Why do we not see Demonic Possession Anymore? | Season 3 Episode 5

Demonic Possession in the Gospels Versus the Rest of the Bible

Welcome back to the Point Taking Podcast. As Hunter says, the only podcast. I'm Josiah, and according to Anna, I am a much worse host than Hunter. She didn't even say, she said, not just he's a better host, which I had already said he was.

She said he is a much better host, and that was totally unnecessary and unneeded. So thanks for that, Anna. Appreciate that. You're welcome, Hunter. I'm in your corner. Yeah, so there's Hunter. I miss you, come back.

There's Hunter's best friend, Anna, over there. And then here, we have our good friend, Dana. Hey, Dana. Hey. Have you ever been on a podcast before? I have not. I've been on several, all here. All here, but I've been on several.

What about? She's Dr. Dana. Dr. Dana Sneed.

I was like, why didn't you introduce her as Dr. Dana? She has letters after her name. She does, she does. What would those letters be? Is it PhD? Yeah. Okay. PhD, okay. So she is the smartest one of us up here.

That's what that means. If you're a doctor, you have to be the most intelligent. Is that what that means? Do you hear me? The most smartest. Spend the most time in school. Yes. I don't know. I know some people that are doctors that are idiots.

Yeah, I bet Dana does too. I bet she's met many of them, but I've met some people that are doctors that are idiots, but okay. I had a math teacher from Hungary when I was at University of Memphis. He was brilliant, but he didn't like being called a doctor because he, quote, doesn't heal people.

So he didn't like being called a doctor. We just called him by his first name, which I can't pronounce nor remember, but it was pretty cool. All right. So today, the question is a straightforward question.

I can't remember if it was sent in by a listener or by a brother Christian. I actually can't remember. It's probably the same thing, no matter what. And the question is, demonic possessions. And I'll word it the same way that it was asked.

Why don't we see them today as much as we did in the Bible? As much as we do in the Bible. And that is the question. Why don't we see demonic possessions as much as we do in the Bible? But before we get there, we have to ask Dana some of the questions we come up with the past few weeks to just make sure she's on the right side of history.

Dana, cake or pie? Go.

And explain. For the rest of your life, you can only have one for the rest of your life. Cake or pie?

Pie, because there's more varieties. Okay, that was the right answer. That is the correct answer.

Very good. We asked her the one for Thanksgiving. I keep wanting to say potato salad. Is sweet potato casserole a side or dessert? And you said. I said it's a decoration. Because she doesn't eat it.

So, okay. So it is pie. Now, if we give cake brownies and give them donuts, does it change your answer?

So you mean cake brownies and donuts all on one side? Yeah, that's on that side.

And we don't give pie pizza, which it should be there. But if we don't give pie pizza.

I don't know, apple pie is kind of my favorite. So you would still say with pie?

Probably. I don't even have to give you the kicker. The kicker is that cheesecake is pie. Oh, well then definitely. Yeah, yeah. Let's go with pie. Yeah, and whenever people say, oh, it's in the name, I have like a set number of examples.

But it has a pie crust. Right, I have a set number of examples in my brain of things that are in the name that are not that thing. Koala bears, Grape Nuts, Affordable Care Act, doesn't mean it was affordable or they care.

The Patriot Act wasn't patriotic. See, I have So what's the definition for pie then, that it has a crust? The definition for pie is it has a crust and filling. Now, that's why I say cobbler counts as a pie, because even though it has a topping, it still has a crust and a filling.

That's how I view it. All right, well, with that definition,.

I'm definitely on the side of pie. Yeah. By the way, graham cracker crust I'd be sad about Krispy Kreme donuts.

I'd be sad about losing those. Yeah, graham cracker crust though is not the best. I like the regular soft one, not the graham cracker. No, the best, like the regular dough. Is Oreos. Yes. Well, you know what, Oreos are a good crust.

I will say that. All right, now that we got the important stuff out of the way, let's get to that Bible stuff. I can't say that. I can't even say it. So, I'll start here, and then we'll kind of go from there naturally.

The question has a little bit of a presupposition in it. The question was, why don't we see demonic possession today like we did in the Bible, as much as we see it in the Bible, because it's quote, all throughout the Bible.

That's a quote from the listener who asked the question. And I would say that that is actually not true. I would say that people think it's all throughout the Bible, but in reality of the 66 books of the Bible, you would only find demonic possession explicitly in a few of them.

I would say that you would not find it in Ezra or Isaiah or Nehemiah or Esther, or you can make an argument for Daniel, but probably not, or Malachi or Micah or Joshua or Ruth. You would not find it there.

In the New Testament, you would not find the explicit demonic possession in the book of Philippians or Philemon or Jude. I will allow revelation because there actually is an example in Revelation, but you wouldn't find it in 1 Corinthians.

You wouldn't find it in most of the New Testament book. I would say that if you took away the four gospels and a couple chapters of Acts, there would be very little demonic possession in the Bible. When people say it's all throughout the Bible, it's actually just very common in the four gospels.

That's really what people mean. And I don't think people have a proper perspective of that, because if you really think about it, the gospels cover roughly, if you don't count the genealogies, 35 years of history, but they don't have a lot to say about the first 30 or so.

So really it's mostly three and a half years of history. During Jesus's ministry. Right. That they focus on. There, and pretty much only there in a 50 square mile area of the world, do you see a massive amount of demonic possession.

And you don't see that anywhere else in the world, anywhere else in history, in biblical history, which is history, anywhere else in the Bible at that rate. Not even close. Whole swaths, whole sections of the Old and New Testament have zero mention of demonic possession.

Not to be confused with demonic activity or things like that. So I would say, I would challenge somebody who thinks that demonic possessions all throughout the Bible to recognize it's really just the gospels and Acts for the most part.

Now the next question would be, why? Why do we see it more in those books than we do the rest of the Bible?

Dana, you got a guess? Well, I would say to start with is, if we're starting with God's word is our authority and God himself as the sovereign ruler of all things, and we see that all things are made for his purpose and according to his will and his plan, then I think that we can look at the time of Jesus's ministry and see that God was using those things and so allowing those to be recorded and talked about and observed because it illuminated Jesus's purpose and his work, his ministry, and therefore sharing, helping us to learn about God.

That's interesting. So when the Bible says all things are subjected under his feet, and all things are to him and through him and for him, and he works all things according to counsel's will and all things are subject to him, you actually think that means all?

Yes. Including spiritual and physical realm?

Yes, and in fact, we see that because when Jesus is, he's interacting with the demons. Let's just take Legion, for example, right? That's what everybody knows because Jesus cast him out and sends him into the herd of pigs, right?

Well, why does he leave the person? And he asks permission, can I go into that herd of pigs? Well, because when Jesus gives a command, he has no choice but to obey that command.

Isn't that crazy? Yeah. Even the demons ask permission because they know who he is.

And there are times where the Bible says they beg. Yes.

They grovel. And it's actually demons are the first one, a demon-possessed person, the demon is the first person to actually identify Jesus before he has revealed himself to everyone else. He says, son of David, what are you going to do with us?

Well, because he healed that one guy.

And then he told him, don't tell anybody about what I've done for you. And then he told everybody. And you know, it's funny. Who wouldn't?

And for those of you who maybe didn't catch that, when that demon said, son of David, recognize if you haven't paid attention to Matthew chapter one, son of David, that demon was saying, I believe this is the Messiah of second Samuel, the Messiah of Isaiah, the Messiah of Genesis 50, the promised one, right?

The anointed one. That's why when those two blind men say, son of David, have mercy on us and Jesus heals them according to their faith, the faith they displayed is that they believe In the prophecy.

They believe in the prophecy. They believed in that quite literally, which they had not seen now coming to pass that this really is the Messiah. So yeah, so, and I think this is important to start this framework here because as Dana rightly pointed out, when God wanted Saul to be tormented with an evil spirit, it doesn't say an evil spirit tormented Saul.

It says Yahweh sent an evil spirit to torment Paul. When Job, no, when Satan wanted to torment Job, what happened? He had to ask permission. Satan had to ask Yahweh's permission. Satan had to ask God's permission because Job is one of his children.

I think we have a wrong mindset of Satan. I will never minimize Satan's power, Satan's knowledge, Satan's craftiness. He's the most cunning creature, but he's the most cunning creature that God has made.

Genesis 3, 1 says, it's an amazing verse that when Moses wrote that down, I know it must've just boggled his mind. Genesis 3, 1 says the serpent was the most crafty, the most cunning of the creatures God had made.

Ephesians 2 says that everyone in this room and listening to this either is or at one point was walking according to the ways of this world, to the ruler who exercises authority over the lower heavens.

And what's amazing about that is Bugs Bunny really messed us up here. There's no such thing as a neutral human with an angel who is actually not an angel on one shoulder and a demon who's actually not a demon on the other shoulder, right?

There's no biblical precedent for that. Demons don't look like that and angels don't look like that. They're not vying over your soul. And that's not happening either. But more than that, the Bible doesn't say that Satan had puppets to do his bidding.

It says that Anna, Dana, Josiah, Taylor, Lowell, and every other person either was or is walked according to the ways of this world, not on a leash, just in step with the ways of Satan. So when it says the whole world, the power, the sway of the whole world lies in the power of the evil one, or when it says he has held them captive, when it says he's the deceiver of the whole world, it's not that they're in a prison cell.

It's that they are walking in step with his ways. That's why you are either a child of Satan or a child of the father. So I wanna be clear about that. His power is deception, and it is a great power, but it is not coercion against an unwilling, humble, God-obedient participant.

It is someone who's walking according.

To the ways of this world. And they're also not omnipotent and omniscient.

I was gonna bring that up, and that's the same thing about Satan, is people are like, oh, Satan's tempting me. It's like, okay, you do realize he is not the same as God. Like he is one guy, he's just like walking around, you know, doing whatever.

He's not specifically tempting you. Yeah, it's like you're not important enough for him to tempt you. Are you kidding me? He's going like after the leaders.

And stuff of this world, not you. You're not important. Sorry to break your heart. Yeah, but when Daniel is, he prays and he has to wait, and God sends an angel to answer his prayer. And I believe it's Michael in that case.

And he says, I flew swiftly to come bring you this answer. Well, because he's not, and that's an example of an angel, but angels, demons are just angels. They're just fallen angels.

They're all created heavenly beings. Well, is that the same one. Where, now correct me if I'm wrong, if he was like, I came from fighting this war. The Prince of Persia. Yes, yes.

Michael's not the one, Michael. Michael's the one who defeated the Prince of Persia. So that the other angel could come.

Yes, okay. But yeah, and it's all wrapped up in the same thing. Daniel's getting these visions and then God is sending these messengers, these angels to help explain the visions that he saw. But if he said, I have to fly swiftly, that's because he can't be in everywhere.

That's a great point. I've never thought about that. Me either. Yeah.

Boom. See, she's the smartest of us. That's a great point. You know, you ever think about Gabriel's job in the New Testament? He tells two women they're pregnant. That's basically his whole job. He didn't have, Michael has to be the defender of Israel.

Gabriel tells two women they're pregnant.

He does something. And possibly also tells Zachariah and Joseph. But still just messengers. Yeah.

Israel is in the pregnancy. He's still just a messenger. But if I'm not mistaken, he shows up at one point in the Old Testament and actually has an actual job.

An actual job. Yeah, like Gabriel said. Delivering God's messages aren't an actual job. God used a dream.

God used a dream to do that for 99 of his prophecies. And then all of a sudden, Gabriel, no, I want you to deliver this one in person. Hand deliver. Yeah. Because she's not going to believe it if we do this in a dream.

No. Well, Zachariah didn't believe in him. Yeah, well. He did see the angel. Yes.

He didn't have a lot to say about it after that, though. No. I love that. Because he was mute. Because he couldn't speak until, when could he not speak until he knew the name? His name is John. Yeah, because he wrote it down.

He couldn't, obviously, because he couldn't speak it. So. You should name him after yourself.

No, his name is John. I think Anna kind of gave a hint towards maybe the question of, okay, now that we're going to reword the question, it's not throughout the Bible, but it's prolific in the life of Jesus and a few times in the book of Acts.

Why so much there? And I think Anna, by pointing out that they're not omnipotent, they're not omniscient. No, that was Dana that pointed that out. I agreed with what she said. So that Anna pointed that out.

I think that helps answer the question. Why would they be so concentrated in one part of the world at one time? Because we can all agree, I think part of the problem is people just don't think logically and critically about it.

There's not an infinite number of demons. There is a finite number of demons. In fact.

It's only a third of all the spiritual creation.

If we take Revelation 12 or 14 and whatever it is as a recording of the sin of Satan and all that, it is a third of all the angels, which would mean there's twice as many angels as there are demons. Did I do that math right?

Two thirds and one third? Yeah, I did. So, you know, there's only a finite number and they are very knowledgeable of God's word with head knowledge, not heart knowledge, very knowledgeable of that. But the Bible says, there are things that the apostles got to see that angels longed to see, okay?

They desire to look into these things is what the book of Hebrews tells us. They don't have omniscient knowledge. God has revealed his will to us in his word and Deuteronomy says some of his will he has chosen not to reveal to anybody outside of himself.

For now, for now. That would include sometimes Michael and Gabriel and all the others and Satan. So with that being said, why ladies do we think there's such a concentration? Cause it is, you read Mark.

Yeah. It's all over. Why is there so much demonic possession in the gospels?

Well, and I kind of want to go back off of what Dana said earlier is. So you're not going to answer my question. I'm going to. You're going to make your own. Is that what you're going to do? No, I'm using Dana's answer from a previous question for my answer.

Yes ma 'am, yes ma 'am. So I'm piggybacking. You're chicken backing. You're chicken backing. Yeah, sure, chicken backing. Pigs get too much credit. Sure. But what I was going to say, and I forgot because you.

I'm sorry.

Okay, let me help. The question was, why do we see so much demonic possession?

To give God the glory, to allow people to see Jesus. I don't want to say work his magic because it's not magic, but to use his God-given abilities and to have people come to know him and just give glory to that.

That would be my answer. Amen. I would say that absolutely. That's the ultimate answer because God is the one that's ultimately in charge.

Because it's about the miracles and stuff. If it's just this random guy, you know, walking through towns, not really doing a whole lot, he's not gonna make a big impression on people. I mean, let's be honest.

Right.

But I think we also have to look at it from the demon's perspective because the demons aren't trying to give glory to God. They're trying to take the glory from God. Right.

Which is ironic because in their doing, they give glory to God.

Yes, but I would say that that's the answer from their perspective. That's why they are there because they're trying to take the glory from God. And what better way to take the glory from God than to interrupt the ministry of the one giving glory to God.

That's good.

So let's think about planet Earth because I don't wanna get too metaphysical, but there's no reason for demons to be in Venus or Mars or other parts of the universe. It's not a matter of traveling abilities.

It's their job and desire is to deceive the ones creating God's image. And just a quick reminder, fellow listeners, whenever I have someone in counseling tell me, well, I feel as low as dirt. I don't know if this is a good counseling thing.

I normally report back with, well, actually you're lower than dirt because God told the dirt to bring forth fruit and trees and bushes and grass and the dirt obeyed him. You and I didn't. Dangerous. Right?

Well, I say you and I, me too. But it's the truth. It's the dirt obeyed. Truth is truth. The dirt obeyed God. The fish swam when God told them to. The birds flew when God told them to. The reptiles did.

We didn't. We disobeyed. We're the ones creating his image that can know him intimately and love him deeply. And we choose not to. And we, right. So we are the ones that rebelled. And some spiritual beings.

But we're the ones that rebelled. So I say that not like, oh, you're a loser. To recognize how much God forgave you. You can't, there's no such thing as forgiveness if there's not rebellion. So with that being said, if demons are spread out.

And look, I'm just doing this for the few people in the world that think like me. If there are 10 ,000 demons, I'm making that number up. If someone fact checks me on that with a Bible, I'm gonna like throw my microphone.

There's 10 ,000 demons and they're spread out all over the world in 27 AD. Well, if 1 ,000 of them were with the Native Americans in North America and the Aborigines in Australia and all that stuff, right?

I believe that if Satan wanted to bring the most power halting ability that he has to the kingdom of God, it would be in the region of Galilee and Judea in 27 AD, not in modern day Peru or not in modern day Russia.

So we have what I think to be a conglomeration, what is this when they do this? A unification of demons in that one area of the world to where if there had been 1 ,000 in North America, there may only be 10 because they all went to Israel.

And I think that's why we have such a concentration of demons for a very short period of time until after Jesus ascends and apostles start spreading out and the kingdom starts spreading out, the demons then have to again spread out to halt to their best of their ability,.

The kingdom of God and the kingdom work. Well, and if you think about this like a spiritual warfare, because that's what it is and Satan knows because he was told back in Genesis chapter three that he's gonna have a victory and here's Jesus on earth and he knows this is my chance.

And so from a military, a strategy type perspective, this is the climax, this is the thing we've been working for 4 ,000 years on.

That's a good point because, that's a great point, I have not thought of it that way. Satan was told he was gonna lose, the Bible says he doesn't think he knows his time is short. So he knows he will lose the war, he is told he will win a battle because the Bible says what?

You may bruise or crush his heel, but he will crush your head. So that's a good point. He was prophesied to win a battle. So this would be, maybe he's like, okay, maybe this will be the battle I will win.

Maybe, right? Okay, that's good. So we have

And we also see that he was very intentional, like throughout the history in the Old Testament, God made very specific promises about when Jesus was gonna come, what line he was gonna come through. And we see again and again, where Satan and the spiritual forces are trying to interrupt God's plan.

I mean, take Joash, for instance, right? So Joash is the only surviving member of the line of David because his father was king for about a year. And when he died, his mother said, I wanna be queen and killed all of the sons of Athaliah so that she could become, or Ahaziah, Athaliah is the queen, so that she could become queen.

And the only way, so like basically, and interesting connection, she's the daughter of Jezebel and Ahab, but anyways. Pot twist. Yeah, so anyways, so she kills all of the royal sons, except because God is sovereign and his name can't be thwarted.

And so he sends basically a nursemaid to save him and hide him in the temple for six years until he can become king. That's crazy. But that's just a perfect example of where Satan was trying, through this whole thirst for power, he was trying to wipe out the line of David because if he can wipe out the line of David, there is no Messiah.

Right. But obviously, he cannot thwart God's plan.

Yeah, and you know, I think when we look at that, we see Jesus beginning his public ministry and all of a sudden, we have a lot of demonic possession. Now here's where, a small side note, where, all right, all right, y 'all, listen.

The teacher in me can't help it. I'm gonna teach you something real quick. And just bear with me for a minute, or lie in with me. Don't even bear with me because they hibernate this time of year. Lie in with me, you'll get it in a minute.

Did you see the comments about laughing at my jokes last week? No, I did not. All right, I'll make sure to screenshot them. I don't remember groaning at your jokes. No, no, it said laughing. It was Mike Freeman, actually.

Oh, Mike Freeman. No, anyway. He's a dad. He laughs at all his dad jokes. Excuse me, excuse me, excuse me. You're excused. They're funny. And he may be a dad, but you know, the Heavenly Father likes it.

Mr. Michael, I love you. All right, I was gonna try. I was not. So, sometimes we see something descriptive in the Bible and we think it's prescriptive. And here's what I mean by that. Yeah, I didn't come up with that mnemonic device, but.

Okay, so you are allowed to say dancing is not sinful because descriptively we have godly people worshiping through dancing. You cannot prescriptively then say that, oh, that means you must dance to worship.

That's foolish. That's foolish, right? I would not tell people it is a, no, this may be, I would not tell people it is a prescriptive command that you have to have worship on Sunday only. I think that is descriptive, but it's a good example to be set for the Lord's day.

Does that make sense? There's no command of you must do it the first day of the week. That is the example we have from the apostles. So, descriptively we have throughout the gospels demons causing not just emotional and spiritual, but physical ailments.

So, we'll have someone being mute because they're possessed with a demon. Well, if someone being paralyzed because they're possessed with a demon, there's a bunch of these, right? That's descriptive. That is not to say that everyone on planet Earth right now that is mute is demon possessed, that everyone on planet Earth right now that has a withered hand, well, no, that wasn't one, that is blind is demon possessed.

That is taking a descriptive event and trying to make it prescriptive for the rest of the Bible. You can't read the Bible that way or you will go crazy. If you read the Bible that way, you will be twisted up all kinds of ways.

It will not make sense to you. Historical books are descriptive. They're not always prescriptive. When we're reading a biography, for lack of a better term, of Jesus's life, you can't say, oh, well, this person was possessed by a demon and they were mute.

Therefore, if you accept these premises, every mute person on planet Earth is demon possessed. You can't do that. You can't do that. So, as we think about that, if that helps anybody out there, keep that in mind.

Even a biblical example of that was the, was it the man that was paralyzed and they asked him whose sin caused him to be, have this ailment and he said, nobody. It wasn't his sin, it wasn't his parents' sin, it was so that I could have the glory.

Yes. The irony is we'll have people do the exact opposite. Oh, well, God made Zachariah, John the Baptist's dad, mute. So, that means every physical ailment you have must be a direct divine punishment.

No, you can't do that either. David punished David in Bathsheba's sin, harshly, the death of the child. You make a really crappy counselor and then you say, okay, that means every death of a child is a punishment of God's sin.

That's not true. You can't take a descriptive event, that's why I'm real serious about this, and then make that prescriptive for every scenario of all time. You do that when the Bible tells you to. Like when the Bible says, he works all things according to the counsel of his will.

Like when the Bible says, for whosoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. The Bible tells us when we can do that. Okay, with that being said, a lot of demonic activity in the Gospels, sometimes physical ailments, sometimes emotional, spiritual.

What Demonic Possession Means and Whether Christians Can Be Possessed

What is, ladies, demonic possession? What is it? Like what does that mean? What is it, if we believe that human beings are a trichotomy or even a dichotomy, but if we believe that they are our body, soul, and spirit, or body, mind, and spirit, when we say a person is demonically possessed, and I don't think any of us are making the argument that doesn't happen at all today, we're making the argument of why it's more prolific in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

What is it about them that is possessed? And that may not even be the best word to describe it, because that is not a common way the Bible describes it. The Bible doesn't normally use that word possession.

It also often uses the words unclean spirit as opposed to demon, but that's okay. What does that mean, ladies? Anna looked at you.

I'm looking at you. So I don't know, I want to know. Because I just think about, you know, like in today's world, people are like, oh, I think of possession to like the exorcist. You know, like that's all that we've seen, and so that to me is like what I'm thinking of is like with the head turning and like the puke and crap coming out.

So it's like, I know that's not right, so that's why I wanted to know Dana's answer. I don't know, I think the exorcist is pretty biblically sound. Yeah, that was a joke. I've been too afraid to watch it.

I've just seen those, I don't do scary movies, so I've just seen those scenes and know about it with culture.

I would say that it's probably something that we wouldn't really be able to completely understand because we can't completely understand the spiritual realm. Right, like we can only, it's one of those things, kind of like the Trinity.

We have to get so far and then just say, okay, I just accept that. And so. I understand it, but yeah. Right. So you can only understand it to a certain point, and then it's just, take it, I'm not going to be able to understand this further.

So I think in some ways, there is some of that to this. But I would say that just in order, a way for us to maybe kind of think about it and to understand it is that when we talk about a possession, really kind of what we mean is that there is a spiritual force that is either taking control, or maybe a better word is interrupting your normal function.

Okay, so like, if it, the way that you would think, or the way that you would act, but there is something else that is somewhat interfering with what you would normally be doing. So I have a question.

So just like, you guys don't say devil's advocate on here. What was the thing you guys said in the last couple of seasons?

Yeah, Hunter and Andrew. He didn't want to say devil's advocate. He wanted to say, oh, oh, oh, oh, hold on, hold on. You guys had the hat and stuff. It's that hat right there. Yeah, it's like we had the hat.

Hector, Hector. Hector, yeah, I was like starting with an H. If you wanted to be a Hector, beautiful Miss Taylor. Give me the hat, give me the hat. Oh, watch the root beer. Is that A-N-W? Yeah, don't waste that.

Yeah, but you really need the cream sodas not the root beer, okay. The Hector hat is for when you want to be devil's advocate, but that's not our favorite term. Yeah. So, and are you going to wear Hector's hat?

Yeah, I'm going to wear Hector's hat. So again, when someone's wearing the hat, especially if you're listening, you have to announce it. If you're not watching this, listening to this, the person wearing the hat is going to say things that are purposely untrue, okay.

So if you're listening to this right now, Anna's about to, are you going to ask or are you going to declare? What did you just say?

Sorry. I have ADD really bad now. That when we're talking about demonic possession, we're talking about interfering with what you normally. Oh yes, thank you.

So playing devil's advocate here, what about, yes, playing, sorry, playing Hector here. Hector. What would a female version of Hector mean? Hectora? Hectora. Okay, go ahead. Playing Hectora. What would you consider like schizophrenia?

Because you have paranoia, you have people hearing voices, you know, like all of those types of things. So like, what would you And she asked you that, not me.

Look at this, this is great. I'm not a certified biblical counselor.

Oh my gosh. I mean, are you really certified?

Oh my gosh. This lady just said that.

I cannot believe that. But what is your take on it, Dr. Dana?

Doctor. I will say that things get very tricky when you start getting into psychological issues because I don't think that there are, I don't think that you can paint with a broad brush. Okay? Blanket statements.

I think sometimes there can be legitimate issues going on. I think that sometimes those can be like a physical, biological, whether that's, you know, chemical imbalances or something that is tied to some sort of a physical abnormality of some sort.

And I do think that it is possible for there to be some sort of spiritual warfare going on in there. I would say that I would not automatically jump to saying that every schizophrenic Right, because again, I mean

Yeah, I agree. There are only limited demons and they are going to be working wherever it is gonna be the most effective for them to be working. And I would even, it's kind of a tangent, but I would say that this is kind of jumping ahead to why don't we see as much today?

But I would say that probably more likely, think about the way our culture and our societies work nowadays. They don't have to afflict a single person. They can guide television, social media, you know Government.

These influences that have long, far reaches. And so I think that that probably is a reasonable thought why you don't see as much, or at least we're not aware of as much, demonic possession is because they're not possessing individuals.

They're just influencing. They're influencing in a more subtle way. Because you also have to think about this, because we are not a spiritual culture the way that the early first century and before, and even the first few hundred years since then, right?