God
00:51:09.280 in knowing good and evil. But the consequence of her sin was suffering and physical death. And in elevating
00:51:14.740 the self, whether through traditional self-help or female empowerment or out great witchcraft,
00:51:19.160 you might find success. You might lose weight. You may get in a relationship, but that way is the wide
00:51:23.980 gate that leads to a place that none of us want to go. So Satan saying the same lie that he always had
00:51:31.580 since the very beginning shows that he is cunning, but he's not creative. He is insistent, but he is not
00:51:39.840 innovative. He has the same lie dressed up in a million different ways, some seeming more neutral
00:51:45.420 and some seeming darker than others, that we as Christians are obligated through the wisdom of God
00:51:50.780 to be able to point out and to resist with all of the strength the Holy Spirit can give us. Read Ephesians
00:51:56.380 6 and see the armor of God that he gives us through Christ to be able to fight these battles. Again,
00:52:03.580 there is no neutral ground. The time has come and gone for Christians to be able to accept 0.98
00:52:09.800 mainstream messages as having any sort of redeeming value in them. The time has come and gone for us to
00:52:16.920 be able to not pay attention. The time is come and gone for us to be apathetic. We have to care.
00:52:23.080 We have to pay attention. We have to know our Bibles and we have to be able to confront these cultural 0.99
00:52:28.340 messages with the truth of God. So I don't think that we should constantly be looking at the world of
00:52:36.160 witchcraft and we should constantly be observing the works of darkness that are happening in the rest
00:52:40.840 of the world. I think, frankly, all we need to do is to know our Bibles, to pray hard, to be aware of these
00:52:47.300 things, to be as innocent as doves, to be as cunning as a serpent in that, to be as knowledgeable or to be as
00:52:55.960 knowing, to be as perceptive as what the Bible says a serpent is like. So that's our responsibility
00:53:05.160 as Christians, to know that this stuff is going on, to not worry about it because, like I said earlier,
00:53:10.200 he who is in us is greater than he who is in the world and we know that Jesus is going to defeat
00:53:15.500 Satan once and for all, that he is going to rule in perfect peace forever, that we don't need to have
00:53:20.180 anxiety about any of this stuff. We don't need to have fear about any of this stuff because we have the
00:53:25.560 power of Christ within us and because of that, we are enslaved to righteousness. We are empowered to
00:53:31.980 do righteousness. We are ambassadors of Christ. We are the aroma of Christ. We are givers of light.
00:53:38.220 So we don't need to worry about this stuff, but we do need to be aware that it's happening. We do need
00:53:42.480 to fight darkness with the light that Christ has given us and we need to make sure that we are not
00:53:49.080 being apathetic and we are not being complacent and we are not the frog in the boiling water accepting
00:53:55.140 the messages of self-empowerment, not realizing that it's just a witchcraft-like lie from the pits of
00:54:02.820 hell. So that was a really long podcast. I should have just done the witchcraft stuff, but you just
00:54:07.940 never know how long I'm going to go. Okay. That's all I have today. I'll be back here on Wednesday.
00:54:12.460 I'll see you guys then.