Latest / Sasquatch & Sourdough / Ep. 57 | The Early Church Wasn’t Afraid | The Supernatural World Is Real

Transcript

Ep. 57 | The Early Church Wasn’t Afraid | The Supernatural World Is Real · Sasquatch & Sourdough

0:10
SPEAKER_00: I remember lying in the backyard as a kid, flat on my back in the mossy covered grass beneath the trees.
0:18
SPEAKER_00: The ground was cool underneath of me, soft and quiet.
0:23
SPEAKER_00: Above me, the branches moved slowly in the wind, letting sunlight break through in flashes, little pieces of light slipping through the canopy and landing across my face.
0:34
SPEAKER_00: I didn't have language for it then.
0:38
SPEAKER_00: I probably wouldn't have called it spiritual.
0:41
SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't have said Holy Spirit.
0:48
SPEAKER_00: I just knew those moments felt full.
0:52
SPEAKER_00: Like the world wasn't empty.
0:55
SPEAKER_00: And I think about that a lot now because somewhere along the way, we lost something.
1:02
SPEAKER_00: Not wonder, exactly.
1:05
SPEAKER_00: Closeness.
1:08
SPEAKER_00: We became louder, more distracted, more afraid.
1:13
SPEAKER_00: And instead of learning how to walk with God through a supernatural world, we either ignore it completely or become obsessed with darkness, decoding, consuming, analyzing fear endlessly.
1:29
SPEAKER_00: But when you read the book of Acts, I wonder if the early church lived in a supernatural world too.
1:39
SPEAKER_00: Spirits, sorcery, oppression, miracles, healing, strange encounters.
1:46
SPEAKER_00: And somehow it seems they weren't afraid.
1:52
SPEAKER_00: That's the part that I can't stop thinking about these days.
1:56
SPEAKER_00: Because right now, a lot of people seem spiritually exhausted, aware of darkness, but disconnected from life.
2:06
SPEAKER_00: And maybe that's the real question.
2:08
SPEAKER_00: Not, is the supernatural real?
2:12
SPEAKER_00: But what kind of atmosphere are we cultivating?
2:17
SPEAKER_00: What kind of spirit are we feeding?
2:20
SPEAKER_00: What kind of life is being produced within us?
2:25
SPEAKER_00: Welcome back to Sasquatch and Sourdough.
2:49
SPEAKER_00: It is disclosure day.
2:52
SPEAKER_00: I can't believe how God has put this episode together because I've been seeing so much content, either like super mainstream Christian or super weird fringe.
3:03
SPEAKER_00: Everyone's been talking about this like upcoming disclosure.
3:08
SPEAKER_00: And here we are.
3:10
SPEAKER_00: And this episode is, I'm really excited about this because I totally did not again put it together myself.
3:17
SPEAKER_00: God literally just put the book of Acts on my heart, and here we are.
3:22
SPEAKER_00: So welcome, welcome to disclosure.
3:25
SPEAKER_00: Whatever that means, I don't even know anymore.
3:30
SPEAKER_00: Um, when I was a girl, I was absolutely in love, surprise, surprise, with the X-Files.
3:37
SPEAKER_00: Um, that is pretty much where all of my lore started.
3:40
SPEAKER_00: Um, I love the X-Files.
3:42
SPEAKER_00: I never in a million years in my entire life thought that this timeline would be where I landed, that we would actually be here.
3:51
SPEAKER_00: And the X-Files is like, I mean, I knew it was kind of the thing, but like now we're talking about it.
3:59
SPEAKER_00: It's very, it's very strange.
4:02
SPEAKER_00: But here we are.
4:13
SPEAKER_00: I don't know, like one of those late night fireside chats.
4:16
SPEAKER_00: Some sober, some probably not, just laying back, looking at the stars and just what ifing with friends and now with intern Rob.
4:25
SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah, but here we are.
4:27
SPEAKER_00: We're here.
4:27
SPEAKER_00: It's disclosure day.
4:28
SPEAKER_00: And I think one of the things that I've just been noticing is it's wild.
4:33
SPEAKER_00: Like all of the fringe spaces, like I said, and mainstream, like literally Tim Alberino is like in Relevant Magazine.
4:43
SPEAKER_00: And if you are a Christian, you and you are familiar with like Christian content, it's just crazy to watch these worlds like collide.
4:53
SPEAKER_00: Um, it's very, very interesting.
4:55
SPEAKER_00: And everyone is speculating and everyone is fear-mongering.
4:59
SPEAKER_00: And I've I've noticed that if you guys have been listening and kind of have, you know, followed the growth of this show.
5:07
SPEAKER_00: Um, I've been kind of picking up on that and talking about that quietly for probably the past year, where it's just like, okay, we get it.
5:16
SPEAKER_00: Like everything is weird and it's getting weirder.
5:19
SPEAKER_00: But how is that helping like anybody?
5:22
SPEAKER_00: People are still, you know, people are still addicted to drugs, people are still getting diagnosed with cancer, people are still losing loved ones, people are still battling anxiety and depression.
5:32
SPEAKER_00: Like we still have to take care of people.
5:35
SPEAKER_00: And how are we doing that as the church?
5:37
SPEAKER_00: How are we doing that just, you know, as God's kids?
5:40
SPEAKER_00: So I don't know.
5:41
SPEAKER_00: I that's been really big on my heart, especially in this space where it's like, okay, yeah, great.
5:46
SPEAKER_00: I don't just want to be like another, it might work for other Christian content creators in this space.
5:52
SPEAKER_00: Um, but for me and my podcast, we will serve the Lord.
5:57
SPEAKER_00: Um, so that's kind of where my heart is here.
6:00
SPEAKER_00: And I'm just, it's just wild.
6:02
SPEAKER_00: It's wild to watch, but it's also, I want to kind of bring us back down to the earth.
6:07
SPEAKER_00: Like, hey, let's not freak out, right?
6:11
SPEAKER_00: You guys are here for a little fringe, a little whimsy, but also weirdly encouraging content.
6:17
SPEAKER_00: So that is what I hope that this episode will serve to do.
6:21
SPEAKER_00: So some housekeeping things.
6:23
SPEAKER_00: Um, if you're new here, oh my gosh, welcome.
6:26
SPEAKER_00: What a doozy.
6:27
SPEAKER_00: You came to the right place for weirdly encouraging content.
6:31
SPEAKER_00: Um, you can probably the best way I like to tell people is uh the best way to get connected is find us on Instagram.
6:39
SPEAKER_00: I do a lot of my sharing outside of the podcast.
6:44
SPEAKER_00: I'm not exactly as consistent as I want to be.
6:48
SPEAKER_00: Um, like I always kind of say, I want this to be something that's curated that I can give an appropriate amount of time to.
6:56
SPEAKER_00: And just between ministries of life and motherhood and being a wife and working in production ministry at church, I have a lot of plates to juggle.
7:06
SPEAKER_00: So I I take my time with this because you guys deserve quality and not quantity.
7:12
SPEAKER_00: So I just try to make sure that it's it's made with excellence.
7:16
SPEAKER_00: Um, so that's why sometimes it's not exactly weekly.
7:21
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, check us out on Instagram.
7:24
SPEAKER_00: You can send an email and give me some feedback.
7:27
SPEAKER_00: Let me know if you like it, if you hate it, what you think.
7:30
SPEAKER_00: Um, maybe some prayer requests at sasquatchandsourdough at gmail.com.
7:35
SPEAKER_00: And then we also have an encounter map um that's very dusty right now, and that is at the website uh sasquatchandsourdough uh.com.
7:45
SPEAKER_00: So you can check all those things out there.
7:48
SPEAKER_00: And I just wanted to take a moment and thank you guys so much for listening.
7:52
SPEAKER_00: Uh, this month has been the biggest month of listens and downloads ever.
7:58
SPEAKER_00: So thank you so much, guys.
8:01
SPEAKER_00: I love that you guys spend time listening to this content because your time is valuable.
8:07
SPEAKER_00: Um, you're taking time, whether you're driving to work or you know, maybe just quiet time cleaning the house, whatever it is that you're doing, you're taking time and you're spending it with me.
8:16
SPEAKER_00: And I really appreciate that.
8:17
SPEAKER_00: So I just wanted to give you guys some honor and praise and say thank you so much.
8:22
SPEAKER_00: I love you guys.
8:23
SPEAKER_00: You're the best.
8:26
SPEAKER_00: Okay, yeah.
8:27
SPEAKER_00: So, like I said, this episode, I really wanted to serve as like a reminder of let's keep the main thing the main thing, even though disclosure has happened.
8:35
SPEAKER_00: Um, while I was trying to put this together, I did not think that it was gonna happen on a Friday.
8:41
SPEAKER_00: I don't know why we're releasing things on Friday.
8:43
SPEAKER_00: I guess it's kind of like when you get fired from work.
8:45
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what's going on, but uh it it could get wild, it could get just crazy, or we could just turn off the internet and go like touch grass.
8:54
SPEAKER_00: That would be amazing too.
8:55
SPEAKER_00: So um, I did have a lot of fun going in the woods and making my most recent uh Instagram content.
9:02
SPEAKER_00: So if you want to see that, it was crazy.
9:04
SPEAKER_00: Intern Rob had a really good idea of just literally inviting my own alien.
9:09
SPEAKER_00: So you guys gotta check that out.
9:10
SPEAKER_00: It's it's silly.
9:14
SPEAKER_00: There are stories that survive for centuries because they feel like echoes from another world.
9:20
SPEAKER_00: One of them comes from a small village in 12th century England.
9:25
SPEAKER_00: The story of the green children of Woolpit.
9:28
SPEAKER_00: Two children appeared near deep pits outside of the village.
9:33
SPEAKER_00: Their skin was green, they spoke a language no one understood, they were terrified of ordinary food, ordinary life, almost like they had come from somewhere else entirely.
9:46
SPEAKER_00: And what fascinates me isn't whether we can explain their story perfectly.
9:51
SPEAKER_00: It's the feeling underneath of it, the ancient instinct humanity keeps returning to, that the world may be deeper, maybe stranger, more layered than we realize.
10:03
SPEAKER_00: And honestly, I think most people already know that.
10:07
SPEAKER_00: That's why stories about strange encounters stay with us, because people experience moments where reality suddenly feels thinner somehow.
10:17
SPEAKER_00: People describe forests getting completely silent around them, not peaceful silence, but a different kind.
10:23
SPEAKER_00: The kind that makes someone stop walking before they even know why.
10:32
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's just awareness, not chaos, not the threat of an attack.
10:37
SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's why these stories resonate.
10:40
SPEAKER_00: Because deep down, people know the world isn't empty.
10:44
SPEAKER_00: The problem is that awareness without God eventually turns into fear.
10:49
SPEAKER_00: Because if you recognize the supernatural exists, but don't know who you are in the middle of it, everything starts feeling dangerous.
11:02
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so the Green Children of Woolpit has come, and I hope I'm saying that right.
11:08
SPEAKER_00: I'm it's been brought to my attention that I'm really bad at pronounce pronunciation.
11:14
SPEAKER_00: So I don't know if it's my like Baltimore accent or what, but um, I I definitely mispronounce things a lot.
11:21
SPEAKER_00: So I apologize, but anyway, I digress.
11:23
SPEAKER_00: Um, this story has like really kind of fascinated me for a while.
11:27
SPEAKER_00: It's just like any one of those other kind of stories where you could dive into it in a hundred thousand different ways and extract what you're gonna extract, but I just find the account itself fascinating.
11:42
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so I'm gonna give I'm just gonna give a little bit of a rundown of the story because it's just absolutely amazing.
11:49
SPEAKER_00: And when you look it up, if you look up their village sign, it's so, oh my gosh, it's like it's like a perfect little like village sign depicting the two green children.
12:02
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and it was put up in 1977, and like it's like a black and it's just it's perfect.
12:07
SPEAKER_00: It's so like spooky and creepy, and like, yes, this is your village sign.
12:12
SPEAKER_00: It's like a little churchyard and like a wolf and like two children holding hands.
12:16
SPEAKER_00: Like, oh my gosh, creepy.
12:18
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so let's go into the story.
12:20
SPEAKER_00: At harvest time, one day during the reign of King Stephen, so this is around um 1135 to 1154.
12:28
SPEAKER_00: According to William of Newburgh, the villagers of Woolpit discovered two children, a brother and sister, besides one of the wolf pits that gave the village its name.
12:41
SPEAKER_00: Their skin was green, they spoke an unknown language, and their clothing was unfamiliar.
12:48
SPEAKER_00: Ralph of Cogshall reports that the children were taken to the home of Richard DeCain.
12:55
SPEAKER_00: Ralph and William agreed that the pair refused all food for several days until they came across some raw broad beans, which they consumed eagerly.
13:06
SPEAKER_00: The children gradually adopted the normal food and in time lost their green color.
13:12
SPEAKER_00: It was decided uh to baptize the children, but the boy, who appeared to be younger, uh the younger of the two, was sickly and died before or soon after baptism.
13:23
SPEAKER_00: After learning to speak English, the children, Ralph says, just the surviving girl, explained that they came from a land where the sun never shone and the light was like twilight.
13:36
SPEAKER_00: William says the girl called her their home St.
13:39
SPEAKER_00: Martin's Land.
13:40
SPEAKER_00: Ralph adds that everything there was green.
13:44
SPEAKER_00: According to William, the children were unable to account for their arrival in wool pit.
13:49
SPEAKER_00: They had been herding their father's cattle when they heard a loud noise.
13:54
SPEAKER_00: According to William, it was like the sound of the bells of uh St.
14:00
SPEAKER_00: Edmund's Abbey, and suddenly found themselves by the wolf pit where they were found.
14:06
SPEAKER_00: Ralph says that they had become lost when they followed the cattle into a cave and after being guided by the sound of bells, eventually emerged into our land.
14:17
SPEAKER_00: According to Ralph, the girl was employed for many years as a servant in Richard DeCain's household, where she was considered to be, quote, very wanton and impedent.
14:27
SPEAKER_00: Oh, so she was not probably her best behavior.
14:31
SPEAKER_00: William says that she eventually married a man from King's Kingslyn, about 40 miles from Bullpit, where she was still living shortly before he wrote.
14:41
SPEAKER_00: Based on his research into Richard DeCain's family history, the astronomer and writer Duncan Lunin has concluded that the girl was given the name Agnes and that she married a royal official named Richard Baer.
14:59
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so there's a lot of um explanations and folklore that kind of surround this.
15:05
SPEAKER_00: The folklore is pretty interesting, um, and it kind of gets like very it's a little bit detailed.
15:11
SPEAKER_00: Um, but so it says like the modern version of the tale links the green children with the babes in the woods.
15:17
SPEAKER_00: Although there are differing stories, a common motif is that they are left or taken to die in the woods, often identified as whayland wood or um theftwood forest after being poisoned with arsenic by their uncle.
15:31
SPEAKER_00: Uh so the arsenic poisoning results in their discoloration.
15:35
SPEAKER_00: They become further linked with Woolpit children after escaping the woods, but falling into the pits before their ultimate discovery.
15:43
SPEAKER_00: This version of the story was known to the local author and folk singer Bob Roberts, who says in his 1978 book, A Silence of Suffolk, quote, I was told there are still people in Woolpit who are descended from the Green Children, but nobody would tell me who they were, end quote.
16:02
SPEAKER_00: Well, I guess probably not.
16:04
SPEAKER_00: Let's just let's get rid of that family history.
16:09
SPEAKER_00: Oh my goodness.
16:12
SPEAKER_00: A lot of the um medieval villagers believed that they were fairies or from an underground world, and then there's also a theory uh that later developed um by Robert Burton in 1621 proposed they were extraterrestrials and notion often associated with the St.
16:31
SPEAKER_00: Martin's Land description.
16:33
SPEAKER_00: So let's get into that a little bit.
16:39
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so this portion of the account, um this says the girl's ethereal-like description of her homeland and their initial diet of just raw green beans, then commonly recognized as the food of the dead, spawned the idea that the green children were some sort of fairy folk from the subterranean world.
17:00
SPEAKER_00: Based on the accounts by both chroniclers, the events described matched well with ideas regarding fairies that were common in England back then.
17:09
SPEAKER_00: At that time, people were not only receptive to possible encounters with human-like fairies, but also the meeting of these two different realms.
17:19
SPEAKER_00: As such, the green siblings of Woolpit were thought of as being fairy children who became trapped in the human world.
17:27
SPEAKER_00: To date, there are some who still view the children as personifications of nature, similar to the likes of the Green Man or the Jack and the Green of English folklore.
17:39
SPEAKER_00: So that's interesting.
17:43
SPEAKER_00: The earliest link between the green children of Woolpit with extraterrestrials dates back to 1621, when Robert Burton suggested in the oops, in the Anatomy of Melancholy that the Green Children, quote, fell from heaven.
18:01
SPEAKER_00: This was further expounded by Francis Goodwin, the Bishop of Hereford, and also a historian in his speculative fiction, The Man in the Moon, which was published posthumously in 1638.
18:15
SPEAKER_00: However, credit for the most elaborate theory involving the green siblings and extraterrestrials goes to astronomer Duncan Lunin in his book Children of the Sky, published in 2012.
18:26
SPEAKER_00: He hypothesized that the children were part of an extraterrestrial settlement experiment.
18:32
SPEAKER_00: In short, Lunin ventured that the green children were accidentally expelled from their home planet and beamed to wolpit following a technical, quote, matter transmitter, end quote, malfunction.
18:45
SPEAKER_00: In line with his extraterrestrial settlement experiment theory, he further pinpointed the genetically modified alien plants, which served as food source for the planet's inhabitants and the cause for the children's greenish complexion.
19:00
SPEAKER_00: Okay, well that's uh that's a little wild.
19:04
SPEAKER_00: Okay, yeah, there's just a lot of like conflicting evidence.
19:07
SPEAKER_00: And there's also kind of this theory that it like never even happened because there was so much time in between when it was actually documented.
19:14
SPEAKER_00: Um, but it's definitely something that you can you can take a little bit of a deep dive in.
19:19
SPEAKER_00: I don't know, somebody probably already debunked it.
19:21
SPEAKER_00: Who knows?
19:22
SPEAKER_00: But it's very interesting for sure.
19:26
SPEAKER_00: And it ties in very well with our little disclosure episode.
19:32
SPEAKER_00: So that is the green children of Woolpit.
19:36
SPEAKER_00: Oh, poor kids.
19:42
SPEAKER_00: There's an old Christian idea, sometimes called a thin place, a place where the distance between heaven and earth feels smaller somehow.
19:52
SPEAKER_00: Ancient Christians believed repeated worship-shaped atmosphere.
19:56
SPEAKER_00: Prayer mattered, attention mattered, devotion mattered, because worship leaves an imprint.
20:04
SPEAKER_00: And maybe we already know this instinctively.
20:07
SPEAKER_00: Some homes feel peaceful, some places feel heavy, some forests feel holy, some rooms feel exhausted.
20:18
SPEAKER_00: Recently, on Blurry Creatures, episode 422, a woman from Maryland talked about this exact idea, how repeated acts of worship, whether holy or destructive, can shape the atmosphere of a place over time.
20:32
SPEAKER_00: I think that explains more than we realize because worship is never neutral.
20:37
SPEAKER_00: Fear shapes atmosphere, violence shapes atmosphere, obsession shapes atmosphere.
20:44
SPEAKER_00: And the presence of God changes everything.
20:47
SPEAKER_00: Prayer can change things, peace changes things, worship changes things.
20:52
SPEAKER_00: Maybe places remember worship, and maybe that's why I keep coming back to that memory in the backyard, lying in the moss beneath the trees, watching light move through the branches, feeling something holy in the stillness before I had language for it.
21:10
SPEAKER_00: Maybe the atmosphere wasn't empty.
21:13
SPEAKER_00: Maybe worship was already happening.
21:37
SPEAKER_00: I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
21:42
SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's one of the cleverest ways to discern spiritual atmosphere.
21:47
SPEAKER_00: What is being produced?
21:49
SPEAKER_00: What grows there?
21:51
SPEAKER_00: What happens to people over time?
21:54
SPEAKER_00: Because not every spiritual experience leads toward life.
21:58
SPEAKER_00: Some people leave exhausted.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: Obsessed, afraid, completely disconnected from God and reality.
22:07
SPEAKER_00: Not every thin space is holy.
22:10
SPEAKER_00: Some atmospheres become thin through repeated darkness, through fear, through violence, through worship directed toward things that cannot give life back.
22:23
SPEAKER_00: But the presence of God produces something different: peace, clarity, freedom, courage, stillness without emptiness, awareness without fear.
22:36
SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's why the early church wasn't afraid, because they weren't rooted in darkness, they were rooted in life.
22:48
SPEAKER_00: So this is Acts 19, 11, the sons of Siva.
22:53
SPEAKER_00: And God was doing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul, so that even handkerchiefs or aprons that he touched, his skin were carried away to the sick, and their diseases left them, and the evil spirits came out of them.
23:07
SPEAKER_00: Then some of the itinerant Jews, Jewish exorcists, undertook to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, I adore you by the by the Jesus whom Paul proclaims.
23:22
SPEAKER_00: Seven sons of a Jewish high priest named Siva were doing this.
23:27
SPEAKER_00: But the evil spirits answered them, Jesus I know, and Paul I recognize, but who are you?
23:35
SPEAKER_00: And the men in whom was the evil spirit leaped on them, mastered all of them, and overpowered them, so that they fled out of the house, naked and wounded.
23:45
SPEAKER_00: And this became known to all the residents of Ephesus, both Jews and Greeks, and fear fell upon them all, and the name of the Lord Jesus was extolled.
23:55
SPEAKER_00: Also many of those who were now believers came, confessing and divulging their practices, and a number of those who had practiced magical arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all.
24:10
SPEAKER_00: And they counted the value of them and found it came to 50,000 pieces of silver, so that the word of the Lord continued to increase and prevail mightily.
24:19
SPEAKER_00: So that's just really, really fascinating to me.
24:21
SPEAKER_00: And I kind of came across that, and I don't know, I don't mean I don't want to get too deep into what's going on now, but it's just kind of like one of those, like, you know, where is our heart?
24:33
SPEAKER_00: Where is our worship?
24:34
SPEAKER_00: What is it that we're putting in um into our hearts and believing in?
24:41
SPEAKER_00: And when we're doing things in in God's name and for God's will, like, is our heart really there?
24:51
SPEAKER_00: But like this the cool thing is with that is that there was authority.
24:55
SPEAKER_00: Um like the evil knows the authority that we have.
24:59
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's just maybe my main point with this episode is don't forget the authority that you're walking in.
25:06
SPEAKER_00: If you're a believer and if you're spirit-filled, and if you know the Lord and you're walking with him, then you have incredible authority over whatever darkness, you know, the internet wants to drum up about all of his stuff.
25:30
SPEAKER_00: Authority was never technique, it was proximity.
25:34
SPEAKER_00: The people in Acts carried authority because they had been with Jesus.
25:39
SPEAKER_00: And I wonder if that's what's missing now.
25:42
SPEAKER_00: Not information or presence or more fear, but more closeness to God.
25:57
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so I would be remiss if I did not find another awesome Bigfoot encounter from the BFRO, the Bigfoot Field Research Organization.
26:10
SPEAKER_00: So this account is actually from 2012.
26:14
SPEAKER_00: Um, it is winter, March 3rd, Tennessee, and it's in Anderson County.
26:23
SPEAKER_00: On March 3rd, 2012, something happened to me and a buddy that we can't explain.
26:29
SPEAKER_00: I hadn't really thought about whether or not I believed in Bigfoot as a biology student, but whatever this was made a believer of me.
26:37
SPEAKER_00: Basically, it scared the hell out of us.
26:40
SPEAKER_00: Me and Clay have grown up in the Norris Lake area where hunters, fishermen, backpackers, and general outdoorsmen, and we've never encountered anything like this.
26:52
SPEAKER_00: Earlier that day, we had decided to take my four-wheeler up to the lake, approximately five miles from my house, to a clearing, and build a fire.
27:03
SPEAKER_00: We got to the clearing around 9:30.
27:05
SPEAKER_00: We kept hearing two owls hoot at each other from across the lake, and we both kept hearing something moving in the tree line 60 yards from our fire.
27:16
SPEAKER_00: We quickly dismissed the footsteps as being a deer, or as the night progressed, the wind started to blow really hard.
27:23
SPEAKER_00: At 11 p.m., the wind started to die down a little bit, and I noticed that the woods were totally silent.
27:30
SPEAKER_00: The owls had stopped hooting, and the water wasn't whitecapping anymore.
27:36
SPEAKER_00: Around midnight, we decided to leave, and as we stood up, we heard these sounds in the woods like sticks breaking.
27:44
SPEAKER_00: We knew that if it were a deer, we would have spooked it a long time ago.
27:49
SPEAKER_00: I felt eyes on me, and for some reason, I had this random notion to make a wood knock.
27:55
SPEAKER_00: I had seen the finding Bigfoot show and thought maybe I could get a response out of whatever was in the woods.
28:01
SPEAKER_00: I picked up a piece of cedar from the wood pile and knocked it against the cypress tree.
28:06
SPEAKER_00: We waited for the echoes to clear, and while I didn't hear anything, Clay stood straight up and started breathing heavy, saying he heard a wood he heard a knock back.
28:16
SPEAKER_00: I thought he was lying, soon after became a believer.
28:20
SPEAKER_00: I knocked again and this time I heard three distinctive knocks back.
28:24
SPEAKER_00: There's no way I could have been it could have been an echo because the reply came long after the echoes cleared.
28:30
SPEAKER_00: I suddenly got scared, like shaking.
28:33
SPEAKER_00: I knocked again and let out a whooping call.
28:36
SPEAKER_00: We got one distinct knock back, and then we heard this growl, this horrible growl.
28:42
SPEAKER_00: It was guttural and yet somehow primate-like.
28:46
SPEAKER_00: It was like a monkey whooping and a deep snarl at the same time.
28:51
SPEAKER_00: Almost like whatever made it was using two sets of vocal cords.
28:56
SPEAKER_00: We started freaking out, but we really wanted to figure out what it was.
29:00
SPEAKER_00: So we jumped on my four-wheeler and rode toward the sound.
29:03
SPEAKER_00: We stopped periodically but never heard anything.
29:07
SPEAKER_00: What was strange was that we both felt strongly like something was watching us.
29:12
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that feeling alone was terrifying because it just felt like pure hatred.
29:17
SPEAKER_00: We ended up riding back to my house without actually seeing the creature.
29:20
SPEAKER_00: But whatever it was, it was angry that we were there and it absolutely hated us.
29:26
SPEAKER_00: True story, no joke whatsoever.
29:28
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
29:30
SPEAKER_00: Poor Josh and Clay.
29:32
SPEAKER_00: Oh my gosh.
29:34
SPEAKER_00: Other stories.
29:35
SPEAKER_00: We have a friend named Blake who reported an incident in Clinton, Tennessee.
29:38
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
29:40
SPEAKER_00: Um, okay, there's a follow-up.
29:42
SPEAKER_00: Oh good.
29:44
SPEAKER_00: After speaking with the witness via phone, I have additional details to add to this report.
29:50
SPEAKER_00: Okay, and so that is actually um, this is coming from a follow-up investigation from BFRO investigator Ashlyn Yost.
29:59
SPEAKER_00: The witness lives fairly close to the area where the report occurred.
30:03
SPEAKER_00: Being an avid backpacker, rock climber, and biology student, he is quite familiar with the area and the wildlife here.
30:10
SPEAKER_00: He recalled that the first sound that the two heard was as they were en route to the clearing where they planned to build the fire.
30:20
SPEAKER_00: They had stopped to check on one of the tires of the four-wheel wheeler they were driving.
30:25
SPEAKER_00: When they stopped, they were able to hear heavy footfalls approximately 60 yards away from them.
30:30
SPEAKER_00: Whatever was making the sound was not in their field of vision.
30:33
SPEAKER_00: The witness emphasized how deliberate and bipedal the footfalls sounded.
30:38
SPEAKER_00: After checking the tire, the two men continued to their destination, where they began to build the very large fire.
30:45
SPEAKER_00: The witness recalled how cold it was when then at the at night, between twenty-eight and thirty degrees, he remembered the wind howling and that storm clouds were blowing in.
30:54
SPEAKER_00: He believes that it either snowed or rained the day before or day after this occurred.
31:01
SPEAKER_00: Even with the loud wind, the two men could hear something pacing back and forth just in the trees beyond their camp.
31:08
SPEAKER_00: He estimated that the pacing went on for around 20 minutes.
31:11
SPEAKER_00: Again, he estimated whatever was pacing to be approximately sixty yards away from them.
31:16
SPEAKER_00: The distance is what it the distance it was pacing was an area approximately forty yards in width.
31:23
SPEAKER_00: It was at this point that he decided to make his first attempt at knocking.
31:28
SPEAKER_00: After the knock, the witness said he heard nothing.
31:31
SPEAKER_00: So his friend started to shake.
31:33
SPEAKER_00: His friend thought that he had heard a response and prompted the witness to knock again.
31:37
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
31:38
SPEAKER_00: Since the encounter, the witness has returned to the location, but only feels uneasy at night.
31:43
SPEAKER_00: The witness returned several days after this incident with some other individuals to look around.
31:49
SPEAKER_00: Close to the clearing where they had built the fire, they found a pond surrounded by a muddy bank.
31:56
SPEAKER_00: In the mud, they found a large bear footprint.
31:59
SPEAKER_00: They proceeded to cast the track, and the witness is not in possession of the cast.
32:04
SPEAKER_00: It was also noted that this track was found in a very desolate area where the weather was at or was below freezing.
32:12
SPEAKER_00: The photo was not clear enough to add to this report, unfortunately.
32:16
SPEAKER_00: Oh my gosh.
32:20
SPEAKER_00: Oh, so since the incident, the witness has felt compelled to start researching other potential reports.
32:25
SPEAKER_00: He hopes to learn more about what happened to him that night.
32:29
SPEAKER_00: So that's kind of what happens, right?
32:32
SPEAKER_00: Like we have an encounter, something strange happens, we see a light in the sky, we encounter something supernatural, something spooky, a bigfoot, something we can't account for, and then we become obsessed with it and it becomes like our identity.
32:48
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's really just kind of like where I'm landing with this episode.
32:53
SPEAKER_00: Um, I really just want us to take a step back because so much is unraveling, it seems like, right now.
33:00
SPEAKER_00: We are getting so much information with this disclosure, with all of this stuff, right?
33:05
SPEAKER_00: And I just want us to take a step back and really kind of rein in like, what is it producing in my life?
33:12
SPEAKER_00: What is the content that I'm listening to really doing in my heart?
33:16
SPEAKER_00: Is it making me a better person?
33:18
SPEAKER_00: Is it making me more paranoid?
33:20
SPEAKER_00: Is it making me filled with joy?
33:22
SPEAKER_00: Um, so those are the things I'm just kind of landing on today.
33:28
SPEAKER_00: I really feel like God is just leading me and directing me to just not be so much like, hey, here's a bunch of encounters, but I really just kind of wanted to, I don't know, just be real with you guys, you know.
33:40
SPEAKER_00: Whatever this is, it could be nothing.
33:43
SPEAKER_00: It could be, you know, who knows?
33:45
SPEAKER_00: I'm not even gonna, I don't even speculate at this point.
33:47
SPEAKER_00: I'm just like, God, whatever, you know?
33:50
SPEAKER_00: But whatever it is, um, I just want us to like check our hearts.
33:57
SPEAKER_00: I really feel like that's just what God wants me to tell you guys.
34:00
SPEAKER_00: Like, where are you?
34:02
SPEAKER_00: Right?
34:03
SPEAKER_00: Kind of like, and the the whole it's funny because like the whole premise of this episode was supposed to be like, let's get back to the garden, like the way it was.
34:10
SPEAKER_00: Like the garden was the original thin place, like all that sort of stuff.
34:14
SPEAKER_00: But I just feel like, no, like, where are you?
34:17
SPEAKER_00: God knows where you are, he knows where you are right here, and he was desperate for you out of all of creation.
34:25
SPEAKER_00: He's so much bigger than all of this stuff, whatever it is.
34:29
SPEAKER_00: He's desperate for you, and he wants a relationship with you.
34:32
SPEAKER_00: So if you don't have that, I really think that maybe now is the time to ask him.
34:37
SPEAKER_00: You know, ask him.
34:38
SPEAKER_00: Don't ask me about it.
34:40
SPEAKER_00: I've I've had my own experience, I have my own encounter with Jesus.
34:44
SPEAKER_00: It's the most supernatural encounter I've ever had in my life.
34:47
SPEAKER_00: Um, but ask, ask him.
34:51
SPEAKER_00: You ask him.
34:52
SPEAKER_00: What what are you?
34:54
SPEAKER_00: What's this about?
34:55
SPEAKER_00: If you don't, if you don't know him.
34:56
SPEAKER_00: And if you do know him, get get better at knowing him.
35:01
SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna leave us with uh, you know what?
35:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm just doing it.
35:06
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna read some more scripture.
35:09
SPEAKER_00: Uh this is Colossians 1, 15.
35:14
SPEAKER_00: He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
35:19
SPEAKER_00: For by him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through him and for him.
35:31
SPEAKER_00: And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
35:36
SPEAKER_00: And he is the head of the body, the church.
35:39
SPEAKER_00: He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent.
35:45
SPEAKER_00: For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.
35:57
SPEAKER_00: And you who were once alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him.
36:12
SPEAKER_00: If indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you have heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven.
36:26
SPEAKER_00: Oh, that is just like that's it, right?
36:29
SPEAKER_00: That's where we have to land with this.
36:31
SPEAKER_00: I really, really pray that that's where we land with it.
36:34
SPEAKER_00: Because whatever it is, that's that's it.
36:38
SPEAKER_00: Like, that's God's word.
36:41
SPEAKER_00: Right?
36:43
SPEAKER_00: Not freak out, like, do do the thing.
36:47
SPEAKER_00: Let the main thing be the main thing.
36:50
SPEAKER_00: And that's just my prayer for us.
36:59
SPEAKER_00: Because the truth is the world is still strange.
37:03
SPEAKER_00: People still encounter things they can't explain.
37:06
SPEAKER_00: Moments where forests suddenly go silent, places that feel thin somehow, atmospheres that feel heavy or holy.
37:14
SPEAKER_00: The supernatural world didn't disappear because modern culture stopped talking about it.
37:21
SPEAKER_00: But the real question isn't just what is out there.
37:24
SPEAKER_00: The real question is what spirit are we cultivating?
37:29
SPEAKER_00: What atmosphere are we carrying?
37:32
SPEAKER_00: Because the early church lived in a supernatural world, and somehow they didn't seem afraid.
37:39
SPEAKER_00: Not because darkness wasn't real, but because the presence of God was more real.
37:46
SPEAKER_00: And maybe that's the invitation now.
37:48
SPEAKER_00: Not deeper fear, not endless obsession, not another cycle of dark content, but becoming people so rooted in the life of God that the atmosphere changes when we walk into a room.
38:07
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's gonna do it for this episode of Sasquatch and Sourdough.
38:11
SPEAKER_00: Remember, until next time, the truth is out there.
38:15
SPEAKER_00: God is with you, and everyone always ends up in the kitchen.