The Cults Presupped w/Cultish

Introduction to Cultish, the Cults, and Presuppositional Apologetics

Welcome back to another episode of Revealed Apologetics. I'm your host, Eli Ayala, and today I have two very special guests, one of which will be joining us a little bit later. He's running a little behind and that's all good.

But I am happy to really have the host of the Cultish Podcast. If you guys are familiar with the podcast, Cultish, it is part of Apologia Studios and they have an excellent podcast where they talk about the cults, the occult, and my favorite aspect of their show is their interviews with people who have come out of the occult or the cult, and it's just awesome to see really firsthand what God is doing, saving people out of these systems, which, you know, it kind of appears like those are kind of the lost cause, right?

You know, how can someone from, you know, Satanism or Santeria or some, you know, like a Wicca or something like that, how can God deliver such a person from those systems? Well, my hosts, well, my fellow guests have had awesome conversations with people who have experienced that very thing, and so I'm happy to have them on and have them share some of their experience based on their discussions and perhaps jump into some apologetic application.

How do we do apologetics to people who are lost in the systems of the cults and the occult, and not just apologetics in general? How do we apply a presuppositional approach to people with competing religious and philosophical systems?

So I'm very excited to have our guests here. Now I'm going to introduce my first guest, Jeremiah, and Andrew, again, will be joining us a little bit later when he's able to hop on. So without further ado, I'd like to welcome Jeremiah.

How are you doing, brother?

Jeremiah Laird. I'm doing well. I'm coming to you live from my house on a webcam that is probably about six years old, but in that world, that's probably about two to three decades, the way technology is.

I just had errands I had to do, so my wife's in a Bible study, so I've got some free time, but you can hear me loud and clear, so we're No problem. That's all that matters, right?

Yeah. That's all that matters. They get to see you in the raw, right? Without the full, the lighting and all that kind of stuff. So this is very appropriate. In the back, you have kind of a light shining on the wall.

It actually looks like a ghostly figure, so very appropriate for our conversation. Well, I'm sure most people are going to know who you are, but why don't you just tell folks who you are a little bit about your podcast, and then we'll jump right into our discussion.

Yeah. So I go, I co-host and help produce along with the studio, a podcast and kind of run it. It's really a Christian ministry called Cultish, and it is a podcast that came to fruition back at the end of 2018.

And we kind of have the idea, if any of you have followed Apologia for a long time, we have always done outreach and ministry to the Mormon community, Jehovah's Witnesses, like you name it. There's a lot of counter-cult apologetics, really formulated after the late Dr. Walter Martin, who wrote the book Kingdom of the Cults, which I would definitely suggest you get a copy of that if you don't have one.

And we just knew that we were expanding a lot of different topics that we were covering, excellent book, including, you know, you think about all that's happening with like end abortion now, Jeff and Luke on Apologia Radio, they're dealing a lot more like social issues.

And there are just a lot of other areas that started to encompass what they would cover in their ministry. So I always thought, man, it'd be nice if we had something, I think I had mentioned in passing, something that would just laser focus in on the cults.

And I was thinking more like Mormonism, I didn't even really think too much of like the occult, you know, that much back then. And Jeff brought that idea to me, and we started thinking about what that would look like, and that formulated into what it is today.

And Andrew and I, we now co-hosted together. We started together in Arizona, and Andrew's now, Andrew's now my virtual co-host because he's part of Apologia Utah, up in Salt Lake City, Utah, right outside Salt Lake City.

And we are now in our fifth year, we have covered everything from Mormonism, you know, interviewing people like one of Warren Jeff's former wives, we've dealt with other people who've come out of different polygamous cults, we've talked with former astrologers, former Wiccans, former, you know, we had a pastor who accidentally performed an exorcism.

And in the backwoods of West Virginia, which was a fun episode, just a lot of, a lot of things, accidentally, I can get into that story if you're interested. It's because he reached out to me, and this is a guy who's a who's solid, who's a reformed pastor, like would adhere to a lot of the same, the same what you call systematic theology you probably adhere to.

And the way you explain is very interesting. And that's been something that's very interesting, because I think this will go into like presuppositions with how we understand the supernatural with the Bible talks about the physical realm, but also the unseen realm, as far as the material, the immaterial, that will go into the presuppositions.

And so just anyway, it's just a broad variety. I mean, I think of like so many people. I mean, we are biggest, we just had an interview that we're releasing next week with someone named Yomi Park, who was a survivor, North Korean survivor.

She's been on Joe Rogan, Lex Friedman, we got to talk with her for two hours. So it's just honestly, like Andrew and I are just two normal guys. And we've just been consistent and we just are just continuing to truck forward and seeing whatever falls in our lap.

We just want to be faithful, make good content for people to enjoy. So it's been a lot of fun.

Well, I think you guys are doing an excellent job and you're really scratching where people are itching based upon what I see and I'm listening to it. It looks like you guys are getting a great reception in terms of your content and especially, I really appreciated your episode on Bethel.

I think it was Escaping Bethel. I don't remember the.

Yeah, that was that was eons ago that that whole situation was capturing lightning in the jar, just kind of given the circumstances. But I think overall, you know, I don't like to brag about, you know, there's times where you've had podcasts that have like been top ranked, whatever.

I don't really like to say, hey, look at what we've done. Like we're super creative. I mean, we try and do make the best content available. But I think the reception that it's got is really more indicative of just the marketplace of ideas and where the cultural and spiritual climate is right now.

Us being in a post-Christian where the West is in full collapse and we're in a post-Christian, really neo-pagan, resurgence of neo-paganism, like all these things are happening at once. And this is something that's really bringing the light of the gospel and the biblical world into all these subjects.

Walter Martin, Counter-Cult Apologetics, and the Myth of Neutrality

Hmm. Now, now you mentioned Dr. Walter Martin before, so I would imagine his ministry heavily influenced kind of the direction you guys are going. Right. I mean, is that is he a major influence or is it just kind of like a side effect?

Like, yeah, he's got great stuff because of the type of things that we're involved in. How much was the work of Dr. Walter Martin an inspiration for the topic and kind of theme of your of your show?

Yeah, that's a great question. I would say both. And I think that one of the things I really, really appreciate about Walter Martin is that he always he saw that, hey, we've got issues within the church we have to deal with, you know, in-house discussions like people who kind of go too far to face stuff or some of the hyper charismatic stuff or those sorts of abuses.

But his main goal was the world of the cults. And so he would always try and find ways to collaborate, even cross denominationally with different Christians who were they shared on the essentials and show charity, have charity in which we disagree.

But where can we unify, where can we collaborate and how can we figure out a way to join forces to take on whatever subject that it is? And so even though while we are confessionally formed Calvinists, we've been able to have people like Mike Winger on, Melissa Dougherty, just a lot of people where we would have significant secondary issue disagreements.

But we've had the common faith in common and we've wanted to address all everything from the progressive Christianity to the New Age to Jehovah's Witnesses and how to evangelize them. I think that's one area.

But I think ultimately another area with Walter Martin and just really seeing the Bible as the authority. You saw this both in the works, the Kingdom of the Occult and Kingdom of the Cults. And he would he lived from a perspective of neutrality.

I don't know him and Vons never met or talked, but I think if you read Kingdom of the Cults, he definitely had a perspective of neutrality being a myth. He would define a cult specifically of any group or organization gathered around one's own misinterpretation of the Bible, where they always adhere to Christian terminology, but they fundamentally deny that Jesus Christ is God come in the flesh.

And he had that general presupposition. This is what defines a cult, because when you if you live in a world where if we're coming with a presupposition that Colossians is true, Colossians is one that all things are created by Christ and for Christ.

And he's the firstborn of all creation that has preeminence over everything. And in him, all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge lie like you can't come to the idea of the cults from a point of neutrality.

And so one of the things that Walter Martin would say is that the existence of a counterfeit predicates the authenticity of an original. That is the presupposition that Walter Martin would take in. And that's what we would do, too.

And ultimately, we'd say that's a biblical view, because every cult, they all want Jesus on their team. And on some level, they have to do something with the Bible. So they have to give it some sort of adherence.

But they fundamentally distort the true biblical gospel.

Hmm. Yeah, that's very helpful. Now, when you talk about a cult, sometimes people get confused between the difference, the difference between a cult and the occult. Do you think you can kind of tell us the difference between those two categories?

Cults, the Occult, and Why Christians Avoid Them

Yeah, so usually a cult, when you look at it, it's something that's it's that there's a structural organization behind it. There's usually a charismatic leader or an organization. And even cults and the occult, they can kind of coincide with each other.

Sometimes they're part and parcel with each other. But usually with a cult, it's a specific leader or organization that has a specific dogma ideology that you have to adhere to. And truth lies in that authority.

With the occult, it's really a one-istic worldview where all is one, all is self. The starting point is you, like you are God, you are one, you are self of the universe, the truth always begins with you.

But the idea within the occult is really to transcend and usually and reach a higher level of consciousness, but usually tapped into some sort of secret, esoteric, hidden knowledge and into another dimension.

That's really that's really what the occult lies. And so I would say a cult is just very generally is just an organization or a leader that you have to submit to one's authority where they are they are the ultimate authority, like they are autonomous and you have to submit to that with the occult or the New Age.

You know, those are those are pretty much two sides of the same coin. That is where the truth begins with you or you are the one who's autonomous. But in that process, the way to increase your autonomy, to increase your knowing again, is to tap tape, find a specific process, practice to tap into alternate spiritual dimensions with the Bible warns about in Deuteronomy 18.

What I think is very interesting, because when we do apologetics, we tend to think in terms of like the intellect, right? We read the books, we get the arguments, you know, we try to structure our thoughts, you know, even with presuppositionalism, it's it's obviously based in scripture, but it can get very philosophical, right?

It's very easy, I think. And maybe you can kind of share your thoughts on this. It's kind of easy to be overly intellectual and forget that apologetics and evangelism and interaction with unbelief is also a spirit, a sense of spiritual warfare.

So where does how conscious are you of the spiritual warfare aspect when you're looking into these sorts of things or when you're engaging with people, sharing your faith with people who are in these various systems?

How do you balance the spiritual warfare, spiritual aspect and kind of what seems to be more of an intellectual emphasis, although we know they're not necessarily.

Separated? Yeah, I think in both cases, especially with occult, is that you have like I have lost count of how many Mormons I've talked to and I have an idea of where the conversation can go. And sometimes if you've been in countercult apologetics for a long time, it's almost like you can go on autopilot and that can be dangerous in the sense that you're forgetting the fact this is a real person, a real image of God who has an unbelieving worldview or is in a false and deceptive system.

And you have to realize, no, this is an actual person. You have to love them. And it's also there's times where you can have all this apologetic knowledge, you know, it's almost but if you don't actually have love for these people, if you don't communicate in a way that, you know, you think about soft answer turns away wrath, you become a clinging gong in a sense.

And I think that is one of the areas that you have to be very, very careful about, because when you're beginning with a preceptual standpoint, you don't have to worry about like your goal isn't to be right, if that makes sense.

OK, I don't need I don't need to be right. Like God is right. Like that, you're coming from a point of Christ being the ultimate source of truth or all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, kind of like how Spurgeon would say, don't, you know, I don't need to defend the Bible.

That's all I need to do is unleash it like a lion. I'm paraphrasing Spurgeon's quote. But yeah, I think, though, especially when you're dealing with the world of the occult, you have it's a lot more spiritual warfare where you become much more aware that this is some people are tapping into things they haven't seen like they I have a vantage point.

I'll give an example. I was having a conversation with a lady and she was talking about her involvement in Reiki energy healing, which is essentially different. It's a new age practice where you get in contact with spirits and you can and you can use this sort of energy force like another people like in a healing session.

And if you look it up, it's even now there's even like hospitals that now actually you can actually get three insurance like Reiki energy, which is crazy. But yeah, like I was talking with her and I started asking her about her psychedelic usage, which is a big thing that I think about, you know, DMT, excuse me, ayahuasca, you think about all the different psychedelics that can be taken.

But those psychedelics, the purpose of that is pharmakia and is to get you into an ultra state of consciousness to make yourself subjective to other spirits. And in this sense, like I started just asking her about, well, you're taking psychedelics, aren't you?

Like I just I felt spirit like I felt the spirit inclined me to ask that. And then we admitted to that and said, yes. And I asked her, like, what and what about the entities that are getting a contact with you around three o 'clock in the morning?

Because that is part of one is just what happens when people take these psychedelics, but it's also what the Bible warns about when you do pharmakia, it's a form of sorcery, which God condemns. And when you start getting these practices, it gets you in contact with things you should not be in contact with.

So the idea of demons, if you want to have want to call like entities or things that are getting there, attaching themselves to you or that you're yielding yourself onto this a lot of times, if we're in the reformed world, we tend to get kind of skeptical of this stuff because this seems to be out in kind of that hyper mania world.

But the reality is that the Bible does talk about how the Bible is a dimensional book. We have angels, principalities, dominions and powers. And there's places that, you know, God's God's not a killjoy.

Like in God's presence, there's fullness of joy in his right hand, the pleasures forevermore. But there are areas that are like are no flies. And it doesn't matter what your intentions are. If you cross it over, you're going to be in trouble.

And this is what happens with the occult. And so in this area, like I knew that this is when I'm taught. So I'm talking to this lady is that I'm realizing that this isn't about me winning an argument.

This is about me being smarter than her. Like, where am I taking her in this conversation? If I'm just taking her to show, haha, like you're doing what the Bible condemns you're doing, therefore you're bad.

Like that's not the end. The whole goal is to point her to the gospel. And somehow or another, I put that back and I explained to her the gospel of John and how and how Christ was the word made flesh and everything that she's trying to do can be found.

She's trying to find everything in the occult that she can be found in Christ. So in that sense, you know, I'm realizing when you're doing apologetics, you're talking with us with someone, someone's there, like someone's soul.

You talk about like eternity being on the line. And so I think you have to realize, too, that this person, especially adhering to Reformed theology, when it says the God of this world has blinded those who sing the gospel, the glory of Christ, like this is what you're dealing with.

So your battle isn't going to be flesh and blood. This is this is about people who blind their eyes. But your goal is to proclaim the gospel, proclaim God's truth, whether it's through using a showing the presubstantial argument, the folly of having a oneness to worldview.

But ultimately, the catalyst for all apologetics is the point people to the cross and the point of the fact that the point to Jesus Christ and him crucified Christ who died for our sins. And this is where they can be made whole, both forgiven.

All that. That's so important, Jeremiah, because I think a lot of people, when we are engaging with unbelievers, we forget what we are defending. We focus on arguments and we focus on logic and all these things are super important.

And we forget that we're actually talking to people and we need to be presenting Jesus. And I think sometimes Jesus is kind of the period that comes all the way at the end. So I'm glad I'm glad you kind of bring that point out.

Now, I'm going to invite Andrew, who's joined us. You made it. Yay.

There you go. Welcome. Thank you. I'm excited to be here.

Well, I'm happy to have you. And Jeremiah has been doing a great job holding holding his own there. Why don't you briefly introduce yourself as you're coming in a little bit late? That's completely fine.

But let folks know who you are.

Yeah, my name is Andrew. I am a church planner out here in Utah. We plan to church Apologia, Utah. Our first service was October of twenty twenty one. I am a Reformed Baptist. I attend Apologia, Utah.

But before that, I was going to Apologia Church in Arizona. I started going there in twenty seventeen. I am a husband with four children, eight or one in three months old. And it's been a wild ride.

And I love Jesus. So that's a little bit of my social security number is five, seven, four. Thank you for that comprehensive. I love that. I love knowing the details of because it kind of, you know, you mentioned kids and family and you're just coming from your.

Was it your son's t-ball game?

Yep. That was a that was an adventure for sure.

It is very easy. We can see people on YouTube and we listen to their podcast and we forget that they're regular people with, you know, regular things going on. So it's a good good reminder that anybody can do what we do.

Right. We people should go out, talk about Jesus, share, share the faith. Nothing special about us. We're just using a platform that God has given us and doing the best we can sharing the gospel. So I appreciate appreciate you.

Well, we've been talking about well, Jeremiah has been sharing with us the difference between cults and the occult. He also spoke about the importance of recognizing that when we're speaking to these folks who are in these systems, we're speaking to real people.

And so it's not always about winning arguments and things like that. But what I really appreciate about your podcast is that you cover certain systems that you won't normally find in the generic apologetics book.

I mean, there is no chapter in Always Ready by Greg Monson on Santeria or, you know, or, you know, Wicca or Satanism or something like that. What inspired you guys to go cover these kind of like fringe systems?

When I say fringe, I don't mean to minimize them. There are a large amount of people who hold to them, but they're not mainline in terms of like on the radar for most Christians. They'll be like something.

What like what is that? This is interesting. And I think it's part of the the intrigue in listening to your podcast. Like, I have no idea what that is, but hey, I want to listen. So what inspired you guys to kind of go into some of these fringe positions and really engage, you know, how we are to understand these things and why it's important for Christians to to know what's up?

And that's for you, Andrew.

You're fresh up on a Poets' T-Ball game.

Yeah, yeah. So so pretty much we've noticed, Jerry and I, that for the longest time, the unbelieving world at large is the one that the ones that cover these topics, right? Like Vice or Joe Rogan. And ultimately, they don't have an answer or a standard for what is actually occurring within these systems.

Therefore, they don't have hope or the gospel, which is the true resolution to the problem at hand. So we see that we want to look at this not through a, quote unquote, neutral lens, which we know is impossible, but through the only standard in which can make sense of these fringe encounter cult situations like Satanism or Wicca and things like that.

And Christianity is the best answer to these systems because it actually brings salvation through Jesus Christ. Like Jesus's sheep hear his voice. And we as Christians need to go out there. We shouldn't be shying away from these fields because then that's when the secular world at large jumps on them and they don't have an answer.

So that's pretty much where our heart was at when we wanted to tackle some of those cultish and fringe topics.

Yeah. Why do you think Christians kind of veer away from these what we would call these weird topics? Right. It's like, well, you know, I want to know about atheism. There are people who rarely come in contact with an atheist and sometimes come in contact with other people.

We tend to think of like atheism. Even if I'm not going to talk to an atheist, I want to read the book. And how do we respond? But these other the other groups that people seem to kind of think that's too weird to engage in.

Why do you think that's the case with with a lot of Christians?

Yeah, I'd say it's because Christians are spiritual people. And there's are there is spiritual powers out there that sometimes many, many, maybe many Christians can be afraid of, you know. So it's something that they want to steer away from.

I know me growing up as a young Christian, I was afraid of those things. I didn't want to do anything with them. You know, I grew up as a premillennial dispensationalist. So I thought Jesus would be coming at any time.

I was going to be raptured at any moment. And I thought any of those like Satanists or Wicca that had I essentially thought that had more power than Christ, essentially like. And I think that's what Christians why they steer away from it.

But I think that proper understanding of Jesus in Colossians chapter two, that he disarmed all principalities, rulers and authorities is really gives up. We should we should be excited to engage these people because it's not us.

It's not our wit. It's not our intellect that can save them, but it's purely through the power of the gospel. And Jesus is the conquering king. So so, yeah, that's awesome.

Horror Movies, Music, and Distorted Views of the Supernatural

Now, I have a question here because I grew up watching horror movies. Yeah. So my idea of and I grew up in a Spanish Pentecostal church. So very charismatic. And we were always in touch with the spiritual.

And I don't mean that in a negative way. I didn't grow up in a weird church or a weird household, but we were always conscious of the supernatural. So it wasn't like I thought Satan was under every rock.

But we were aware of this realm. Right. What role do you think? And this is a question for both of you, and you can probably share your thoughts, you know, one after the other. Maybe Jeremiah could take this one first and then Andrew jump in.

What role do horror movies and the culture's perception of these sorts of spiritual realities, what role does that play in shaping and forming how Christians today evangelicals perceive these spiritual realities?

And I ask that on purpose because if you take a look at move away from movies for a second and we take a look at music, music, Christian music is so influential in the Christian world. Unfortunately, many people will form their theology and their perceptions of God from music they listen to.

And I would imagine that that's probably very similar with movies. So what do you think the impact is there? Is it a big influence? Do you think it's not a big deal? How often do you think Christians are allowing culture and movies to inform their views of spirituality?

I'll go on it. Well, I'll I'll respond by saying I'm a huge movie buff. So but the one thing is, I've never been I've never been a big horror fan. OK, it never been my I feel guilty.

I don't watch horror movies because, well, I love Jesus. But anyway, I'm actually interested.

I'm interested in like the history behind horror, like the whole history behind the horror genre, like and how it came to fruition. And that in and of itself is fascinating. I will say that a lot of the Christian perception of the evil, the unseen realm and all that sort of stuff really has been affected very much by Hollywood.

So there's actually a classic lecture by Dr. Walter Martin on exorcisms. And in it, the first 40 minutes of his lecture, he's talking about the exorcist film, about what's accurate and what's not.

And so he talks about the exorcist movie in the 70s.

Yes. And so something like that, you know, you think about the classic exorcism scene from that, which I have seen that. I haven't seen the entire movie, but I know that scene. I've seen that. There's no judgment here, Jeremiah.

It's like you're a Christian. Yeah, it's only for research purposes. Yeah, for research purposes. But I saw the whole thing from beginning to end. It scared the living daylights out of me.

Oh, yeah. But in any any of these movies, like whether it's The Conjuring or any of these exorcism movies, it's made for cinema. It's made for when you're there, when you're when you're tug of coke and you're a big tub of popcorn, you know, and they want to keep you suspense.

But what actual actual actual exorcism looks like in real place and when someone who's possessed is not what you see on the silver screen. So, for example, I was telling you earlier about the exorcism of Kristen Bell in the episode we did with this pastor in Josh Robinson, West Virginia, this lady had it was a witch that had a lineage that I think went back to Salem, Massachusetts.

And when they went and baptized her, he said some sort of liturgy that was based off of something that Martin Luther said in regard to the role of baptism and the role of a believer. But it had to deal with like Christ power and authority over that person that, you know, nothing nothing in here can dwell within them.

And you had two or three independent lines of testimony later on to verify when they dunked this lady in the river, like something came out of her, like something happened because it wasn't just what you could see is what you can just sense, especially being a Christian filled with the Holy Spirit.

Like you've been on the street of evangelism and you can tell when something's up, you know, when like there's a there's a conversation of the intellect and there's a real spiritual battle. Like I can't put on goggles and tell you what that looks like.

You just intuitively know as a Christian. And so if you look at this video of this lady when she's actually going under the water, you remember the video, right? Yeah. Yeah. So when you see the video of this deliverance, it does not look like anything that you've seen on, you know, people like casting a demon out of someone that you've seen, you know, in deliverance ministries or in movies.

It doesn't look anything like that. And so that a lot of times, you know, we think we try and be very. Yeah, I think Hollywood is very much. We think very like Hollywoodesque, like with the occult. And even, for example, a more modern version of Andrew, I'll let you jump in here is the Doctor Strange movies from the Marvel Universe is that that is something that's very special effects is very cinematized.

Even at the end of Doctor Strange, the second one of the I think the second Doctor Strange. Oh, yeah. Where you see him, he actually ends up with a third eye like over his head. And it's kind of a special effects thing.

But that's that would never look like that in real life. But there's a real worldview behind people who tap into the occult thinking they can open up this third eye to have special esoteric hidden understanding.

But that's not it's not going to look like that way cinematically. So, yeah, I think cinema has definitely had a huge effect on Christians. We always we tend to go to Hollywood versus scripture to understand the supernatural and what are your thoughts?

Yeah, that was my thoughts. Exactly. Jerry, like when we.

We would be fools to say that the media doesn't influence the way we see things. You know, it truly does. But the truth is, is that it shouldn't be the way that we view the supernatural. Like we have the word of God that gives us what we need to know about the supernatural realm instead of looking towards other types of media influences to try to understand something we don't.

We shouldn't be understanding further than scripture, if that makes sense. There's there's realms that we should know or realms that we should not know everything about. But talking about The Exorcist, I saw that movie when I was 10 years old and it terrified me for years.

And it was like 10 years old. My brother, he he tied me down and made me watch it. Christmas morning. Crazy enough. I've got a pretty crazy story about my life growing up, but that movie, though, still to this day, it influences me.

Like sometimes I'll wake up in the middle of the night and maybe three a .m. and I'm like, I'll just see the picture of that little girl. You know what I mean? In my head. And I shouldn't be afraid of those things.

And the little creepiness creeps in. But then I have to correct myself with what the word of God says about the truth and the reality of the salvation in which I'm living and being indwelt by the Holy Spirit and things of that nature.

So, yeah, I mean, I definitely agree that Christians probably by modern worship music have an influence of the way they perceive God through music the same way as they probably perceive the supernatural through media.

But again, we need to correct some of our perceptions by and with the word of God so we don't fall over the teeter totter into a realm to where everything is terrifying. When the reality is, is that all things are being placed under Christ's feet.

Sure. Yeah. That's the whole thing. So I think there's something going on like right now, both in the culture that's connected with the body of Christ. So right now, as you know, we are full flux into neopaganism.

One is a complete post-Christian society. This is a whole nother rabbit hole. I think this is a direct result. I think all the stuff you're seeing about transgenderism is a direct result of neopaganism, because I'm Paul Romans chapter one.

The first byproduct, when you worship the creation rather than the creator, mask the God's roles of masculine and feminine get reversed and they get switched. So that's a whole other thing. But what's also going on right now is that God is doing something amazing where there's, I would say, a revival is going on in the sense that there are scores of people who are leaving the new age and coming to Christ.

I believe that's what's happening with JP Sears right now. You know, he's using very biblical. And this is something, too, when it comes to presuppositions, understanding how to minister to people who are in the new age, when people who are in the new age, when they come to Christ, the only thing that they know is new age experience.

So it's very easy if you want to, you know, put all our all our discernment filters on and microanalyze every single sentence. You have to realize that only they're using like effectual calling. Right.

So I think about effectual calling like John 6, 44. We know that that's a that's a process. As we saw in his reform, this is how God draws people to himself. A new ager who's in the process of experiencing effectual calling, they may say something like, I'm coming into Jesus and his light.

Right. That sounds kind of new agey, but it's like something is happening where they don't they're wanting to all of a sudden, like, I'm going to read the Bible. I don't want to I don't want to I have these crystals still in my room.