This episode takes you through a spectrum of religious beliefs and practices, from Pentecostal doctrines to the charismatic movement, and further into exploring biblical texts and historical Christian practices. Join us in unraveling the teachings of Johann Christoph Blumhart, the difference between praying and talking to God, and the spiritual battles that underscore the Christian journey.
SPEAKER 1 :
Thank you.
SPEAKER 02 :
Good afternoon and welcome to the Narrow Path Radio Broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg and we’re live for an hour each weekday afternoon. Taking your calls if you have questions about the Bible, about the Christian faith, maybe a disagreement that you have with the host, maybe because you’re not a Christian or you’re a Christian with a different viewpoint. I welcome all calls of this type, and I want to just let you know there’s one line open right now at this number, 844-484-5737. That’s 844-484-5737. If you’d like to call, that line is sitting open at the moment. We’ve got plenty of people waiting to speak, though, and the first is John. calling from Stuttgart, Germany. Hi, John. Welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.
SPEAKER 04 :
Thank you, Steve. I’m a pastor to – I do ministry to military in the Stuttgart military community. Thank you. And my question is this. My understanding of the New Covenant – is it’s between the Father and Jesus, and by our relationship with Christ, abiding in Him, trusting in Him, we get to be part of that. Is that your viewpoint?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, it could be seen that way. When Jeremiah mentioned, however, in Jeremiah 31, the new covenant, he said that God was going to make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. this could possibly be seen as, you know, the true house of Israel and the true house of Judah are those who are in Christ, and therefore God is making the covenant with Christ, and those who are in him therefore share in that covenant. I mean, I guess you could see it that way. I’ve tended to see it, well, I kind of see that. as a possibility, but I wouldn’t necessarily explain it that way, at least not in every case. I believe that the Old Covenant made at Sinai was made to the people who came out of Egypt, which was a mixed racial group, the Bible says, and it was based on keeping obedience and keeping the covenant with God, and then there were promises made. Now, The new covenant, I believe, similarly has to do with the need to, well, God makes promises, and we accept the terms of those promises. And in the new covenant, the terms are clearly that everyone must submit to Christ, who’s the Messiah. You know, God set up Christ as king, has given him all authority over heaven and earth. requires all men everywhere to repent. These are just phrases from Scripture I’m giving you, but I’m sure you’re familiar with them all, that we are to surrender to Christ as King and Lord, and that is the terms of our acceptance of the covenant. Now, that doesn’t disagree with the first way I mentioned it, and the way that maybe goes along with what you were saying more, and that is that our surrender to Christ is and loyalty to him is what includes us in him. And if we are in him, then we share in his status. And if God has a covenant with Jesus, then we in Jesus have a covenant with God that is the same covenant because we’re in him. So that would be, I think, a way of looking at it also.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, I appreciate that. I just found out about you over the weekend. We had a conference here in Germany, and we had a guest speaker from Texas. His name’s Kevin. He’s a Church of God guy from Baytown. He talks to you quite a bit. But, you know, I’ve been listening a lot to N.T. Wright and studying some under him. And I am Pentecostal, but I don’t think I hold to the traditional, all of the traditional stuff. You know, I believe in the gifts and praying in tongues and stuff. Uh-huh. So, that’s just kind of where I’m at.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, my ministry is fairly well-liked among Church of Christ people because several… Church of God.
SPEAKER 04 :
I’m Church of God.
SPEAKER 02 :
Oh, Church of God. Tennessee, Cleveland, Tennessee, Church of God?
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER 02 :
Oh, I got you.
SPEAKER 04 :
I’m not totally, but that’s the denomination that supports our ministry.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, well, I myself would have to be called a charismatic in my views, because I believe in the gifts of the Spirit, and I believe in the baptism of the Spirit. But I would disagree with some Pentecostal doctrines, mainly… I would say mainly the one that says that speaking in tongues is the necessary initial evidence of the baptism of the Spirit. I myself speak in tongues, and I believe in speaking in tongues. I just don’t believe that the Bible teaches that everyone who has not spoken in tongues is necessarily not baptized in the Spirit. That’s where I would probably disagree.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, I don’t have a problem with your staying there at all, because… For some reason, it just doesn’t work that way, but we’ve taught it that way. But it seems like in the late 60s, early 70s, when they had this charismatic movement, it seemed like they taught that a lot. I remember not just Church of God in Pentecostal, but just charismatic people. They believed in the baptism in the Holy Spirit. And, you know, in the evidence of speaking in tongues, they say you get a prayer language. It’s the terminology.
SPEAKER 02 :
My ministry began at that very time. Yeah, my ministry began at that very time. And I was in what they called the Jesus Revolution, the Jesus Movement. And it was a mild, or what Chuck Smith referred to it as mildly charismatic, because Chuck had been a, he was a Pentecostal pastor. And he felt there were certain positions that the Pentecostals took that were a little more extreme than what he found in Scripture, but he did not reject the baptism of the Spirit or the gifts of the Spirit. So I was raised Baptist, and when I went to Calvary Chapel in 1970, that’s the first time I ever heard of the baptism of the Spirit or the gifts of the Spirit.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, yeah. Well, it’s an honor to meet you and talk with you, and I plan to say, you know, I follow you somewhat because I like your teaching and I’m sure you can learn a lot.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, I’m glad to have you in fellowship with us. And I’ve been to Germany many times, not recently, but I’d love to meet you sometime if I ever get to Stuttgart.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, if you do, you’ll have to stay and preach for me or something.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, that’s usually what I do when I go to Germany.
SPEAKER 04 :
All right, brother. Well, thank you so much for your time.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, God bless you, John. It’s a pleasure to hear from you.
SPEAKER 04 :
Oh, by the way, you’re only nine hours in. I’m only nine hours ahead of you.
SPEAKER 02 :
Oh, okay. So you can go to bed now.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, I can. It’s one in the morning. All right. I appreciate your program.
SPEAKER 02 :
All right. God bless you, brother.
SPEAKER 04 :
God bless you. Bye now.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay, Kevin from River Rouge, Michigan. Welcome to The Narrow Path.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, Steve, I got saved in Frankfurt in 73. You guys… You guys are probably my age. I got two questions. The first, I got a question about the year John wrote his gospel, and if it was after 70 A.D., why didn’t he mention return of Christ? The second one is real quick. Because of the lack of personal Bible study, why do you think the decrease in discipline is so in its relationship to poor discernment in the church is so predominant right now.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, I think there’s been a loss of faith in the reliability of Scripture in our culture in general, and I think it has impacted people in the church as well. Not all people. I mean, there’s people who will be faithful to God and to the Scriptures, and especially those who have done enough research to know that all the evidence favors the claims of Scripture and the claims of Christ. I mean, truly, this is not just some kind of a hyperbole. I’ve spent many years looking into the evidence for and against Scripture. the inspiration of scriptures, and I cannot imagine how anyone thinks they can make a case against scripture or against Christianity based on the evidence that’s out there. But I believe that most people haven’t studied that. I think they’ve listened mostly to skeptics. And the criticisms that the skeptics make about the Bible generally speaking, come from their total misunderstanding of the Bible because they’ve never made any effort to know how to study ancient Near Eastern literature. Once somebody has endeavored to do that, many things come clearer. But nonetheless, most people are not deep thinkers and most certainly are not researchers. And therefore, they get their ideas largely from memes and social media and such. And because of the increasing disdain that our secular culture has for God and for the Scriptures. I think that a lot of Christians who want to be Christians still are having somewhat of a weakened faith in the reliability of Scripture. There’s no excuse for it, but that’s happening. I think a love of truth is not quite as dominant in the present generations as it was back when I was a young man. I mean, I grew up in the hippie days. Of course, I was never a hippie myself, but I loved the fact that the hippies were eager to talk philosophically about truth. They wanted to think deeply about things. Sure, they delved into Eastern religion and drugs and things that I didn’t approve of, but it was refreshing to to talk about truth with hippies because many of them were very sincerely interested in truth. And they would have agreed that the truth is what matters most. Whereas in the generations that have come since then, I don’t find in general a cultural conviction that seeking the truth is necessarily a very important thing to do. And so people who don’t care very much about truth… and let’s say they’re more interested in popularity on social media or they’re interested in making money or some other thing other than truth, they’re not highly motivated to research or to think very deeply. They just want to get by and stay popular. I think that this has led to many Christians not reading the Bible very much, and their biblical illiteracy is what has led to their ignorance, of course. And so I think that is a major problem at this present time. Fortunately, there are people who do care about truth, and, you know, they may be a rather small percentage of the population these days, but… They are significant enough to provide a forum for those who are interested in knowing what’s real, what’s true, what the evidence is, and things like that. But a lot of people just don’t want to learn anything that would go against what they prefer to believe either. So we’ve got that major problem in our society. And in many cases, the church is little more than a cross-section of our society. It’s that little portion of our society that want to be religious. But not all of them care much about truth. And that’s where it gets very frustrating for us who really do want to talk about the truth and find even Christians who just really aren’t that interested. Now, you were asking about John’s Gospel. You said if it was written after 70 A.D., which I think is very possible that it was, that, you know, why didn’t he mention the second coming of Christ? Well, first of all, I don’t believe that the second coming of Christ occurred in 70 AD. I believe the second coming of Christ is still future. So there’s that. And so, you know, you’re referring to, of course, the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD. I believe Revelation was written before that time. But I also believe the Gospel of John was written sometime after Revelation. I believe that John’s Gospel mimics language from the book of Revelation. In fact, the very reference to Jesus as the Word, which is found only in John’s writings. No other writer in Scripture calls Jesus the Word, but John does in the Gospel of John and in the first epistle of John. But that was revealed to him in Revelation 19 when he saw Jesus and his name was called the Word of God. This would appear to be the first time John was exposed to the idea of Jesus being the Word. And it must have informed some of the things he said in his gospel and his epistles. So I believe that Revelation was probably the earliest writing of John the Apostle. and it was written, I believe, before 70 A.D., and I believe it predicted, in many respects, the things in 70 A.D. His other writings may have been written at any other time, either before or after 70 A.D., but if they were written afterward, I would not expect them to mention, certainly would not mention the second coming of Christ as having occurred since the second coming of Christ hasn’t occurred yet. Now, we might say, well, why didn’t he mention 70 AD. Well, the Gospel of John is not recording future events or even historical events that are unrelated to the life of Jesus. He’s recording the life of Jesus. His Gospel ends with the post-resurrection appearances of Christ after his resurrection and before his ascension. That being so, there’s no occasion to mention the occurrences of 70 A.D. since his account only gets up to around 30 A.D. So even if he wrote it after 70 A.D., he’s not discussing things that happened after 30 A.D., and that’s why it wouldn’t come up in his gospel, I think. That’s how I would understand it.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah?
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay, brother. Thanks for your call. Mike from Cool, California. I live in Cool, California, but not the city of Cool. How are you doing, Mike?
SPEAKER 07 :
Oh, good. And yourself? It’s good to talk to you again. Yeah. So I have a deep theological question here for you. What’s the difference of praying to God and talking to God? I know when I pray, I want to end my prayer in the name of Jesus or in Jesus’ name. But when I talk to him, I just and primarily in gratitude of having the opportunity.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay. Well, talking to God can take many forms. It can be praise. It can be thanksgiving. It can be asking questions for him to answer to you. It can be just talking to him about whatever’s on your mind. Prayer is one specific kind of talking to God, and that is specifically… Prayer, the very meaning of the word, is to present petitions and to ask for things. So the Bible does not indicate anywhere that our offering or asking petitions of him is the full extent of our interaction with him. And I would have to say probably I talk to God more in ways that are not presenting petitions. So I certainly present plenty of those, too. When I’m presenting a petition to God or asking for something, for him to do something, that is what we call praying. Now, some people just kind of use the word prayer as a cover term, an umbrella term for any time you’re speaking in God’s direction. and therefore they would say things like, you know, prayer includes thanksgiving and praise and things like that. Well, maybe in the way they’re using the word it does. I believe in thanksgiving and praise being offered along with prayer. In fact, that’s kind of how Paul put it when he told us to pray in Philippians chapter 4. Let me see if I can find that passage here. Philippians 4, verse 6. Be anxious for nothing but in everything by prayer and supplications. Now, those are asking for thanks. With thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. Notice, you pray, you make your requests known to God with prayer and supplication. Supplication is also asking. And it says you do this with thanksgiving. In addition to praying, you also give thanks. It’s not the same thing as praying, but it certainly is appropriate. At all times, it’s always appropriate for Thanksgiving and praise to be offered. So, I mean, if you’re just in a conversational situation where you’re walking down the street and talking to God about stuff, I don’t see anything wrong with that. It’s not what I call prayer. But I don’t use the word prayer to refer to every kind of communication with God. I think there’s many different kinds of communication with God, just like there are with anyone else. I mean, sometimes you might ask somebody else to give you something. And prayer, Jesus refers to it as like a child asking for something from their father. So that’s one kind of communication. But hopefully children talk to their father even when they don’t have anything to ask for. you know, to thank them for things, to enjoy them, just enjoy their company, ask answers to questions, things like that. I mean, so conversation is not limited to asking for stuff or presenting petitions. So that’s the thing. Now, you said you know that when you pray, you’re supposed to say in Jesus’ name at the end, but what about these other times of conversation? Well, to pray in Jesus name, I’ll try to be clear about this. I don’t believe praying in Jesus name means that you attach the words in Jesus name at the end of every prayer. Now, you might. And I frankly do myself. I’ve always been raised to do it from my childhood. I hardly end a prayer without saying in Jesus name. And that’s a childhood habit. I continue and I don’t see anything wrong with it. It’s just that some people may get the impression that they can say anything they want in prayer and just say, in Jesus’ name, and that means that, in fact, they have prayed in Jesus’ name. But doing something in somebody’s name doesn’t mean that you claim to be doing something in their name. It means that you are actually acting as their agent. You’re actually doing something in their place. That’s what doing something in the name of another person refers to. You’re their agent. You’re carrying on their business. on their behalf with their authorization. That’s what doing something in someone else’s name means. It’s like having power of attorney or, you know, being given the right to manage somebody else’s funds or something. You’re acting in their name. Now, the Bible says in Colossians 317 that whatever we do in word or in deed, We should do in the name of Jesus. So it’s not just that when we ask for things, we say in the name of Jesus. Everything we do, we are to do in the name of Jesus. But that certainly doesn’t mean that everything we do should be accompanied. By our repeatedly saying, in the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus, that would get clunky and seems unnecessary. The thing is, we’re supposed to be doing things in the name of Jesus. That is, we are acting as his agents, carrying out his tasks with his full authorization to act on his part. We’re acting in his name. We’re acting with his power of attorney. We can state that as often as we’d like to, or we don’t have to state it all that often. It’s just something we have to be doing. So you could pray a very inappropriate prayer, a very selfish prayer, something that Jesus would never even approve of, and yet you can say in Jesus’ name at the end, and you can imagine that you have now prayed in his name, but in fact you weren’t acting in his name. You’re acting in your own name and claiming to be doing it in his name. On the other hand, the prayers in the Bible, especially in the New Testament, in the book of Acts and so forth, are clearly done in the name of Jesus, and yet none of them end with the phrase, in Jesus’ name. So, to say, in Jesus’ name, is not inseparably related to doing things in his name. It’s more important that we recognize I have no right to do anything except what God and Christ have authorized me to do. And it must be his business. I must be about my father’s business. And I’ve been authorized by Christ to act on his behalf for his interests. And everything we do and say should have that. So if you’re walking into the street talking to God and you don’t say in Jesus’ name, that doesn’t mean that you should. Although, I mean, you might. I suppose to say in Jesus’ name is not a way of informing God of anything because he knows if you’re doing it in Jesus’ name or not. It’s more a way of reminding yourself that you here is Christ’s agent, which should perhaps rein in the kinds of things we say and do, knowing that there are certain things that we might be inclined to say and do that would not represent his interest at all and are not the kinds of things he would say at all. But to act in someone else’s name means you are authorized by them to act as they would in their interests. And so I hope that clarifies something. So it doesn’t necessarily refer to adding the phrase in Jesus’ name to everything you do. It just means that you really do what you do as his agent and in his interest.
SPEAKER 07 :
Thank you so much. Have a great day.
SPEAKER 02 :
Thank you, Mike. Good talking to you. Greg in Nappersville, Illinois. Welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yes. Hello, Steve. Hi. So I’ve been reading a book called The Awakening about Johann Christoph Blumhart.
SPEAKER 02 :
I’ve read it. Yeah.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah. So I’m just reading that now, and it’s just amazing. And I guess one of the things I wanted to ask you about was the things where it appears that The woman, I don’t know how you pronounce it, Gottlieben.
SPEAKER 02 :
Gottlieben. Gottlieben Dittus.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah. Okay. How it appeared that there were basically people, and I think Blumar described it as kind of they had been aligned with Satan in their life, and now we’re almost… kind of possessing her like there was a woman who killed children when she was alive and and supposedly you know it was like she was one of the people that was like a demon that was or and then he he’s you know she was um bloomhart decided you know through scripture that to like talk with her And she ended up asking to, like, if she could go to his house, and he said no, or go to his church. Right. And he said, you know, if Jesus wills it. And that’s when it says, he says, anyway, she left her. So, you know, in the book talking about possibly, you know, people not necessarily going directly to maybe, like, Hades or whatever, but I guess I just wanted your thoughts on that. Yes. And what experience did you have? What’s going on there?
SPEAKER 02 :
Right. It’s a very fascinating story. Awakening is a story of a Lutheran pastor in the late 19th century, Johann Christoph Blumhart. And he didn’t ask for this, but he was thrust into a situation where one of his parishioners, a young woman named Gottlieb Inditis, was actually demon-possessed and required prayer. which he engaged in with her for two years before the demon finally left. She had many demons, actually, and they were coming out periodically over the course of two years. Now, he never went to see her alone. He always brought the mayor and a medical doctor with him to bear witness to what was going on. And after, I’m going to say, after the woman was delivered, there was other stuff. God kind of used him to pray for the sick, and people were getting well so much that the doctors in his town complained to his superiors in the church and telling him not to let him pray for the sick anymore because the doctors were going broke. And so he was asked not to pray for the sick anymore, and so he left the church. This is the story in Awakening. Let me just say, I’m going to take a break here, but I’ll come back, because I want to talk a little bit about your questions about demons and demonization and his theories about that. But I need to take a break at this point, so don’t think I’m going to ignore your point. I want to talk about it. You’re listening to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. We are listener supported. We have another half hour coming, so don’t go away. If you’d like to help us out on the radio, keep us on the air, you can write to the Narrow Path, P.O. Box 1730, Temecula, California, 92593, or go to our website, thenarrowpath.com. I’ll be back in 30 seconds. Don’t go away.
SPEAKER 01 :
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SPEAKER 02 :
Welcome back to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg, and we are live for another Half hour taking your calls. We’re in the midst of a conversation with a man, Greg, who called us from Illinois just before the break. We’re going to continue talking to him. But if you’d like to be on the program, you have questions about the Bible or the Christian faith or a disagreement with the host, feel free to call this number. 844-484-5737. That’s 844-484-5737. 484-5737. Greg, thanks for holding. We were just talking about Johann Christoph Blumhart, Lutheran pastor in Germany in the late 1800s. And by the way, his son, Friedrich Christoph Blumhart, also was… had a ministry like that because it’s as if his father’s mantle of ministry seemed to have fallen upon him when his father died. And the son also had a healing ministry. Now, these were not in the Pentecostal movement. These guys were Lutherans. They were not what we call charismatics. They were simply, in the case of the father especially, he was just minding his own business as the pastor of a small parish church. in a little town, and he got thrust into this conflict with Satan, where he was dealing with a woman who had multiple demons in her. And as I said, everything that he did, he took a doctor and the mayor of the town with him, so that there were plenty of witnesses to what happened. And among the things that happened were crazy things that demons did that are reminiscent of, but In many cases, scarier than the things that you see in the movie The Exorcist. I mean, the movie The Exorcist was based on a true story, too, with some Hollywood embellishments. But this story of Blumhart, the demons through this woman did things terrifying. far worse than what happened in The Exorcist. And it’s one of the most remarkable cases of demon possession that I’ve read about. And I’ve read about hundreds, maybe not hundreds, scores at least, maybe hundreds. And it’s just a remarkable case. And there’s another book besides the one you mentioned. Awakening is the one you mentioned. But the book I first saw was called Blumhart’s Battle, A Conflict with Satan. And it’s strictly his own writings. in how he gave account of this whole story to his superiors in the Lutheran denomination. And because they called him to give account for what had gone on, it was so remarkable and crazy. Anyway, so his own account in detail of these things actually includes a lot more than the book Awakening does. Because there were things that were so bizarre that I think the book Awakening left them out either to avoid terrifying the readers… or to avoid stretching their credulity, that modern readers might not believe these things happened. But Blumhart himself, who was not at all a boastful man, he was a very humble pastor, gave a very measured and unemotional description of everything that happened along the way in the whole story in a book called Blumhart’s Battle. Now, you asked about the demons. The demons that spoke out of this girl gave various stories. Some of them claimed to be persons who had lived in that town and even been in that church before he had come there, and who are now dead. One was a woman who had killed her baby, and she was often seen as an apparition standing, holding her baby. You know, Gakleben Dittus, the girl who was possessed, would see these apparitions. And I’m not really sure if Blumhart saw them or not, but she… But the things that happened were very strange. Now, I liked his book because it’s an amazing and credible historical account of things that happened. I do not necessarily feel obligated to buy all of his interpretations of things, because obviously he’s thrust into a situation where he’s confronted with the paranormal. And he’s trying to give his own interpretation, understanding of these things. The demons did make claims to being the spirits of people who had lived and died. And Blumhart took this apparently at face value, and therefore he believed that demons, at least in some cases, that some demons are the human spirits of people who had bound themselves over to Satan during their lifetime. and then after death were forced to serve Satan, and that’s what these demons seem to be saying, and that is what Blumhart took at face value, and he didn’t have any knowledge otherwise, so he kind of just talks as if that’s the case. And I have to say, I can’t say for sure that it isn’t the case, because the Bible tells us very little about the demonic realm. What it does tell us is that people are sometimes demon-possessed and that they can be delivered from this condition in the name of Jesus, by the power of Christ. And his story proved that to be true. But they weren’t delivered instantly. This took two years. At the end, and this whole endeavor in this small town was publicly viewed. There were times when the whole town was around the girl’s house looking in through the windows as these manifestations were happening. But finally, after two years in the middle of the night, the whole town was awakened by a loud voice saying, Jesus is victor. And it is assumed that that is the voice of the demons. After that, the woman was delivered, and she was free long term. Everything that had been crazy and supernatural going on in her life just ceased to happen at that point. The last demon was gone. And in the book, Blumhart’s Battle, he even writes an epilogue saying, six years later, he and his wife have employed this group. Gottlieb and Dittus, as a nanny for their children, and that she’d been perfectly a wonderful nanny and totally normal, even though she’d been like a crazy, psychotic person when she was demonized. So he had total confidence in her deliverance and saw evidence of it all the way up until six years later where he wrote that. Anyway, is it the case then that demons are the spirits of evil people who have bound themselves over to Satan? And therefore, when they die, they’re not free to go anywhere except to serve him in this world and to clear out his missions. I would not affirm it. I have always been taught that. from my childhood in Christianity that demons are fallen angels. Now, some of them might be. I don’t know. But the Bible never tells us that demons are fallen angels. What the Bible does tell us is that some angels have indeed fallen. And there are such things as demons. There’s no place in the Bible where the fallen angels are equated with the demons, are identified with them. I have always, you know, and I think many Christians have, assumed that these demons are the same as the fallen angels, but the Bible does not affirm this in any passage. So it is possible, but it’s not indisputed. Now, is it possible that some demons are, in fact, the spirits of departed souls? Maybe. I don’t know. I don’t know of anything in the Bible that forbids it. And, you know, people are going to say they’re searching their minds. I’m sure many people listening are searching their minds for the scriptures that would prove something other than this. And trust me, I’ve done that. I mean, you don’t have to trust me. Feel free to do it yourself. But I’ve done that, and I’m not aware of any passage that would entirely rule that out. So, you know, Blumhart may have been right to take these reports at face value, or he may have been deceived by the demons. It’s not impossible for a Christian to be deceived. Demons are often liars. Although, frankly, everything they said on record in the New Testament, like in the stories of Jesus facing demon-possessed people, or in the book of Acts, where the apostles faced demon-possessed people, it would appear that virtually everything that the demons themselves spoke out of people were true. For example, when Jesus confronted demons, they cried out, we know who you are, you’re the Holy One of God. Well, that was true. He was. It didn’t make him more eager for them to be witnesses to it, though. There is such a thing. If you’re a speaker in public and some wacko speaks up in agreement with you, That’s what we might call an embarrassing supporter. But, you know, I would say demons might be seen as embarrassing supporters of Jesus’ claim to being the Son of God because he is, and they knew it too, and they would speak it out. In fact, they might have done it in order to embarrass him. It’s hard to know. Likewise, in the book of Acts, in Acts 16, in Philippi, a demon-possessed woman is following Paul around saying, these men are teaching the way of salvation. Well, that doesn’t sound like a bad message. That’s true. They were. But again, Paul was annoyed by this and told the demons to be silent and come out, and they did. So, in other words, the Bible does not indicate that every time a demon speaks, it’s lying. In fact, the Bible does talk about deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons, which certainly would be lies. But in the cases we know of, where demons spoke out of people, we don’t know of a case where they lied. So… You know, I don’t know that it was wrong for Blumhart to take at face value something the demons said about themselves, which did not contradict Scripture, though I would withhold judgment. That is, I would not affirm that what demons said was true because you can’t trust them. Anyway, it’s an interesting predicament. Fortunately, whether he believed correctly about them or not, he did believe correctly about Christ and his victory and was able to defeat them. Thank you, Greg. I thought you were still there. All right, let’s talk next to Thomas from Keller, Texas. Thomas, welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.
SPEAKER 08 :
Howdy. Can you hear me all right?
SPEAKER 02 :
Yes, sir.
SPEAKER 08 :
All righty. I had a question in regard to salvation. I’m going to be one of your shallower thinkers here, so help me out as you hear what I have to share with you. All right. In growing up in a very abusive household with three brothers and a father who was very militaristic, or at least he used a lot of the military tactics that you would in a boot camp, if you will. And I remember this from four or five years old all the way up to 13 when my mom’s dad split. So it was very performance-oriented. Everything was performance, and we never passed. It was unattainable. Never passed mustard, yeah. Yeah, and I think that’s why I was very drawn to some of the podcasts of ex-special ops guys. They push them so hard that they either break or they make it usually most of the time they break. Well, God did not let me break with a soft, tender heart. I wanted to. I even prayed for that when I moved away from the farm. God, give me a hard heart because I’m not going to measure up on the streets. I’m just a clodhopper. I’ve got a very tender heart, and I’m not going to make it. Early on, the first item I used to escape the fear and the angst and the terror, if you will, was pornography. I got hold of it when I was about 11, and then went on to dope and booze and whatever else. But that was one thing that did not leave easily and still tempted with it today. And I hear other Christians say, well, yeah, you know, if their standard is, and I want to hear what your standard is, you know, if you’re not struggling with this all the time, well, then you know you’re saved. Well, you know what, Steve, I hear from God. I hear his voice. I know when he’s directing me. Sometimes I think that he uses extreme pain because that’s pretty much what I understand. And I’m not saying he’s punishing me. I usually punish myself, and then I get myself in a pickle, and then I’m crying out to God, and he shows up. You know, he eventually does. And I sometimes think I’ve kind of walked myself into that unnecessary behavior.
SPEAKER 02 :
So could you tell me what your specific question would be?
SPEAKER 08 :
I apologize, yeah. That’s all right. Just the salvation that bothers me every time I hear somebody say, and, you know, even Paul said in Romans, You know, I’m the chief sinner, but yet in other portions of it, I’ve overcome. That, to me, is very frustrating. And then I hear it kind of mimicked in the world today, so it kind of messes me up. I want to hear what your thoughts are on that.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay, sure. Well, it sounds like you, before you were a Christian, were in many bondages, you said, to alcohol and many other things, including pornography. I mean, I don’t know you, but it sounds from your testimony that you were delivered from all of them with the possible exception of pornography, which means that’s the one vice that you still are battling. Well, I have to say that almost every Christian is battling with temptation. I personally think every Christian battles with temptation, though I do think that you maybe reach a point in your Christian life where most temptations are not very strong anymore because you’ve I don’t know, defeated them or you’re just stronger. You have less interest in worldly things. I’m not sure. I have to say that, you know, I had as many temptations as anyone in my life growing up. I feel fortunate that there’s not very many of them that assail me quite the same degree anymore. But I’m an old man. And maybe that’s what you can look forward to when you’re really an old man. Maybe you’re already an old man. I don’t know. But that these temptations are diminished. In any case, what marks you out as saved or unsaved is where your loyalty is. Is your loyalty to Christ and your determination to obey him and serve him and defeat sin and to live a holy life? or is your loyalty to yourself and your flesh and your sins? Now, it seems to me, though I can’t speak for you, that your loyalty is to Christ. I mean, sure, you fall into sin, which is tragic and not good, but about average for most people. The point is, falling into sin is not the same thing as being loyal to your flesh and your sin. You may be hating your sin. And that’s what Paul talks about in Romans 7. It’s also what Paul talks about in Galatians chapter 5 and verse 17 when he talks about the flesh lusting against the spirit, the spirit against the flesh, so that you don’t do what you want to do. Paul indicates that when you become a true Christian, you have been enlisted in a spiritual warfare. And part of that warfare is against the devil’s strongholds. that are in your own life, as well as being used by God to reach out and knock down some of the devil’s strongholds that are in society and the world at large. So, I mean, there’s the defensive warfare and the offensive warfare, but we’re involved in both. And the fact that there is a war means that there’s still a vital enemy that is opposing us. In your case, it sounds like it’s going to be pornography, which is a terrible tyrant in the lives of very many people. And one of the problems with it, of course, is that your own sexual biological drives are going to be with you until you’re probably too old to know about them, to feel them anymore. And those biological drives, you can be in bondage to them, or you can overcome them. But they continue to assail. Even if you succeed in saying no to the temptation, it’s probably going to come back again sometime. And yet this is the nature of the battle, that you’re fighting it, is the indication that you don’t love it, that you don’t want it, that you’re not loyal to it. You’re loyal to Christ. If you weren’t loyal to Christ, then some other thing would have to explain why you’re trying to fight against pornography or why you wish it wasn’t there, why you wish you could defeat it. I mean, now, there might be people who aren’t loyal to Christ and they’d like to give up pornography because it’s destroying their marriage or something. But I think the main reason that anyone, especially one who calls himself a Christian, would try to fight off the temptation of pornography is because he wants to be holy. He wants to not sin. He wants to please God. That is what identifies you as one whose heart is for God because your heart is disgusted. with other behavior. Now, this does not mean that, you know, because your heart is right, it all is well, and that it doesn’t matter if you fall to pornography or not. No, it still does the same damage, even if you’ve got a good heart about it, even if God recognized you as his child and as one of his soldiers in the battle against sin and so forth. He’s on your side, but that doesn’t mean it’s okay to do it. You still want to defeat it because… Well, for one thing, God hates it. For another thing, it’s a terrible taskmaster. And so I don’t know all the things that are going on in your life that could be, let’s say, changed in order to give you better victory in that area. What I can say is what you’ve told me indicates to me, at least, that you really are devoted to Christ and trying to defeat sin in your life for his sake. And that’s a positive. Now, there are, I don’t know, I’m sure there’s ministries. In fact, I keep seeing ads popping up on my phone for men. I don’t know if it’s a seminar or something, you know, for men to defeat pornography. I’m sure it’s a big problem that many people are trying to wrestle with. And, you know, I don’t know what these people offer. A long time ago, there was a book that came out. Called Every Man’s Battle, which I think was largely about this. You might find it still in print and maybe it’s helpful. But, you know, I I’ve never been a user of pornography. I’ve never I just never got hooked on it or never used it. So I don’t know. You know, I can’t say, well, here’s how I beat it. because it wasn’t my demon. I’ve had other problems, but not that one. So, I would suggest maybe you go online and look for Christian resources to help men with that. In general, though, of course, the answer is to walk in the Spirit, and you will not fulfill the lust of the flesh. That’s what Paul said in Galatians 5.16. Walking in the Spirit, then, is the challenge. You know, how do you walk in the Spirit? Well, that’s That’s a multifaceted thing that has to do with leaning on, trusting in, obeying, being sensitive to the conviction of the spirit. And so it’s really the whole Christian life is walking in the spirit, which makes it hard to just boil it down to one or two things. But in terms of getting the spiritual victory over that particular problem, There are ministries and books and such that address it directly. And I would just say, search those out and avail yourself of them and see if they provide any help. In the meantime, don’t feel that you’re condemned simply because this thing keeps assailing you. If it wasn’t that, something else would be. Every Christian has something that assails them. It’s just that pornography is a particularly disgusting thing. But there are other disgusting things, too. So… My heart is with you. I can imagine what it would be like to be trying to beat such a thing and not be able to feel like you can do it. But, yeah, just I would say go in peace and fight in peace with God, but at war with sin and continue fighting that battle, brother. I appreciate your call. Thank you. Yeah. OK, let’s talk to Shirley from Bellingham, Washington. Shirley, welcome to The Narrow Path.
SPEAKER 03 :
Hello, Steve. Can you hear me?
SPEAKER 02 :
Yes.
SPEAKER 03 :
Thank you for taking my call. I’ve been studying the question of when is the day of salvation and also the pouring out of the Holy Spirit. I have two questions regarding Isaiah 44, verses 3 and verse 5. First question, in the second half of verse 3, It says, quote, I will pour out my spirit upon your seed and my blessing upon your offspring. Can I assume the words seed and offspring are referring to both Jews and Gentiles who would be converted during the church age? And the second question, could you please explain the meaning of verse 5?
SPEAKER 02 :
All right. Yeah, what he’s talking about there, of course, is the promise that occurs many times in Isaiah and in several other prophets of the outpouring of the Spirit, which we know from what Peter said in Acts chapter 2, was fulfilled at the day of Pentecost. And so this is talking about, of course, the messianic era when Jesus would come and pour out his Spirit on the remnant. Now, when you say, is this on Jews and Gentiles also? Well, yes. I mean, Jacob or Israel refers to, of course, the people of God who always included some who were Gentiles. From the very first day that Israel was declared a nation, which was in Exodus 19, there were Gentiles among them. And the law of God always allowed that Gentiles could become part of that simply by being circumcised and becoming what we call proselytes. So there never was really a time when Gentiles were excluded from this. We know, of course, from subsequent history that eventually when the Gentiles started coming into the body of Christ through the New Covenant, their numbers became so great that they eventually outnumbered even the Jews. But it was still the same phenomenon. It was the faithful remnant of the Jews that this was referring to. God poured out his spirit on Pentecost on the faithful remnant of the Jews gathered there. And that entity began to call itself the church early on in the book of Acts. That group of the remnant of Israel is referred to as the church. And then, of course, the book of Acts tells how A little later, Gentiles began to come in, and then they came in in great numbers. So, yeah, it does include Jews and Gentiles as his seed. Now, you mentioned verse 5. One will say, I am the Lord’s. Another will call himself by the name of Jacob. Another will write with his hand the Lord’s and name himself by the name of Israel. This, I believe, is simply referring to the fact that people will identify themselves as part of God’s people, Jacob or Israel, and belonging to the Lord. This is poetry, of course. And poetry often is written in a way different than you’d write prose. And there’s repetition here, which is the main feature of poetry. But it’s kind of strange to our ears. One will say, I am the Lord’s. Another will call himself by the name of Jacob. Another will write with his hand, the Lord’s, and name himself the name of Israel. The first half and the second half are parallels. What it’s saying is the people who are converted during the Messianic era, which includes you and me, We’ll identify as God’s people. We will say we belong to the Lord. That’s what being a Christian means. The Lord is Christ, and Christian means belonging to Christ or a follower of Christ. And so that’s us. But we are also Jacob or Israel, it says, which is, of course, biblically true also, because we have joined the remnant of Israel in believing in the Messiah and becoming one body with them in Christ. So we are Israel with them, as Ephesians chapter 2, verse 12 through who knows where, 15 or more, would suggest. I’m out of time, sorry to say. You’re listening to The Narrow Path. Our website is thenarrowpath.com. Thanks for joining us.
