WWUTT 2635 Q&A Opening a Portal, Illegal Aliens, Married to an Unbeliever

Is it possible to open a portal to channel God to speak to you more clearly? If there is an illegal immigrant in your church, what are your obligations? If you are married to an unbeliever, what does the Bible say you must do?

The answer is when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand the Text, a daily Bible study in the word of God, that we may be conformed to the image of Christ. Tell all your friends about our ministry at www .wutt .com. Here once again is Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky. You're welcome.

Opening Psalm and Listener Questions

Welcome to the Q &A. Thanks. An actual Q &A. Yeah. Not like the recorded, throwing together some YouTube videos for the Q &A last week. Yes. Let's get started with Psalm 71. Okay. In you, oh Lord, do I take refuge.

Let me never be put to shame. In your righteousness, deliver me and rescue me. Incline your ear to me and save me. Be to me a rock of refuge to which I may continually come. You have given the command to save me for you are my rock and my fortress.

Rescue me, oh my God, from the hand of the wicked, from the grasp of the unjust and cruel man. For you, oh Lord, are my hope, my trust, oh Lord, from my youth. Upon you, I have leaned from before my birth.

You are he who took me from my mother's womb. My praise is continually of you. Well, welcome to the Friday edition of the broadcast when we take questions from the listeners and you can send those questions to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com.

You can also send us a voicemail. Go to wwutt .com, click on that voicemail button on the top right corner of the page and record a message for us. I've got a couple of voicemails. Awesome. That we're gonna be looking at here today, but I'm gonna start with this one because this one will involve playing a YouTube video here.

Okay. This is from Tim. He says, I was watching a video addressing a woman saying that she opened a portal over the White House. Okay. I have not heard this. There's so A portal. Oh, okay. A portal.

Like what do you think of when opening a portal?

I think of aliens coming, like in a movie. That's not it. Okay.

Yeah, I know. That's like, open a portal to what? Yeah. What sort of entity are you welcoming through this portal?

Is this now like a time jump, you know, kind of thing? Yeah, right. Where we go from one place to another? Or what's that called? Well, there's a Not a time jump, but where you go from one place

Oh, a wormhole. Wormhole. Yeah, okay. That's what I was thinking. I was gonna say, there's the

No, that's not really a portal. There's the video game portal. Yeah, that's true. Which it is kind of like wormholes. You're like jumping from one point to another point.

And then, isn't there like a movie about the, I don't, goodness, it's been forever.

You can't make gestures on the podcast.

No, I'm giving you the gesture so you can like, oh yeah, it's this movie. Oh, yeah. So it has like a portal, basically, that it's a gate, gate something. The Gate?

That was like a horror movie from the 80s. No, it wasn't that one.

And it was an action movie. I don't remember Ah, it was one that you know.

I don't remember the movie, The Gate. I remember there was a poster for it that was hanging in a video rental store. Oh, boy. That my dad liked to go to. And it freaked me out every time.

They did a pretty good job, at least they used to. I don't know if they still do it now.

Man, you cannot beat 80s horror movie posters.

It is like super scary.

Not telling anybody to look these up, but you know.

No, don't, but just so you know, there is a difference.

Most of them are from films I never even saw, but the posters stuck with me and I never forgot those posters. Oh, even the poltergeist poster, because that one's legendary, where you have the girl who's got her hands on the TV screen.

Yeah, that freaked me out too. Yep, me too. I didn't even know what was in the movie and it scared me. And we didn't have cable growing up, so we got that snow TV. Yeah, that's exactly. Yeah. Any of us growing up in the 80s and 90s, we all know the snow TV.

Begging for cable at that point. Yeah, right.

Anyway, we've gone off on so much of a tangent here. I'm not even a sentence into this email.

So sorry, so sorry. Okay, so portal above the White House was it?

This woman claims that she's opened a portal.

Above the White House. Wow, I mean, that takes some talent, because I've never seen that.

Tim says there's so much evil and wrong in her video that needs to be unpacked, that I thought it would be a perfect video for you to break down. Oh boy. By the will of God, someone should unveil the deception going on in the video by someone who understands the text.

Hopefully this reaches you and your team. Becky, you're my team. Yeah. Hey, hold on. So people are believing this too? Oh, I'm sure there are. Oh. Let me see. This is not the video. This is a clip of the video.

Okay. The actual video is like an hour and a half. Hang on, let me see if I can find the, yeah. I didn't pull that one up. And now my YouTube's not even coming up. Okay, there it goes. So typing in opening portal above White House.

The FBI is like following my search results here. Why is this guy trying to open a portal over the White House? So the full video is an hour and a half and it is by Donna Rigney Ministries. Now she claims to be a prophet.

Okay. So this is prophetess, I suppose, Donna Rigney. She's got about 45 ,000 subscribers. Her channel's a little bit smaller than mine, but it was significant enough that the website Right Wing Watch grabbed a portion of this interview and put it on their channel.

So that's what I have in front of me here is a minute and a half. This is not following the full hour and a half interview here, but you get the gist of what she's claiming in this segment of the interview.

All right. Okay, are you ready? No. You never are whenever we do this. No.

Brace yourself, babe. I will, I will. Brace yourself, here we go. Buckle up. We're all done. The next day, father explained to me, he said that now that this was opened, this portal was opened over the White House and over Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump was going to easily be able to get intel from the Holy Spirit.

Hallelujah. That God was gonna easily be able to give him wisdom for decisions he has to make, that it's just open, open communication, that, oh, that God will easily be able to speak to him and he'll hear him.

There's been nothing getting in the way of him being able to hear. Just like Daniel, it took 21 days for him to get the answer. That's not gonna happen. With an open heaven, immediately, Donald Trump will be able to get direction from God, how to lead the nation, and other presidents after, but if they're serving God, they too will do okay with him.

Okay, let me stop there. So, she's opened this portal. She's done this, she's opened a portal.

Well, I mean, I guess I'm very grateful that she, you know, allows God to lead them.

Yeah, it wasn't, I didn't accidentally open a portal to hell, I opened a channel to heaven so that the Holy Spirit can directly communicate to Donald Trump. And before, now he's got, Isn't that called prayer?

Now he's got more guidance than even Daniel had. Did you catch that part?

I did. Right. Yes, because it took Daniel days. It took him three weeks.

And it's not gonna take that long. Now it's not for Donald Trump. Nope, he's got direct communique from God.

Oh my, so everything that comes from Donald Trump's mouth is gonna be God? Well, a lot of these charismatics,.

Yeah, a lot of these charismatics would say. That's scary. Would go that far, yeah. That is frightening. And apparently, God was unable to do this until this prophetess opened up this channel. What is God doing at that?

Oh, thank you. There was kind of a clog between me and the president, but now that you've opened that portal, now I can get those messages straight through to the president.

And any president after him. Yeah, that's what she said, right?

Yeah. All right, we'll finish the next half, yeah. Portal that's open.

So now we're finishing up where everyone's soaked, because I explained to them with after each song what I saw, and then we shared, other people saw things too. And somebody felt the Holy Spirit guide them to take a picture of the sky.

And so, oh boy. So here's a picture of the sky, and then see towards the bottom and the center of the photo was a brighter light. And so as we expanded it, if you look at it closely, you can see a profile of an angel's face.

And Wow. Yeah. Wow. Of the angel blowing the debris. Wow. And that's what I did, I'm like, wow.

This is like looking, for those of you who can't see this, this is like looking for the face of the man on the moon. Yes. Like looking at the moon and seeing a man's face. That's what this looks like.

Yes, definitely. It's just a white splotch, and apparently It's like the abstract painting.

Yeah. You can go and look at it, and everybody sees something different. Yeah, it's true.

I was looking at this, and I was trying to come up with something different, but I can't even see what she's saying. So I just I see it from this angle. You do? Okay, so maybe I have to move to the side of the monitor.

It could be like one of those things, the types of pictures that are just repetitive picture, but then whenever you like cross your eyes just right, and unfocus Like hound's tooth. Then it like pops out at you.

When she said we took this picture, and she was gonna show the sky, I thought it was gonna be. You're driving west, and the clouds kind of break, and it's rays coming down. Yeah, that's what I was thinking too.

That's what I was expecting. That was exactly what I thought I was gonna see.

It's just a cloudy picture. Yeah. And with like some breaks in the clouds that have light protruding, and even that bright, but it's not so It just looks like a cloudy day. That's all. It does. It really does.

It looks like there's rain on the other side.

Right, I would be more convinced by that usual, the sun rays breaking through the clouds, and oh, look, God is shining down on the White House. That's what I thought she was gonna show, and that's not what we saw.

Anyway. No. So what is the problem with this? Well, it's just dumb. I really don't know what I have to say beyond that.

It's just utterly ridiculous. Well, I guess the concern would be, is she inviting in demons, or more work of Satan, or stuff like that? Should we be concerned about that kind of thing?

Right, if 2 Corinthians 11 tells us that Satan disguises himself as an angel of light, then how do we know this image of this angel that she claims that she sees is actually an angel from God that is blowing something away, like she described?

Or did she open a portal up to something else? I mean, how would you even know? What in the world are you talking about? Because God told her. Of course, that's the way they all do it. Yes. God spoke to me, Hebrews 1, 1.

Long ago, at many times, and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days, he's spoken to us by his son. So the way that God spoke to Daniel back in the day is not the way that God communicates to us now.

Correct. He communicates to us through his word, the Bible, and you don't need anything more than that. And like you said, if you want to pray for the president, then pray for the president. Yes. But you don't have the power by any word or command or otherwise to open portals of channels to increase the strength of the message from God to Donald Trump.

If Trump is not going to repent of his sins and turn to Christ, then he doesn't have any more open transmission to God than he had before.

I'm kind of wondering how gullible he would be, because she said that he would hear him very clearly now. And if somebody wanted to get up in the rafters or whatever and start speaking to him.

I don't know that he would fall for that, but.

I mean, security might be on top of that, but you never know.

Yeah, right. But I will say that I think that, and I've talked about this before with Give me a raise. Give a raise to your chief of staff. It's the chief of staff up there in the rafters. I've talked about this with friends before that if there was more opportunity for Trump to have heard the gospel and really have had his heart convicted by it and realize that he was still in his sins and needed to turn to Christ.

Because every once in a while, we'll hear these stories that come about Trump that will say something to the effect of, you know, he's talking about how I, I need to do this so that I can get to heaven.

Or I don't know that I'm gonna make it or something like that. You know, this happens every three or four months. There will be some story about him saying something like that. And I just have to wonder if these charismatic people that he surrounds himself with, if they've not convinced him that God's already on your side, there's nothing else that you need to do.

And it's prevented him from truly hearing about his sin and need for Christ. And this has developed this uncertainty that he has in the very state of his soul, because he doesn't know. Since he doesn't know Christ, he's just got all these charismatic people around him that give him these loving affirmations.

You're on God's side and he's with you. And he doesn't truly have an understanding of his sin and need for a savior.

I just, I know I could not handle his job. There are too many people having two big voices all over where he goes. It doesn't matter where he travels.

And in so many different things. Oh, everything. I mean, just what a president have, what a world leader would have to juggle. Yes, every day.

It is enough in our household of seven people, including myself, I am definitely included in that. But it is too many voices saying, I want this, I want that, we should do this, we should do that, hey, how about this?

This suggestion, I mean, it's just, it's overwhelming.

I think that he definitely has the skill and the capacity to handle that. Oh, yes. I think he certainly does. But when it comes to faith, is the reason why. We're still praying for him. Right, we were still praying for him, that's good.

But is the reason why he doesn't know because of all these charismatic people around him who just keep giving him these false assurances. And now he doesn't really have any true assurance in Christ. Makes you wonder.

Yeah. Was there anything else about that? No, nothing, we're not gonna listen to that any further. Okay, good. And I definitely didn't want to do the full hour and a half video. Oh my goodness, thank you.

Repentance, Gospel Clarity, and Testing Teachers

Going on here to a question from Mike.

Hi Gabe and Becky, if you're there. This is Mike Wells from Zephyr Hills. Yep, she's right here. Hello. I asked you about Bryce Crawford a few weeks ago, maybe a month or two ago now at this point. Today I have a question to you about Ryan from needgod .net.

I watched a number of his videos and I really appreciate his evangelistic zeal and have been very encouraged by his just constantly preaching the gospel to people online and when he goes on missions trips.

But I've been a little concerned with his presentation of the gospel. It seems to lean towards a free grace understanding of the gospel. He emphasizes repentance as simply changing one's mind and he does place a very strong focus on trusting Christ.

That part is good for sure. But I don't hear much about the necessity of repentance as resulting in a transformed life or the cost of discipleship. He does talk about repentance as a change of mind. He does talk about turning from sin as the fruit of repentance.

But turning from sin not as repentance itself. Do you think Ryan's presentation of the gospel is able to be balanced or do you have any concerns that it could unintentionally minimize repentance and the evidence of saving faith?

I'd be really interested in your assessment. Again, I believe he's a genuine brother and I believe he speaks so much truth but when I hear him, something seems definitely off with regard to that. So again, thank you.

And I look forward to hearing your response. Thank you, Mike. Appreciate your question. I have watched some things from Ryan from needgod .net. A lot of his videos will even come across my feed on X. They're always short.

It's not like I've sat there and listened to a long presentation from him but the short segments are solid. It's really good. There was a video of his that I saw in which he was sharing the gospel with a woman who happened to be a very famous OnlyFans prostitute.

Okay. The women on OnlyFans are prostitutes. Right. They're selling sex for money and attention and otherwise. So this very, very famous woman, famous from OnlyFans, it looked like they were outdoors at a parade or something like that but he was interviewing her.

Okay. And I was like, wow, how do you end up in a chance? I mean, of course, by the providence of God, but how do you just stumble across each other that way? And she was even willing to stop and talk with him and he shared the gospel with her.

And so I DM'd him and I asked him like, how did you just run into her like that? And he told me where they were and how she was getting attention and knowing who she was because of how often she ends up in the news doing just outlandish stunts.

He went up to her and she was willing to talk and he shared the gospel with her. So that's an exchange I've had with Ryan. On a personal level. On a personal level, yeah. I did reach out to him once and ask him that and he was very gracious to answer my questions.

But anyway, otherwise, with everything else that he shares, I don't have any cautions if he's teaching repentance as a change of mind, that's not wrong because that is what the word means. To repent means to change your mind.

Right. And when we come to Christ, that's at least what happens very initially. There is a change of mind. That is what Jesus preached at the beginning of his ministry. He says, the time is at hand, repent and believe the gospel, Mark 1 15.

So you're turning from your unbelief, turning from the direction of sin that you were going in and now you have turned from that to Christ. It doesn't mean that you've just automatically stopped sinning, but there is a change of mind that has happened.

The moment that you come to believe, because you're not an unbeliever anymore, you're now a believer in Christ. Right. So that's not wrong to say that. How much Ryan talks about a change in lifestyle?

I don't know, because I haven't seen that much from him. If Mike, you feel like you've got a feeling about that or a caution about that. I mean, maybe you could reach out to him. Yeah. He was gracious to answer my questions.

Maybe that's something that you could ask him. I mean, otherwise being discerning, you should always be discerning with any teacher on YouTube or otherwise. Definitely. I mean, even in the things that I say, you should test it with scripture.

1 Thessalonians 5. Yes. Test all things, hold fast to what is good, abhor what is evil. And I'm not offended by that. I'm not offended that somebody would want to test my words. Remember that the apostle Paul in Acts 17 went to teach in Berea.

And as he's sharing the gospel and saying that Christ is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets, what did the Bereans do? They went to the scriptures. Yeah. To test if what this apostle of Jesus Christ was saying was true.

Right. They even tested the words of the apostle. That's good. Scripture is our authority. It is the word of God. We test all things according to it. So if you're hearing Ryan say some things and you're wondering if his message about repentance in particular just needs to be more robust, examine that according to scripture.

And I would encourage you to reach out to him. I think that he would be receptive to that or would clarify his position a little bit more. Right. Because like I said, I can't really go off of what I've seen since.

Most of what I've seen has just been these short clips. Yeah. But he's willing to step out and debate. I noticed that he just recently did a debate with Trent Horn, who's the Catholic Answers guy. He's had debates with other people.

I think there was a Mormon. There was an Eastern Orthodox guy that he did a debate with. So he wants to be out there sharing the gospel. Like you said, Mike, love his heart and love his desire to want to share Christ with other people.

I've definitely seen that about his ministry. And all I can say is a hearty amen to that. Yeah, definitely.

And I'm sure that he is wanting to fine tune his approach because nobody just goes out there and does it perfectly ever. Of course, right. So if you have like godly advice, then by all means, I don't think he would turn you down.

I mean, sounds like he's a godly man. Yeah, right, right.

I can say that very young in my ministry, I loved having men reaching out to me and telling me, hey, I heard you say this. This is actually not the way that we want to word this or something like, you know, something.

It could have been something as silly as I had my analogy about the Trinity wrong. Yeah. It could be something like that. That's modalism, Patrick. Modalism, Patrick. You know, cause God is like water.

Sometimes he's a liquid. Sometimes he's a solid. Some, no, that's modalism, Patrick.

Yeah. But anyway, so yes, definitely reach out. And thanks for pointing him, you know, others in that direction too to watch and hopefully get a fire going under them too.

I don't remember if this happened the day that I heard this question from Mike or if it was somewhere like the day before. Anyway, I know that within the past week, I pulled up needgod .net and Ryan has like a full quiz section on there, like a full Bible quiz section.

Awesome. It is the biggest collection of Bible quizzes on a website that I've ever seen. Oh, that's great. You can actually go to a chapter of the Bible and do a quiz on that chapter, every chapter of the Bible.

Neat, that's a lot.

So if anything, I could direct you to Ryan's website, needgod .net and you can find some fun Bible trivia there. Yeah, definitely. Test your knowledge. I did a couple of chapters out of Acts cause that's one of the books I'm studying and right now, obviously, since I'm doing Acts on the podcast and I aced it, but it was some challenging questions.

It does really good, really good the way that it arranges those questions. Anyway, have fun with that. Okay, this next one comes from Roberto. This is another voicemail and this one comes in two parts.

So I think I'm gonna play part one here and then we'll do part two.

Okay. Hey, Pastor Gabe, this is Roberto reaching out and I was actually wondering, I've had a question that's kind of a float one in my mind. I know I discussed it with my secretary and I've been meaning to speak with a senior pastor here at the church, but what are your thoughts on this?

What are the moral and legal obligations a pastor may have when it comes to undocumented citizens in the congregation? So do they have an obligation to report them to ICE? Is this a liberty issue? Meaning he can choose whether or not he wants to report someone?

Not even just down to the pastor, what are the obligations that a member may have? Elders, should we withhold membership from someone who is not a documented citizen of the US? Should we be weary in adding them to a congregation?

Should we watch discipline? Should they be on church discipline for not being citizens? And also, should we accept any type of offering that they may give?

Okay, let's stop right there because then the next part of his question is going to go toward, should we accept an offering if that money was acquired illegally or something to that effect? So that's going to be part two.

Let's just focus now on if a person is an illegal immigrant. Oh, that's heavy. Should we allow them to be in church or do we need to turn them in? Well, first of all, let's go to Romans 13, verse one.

Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore, whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed and those who resist will incur judgment.

For rulers are not a terror to good conduct but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good and you will receive his approval. For he is God's servant for your good.

But if you do wrong, be afraid for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer. Therefore, one must be in subjection not only to avoid God's wrath but also for the sake of conscience.

Yeah. So what do you think your conscience would be telling you to do in that situation?

Well, I mean, if we're going that route, I would think to be as a pastor, you're supposed to be above reproach. And if you allow somebody to do something illegal in your congregation and you kind of cover it, if you will, or ignore it, doesn't that look bad on someone?

Oh, yeah. Like what else are you covering or ignoring? Now I become a participant in that.

And this is not a matter of somebody's been out there preaching the gospel. Yeah, this is not somebody's been preaching and now the government is coming against them. And so we're trying to hide them to protect them from the wrath of the government.

It's not that kind of situation. Right, not at all. This is a person who is breaking the law. Right. They are in the country illegally. Right. And if they're not going through a process of gaining citizenship, if which, you know, if they're going through a process.

Of gaining citizenship, then they're probably there legally. Right, right. Well, that's what I'm thinking. Like there's other things like getting a work visa or what is it? Your green card or something.

Like if they still do that, I don't know. I'm so old school here.

I'm so out of the loop. But at the same time. Yeah, or school visa or something like that.

Something like that, you know, where they're in the United States legally, but they're not exactly a citizen. Then I think it's fine. Sure. Because they're there and they're abiding by the law. They're not here.

Even if they're not a citizen,.

They're not here illegally. Right. At that point, they have permission from the government to be here. Right. Even if it's for a limited time. Right. But if we're to be subject to governing authorities, let every person be subject to the governing authorities.

Right. The person who is there among you, who is illegally present, is not subject, is not being subject to those governing authorities. And you must be. And so for the sake of conscience, because otherwise, are you aiding and abetting a criminal then at that point?

True. If you know they're illegal, but you're not notifying the government, there's somebody here that shouldn't be here because they've entered the country illegally. It pulls my heartstrings because I'm like,.

What if that's a friend, you know? I know. Like, that would be so hard. I know. But at the same time, I don't.

And again, like you had pointed out, we're not talking about people who are here who aren't citizens. Right. Because you can still have permission from the government to be here. Right. We have always had members in our congregation who are not American citizens.

We've always had that. Yep. And it's not that they're here illegally. They are here by means of some other permission. Right. And maybe then going through that process of gaining citizenship, but they aren't illegal.

Right. So we're just talking people who have entered the country illegally. And if known by the government, they would be detained and deported. We know that that would be the outcome if the government knew about their presence.

Yeah. So if you're aware of that, then you do have an obligation in subject to governing authorities to do the right thing. And especially now, let me give it to you in this position as a pastor. I have men in my congregation who work in some capacity of law enforcement, whether that's upholding the law, whether that's working like as a police officer or something to that effect, a lawyer, you know, anything.

Right. I've always had people in my congregation that have worked in that capacity. So I know that if they knew, they would do their jobs. Yes. And they would make sure that the person who is a criminal here at this point, because they're in the country illegally, they would do their job and fulfill what needs to be done in turning that person in.

And so I know that. And if I am aware that a person is here illegally and I'm, you know, trying to cover that up or just turning the other way or ignoring that I know this or something like that, I could get people in trouble in my congregation.

Yes, you could.

Very easily. Who are in law enforcement and maybe And they can lose their careers. Yeah, right. I mean, it's potentially.

Right. It could be a big mess in a lot of different ways. So again, with what's said to us here in Romans chapter 13, that the governing authorities are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. In this particular case, the governing authorities are enforcing the laws of the land.

This is not a tyrannical dictator who's imposing his will. He's following the laws that have been set down in the books in our nation. Right. And we all have an obligation to follow those laws. Right.

In the United States of America, in particular, we're not a dictatorship, not a monarchy. So there's not somebody that sits over everybody else and we do what that person says that we should do. No matter what it is.

Right. Even our governing authorities are subject to the laws that have been established in this land. So we are just upholding those laws and doing so, not just to avoid God's wrath, as said in verse five, but also for the sake of conscience.

And toward the end, in verse seven, pay to all what is owed to them. Taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, and honor to whom honor is owed. Amen.

All right. Now let's go to part two here. This is the next question that Roberto had.

Well, okay, hold on. Okay, all right. Just to fully answer his questions, what about a congregant? Still the same? Right. So a member of your church, they've actually gone through the membership process.

Is that what you're saying? No, I think he said a fellow congregant, like somebody else in the congregation knows, not just like a pastor. Oh yeah, right, right, right. Somebody in the congregation knows.

Is it upon them to turn them in as well? That's a good question.

I think what a good thing to do in that case, like say somebody in the church knows that another person in the church is an illegal citizen. So do they take it upon themselves to alert the governing authorities?

They could do that anonymously. But I think that as brothers in Christ, if you know this person, though they're disobeying the law, if you know that they are a brother or a sister in Christ, I think you really have an obligation to go to them and talk to them.