This Week in Witchcraft (S1 E1)

Welcome to this week in witchcraft The elements have been conquered with intense heat and witchcraft has become more cosmopolitan.

Can you spot it out in the wild? I'm dylan hamilton and with me are michael dirham david casson and andrew hudson

Welcome to a special episode this week in witchcraft. Can you spot it out in the wild before we go into answering this question?

We're going to explain our intro The elements have been conquered with intense heat and witchcraft has become more cosmopolitan christ and his glory and his holiness

Being that intense heat has gone out into the world and light has come to places that have been thoroughly shrouded in darkness

No longer can witchcraft be viewed as something that is animistic where we have witch doctors witches and cauldrons and black cats

To call witchcraft. We now have a more Crafty view a word crafty view which witchcrafty view of how

Magic is presented in this world and it's usually used through words and lies and deceit and deception

And before we get started Into our witchcraft this week.

We're going to have michael give his definition of witchcraft so witchcraft is a demonic appropriation of alternate authority trying to grab hold of authority

Other than god's authority to declare what is true What is good?

What is beautiful? It has to be a demonic appropriation of alternate authority because If we're not relying on god's word and god's truth to make sense of the world that he has made

We're grabbing our standard from the father of lies This is why witchcraft is a demonic appropriation of alternate authority

Perhaps it's best just to say it this way trying to Change things in the world around you simply by using words

Where people are casting spells today in our culture? Looking at that which is evil and calling it good looking at things that are good and calling it evil or Simply stating their preferred pronouns

So we see it in the wild as dylan Cleverly puts this we see it around us.

We need to identify The witchcraft going on in the world around us call it what it is so that we may repent and follow christ and I think andrew you've got a good example for us this week.

I sure do. In fact, I have Something about practical magic and by that we're talking about putting magic into practice recently in washington dc

I say recently in approximately mid -january an artist had put up some paper boards with soviet style propaganda images

One of which just to illustrate it is a picture of the united states president joe biden with a hammer labeled osha

And surrounding it with comply Well, that's that's that's a dangerous bit of propaganda to dispel

The lies however, about 11 minutes after they were put up on a building

A local resident came by and tore them down And when she was asked why why are you taking down this art?

Is it is it not approved art? She said it was a public health concern for public health

So she has taken The viewpoint or the word of public health

Turned it into well, this is concerning. So therefore i'm going to protect

And do my part through the use of this practice of tearing down Something that would oppose public health

That's kind of like the basis of Occultic ideas of bringing your will

Into reality through the use of whatever device possible And that's a good that's a good example because by calling it a health concern

This affords her the moral Currency imperative imperative she must to save others

She must tear down These pieces of art. So what is she up to?

She's using a word health that Really is overused in our in our day, but it's one of those uh, one of those words that has been enchanted with so many new nuances of Of meaning that it no longer means health

Like you would find in a dictionary A generation or two ago now The word has been enchanted.

We still have the word but there's all sorts of new meanings that have been brought into bear She's not coming up with a a new word, you know tearing down Tearing down other people's artistic expressions and protests

Okay, this this isn't totalitarianism. We're going to call it You know the common good we're going to come up with a new term.

It's not it's not the invention of a new term It's using using a term that's already there that everybody can get behind.

Oh, we all want to be healthy We all we're all for health. How can you be against health exactly but then redefining it enchanting it with something new?

And that's definitely witchcraft out in the wild That has left the realm of the thought and entered into action.

Yeah, so you said practical Practical magic, you know acting it acting it out

As she's casting her spell Declaring this to be a health issue tearing down Endangering her worldview.

She couldn't handle the disenchantment A disenchanted artist drew these things, right? But see what just happened

So what he just what he put up obviously using the soviet style propaganda posters is saying he's bringing that together with pictures of The president, you know the the president of the united states and lord fauci yeah and and lord fauci

Mr. Science and this is now consider this what he's doing is satire But with a point

I mean, it's demonstrating Now he's not actually doing sorcery He's not saying that joe biden and fauci

Are soviet agents Right, he's not saying that he's not saying that these are card carrying soviet agents and and You know, he's not so he's not doing some sort of sorcery bringing two things together and mixing them together

That that don't actually belong together But what he's doing is it's satire.

It's it's it's pointing to the fact that they're acting in ways that kind of hard to To not it's kind of hard to see the difference between what they're doing and what was done in communist

Russia and the american people have I suppose rightly been indoctrinated or Shown the errors or how this artistic form was used to influence others for evil

Right, but when she sees it, she doesn't see satire she sees a competing spell

Exactly to her. It's a desecration right? So here is here is here is a Here is an anti -power move coming from a warlock

I must respond and cast my spell and undo what was done She she can't she can't see satire right

You know, she's in a battle You know, that's part of the reason, you know, why? humor is lost

Like why can't certain people of a certain persuasion? Why can't they they laugh where'd the where'd the humor go what because everything is reduced to these unimaginative

Categories, right god still has a sense of humor, you know, paul had a sense of humor talking to the pagans in act 17

About you know how religious they were This is a this is a riot the way that he started talking about, you know

Sometimes act 17 is used as a model of like this is the way This is the way to really engage in a way that doesn't rock in many boats

You know, this is this is high brow engagement for the christians in our and our sophisticated paul is having fun

I see the chur of religious people And then the whole thing about the unknown god and then he turns it on his head this is humorous

And it's even humorous when they can't figure out that when he talks about resurrection He's not talking about another god.

They think resurrection is the name of another god This is how dense these people are. It's a funny story

Um, and of course it has a point But they don't have any humor in it They're like what's a seed picker doing?

You know talking about this that and the other they they don't they don't get what's going on this also brings up another interesting bit of witchcraft that goes on within In many of these enchantresses circles, what is art?

To her that is not art Right. It's it's desecration. But most of what's been produced since about 1900 to now

We could chalk up as desecration and not art And not of any sort of artistic

Use or any sort of sort of artistic expression using gifts And even even if most of the people that we we've seen from 1900 to now used their gifts or they had gifts

What what was their thing their thing was to? Exalt themselves by not actually using those gifts properly this is

Sophisticated humor what this guy did. It's a sophisticated humor and all she can think of is

These posters are going to kill people because they won't Follow the rules and and do their rituals and keep themselves

Holy, they'll become unclean if they believe these posters, right? So it's it's it's attacking the holiness code that she can't

Live without and believes that others cannot live without and so the only thing she can do is just tear it down This is a this is a lowbrow response to highbrow humor

And I can't think help but think about what happened and also in the book of acts When the status quo was challenged and the best response to the people who come up with In ephesus is to scream for two hours

Great is diana the goddess of ephesus, you know that's all they can do is just scream the same thing over and over and over and over again, it's like How many times do you have to yell it?

You know, but that's that's their only that's their response to the invasion of the truth Is to to yell the mantra over and over again, but business is booming

Yeah Business is booming. I say business is booming in the sense that you know in the same way that their idle

Manufacturing process was going to be torn down business right here with health

Being now the the chief end If we if we reject such things as being materialistic, you know, well,

I I can't get people to buy into it now Well, and remember that this this whole thing is being driven by the fear of death and the bible says the fear of death is slavery and some people

Find a lot of security In slavery and they do not want to be set free that requires responsibility

Taking ownership Mm -hmm And I think the communist party was against individuals taking responsibility too.

So all right, we'll do the thinking for you. You just Yeah Shut up and get back in the red line

That's a good thing Sorry Shot at bernie

Well since I think we've exhausted the witchcraft here we can go on to some good media and We're gonna go to some recommendations of things we've been consuming or we have consumed before and we found very helpful or Very edifying in our lives

And we'll start with michael if he's got something he's either recently Enjoyed or in the past and uh, see if it can it can help you and edify you as well

Uh, so right now i'm rereading a book. I I read a long time ago and it's part of a discipleship group and The book is called according to plan by graham goldsworthy and it is a

I think probably college level or senior in high school level read through of a biblical theology

How does the how does the whole story of the bible fit together? And how are we to read the bible in a way?

um that we're supposed to In the way in the way that it's intended to be read instead of reading it like critics or reading it like archaeologists or reading it like Scientists reading it as believers in christ and graham goldsworthy is uh

He's he's very elderly now, I don't know if he's passed away yet or not. He's he used to teach at more theological college in sydney australia as anglican and he's written several books on biblical theology and seeing christ

As the lens through which you are to read all of scripture and to see all of life and So he's been very helpful, uh to me in that regard.

This is just one of his books, but I would say It's a great introduction to everything else. He's he's written.

So according to plan graham goldsworthy super dave So I finished a book recently and I think

I mentioned it on a previous episode some progressive covenantalism um, and it had taken some of the classic dispensationalism to task so Over the last couple of weeks.

I have been rereading Rightly dividing the word of god by c .i. schofield

If you do not have a copy you can get a free one. There are not too many people that defend classic dispensationalism anymore it tends to be more of the more progressive or reformed or Uh in lowercase r dispensationalism, so that's the kind that you're going to encounter now, but I have been

I hate to use this this this word, but you know know your enemy But I have really enjoyed getting into his mind and and to why did he you know

Where did he start off from and it's actually given me an understanding of some of my family members and some of the people that I have

When I hear some of the things that they say I'm, like wait a second. That's not biblical.

That's schofield I'm, I have been able to uh, like my Private devotions in the morning.

I've been reading first thessalonians. That is the quintessential Dispensational here's the rapture

It's right there. It is right there. And and that's when there's a first lesson is for it's like, you know, it first lesson for even the

The the main point of all of thessalonians, it's about encouragement and and paul wanting to give them because he was he was afraid that their faith was going to be in jeopardy because He was suffering the very things he told them he was going to be suffering

And says but you guys love me so much and I love you and I just want to make sure you're encouraged and you know

Don't worry those who have died They're going to rise first and then we who are alive it is coming. We will be with the lord

You know, he's encouraging them But this is the this is the quintessential verse that says this is why there's a difference between the the church in israel what and and so i've been able to Where are they getting these terms and just chapter one?

uh where he talks about jew gentile and the church of god and he he wonderfully

Goes through the church and says how there's no distinction Between the jew and the gentile in the church and in christ

He has this nice command of that i'm like good and he says but this is not what we see in the old testament where the jews

Are prompted to obedience because of earthly blessing And that's what you get from obedience you get earthly blessing and that's why we shouldn't be judaizing the church and building giant

You know giant buildings Because are they when he starts talking about the kingdom of god and mark and the kingdom of god and matthew

That's for the church and then he goes through and talks about the kingdom of god and is applied to Israel and he's in he's and he's in luke and he's going back and forth and back and forth between a complete

Misunderstanding of what the kingdom of god is And he uses it interchangeably He takes these same parallel passages and applies one this one

One this way and one the other way and i'm trying to make heads or tails of this chapter one And this is the start.

This is the starting point for his entire theological system and I have enjoyed

Going through it not to take it apart because again, most people don't don't defend the classic dispensationalism

So you're not going to win arguments. You're not going to go through this It's okay. Now i'm armed and now I can go fight says no no, no, no, no, it allows you to see

This is human tradition Here and when you import that into a book like first thessalonians

You're starting to see tradition and scripture tradition and scripture and if you can at least identify the lens

I mean we all have lenses and we all have some biases that we will we will bring okay

At least identify them But the lens that we should be using is christ

So as i've gone through this if you have not read it and you think you understand classic dispensationalism, but you've never read schofield

Give it a try. I would say Chapter one if you can make heads or tails of it

So that he's being very consistent Come show me how because he's not I can't see how he's being consistent now

That's a really good starting point and then from there now that we've established that according to the church is is one

One body and israel is another body Now we can go and explain the rest of scripture

When hey, you lost me it, you know about halfway through chapter one, dude So I that that's what i've been enjoying as i've been going through that as a as a just because so many other books that i've read have referenced it one of my

My family members has said you really need to read this book. So to help you understand the bible like Okay, I read it

Now what back to the sources? You said you can pick it up for free Yeah, you you can find it online.

Okay, um for for free pdf. Yeah Yeah, I actually have a I think

I got a 99 cent copy that's actually downloaded onto my my kindle right now But okay, there you go.

Anyway, that's that that's what i've been reading. Hopefully nobody, um throws me out of our church I don't think you have to worry about that I am also very curious how he can go from One point to the other and wait, wait a second.

You lost me anyway, so I have recently begun reading animal farm by uh

George orwell, sorry I I did I was not exposed to george orwell's work and when most people are in the united states and and that by that I mean public education system, whether it be, you know high school or uh, it's it's really below a collegiate level, but but apparently it didn't show up in the curriculum that I I I had whenever I was going through school in tennessee

My wife had she's all she's already read it, but apparently it was for an ap course, uh for for high school, um, anyway i've been very appreciative of Drawing upon something that's so well known culturally with animal farm but at the same time coming to know a little bit more about the the author george orwell and his apparently associations with a trotskyist organization in spain in the 1930s

And that was something I did not know and and after after learning that I began to see it in his writing already so It's it's an interesting read.

It's a timeless read It's very easy for me to import myself into seeing.

Oh This is happening now as well because authoritarianism whether it be cloaked under the name socialist or or crony capitalism or authoritarian communism

It it's it's all the same whenever it rears its head it's collectivism it's very collective and it's very hypocritical the revolution

Is not a reformation because it doesn't solve anything It's just the oroboros eating its tail over and over again

Yeah, it doesn't solve anything metaphysical It it only solves certain physical things for certain

More equal than other pigs manifestations of greed look different in different systems

We've we've already had the great reset. It was called the flood And god said man's heart was the same before and after We've already been there and done that Well, uh my plug for media or my recommendation for media this week is my man jeeves by pg woodhouse

I recently went through and I know i've talked about woodhouse before but we were talking about Satire and this man does it well and he does it thoroughly over hundreds of pages and all of his work

Um, but my man jeeves is an entry point to the birdie wooster novels

About him a young aristocrat in england who's worth millions and gets himself into all kinds of trouble playing jokes on earls and lords and their their sons their daughters and he has a particular aversion to One of his aunts and a great love for his other but his true

Companion through life is jeeves his butler who always ends up having some sort of solution to every problem that birdie gets himself into I mean he's he's kind of Lifted up as the savior in all cases in all these books and it is

Wonderful to listen to and for right now from what I can tell The entire jeeves collection on audible is still free if anybody has audible

So just go out there and download it if you because you can download it and you can just throw it away You don't have to you don't have to worry about it, but it's included with a prime membership or a audible membership so my man jeeves is the first one and go look up the the chronology of the entire series and you can just Whip through them one by one and you won't be disappointed or at least

I hope you won't And That wraps it up for today We're always very thankful for our listeners tuning in every week and for supporting us by rating reviewing and sharing the show