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Episode 493: Are Aliens Actually Demons? · Provoke & Inspire Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: We can fall on two extremes.
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: You can be all about just trying to find demons and everything.
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Everything's spiritual and it gets weird, right.
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: So there's that extreme.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: There's the other extreme, where we just dismiss it all.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: I mean, just think like, oh, you know, it's just this material world and you know, yeah, I pray and we're in a battle.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: The enemy's real and if I'm not aware of it, he'll take me out.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: The whole conversation and maybe why there's tension is because aliens work as a concept really well for an atheist kind of mindset, but angels and demons are reserved for people with belief.
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: You're listening to the Provoke and Inspire podcast.
• 0:42
  Speaker 4: Welcome to the Provoke and Inspire podcast live in person edition in the Swanky Glass conference room.
• 0:49
  Speaker 4: What's up, fellas?
• 0:50
  Speaker 4: Yes, Good to see you.
• 0:52
  Speaker 4: Like I said, this is the Provoke and Inspire podcast and we are an official Stiger International podcast, and this is a very special moment for us.
• 0:59
  Speaker 4: Actually, we just had our.
• 1:00
  Speaker 4: Well, look, tell us what did we do last night?
• 1:01
  Speaker 4: Why?
• 1:02
  Speaker 4: Why are we graced with the presence of Chad and other people from around this globe?
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: Well, we had a very first Stiger banquet.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: We had an amazing time yesterday, like it was basically, as far as I see it, just a huge gathering of friends of, like I mean, a lot of our mission key mission people were here, but also people that have walked to this for many years praying, supporting us we're in the room plus their friends, so new people getting to know what we do.
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: And it was exciting because in a way, it's like celebrating what we've been seeing God do over many years, like it's just a real special moment.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: And then also it felt like going into a new phase, like a new level of growth and of people coming alongside us, so we were really excited for it.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: There were like 300 and something people in the room from all around the Twin Cities and beyond, so it was really cool we raised at least $3 and 57 cents.
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: It cost us like I don't know thousands, but we raised $3.
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: And 50 cents After tax.
• 1:56
  Speaker 4: No, it was good and these moments, for me, are always.
• 1:59
  Speaker 4: They always emphasize one of our core values, which is that we're family, and you really do feel that Like.
• 2:04
  Speaker 4: I know that sounds like a kind of a cliche, Maybe some corporations would use, but in our mission that's how it feels when we have these moments where we get to come together.
• 2:12
  Speaker 4: You cannot have seen somebody for a long time, but when you come together it feels like a family reunion.
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: I've repeatedly heard of the last year, like a lot of people that have been walking with us over the last few years, that that is one of the main things that really draws them in, Like that sense that they're part of a family, a community of people around the world have the same vision to go out, to reach people, to go to the lost, and so and that's like this, even this morning, like worshiping together with everyone there are people there that we've been through so much, so many crazy things together and just be there worshiping and praying for each other is just so precious.
• 2:45
  Speaker 4: Yeah, and you know, obviously one of the greatest felt needs of culture today is loneliness.
• 2:49
  Speaker 4: But that doesn't mean, in my view, that just because followers of Jesus have the sort of the worldview to facilitate and create great community, that doesn't mean they have it Right, right Like it is even unique, I think.
• 3:01
  Speaker 4: In fact it's very rare.
• 3:02
  Speaker 4: It is rare, it is rare, and so for it to be something that attracts you to our mission is not weird, right, I get it Like this world is devoid of that, in and outside of the church often, and so to have that is such a beautiful and unique thing, and it's that we have this common thing that we're striving for right.
• 3:20
  Speaker 4: It's not just community for community's sake, like you said, it's the battles that we've been through, it's the hard things that we've seen, the war stories that we've shared, of funny places we've stayed and places we preach the gospel, and yeah.
• 3:31
  Speaker 4: All right, setlist for today.
• 3:32
  Speaker 4: We have David's Random Story.
• 3:33
  Speaker 4: We've already talked to you about the mission.
• 3:34
  Speaker 4: We're going to save Punching through the awkward for the next episode we're going to be recording live.
• 3:38
  Speaker 4: So that's it.
• 3:39
  Speaker 4: Let's get to it, shall we so I had a friend whenever he would look in the mirror, he'd see a demon.
• 3:45
  Speaker 5: So he was like really freaked out, as he would be.
• 3:48
  Speaker 4: He actually couldn't sleep, was he just really homely.
• 3:50
  Speaker 5: Okay, this is a serious story.
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: We're so trained to not receive serious.
• 3:55
  Speaker 5: This is not something to be mocking Ben, okay.
• 3:58
  Speaker 5: So he would look in the mirror and he'd see this demon and he's like I'm so freaked out and I want to keep him anonymous his name but let's just just pretend that his name is Matthew Benzoonger from California.
• 4:10
  Speaker 4: Let's just let's just make a very, very generic name, yeah.
• 4:13
  Speaker 5: Let's say his Matthew Benzoonger.
• 4:15
  Speaker 4: Let's do it all.
• 4:15
  Speaker 4: Don't call him Matthew B or Ram Benzoonger.
• 4:19
  Speaker 5: So I said here's what you need to do Look in the mirror.
• 4:22
  Speaker 5: When the demon's there Say to the demon go ahead.
• 4:26
  Speaker 5: You do that Every time.
• 4:28
  Speaker 5: I look in the mirror.
• 4:29
  Speaker 5: I want to see you, because you know what that's going to do.
• 4:31
  Speaker 5: It's going to make me read the Bible more and it's going to make me pray more.
• 4:35
  Speaker 5: So you do that.
• 4:37
  Speaker 5: You look at me, I want to see you every time.
• 4:39
  Speaker 5: And after that he never saw the demon again.
• 4:42
  Speaker 5: But the bad news is he didn't read the Bible more or pray more.
• 4:49
  Speaker 5: And then he ended up going off the rail somewhere.
• 4:51
  Speaker 5: But anyway, that's it.
• 4:54
  Speaker 4: All right, moving on.
• 4:55
  Speaker 4: So demons are back in the news.
• 4:57
  Speaker 4: So are aliens.
• 4:58
  Speaker 4: There is this report coming out, based on a podcast where one of the high up guys in the Pentagon he blamed Christians in the Pentagon for resisting research into alien activity out of fear that it was really demons, not aliens.
• 5:12
  Speaker 4: And so he goes on this popular podcast and he talks about that Quote.
• 5:16
  Speaker 4: He says it was not just a little voice in the Pentagon, but a huge group of people that thought the phenomenon that was being witnessed was demons.
• 5:23
  Speaker 4: And so they kind of talk about this and laugh about this.
• 5:26
  Speaker 4: And so I thought why not?
• 5:28
  Speaker 4: A perfect opportunity to once again talk about aliens with the cross-section of demons, without giving any more context.
• 5:34
  Speaker 4: David, since the floor is yours inevitably, what do you think about this?
• 5:37
  Speaker 4: What's your gut reaction to the idea that Christians in the Pentagon are resisting alien exploration?
• 5:43
  Speaker 4: Is this an affront to science or a cautionary tale for us all?
• 5:48
  Speaker 5: Well, when I was in university, I studied philosophy and in our philosophy department there were zero Christians.
• 5:55
  Speaker 5: It was super anti-Jesus.
• 5:57
  Speaker 5: In fact, it was not an affront to my faith.
• 6:00
  Speaker 5: That actually made me believe more than I did before.
• 6:03
  Speaker 5: So I don't know why people would be afraid of exploring any kind of truth.
• 6:07
  Speaker 5: If aliens are indeed aliens from another planet, or if they're demons, why would you not want to discover the truth about it?
• 6:15
  Speaker 5: That doesn't make any sense to me.
• 6:16
  Speaker 5: So people who say that they're Jesus followers but are nervous about discovering the truth about something makes me wonder how strong their faith is in the first place, Because my experience has been.
• 6:26
  Speaker 5: When I really look into other philosophies or religions, it only makes me believe more that Jesus is real.
• 6:33
  Speaker 4: Right, and if you have to use power to enforce a belief, then that in a sense portrays that it's on shaky ground.
• 6:39
  Speaker 4: You see that in a lot of Muslim countries, where it's forbidden to think or explore even the possibility that there's another religious idea that could be good or even better than what you believe, yeah, and again, I don't know if we go in this direction, but a lot of what propelled the scientific revolution was the idea that God created everything, that the world is knowable, rational, that we can pursue it, that God has given us the mind to explore it and then by all means go for it.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: God gave us curiosity.
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: That's one part of this.
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: The whole alien thing that's in the news a lot now and podcasts etc is for me partly.
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: It's that it's like people really curious.
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: They want to like is there something out there I mean I enjoy.
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: Like there's certain podcasts I listen to.
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: Like sometimes I listen to the NASA one or like the astronomy one from the UK because I'm just like really intrigued by trying to understand more deeply what's out there and it's amazing some of the discoveries they're making now, like of how far they can look into the universe and trying to figure out how far back does it go and when did it begin.
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: And then even a lot of scientists then linking that to God, like saying you know there's a few Christian scientists but also even agnostic and atheist scientists saying actually the intelligent design point is the best explanation for it.
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: So that for me is like I love listening to that.
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: There's a curiosity that we have that I think God's given us.
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: And that's one side of it.
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: And then the other side is what you guys have started pointing to as well, which is that the discovery of truth is again a godly thing, like to search for what is true, to use the intelligence God has given us and in many ways, it's the foundation of science itself.
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: Like it came from man of faith and you know we've had John Lennox on the podcast and on some of our events and that's one of the things he often talks about like science is in its roots, in its origin Christian, it's based on believing as a God with intelligence who, you know, made all of this.
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: So I, yeah, I totally agree.
• 8:34
  Speaker 4: I think the aspect of this conversation that caught my attention was there's certainly the conversation about science, and the Judeo-Christian worldview undergirds the pursuit of science, far from inhibiting it, though we have a bit of a sketchy past with science right, we did try to burn some people who tried to explore the universe.
• 8:51
  Speaker 4: So there is that aspect of the conversation.
• 8:54
  Speaker 4: But what jumped out at me is okay, so you can.
• 8:56
  Speaker 4: You can think it's silly, that, okay, there are demons instead of aliens.
• 8:59
  Speaker 4: You know we shouldn't pursue that and you can.
• 9:01
  Speaker 4: You can kind of laugh that off and I instinctively would do that.
• 9:05
  Speaker 4: My instinct would be well, what the heck?
• 9:06
  Speaker 4: Why would we not pursue it?
• 9:08
  Speaker 4: But the other side of it that got me thinking about this is that we have grown up in a culture, especially in the West, where we have so stripped culture and society of the supernatural, where nothing is demonic, even in the Christian world, where my instinct, my natural default, is not to assume anything would be demonic, like how that's so foolish.
• 9:27
  Speaker 4: And yet we have an enemy that's real, we have demons operating in this world, and so I think a potentially interesting conversation here is what role do demons and Satan play in this world and what would it look like?
• 9:40
  Speaker 4: You know, because in our very intellectual, reformed thinking it's kind of like there's just lies in my head that's the only way that Satan operates, but I feel like he probably operates in more ways than that.
• 9:50
  Speaker 4: And so, just as a general discussion, that whole topic what does demonic activity look like in the world?
• 9:56
  Speaker 4: Should we be cautious?
• 9:57
  Speaker 4: Should we just be flippant and pursue or search out anything?
• 10:00
  Speaker 4: How do we guard ourselves and how do we view the whole thing?
• 10:04
  Speaker 4: Chad.
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: Oh, chad, you knew it.
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: Okay, so I'm going to throw a curveball into this conversation.
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: And I'm going to add a third possibility.
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: Would we not consider the possibility of aliens as angelic presence?
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: And why do we default, as Christians, to demonic presence when we think about it from a scriptural standpoint like Genesis 28, I think it is, is the story of Jacob having a dream where angels are ascending and descending.
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: Or you know how many Bible stories are there where angels are present among us, where they appear, and yet how many times are their stories in the Bible where a demon was physically visible to the naked eye?
• 10:49
  Speaker 5: I had that in university, a friend of mine who was a brand new believer and just he was thinking about deep things.
• 10:54
  Speaker 5: You know about his, you know questioning.
• 10:56
  Speaker 5: Did I do the right thing, am I crazy?
• 10:57
  Speaker 5: The doorbell rang.
• 10:59
  Speaker 5: He opened the door and a guy was there, came in, explained everything to him you know all the questions he had and then went to the door.
• 11:08
  Speaker 5: He went to thank him and he was gone.
• 11:10
  Speaker 4: That's another side of the same thing that I'm talking about, which is that, for whatever reason, my instinct is to dismiss both sides of it, to not want to think that anything spiritual.
• 11:19
  Speaker 4: Well, of course I believe in the power of God, I believe in the Holy Spirit, but there is a part of me and intellectual resistance to the idea that you know that I don't know angels, demons it feels like, okay, that's for the maybe more crazy Christians on the periphery, or that which is of course not what I believe intellectually.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: I just I don't know.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and related to that, I think it's important to make a distinction, like I think our culture is curious about aliens and discovery of you know, its space and etc.
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: It's a bit different to the curiosity or the awareness of the way people react to spiritual things.
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: So what I mean by that is there's an aspect of kind of a materialistic, scientific proof thing in relation to the alien thing.
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: Like the Pentagon and everybody researching, they're interested in it because they believe they could really see material proof of life, for example.
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: Right, so they've just sent that probe to the asteroid to get some some of the substance from the asteroid to figure out.
• 12:23
  Speaker 5: Why would there be some kind of life form on an asteroid?
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: No, that's not the answer.
• 12:28
  Speaker 5: You're not making any sense.
• 12:29
  Speaker 5: I am, I am Listen to it.
• 12:30
  Speaker 5: No, you're not.
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: I'll explain it.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: So you have.
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: You have some substance from an asteroid.
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: That what they believe is okay.
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: We can discover where the molecules for life came from.
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: If you believe in evolution, the primordial evolution evolution evolution.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: Thank you, evil evolution, that's how evil evolved over time.
• 12:48
  Speaker 5: I believe in evolution.
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: My point is it's too.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: I think it's two different kinds of people we're talking about here.
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: There are people in our culture who will be all fascinated with the spiritual realm and oh, it's demonic presence or it's angelic presence.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: And there are the very secularist, materialistic ones who are still pursuing like is their life outside in the universe?
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: Are they aliens?
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: Not because they think it's a spiritual thing, because they really want to find material proof, and it's two different things.
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: I think that's an important distinction to make.
• 13:17
  Speaker 4: I think it is, but I also think it isn't, because, to me, what aliens represent to typically non-religious people although I think there are plenty of religious people who might think aliens exist too and have no problem with that, cs Lewis being one of them but I think it to them represents the answer to that, the transcendent mystery that they can't find anything to put into here materially.
• 13:38
  Speaker 4: I actually think it's both, because it answers metaphysical questions.
• 13:41
  Speaker 4: It's kind of this hybrid thing where, yes, they don't have to ascend to a god, they don't have to sort of agree that there's some sort of supernatural being, but if there's this outside thing that we don't yet know, maybe that can be the what's the key to all doors.
• 13:57
  Speaker 4: You know what?
• 13:58
  Speaker 4: I'm talking about C.
• 13:59
  Speaker 4: The Lord of the Rings C.
• 13:59
  Speaker 4: That's it.
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: That's it C I'm doors bucks.
• 14:02
  Speaker 4: C, but do you know what I'm saying, though?
• 14:03
  Speaker 4: So I actually think for them it still represents that, because it's kind of like-.
• 14:07
  Speaker 5: C.
• 14:07
  Speaker 5: It's a way of explaining things without God in the equation C.
• 14:10
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it kind of is a replacement for a god explanation for it right.
• 14:15
  Speaker 5: C, but people also are really hungry for something that has transcendent meaning.
• 14:20
  Speaker 5: That's not God.
• 14:21
  Speaker 5: It's because, like in our apartment here in Minneapolis, when we're here, a cross from us, is this universalistic church.
• 14:27
  Speaker 5: During the Halloween season, they always have free tarot card reading and all kinds of occultic things, and the place is packed out with people, just normal people with their kids going to get their tarot card read or talk to their dead grandma, and I think there's C.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: But wouldn't you say that they're trying to find a substitute?
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: So if somebody's dismissed the possibility of a spiritual realm, if they've said I don't think-.
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: C, okay, c, I'm not sure if there's a god, I'm not sure if there's a spiritual realm, so is there another explanation for things that we don't yet understand?
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: And then they'll go like, oh, maybe there are aliens, there are super intelligent beings who are way more advanced, and that's a big part of this whole search for aliens.
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: Because if you look at like I often listen we've mentioned this very times here but like the Joe Rogan podcast and how he'll be really curious about like okay, where did the pyramids come from?
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: And the ancient civilizations and whether aliens that came, and he loves like exploring that and bringing people on the show that, where they're talking about these ideas.
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: So there is a big part of our culture that's pursuing these.
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: You know, whatever you want to call it, but they're trying to find explanations that you know they're not spiritual explanations.
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: Maybe there is a physical spirit, sorry, physical intelligent being, that's helped us.
• 15:39
  Speaker 4: C, and I would just say it's an aliens of the gap argument, right that for them they don't want there to be a God, right?
• 15:45
  Speaker 4: They don't want there to have to be a supernatural explanation for metaphysical questions they can't answer materially, so they'll rather defer to some mysterious alien Keral, some panacea, like if there'll be an alien that'll answer all the questions that I don't want God to have to answer cold universe can't answer either.
• 16:02
  Speaker 5: So it's to me.
• 16:03
  Speaker 5: I agree with what you're saying, but where did the aliens come from?
• 16:06
  Speaker 4: C Well, that's my point.
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: It's an interesting way to address C One thing does not dismiss the other, that if you really you want to take it all the way-.
• 16:11
  Speaker 4: C yes, aliens of the gap argument, but okay so all of this is fascinating, but I think what matters to the average listener of this podcast is C Aliens.
• 16:19
  Speaker 4: C Aliens is the whole idea of the demonic, because I do think that's that is where this could get more practical, which is, I would say, the average person.
• 16:29
  Speaker 4: Listening to this falls similar to where I am or where I don't know.
• 16:33
  Speaker 4: Want to speak for all of you guys, but my instinct is to laugh off the idea that we should not pursue aliens because they might be demons.
• 16:39
  Speaker 4: And yet I think there is a real demonic and angelic presence in this world.
• 16:45
  Speaker 4: I mean second king, six fifteen through nineteen right Hold the whole Elisha story whereas his eyes opened.
• 16:50
  Speaker 4: I think there is more of a real C Explain the story C Well you know he's surrounded by this enemy and he's freaking out.
• 16:58
  Speaker 4: And then God reveals that there's this massive spiritual force on his side.
• 17:02
  Speaker 4: C so I just seven, right.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: C yes.
• 17:05
  Speaker 4: I could read it to be more accurate and then I wouldn't come off like such a goon.
• 17:08
  Speaker 4: But I don't want to do that because it's a lot of reading.
• 17:10
  Speaker 5: C Basically, he's afraid and he says open his eyes, lord, so he can see.
• 17:14
  Speaker 5: You know that he was in us is greater than them, and then they love him.
• 17:18
  Speaker 4: C Second kings six, fifteen through nineteen.
• 17:20
  Speaker 4: When the servant of the man of God rose early in the morning and went out, behold, an army with horses and chariots was all around the city.
• 17:27
  Speaker 4: And the servant said Alas, my master, what shall we do?
• 17:30
  Speaker 4: So the Lord opened the eyes of the young man and he saw and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.
• 17:38
  Speaker 5: C, that's a pretty intense C.
• 17:39
  Speaker 5: I mean what?
• 17:39
  Speaker 4: an epic story.
• 17:40
  Speaker 4: Right, should have just done that right away.
• 17:42
  Speaker 4: I would have come off a lot more credible.
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: But the point is, I think, in the same way I need my eyes opened, we're more impacted by our materialistic, scientific rational.
• 17:54
  Speaker 4: Yeah, we dabble with the.
• 17:55
  Speaker 4: There you.
• 17:56
  Speaker 4: Okay, we'll kind of entertain the idea of spirituality to some degree, but I think, by and large, my default is to dismiss that reality.
• 18:03
  Speaker 4: The fact that if, if God would open my eyes and flip the switch, I think it would be scary.
• 18:08
  Speaker 4: You know the whole like stranger things, underworld thing.
• 18:10
  Speaker 4: I think it's like there would be a reality around me that would profoundly impact me.
• 18:15
  Speaker 4: Do you guys agree with that?
• 18:16
  Speaker 4: Luke, do you agree with that?
• 18:17
  Speaker 4: I?
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: like that.
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: You used the stranger things reference.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: That was fun.
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: So I agree.
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: And for me, that one of the verses, passages in the Bible that most Kind of stands out to me when I think about a spiritual world and how our secular culture is in a way ignoring it or Not understanding it, is in one, peter.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: He's kind of challenging exactly what I think we need to be challenged with today.
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: He says be alert and of sober mind.
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: Your enemy, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings.
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: And that whole chapter, which is one Peter five, he's calling Young and old leaders in the church, young people, and he's saying guys, stand strong, be alert, of sober mind, because we're in a battle.
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: It's real, there's a spiritual world, there's.
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: It's.
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: This isn't a game, there's something we got to be aware of.
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: And that is exactly where we make mistakes today and I understand I probably in the same category as you, ben like it's too easy for me to just dismiss everything.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: And I see us Lewis put it we can fall on two extremes.
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: You can be all about just trying to find demons and everything and or angels and everything, and you know, I would everything spiritual and and diverge from what we even have in terms of biblical understanding and and you just kind of get it gets weird right.
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: So there's that extreme.
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: There's the other extreme, where we just dismiss it all.
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna think like, oh, you know, it's just this material world and you know, yeah, I pray and I follow Jesus, but there's nothing you know.
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: And so this really challenges that.
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: For me it's.
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: It's like every time I read it I'm reminded we're in a battle, the enemy's real and if I'm not aware of it, he'll take me out, because you know, if, if you're in a, if you're in a war, but you're not actually in the army, you're just standing around observing like that's where you'll get take, you're gonna be the first one out.
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: You know, so you got to be in the war where part of the team, part of the your brothers there in arms and be like okay, I got your back, you got mine, let's go.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: This is serious, you know.
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: I think that's what he's calling us to have that kind of expression.
• 20:27
  Speaker 4: I'd rather be a Warrior in a garden and a garden garden and a gardener and a warrior.
• 20:32
  Speaker 4: I.
• 20:33
  Speaker 5: Don't even know what that means, but I do think that one of the things that the devil wants to do is to get me to believe that he's not real.
• 20:39
  Speaker 5: Right and for me to not believe in the spiritual world.
• 20:42
  Speaker 5: I mean, you know fission 612.
• 20:43
  Speaker 5: Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
• 20:53
  Speaker 5: So when I face difficulties is my first instinct to think about the spiritual Powers, the principalities know it isn't but Paul saying that is where our struggle begins.
• 21:04
  Speaker 5: So if, even if I'm having a personal problem with someone, or whatever it might be, paul said it's not flesh and blood.
• 21:11
  Speaker 5: And what would happen if I would approach things from that starting point?
• 21:15
  Speaker 5: With things change?
• 21:16
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 21:17
  Speaker 4: I see greater breakthrough and, like you said, luke, I think if we don't know the kind of reality we're in, we're not going to engage it properly, right?
• 21:24
  Speaker 4: Which is why, if I'm honest, like when someone says you know, I'm going through something really hard or I explain a really difficult situation, they say, oh, let's pray about it.
• 21:31
  Speaker 4: Like there's a part of my flesh that says, you know, like, of course I believe God can move, but if I'm honest, there's a part of my flesh that'll rise up and be like, alright, but how are we gonna solve the problem?
• 21:40
  Speaker 4: And I hate to admit that, but it's true, it's like it becomes that kind of thing, and I think that part of it is not fully understanding the reality around us and needing the Holy Spirit to open up our eyes, but part of it also, I think, is the enemy working hard to make us not aware of what's going on.
• 21:56
  Speaker 4: Don't you think, chad, if we don't get it, we're not going to fight right, and that's going to make us a lot less effective.
• 22:00
  Speaker 4: And so it's part of it.
• 22:01
  Speaker 4: Is that, ironically, the the spiritual warfare is to make me not realize that the spiritual warfare.
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean absolutely the whole conversation.
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: And maybe why there's tension in the Pentagon which is hilarious to think of at this level, is because aliens work as a, as a concept, really well for an atheist kind of mindset, but angels and demons are reserved for people with belief interesting.
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's where there so for.
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: But, for example, to tie this back to someone who might have an opportunity to talk with a friend About this who doesn't believe in Jesus is from Revelation 10 1.
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: Then I saw another mighty angel coming down from heaven, wrapped in a cloud with a rainbow over his head and his face was like the Sun and his legs like pillars of fire.
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: So, like you know, when they are describing, you know, a alien, like flashing by an airplane, it's like that's not that far off from what is there.
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: So why not go there with like, hey, have you ever considered the idea that there are angelic or demonic beings outside of this?
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: Like, let's explore this more.
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: Can I share some scripture passes that have blown my mind, and I just think that you know it continues like we talked last time about finding common ground and and.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: But so what?
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: Salami, salami, salami but I like how you're trying to turn it really to something very practical and the conversations we have with people and I again I would separate things out.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: It's harder for me to have a conversation about aliens and to lead it to spiritual things, but I do know that I have a lot of conversations with people who have had some kind of spiritual experience and that does Like open their minds and hearts to the possibility of God, and so I mean I even had a conversation recently I can't I think I might have shared this on one of the episodes, but we did this conference in Serbia, this gathering, and it's people from all around the region, and we went out on the streets of Novosad, serbia, to share the gospel.
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: And I had an amazing conversation with this young Muslim guy, albanian background but living in Serbia, and one of the things that was really crazy was happening with him was that he had been Having these spiritual experiences that had opened him to think more about God and about what's true, and he'd been having dreams, like God had given him a dream where he found a like a cupboard, a locked up cupboard, and when he opened it there was a Bible and he pulled it out in the dream and was like, wanting, had this hunger to want to read it, and he'd never read a Bible before.
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: And then he was telling me that one day he was in his kitchen and he started seeing some kind of weird stuff happening, like things move, like some kind of, you know, like we see in the horror movies.
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: You know it's like some kind of ghost or something.
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: And he's sitting there and the way he told it was, he said I decided to try reading the Bible.
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: When I read the Bible on my phone, the things would stop moving and then when I would watch videos of other stuff others like religions they would start moving again.
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: And he's like so I think that's a sign that I should be reading the Bible.
• 24:54
  Speaker 5: You know, that's his perception, I would say that's a pretty good sign.
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah so, but for me it was like, okay, here's an in our conversations.
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: This is that opportunity to be able to say, well, yeah, there is a spiritual, well, it's that.
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: And we need to be aware that we there's so much more than the material things, and so we need to seek truth.
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: We need to understand that, just like we seek truth about other things, we need to seek truth about the spiritual world around us.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: And going back to that reference of CS Lewis, I think the analogy used is like the enemy If he can't stop you from getting on the horse, he'll help you up and make you fall off the other side of the horse.
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: And so the enemy will often start with maybe something like weird, like like making us confused about the spiritual realm and fear and demonic forces and all that kind of thing.
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: And if you, if culture, gets to a point where that's that's not a thing anymore, he'll push us off on the other side, which is to believe he doesn't even exist, which is there's no spiritual realm, there's no enemy, there's no, none of this is real and and that's that's what the enemy's doing, you know.
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: So we can say to people hey, there is a spiritual world and that's why it's so important that we try to understand it and we get to know God.
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I think the rise in interest in aliens and the supernatural.
• 26:08
  Speaker 4: It's not coincidental that it also is coming at a time of epidemic loneliness and anxiety and depression and suicide.
• 26:15
  Speaker 4: I think that people are kind of coming to the end of the material answers and needing something deeper.
• 26:20
  Speaker 4: But one thought that came into my mind that I thought was might be interesting is you know, I think God is so merciful in the way he allows us to experience reality, Like you often will say, David, that you know, if I could fully experience God's love, it would crush me.
• 26:35
  Speaker 4: Like if I could get his heart for the world, like how he feels about the war in the Middle East right now, or how he feels about Ukraine, or poverty, or broken homes or broken I, I would just be laying flat on the ground overwhelmed, I couldn't move right.
• 26:50
  Speaker 4: So, in his mercy, we seek him and he gives us his heart, and then we shape our lives and respond accordingly.
• 26:56
  Speaker 4: I almost wonder if our understanding of the spiritual world is the same.
• 27:01
  Speaker 4: Right when I come to him with a sincere desire to know what's true, I want to align my life with reality, and reality is there is a spiritual dimension that is more real, I think, than the physical dimension.
• 27:12
  Speaker 4: But if I could fully comprehend it at all times, I'd probably go mental Like I probably would be immobilized.
• 27:19
  Speaker 4: It'd be terrifying.
• 27:20
  Speaker 4: I mean, I think we forget the fear, the overwhelming fear that in angels and you know, of course, the presence of God people could even look at their face.
• 27:27
  Speaker 5: Whenever they see someone, see an angel, they're flat on their face.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: Right right.
• 27:31
  Speaker 5: Or like what was the prophet?
• 27:33
  Speaker 5: He had this revelation of an angel and he was sick in bed for three days, daniel remember he was like.
• 27:38
  Speaker 5: He was like physically sick because it was so terrifying and intense and it was an angel.
• 27:45
  Speaker 4: That was a little tangential, but I do think it's interesting.
• 27:47
  Speaker 4: Right, I think we desire to know it.
• 27:50
  Speaker 4: But God is merciful and that he allows us to still function in the very limited brains he's given us, and he gives us enough of the spiritual reality to fight the right way, to be urgent, to live for what matters, to pray the right way, but not so much of it that we'd just be overwhelmed by what I think our little two-dimensional brains can't handle.
• 28:10
  Speaker 5: But wouldn't this also this understanding or this acknowledgement?
• 28:14
  Speaker 5: Maybe we can't take seeing the spiritual world as it is fully, because it'd be too much, but to start approaching things first in seeking God rather than coming up with our own solution, right?
• 28:23
  Speaker 4: I think it's like any form of sanctification.
• 28:25
  Speaker 4: I think the more I grow, the more God begins to peel away the parts of me that are more human and makes me more like Him.
• 28:33
  Speaker 4: I think my belief is that my ability to handle His broken hearts, the truth of the spiritual reality around me, the burden for the loss, I think I would hope that would grow as I grow, as my understanding of God and His love for me and my identity in Him.
• 28:47
  Speaker 4: So yeah, I think he's faithful.
• 28:49
  Speaker 4: Like you know, I don't expect from my three-year-old the same that I expect from my seven-year-old, that I would expect from them when they're 20.
• 28:55
  Speaker 4: And that would be the hope that, as I grow, god gives me more and more.
• 29:00
  Speaker 4: He peels back the layers and shows me more and more of what's true so that my life can more align with reality and so I can be more fruitful for Him and I think there's a really important thing in what you guys are saying in terms of our personal walk of faith.
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: When we live in a culture that really tries to shut off that whole realm of the spiritual, we'll do exactly what you've been describing, ben, which is, like you know, we'll pray.
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: Is that really going to do something, you know?
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: And our faith will decrease, even if we're many years following Jesus, like we can go through seasons of dryness.
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: And I think, paul, it's because, like what you were just saying there, david is, if we don't exercise our faith, then it does dry up, and I think for a lot of us in our culture that happens.
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: And so faith is something you've got to exercise, and when I read it in Scripture, it really is that it's a trusting in God.
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: When I can't see it, when I don't know, and it's stepping into that and it doesn't come to us naturally always, most of the time it'll be a lot easier to just kind of go ah, you know, just get on with life and, you know, don't take it so seriously.
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: You know, we've got this thing that the culture seems to put in us.
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: We've got to fight against it.
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: We've got to go.
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: No, I'm going to pray, I'm going to trust that God will move and that he's here, and then the more you step out in that, the more you start to experience the reality of that and to see God answering prayers and to see that the spiritual world is real and that we are in a battle.
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: So I think we've got to exercise that faith so it doesn't go dry.
• 30:32
  Speaker 4: And I think what that sparked in my brain is the still small voice of God and that, again, if the Holy Spirit speaking to you to take a risk, or to any of us, was some giant, fiery angel with a sword being like, talk to that person.
• 30:48
  Speaker 4: You know, you'd be like okay, you know, but it's not, that's not how he works.
• 30:52
  Speaker 4: He's merciful, he's like hey, I want you to, I want you to you know what?
• 30:56
  Speaker 4: I mean it's this internal, and then as you listen to that and learn to cultivate, that it grows and it becomes.
• 31:01
  Speaker 4: I feel like it becomes stronger.
• 31:02
  Speaker 4: But even that, to me, is how God functions.
• 31:06
  Speaker 4: He doesn't want compulsion, he doesn't want, he wants to draw you out into deeper and deeper waters.
• 31:11
  Speaker 4: But he does that in a sweet, merciful way, I think, where you start to listen for that voice and you start to feel the way he feels and hear him lead you out, and when you take those risks, it opens your eyes up more and more to the reality all around you.
• 31:23
  Speaker 4: Alright, that's it.
• 31:25
  Speaker 4: First in-person snazzy glass conference room office episode, or ARSS, nzop.
• 31:32
  Speaker 4: First one in the books, first one in the bag wait.
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: How long has it been since we've done?
• 31:40
  Speaker 4: this 1462, the Spanish Armada had just sunk to the bottom of the Mediterranean sea Jurassic making a comeback.
• 31:47
  Speaker 4: Monocles were just in style.
• 31:49
  Speaker 4: Leather pants were distributed like berries on street corner.
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: Imagine that for an hour, non-stop fast.
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: That's what Ben was like when I met him.
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: What's crazy.
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: Is it the last time I can remember a Stiger provoked and inspired event?
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: Were those two provoked and inspired events, one in Hawaii and then one in Richmond Virginia, which would have been spring of 2019?
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: I wasn't there, you weren't there.
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: Hawaii again.
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: You weren't there and that was literally right before I came clean on the affair and like the whole.
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: So from that time Up until now this is my first time back- in a so over four years, for almost four and a half years.
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, to me it's.
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: It's beautiful to to be reminded and just like last night, the the amazingness of how you describe family, yeah, and being reminded that the gifts and the calling of God are not revocable and he doesn't just move his hand, remove his hand from us and like, okay, you were too far gone, you were too bland, you were too not spiritual, you were too not risk-taking.
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: I'm done, it's.
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: Last night to me was just like you're surrounded by giants in the faith and nothing's changed in how I see you, and it was just like Whoa.
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: I woke up this morning just having like dreams of like prophesying over people again and wow over people and it's like man.
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: I haven't felt this stuff in a long time I was like I'm getting.
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: And then David calls me out like Chad, come up, we're gonna pray for you I was like yeah, I'm already being ambushed.
• 33:18
  Speaker 4: So that's awesome.
• 33:19
  Speaker 4: I had cool.
• 33:19
  Speaker 4: Love you man.
• 33:20
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I love you.
• 33:21
  Speaker 4: So fun to have you here.
• 33:22
  Speaker 4: You're like the brother I never had.
• 33:23
  Speaker 4: How do?
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: you know, I was gonna say something really awkward, but thankfully I had a sister.
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: I never was resistance.
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: Let's, let's cut that one.
• 33:33
  Speaker 5: Yeah, no, let's go.
• 33:34
  Speaker 5: We're gonna edit that out.
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: It's always means every time we say we're gonna edit, we never do well actually be surprised, right, steve?
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: We've got a whole folder things go, go south.
• 33:47
  Speaker 4: We got a blackmail everyone.
• 33:52
  Speaker 5: Well, mostly David and Chad.
• 33:55
  Speaker 4: Luke, you're squeaky clean.
• 33:56
  Speaker 4: It's disgusting.
• 33:57
  Speaker 4: You're like a politician, just polished from the waist up and the knees down cut.
• 34:01
  Speaker 4: All right, we're done.
• 34:02
  Speaker 4: Leave us a ready to review.
• 34:04
  Speaker 5: We don't.
• 34:04
  Speaker 5: We have any new reviews to read.
• 34:06
  Speaker 4: Let's check live and just let's just check.
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: We're gonna be sad if he says no we don't, you know, I'm gonna check now.
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: Oh no nothing I could just quick Michelle now.
• 34:14
  Speaker 5: See if there is a new one.
• 34:15
  Speaker 5: Should I just read the?
• 34:17
  Speaker 4: latest review on the proof on the Joe on the Joe Rogan podcast.
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, joe Rogan, it's us.
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: Oh.
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: I love that idea.
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: Just just changed the name Joe for David.
• 34:26
  Speaker 5: We need a.
• 34:27
  Speaker 5: We need a three hours, no, we don't you're?
• 34:30
  Speaker 4: I'll read one, because we haven't read one for a while.
• 34:32
  Speaker 4: Okay, from Sally Shield.
• 34:34
  Speaker 4: Wasn't she a famous actress?
• 34:36
  Speaker 4: Yep.
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 34:38
  Speaker 4: I'm laughing out loud, then humbled and challenged.
• 34:40
  Speaker 4: Five stars, thank God for these guys.
• 34:42
  Speaker 4: This podcast is beautiful.
• 34:44
  Speaker 4: It's always leaving me wanting to know God more, learn more, serve others, love others, pray and be his servant.
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: Thank you, wow thank you, sally, for you host a coast and around the seas.
• 34:54
  Speaker 4: We salute you.
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: Oh.
• 34:59
  Speaker 4: That's it, peace.
• 35:02
  Speaker 3: Thank you for listening to the provoke and inspire podcast.
• 35:05
  Speaker 3: If you enjoy this content, consider leaving us a rating and a review on iTunes.
• 35:10
  Speaker 3: Got questions for the guys.
• 35:12
  Speaker 3: Send them to provoke and expire at stigerorg.
• 35:15
  Speaker 3: Thanks for listening.