The Supernatural Worldview of the Bible II

As Pastor Stephanie said, we're going to continue our look into the supernatural worldview of the Bible. And before we start, I thought I'd open with a little, little story. It's not going to match in depth the topiary story of this weekend, which was like, right, so I'm going for stupid. So because I don't have depth, we're just going to try to make it happen. Anyways, here we go.

My husband Michael, who is right there, is totally a creature of habit. And there are certain things that he does the same way all the time. And one of the habits that he has is every Sunday after church, we go home and he makes himself a bowl of oatmeal. This isn't just any oatmeal. This is not peel the, you know, rip the bag off and put hot water in oatmeal.

This is a proprietary recipe oatmeal. I'd be glad to make him oatmeal, but he doesn't trust me with this oatmeal. Sacred Sunday oatmeal. So as is our practice, we go home, and those of you have been to my home, you know that we have a counter that is like pub height, right? And so every Sunday, I'm at the pub height counter.

And then down here, he is preparing his oatmeal. So I kind of looking over as he's preparing his oatmeal, this oatmeal has the following ingredients in it. Bananas, dates, walnuts, peanut butter, and a healthy dose of cinnamon. I'm not going to. I'm telling you, when he's done with that oatmeal, it is yummy.

I wish I could eat that oatmeal. And you might say, why don't you eat that oatmeal? Because basically all those different ingredients are pretty healthy, but they're about 800 to a thousand calories worth of healthy. And I can't. I don't have that luxury.

So a couple weeks ago, we're home and we're assuming the position. He's making his oatmeal and he's putting all his stuff in there, and I am cutting up a chicken breast, and I'm not happy because I'm cutting up a chicken breast and I'm looking over at his oatmeal, and I feel I deserve to be happy. And.

And I thought, you know what would make me happy? If I cut up some of my chicken breast in tiny little pieces and I sprinkled it in his oatmeal. And I watched what happened when he ate it. I think that would be a funny joke. So while he's just having his oatmeal and I cut my chicken up, he's has no clue what's going on.

And when he turned around to go stir the pot, where he's along cook oatmeal, I got the chicken, I went and I put it in his oatmeal. And I'm thinking he's never going to notice because the chicken looks like the bananas, you know, or the walnuts. It looks like he'll never notice the chicken. And indeed he did not. So he gets the oatmeal, he puts it in his bowl and is also his custom.

Every Sunday after church, he takes his oatmeal, he gets a little TV tray, he sits in his recliner, and he watches Sports center, and he catches up on all of Saturday's football games. He doesn't do that before church because that is sanctified time and he does not want to defile himself, but he will defile himself after church and watch it. So he's mixing up his oatmeal and he puts the milk and the sweetener, whatever he puts in there. And I'm just cutting my chicken, and he goes and sits down and he puts the thing in. So I make my way into the living room and I sit down and I'm looking at my phone and I'm watching him like this.

He takes a couple bites, no big deal. All of a sudden, he gets a bite. He goes like this, Swells. It takes another couple bites and he gets another bite that's just a bit off, you know, he's like, Well, finally, in about, you know, six or seven bites, he gets a bite that is a lot of chicken. And he puts it in his mouth.

And no sooner does he put it in his mouth than he spits it back out into his spoon. I said, oh, Michael. I said, what's wrong? He said, janet, you know what? Those walnuts in the cupboard went bad.

I said, really? What makes you say that? They taste like turkey.

I said, turkey, you say? Then the light went off on and he said, what did you do? I put chicken in your oatmeal. And surely there is a precedence for that because last Easter I cut up jelly beans and put it in there. So this is something I'm used myself with.

If he ever dies by poison oatmeal, I will be a Dateline episode, I have no doubt. What was funny is once he found out it was just chicken, he ate it and he finished the Whole bowl? Yes. That's my man. You know, what is the moral of this escapade?

Huh? Well, one. I'm a bad wife. That is so wicked.

Chicken is good. Yeah, oatmeal is good. But when they are combined, it is odd and unpleasant. Weird. Well, what does chicken and oatmeal have to do with the supernatural worldview of the Bible?

Well, the reality of it is that God has created a supernatural world and supernatural beings who inhabit that world. And he created earthly. He created the earth and terrestrial beings, earth beings who live on the earth. And it is all good. But there are boundaries and there are laws that have to be respected in these various spheres, in the supernatural realm and.

And in the natural realm. And when those boundaries are transgressed, the chicken gets in the oatmeal. And it is not just unpleasant and it really is not funny. It is dangerous and it is destructive. And we see a prime example of that kind of transgression of boundaries, right in the account of the Fall in Genesis chapter three.

Right? Humanity and the earth were both corrupted when the serpent, who we've come to understand as Satan, transgressed a boundary and tempted Eve to rebel and disobey God. And we see that humanity transgressed a boundary when Eve reached out and took that fruit in rebellion to what God had told her to do. The destruction as a result of those transgressions of the laws of those world and laws of those worlds and the boundaries, it cannot be understated, right? We live in the result of that kind of transgression.

Death, decay and corruption, they def the world.

And we're not. We know, we're familiar with that one, that transgression. But tonight we're going to begin to unpack another, but lesser discussed transgression of boundaries between the supernatural world and the natural worlds. And that is when the sons of God produced offspring with the daughters of men. I don't know what your background is, but I think that the traditional and conventional Christian understanding that that incident was a one and done, right?

It happened. The flood came. Boom, it's over. But there are scholarly voices who have unpacked this event in ways I never heard. It challenged me.

And I'm going to challenge you tonight with it. And we're going to see. Are you ready? Fasten your seat belts for this. We're going to see how that account in Genesis 6 connects with the origin of demons.

I'll need a couple sessions to do that because I don't want to rush through this. No need to rush through It. So we'll have a session tonight and then I think I've got another one scheduled in a couple weeks. Let me take some time and do a recap of the first session. And the lights went off.

It was beautiful. Slide number one, maestro, if you please.

Last week I let you know that the content of what I'm going to teach, much of it is found in the work of Dr. Michael Heiser. Dr. Heiser released a book in 2015, the Unseen Realm, Recovering the supernatural worldview of the Bible. What he began to uncover and really introduce into the evangelical world was not new information. It was old information that had just kind of been forgotten and neglected. We discussed it was like buried treasure, right?

It was laying in the Bible this whole time. It's just nobody's. Nobody saw it, right? And, you know, I just spent some time just letting you know he's not a kook. He's a respected scholar and his work is respected by people we respect, right?

So he's worth listening to. But I do want to also say that no theologian or scholar or apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, teacher, denomination or group thereof has a complete and correct interpretation of Scripture. I think that's just the height of hubris to think that one group has it all. I mean, we're humans after all, and we're trying to delve into the mind of God in words. And so I think a lot of doctors Heiser's work is really, really good.

But, you know, you need to think about everything that said. Also in our world, there are Christian world, there are people that love Jesus the same. They have like faith have, they're smartified the same, right? They have the same level of education and degrees who fall on different spectrums of what a particular doctrine is, right? For example, free will versus predestination.

How about the timing of the rapture? How about the fall of Satan? How about the origin of demons, right? And so you have to respect another person who is worthy of respect their differences with you. And, and I think in.

To kind of illustrate this whole principle when we talk about Martin Luther, right, The great theologian. I think Scott Volk mentioned him a couple Wednesdays ago. So his. He was a Catholic monk, right? His tradition was forgiveness of sin came through the paying of indulgences.

That was. That's as. That was centuries old. This is what my church believes. And one day he's reading, you know, prob.

The book of Ephesians and he's like, holy smoke. That's not what the Bible says. The Bible says we are Saved by grace through faith and not of works, lest anyone should boast. And so here he was going against all that he believed. And out of that came the Protestant Reformation.

On the other side, how we interpret the Scriptures, about how we should view the Jews, not so much. Right. I mean, if he. I don't know that I'd go so far as call him anti Semitic, but he was. He was buttoned right up to it.

So. So, you see? So he was so right here, but maybe not so right there. And so we just have to test, you know, test everything.

I try to keep an open mind. If there's somebody that I respect and they disagree with how I look at. I mean, all these issues that I mentioned, free will versus predestination, the predestination, the timing of the Rapture, I have an opinion on it. But I am particularly interested in listening to somebody that looks differently at it. Because I might be wrong.

God forbid, why do I want to stay wrong? I want to be open to change. I don't want to believe something just because that's what I've always believed. Hmm. So for me, I just encourage you, try to avoid looking at the Scriptures to confirm what you believe, but rather to inform what you believe.

And, you know, those of us that have had ministry training, you know that when you look at the Word of God to confirm what you believe, that's called proof testing, proof texting. And you can make a scripture say just about anything you want it to say. That's how that. That's how cults are born, Right? But there's a way in humility, that you go to the Word and you say, every morning when I read my Word, I'm like, father, open my eyes to your word.

Teach me. Let me look at this like it's the first time I'm ever seeing your Word. I mean, it's like a child and saying, I don't know. You teach me. And I'm telling you, God will let you know what you need to know.

So we talked a little bit about that. This is an important principle, too, that number two, that the Scriptures on certain topics in the Word of God are more like jigsaw puzzle pieces. They are not the book of Romans. They are not a systematic theology. We used as an example the Scriptures that pointed to who the Messiah would be.

You had to look in Micah, and you had to look in Isaiah, and you had to look in Genesis. And so it wasn't until all those various scriptures and those puzzle pieces were put in place that. That the Image of Jesus Christ of Nazareth emerged. And I will tell you that when it comes to the supernatural world, it's very similar to that. There's no Roman numeral 1, et cetera, et cetera, letter A.

It is a mosaic of pieces that you're pulling from here and from there. And I don't think we have all the pieces. I think there's timing with what God highlights in the body of Christ and the knowledge that he highlights. But we're going to put some pieces in tonight. And you know what?

That's a win. We also looked at the usage of the Hebrew word Elohim.

The Hebrew word Elohim is translated as God singular or God's plural. There is only one Elohim Yahweh. There is only one God Almighty. But in the Hebrew language, as the word Elohim is used, it is also used to mean a spiritual being, a celestial being, a disembodied spirit, a false God. And that's helpful when we're reading through the Old Testament to know what indeed was the writer talking about.

We can't assume anything. And usually we know from the context what kind of Elohim. By far, most of the time it's referring to God Almighty, but sometimes it's not. And in those verses where it's not, it is so interesting what comes across. There are good guys and bad guys in the world of Elohim.

There are good celestial beings and there are bad celestial beings. And finally we talked, introduced to you the divine council that God convenes spiritual assemblies for particular purposes. We saw that in the book of Job. We saw that when God convened the group to see what they would do to get rid of Ahab. He wanted to get rid of Ahab and he had his host around him.

And they said, what are we going to do to get rid of this guy? And the one said, hey, I'll be a lying spirit in the mouth of his prophets. And God said, ooh, that's going to work. Go do it. And so just as Jesus had a group around him that through whom he executed his will and his business, God has a group around him, his celestial family.

These are not automatons. They are celestial beings that he created that he also refers to as his. His children and the sons of God. They have free will just the way, just as we do. And some have exercised that free will to rebel against God as.

As we have also done. So that is the. The review of last week. And I think, you know, that's. You're at a Good place to.

If you weren't here last week, I think you're in a good place to go on. Slide number 2. Genesis 6:1 through 4. The account of the rebellion of the sons of God. Yeah, thank you for getting the color in there.

That's super. Verse 1. And in the brackets, I have the Hebrew words that we talked about. Adam, from which we get Adam and coming from the earth. Right.

And the Elohim, when man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, the sons of God. Right. The Ben Elohim saw that the daughters of man were attractive. Now, who were the sons of God and the daughters of. Of men?

There are learned. There are men of letters who feel that the sons of God and the daughters of men represent the lineage of Seth and the lineage of Cain. The lineage of Seth is the godly line, the sons of God and the lineage of Cain is the ungodly line, the daughters of men. You know, I have to tell you, it doesn't really make sense. Sense either in language or in context.

And I think sometimes, you know, sometimes we want to force something. If you're trying to remove the supernaturalness out of the body or out of the Bible, this is a good scripture to start and say, no, that. That this has to be talking about earthlings and earthlings. But it's unlikely from the. The text.

Certainly Adam is a terrestrial. Right. Adam, man. Adam is being contrasted with Elohim. That's pretty clear.

And the notion of an Elohim being called the sons of God, we saw that in Job, you know, last week. It means angels, basically. And if these sons of God are not supernatural, why is there chaos on the earth after their offspring are born? And why are their offspring born with supernatural powers?

None of that makes sense in context. And I'd be willing to hear more argument about the other. But the way you see, we end up today, where we end up today, you're going to find us probably difficult not to think it was the sons. It was angels and human women. I use angels lightly because that's.

But you know what I'm saying. I want to talk about the word toph. That they saw that the women were attractive in the Greek, that is the B. And I mean in Hebrew. The B in Hebrew is pronounced like a v. So that's tov.

And I. I like to look at the, you know, Hebrew. I had just, you know, say you have just enough education in Hebrew to make me dangerous. Right. And so. And I noticed that where that Hebrew word Is used.

It's most of the time translated as good. In the creation narrative, when God said, and it is good, he said, and it is toph. In terms of a part of speech, when you're referring to something plural, as you are in this sentence, it means good things. And I want to suggest to you that when these celestial beings saw the daughters of men that they were attractive, it wasn't as a man looks at a woman, and it's like, oh, hubba, hubba. I don't think so.

These are celestial beings. What they looked at is that they saw that these women. Women were. These women were good things. These women had a super power.

These women could produce offspring. Celestial beings cannot produce offspring. And these beings. And what is the consistent theme of those who oppose God? And we see that in the section in Ezekiel, this section in Isaiah, I will rise my throne.

I will be like God. These rebellious beings want to have their own deal apart from God. And I think it's. And these are just my thoughts. So I didn't read this in a commentary, so I have zero confidence in it, but I feel kind of good about it.

They were looking at this woman and saying, you know, we're going to do our own thing. We're going to exalt ourselves. We're going to make a family apart from God. We're gonna do what God does. And these women, they're good.

They can help us do what we need to do to break off from God and create our own race. And in creating our own race, we can't pollute it. And we can thwart both the promise in Genesis 3 and the curse in Genesis 3. So there was an agenda here before, beyond, you know. Right.

Don't think that's what that was. And they took as wives any as they chose. And some translations have this, and I think I like this. Or as many as they wanted. These celestials from the text.

Looks like they didn't take these women by force and forced themselves on them. They married these women in order to make their own unique family. We will make a family. They took many wives and they produced many offspring. Slide 3, please.

Then the Lord said, my spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh. His days shall be 120 years. And there is, you know, differences of opinion here. Will man live to 120 or will there be 120 years before the flood? You know, I'm not interested in that right now.

I think it's before the flood, but that's just me. The Nephilim Okay, Nephil is Hebrew for giant. And we talked about the last time, how do we make plural in Hebrew? We add an I am. So the Nephilim is just plural.

Giants. The Nephilim were on the earth in those days and afterward when the sons of God came into the daughters of man and they bore children to them, these were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown. Now this is very, very important as we move forward. The Nephilim are not the celestials who transgressed and mated with the women. The Nephilim are the offspring.

These giants are the offspring. They are the half human, half celestial offspring, offspring of the sons of God and the daughters of men. We see their lineage as we go through the Old Testament, called by other names the Rephaim, the Anakim, my favorite, the Zamzumim, just because that's fun to say. And so all these Eames, there are giant lineages, right? Giant groups of people.

Goliath was of one of those families of these giants. King Ogabashon in Second Kings, right? He had a bed that was 13ft long. So if you're thinking about that's a big, that's one big dude. What football team wouldn't want him?

Bottom line, it was an unnatural sexual union. And so let's just deal with the elephant in the room. How did that mating occur? There are, I mean, a number of biblical examples where celestials take on corporeal form, take on a human form. The gentleman that came, gentlemen that came to visit Abraham and then went down to Sodom and get lot, Jacob wrestled with the angel of the Lord.

And so for me, I don't think it's that far of a stretch to say they could take these forms and procreate. It was chicken and oatmeal and it was not good. Slide number four, please.

The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Now verse 5 follows verses 1 through 4. Dost thou think there might be a connection between the proliferation of evil and the introducing of this unholy mixture into humanity? Let me answer that question for you. Yeah, I think so, yeah.

And we're going to go into a little bit more of this next week. Celestials know things we don't know.

And when they reveal things to us that we shouldn't know, it's very much like corrupting a four year old. You know, there's something destructive about it. It's what happened with Eve. And so they they. There is a.

There is. There is knowledge and things about. I'll say that it's corrupting. It corrupted the human race by exposing them to things that they should not have known. Verse 6.

And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart.

You know, have you ever had a child be so far from you that it grieved you to your heart? I will tell you that you're in good company and that the Lord has compassion on that and give yourself a break. I don't know what did. What did Yahweh do that made him a bad dad and that he's got a bunch of kids that just go their own way. So, you know, allow him to love on you in that moment and don't take that burden on you.

You know, The Lord knows. He knows it grieved him to his heart. That's pain. He knows how you feel. Verse 7.

So the Lord said, I will blot out man whom I've created from the face of the land. Man and animals, creeping things and birds of the heaven, for I am sorry that I made him. That's a whole theological ball of wax right now. How could God be sorry? Didn't you know this was going to happen and you shouldn't have done it?

And I can't go there. That's something for you, Marcelo, you think on those levels, I'm like, I don't know what that means.

Just exegete. Verse 8. But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. And so we know what happens after that. The Lord tells Noah, I'm going to make it rain.

What's rain? You'll find out. So Noah builds that ark, the animals are collected and it starts to rain. Verse 5, Genesis 7. 17, 22, 24.

The flood continued for 40 days on the earth. The waters increased and bore up the ark, and it rose high above the earth. Everything on the dry land in whose nostrils was the breath of life died. He blotted out every living thing that was on the face of the ground. Man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens.

They were blotted out from the earth. Only Noah was left and those who were with him in the ark. And the waters prevailed on the Earth 150 days. Now, what does all this have to do with the origin of demons, you ask? That's why I'm here.

New Testament demons. Right? Demons that are here right now. At this point, it's relevant to introduce you to the Dr. Heiser material because he uncovers the literary link between the origin of demons, the Nephilim and the flood. And here's.

We're going to lay some foundation for you. And, you know, it's okay if, if we have points of disagreement. I love when ideas bounce and bounce against each other. And people of good, good faith, let's. Let's sit together and reason and wrangle, you know, and consider these things.

It's all good. We're talking about the word, right? All right, slide six, please. The most coherent explanation of the origin of demons is contained in the ancient Jewish writings found with the Dead Sea Scrolls in the caves at Qumran in Israel. And these three were found in 1948.

Qumran. If. If you've. If you've been to Jerusalem, you kind of go dead east. And it's like right on the Dead Sea, on the north end of the Dead Sea.

And I cannot remember, did we go there when we were in Israel? You have. I have no recollection of Israel. I will. When I tell another story.

I'll get. Have another funny story. Mike and I, we made one other girl. Oh, God, I can't think of Dave and Heather. I couldn't remember that.

We were at Caesarea Philippi and she. I was teaching about it and she, she said, I can't believe you didn't say, you know, when we were there, when we were in Israel. I said, we were there when we were in Israel. She goes, yeah. I said, no, I don't.

She thought she was crazy, but she wasn't. She was right. Anyways, I'm sorry you guys didn't get to go, but I know you will get to go. And it's once, you know, some of these things, these places will really come alive for you. Hey, by the way, they were founded in 1948.

Anything else happen in 1948? Yes. Israel became a nation. These scrolls were preserved by a Jewish religious sect called the Essenes. The Essenes did their thing between the 2nd century BC and the 1st century AD.

They preserved and hid copies of the Hebrew Bible, also called the Old Testament and other Hebrew writings. This time period is not the only time period of the Roman occupation, but the Roman occupation would have been a part of that. They would have been alive during the Roman occupation, and it would also overlap the ministry of Jesus. So the Essenes were alive the same time as Jesus when Rome was occupying Israel, along with the scrolls of the Hebrew Bible, there were scrolls attributed to the writings of Enoch. Who is Enoch?

Well, he's in the Bible. He's a Bible guy. I actually have him as a student in my class. I just really thought, yes, we have an Enoch. That is so cool.

I'm just going to so bust him the next time I see him. About this story.

Enoch was a descendant of Seth, the good line as he came down from Adam. And he actually was the great grandfather of the boat guy, Noah. Slide 7. Here's what the Bible says about Enoch. In Genesis 5:24, Enoch walked faithfully with God.

Then he was no more because God took him away. Enoch, like Elijah, did not experience a physical death. He was just translated from his earth suit directly into heaven. He had an extremely close walk with the Lord. And I suspect that is the way you are going to go, my husband, because while I'm in bed some morning, this is what I envisioned.

I'm still in bed some morning, you're down there reading your Bible and praying, and I'm going to hear whoosh.

I'm going to come downstairs, chair's going to be empty. I'm going to have to make my own coffee. It's going to be a bad day. Good day for you. Bad day for me.

So you can get me a ticket for that. All right. So, hey, let me tell you about Tertullian, because I know he comes up so much. Tertullian was a church father, like it matters. But like 155 AD and in his writings, he wrote that Enoch wrote books and that Enoch's books were preserved with Noah when Noah went into the ark, because he was a great grandfather of Noah.

And the interesting thing that Tertullian says is that the apostles were very influenced by the book of Enoch. Now, if you're like me, I'm really skeptical of stuff like that. And so. But we don't have to take his word for it. Slide 8.

Because both Peter and Jude quote from Enoch's writings in their books. And that gives that book a little bit of gravitas for me. And it certainly says, yes, they were aware of these writings. You know, they're a collection of writings, if you will. Between Malachi and Matthew, people there were still people of God.

And they were. People were still recording and writing. It's just none of those books were accepted into the Hebrew canon and none of those books were accepted into the New Testament or the Christian canon. But there, there are other. There are other writings people were writing about God in 1st Peter 2, 4 and 9.

This is. Peter is talking about the fate of false teachers that have infiltrated the church. And he says in verse four, for if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell, that's not Hades, it's Tartarus, but it's a Greek word for the subterranean realm of the dead. He sent them to hell, these angels, putting them in chains of darkness to be held for judgment. If this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to hold the unrighteous for punishment on the day of judgment.

Now let me tell you something. This info about what God did with the angels, it's not in the Old Testament. It is in the Book of Enoch. And I know because I bought that book and I read it because I don't trust what people tell me unless I see it for myself. So the Old Testament was Peter's Bible.

That information, that's not. That's not in the Bible, but it's in the Book of Enoch. Does that make the Book of Enoch canon or inspired? No, it just means that Peter read that book and thought it was right because he brought it down. He's not the only one.

Jude 1, the only one chapter in Jude, verses 6 and then 14 through 15. Jude is also talking about false teachers. I'm telling you, that's why he says, those who teach you'd better be careful because your judgment is going to be that much sterner. But these particular teachers were perverting the grace of God and saying, you could do whatever you want with your bodies. The grace covers you.

It's about your soul and spirit, not about your body. And Jude went on to say this. And the angels who did not keep their positions of authority but abandoned, they weren't thrown down. They abandoned their proper dwelling. These he has kept in darkness, bound with everlasting chains for judgment on the great day.

What is the great day? It's the day of the Lord. It's the day he is coming back. He's going to settle scores with the earthly and the heavenlies, right? So we look forward to that day.

Verse 14, Enoch the seventh from Adam prophesied about them. Quote, see, the Lord is coming with thousands upon thousands of his holy ones to judge everyone and to convict all of them of all the ungodly acts they have committed in their ungodliness and all the defiant words, ungodly sinners have spoken against them, end quote. This quote is in the Book of Enoch that I bought, that's now in the Bible. So there was a time when I would have had zero interest in reading anything extra biblical. And in fact, I would recoil in horror at the thought of incorporating any of that kind of material into my understanding of the scriptures.

It felt disrespectful and it felt adulterous to the word of God. You know, until I listened to Dr. Heiser's material and read his books, you know, he's all over the Internet, Dr. Michael H E I S E R and he has a ton of books out there. He's not proprietary about his information. Find him and listen to him. But he pointed out not new things but old connecting points that I'd never heard pointed out before between these intertestamental writings, in particular the book of Enoch and the scriptures and these writings, when understood as background material, like you would approach exegesis, right?

Like you would read a history book to inform you about how did these original listeners. That's the safest way to interpret the word of God. That's the safest way to find out what does that mean for me? Well, what did they think about it? Because whatever they thought about it, I know it has to be kind of the same.

There has to be a truth that transcends time and culture and so forth.

It's not the inspired work of God but it can unlock understanding and a deeper revelation of sections of scripture that are mysterious. And what I found out is in reading Dr. Heiser's material, material, there's, there's sections in the scripture I never understood what they meant. And you know, there's just a key historical point or a little thing here that just will blow your mind and say I was blind, but now I see. And I'll tell you, I think in terms of new information I mentioned last week these teachings will be more Bible conference ish than inspired messages. And, and I know it can be a lot and I, last time I taught I saw that on some of your faces is like this.

But you know what? That's okay because when growth happens there, you know, don't be discouraged by that. Growth happens there the next time. And I think it's just going to be next month. We're going to dive deeper into how the Nephilim, the offspring, right, the half bred offspring are and the origin of demons are connected.

And I'm going to answer the following questions for you. Are you ready? Because I know you're thinking this. If all flesh and blood beings died during the flood, how did the bloodline of the Nephilim reemerge in the Anakim and the Rephaim and the Zam Zumim? We'll answer that for you kinda.

Why did Jesus take his disciples to the pagan worship center in Caesarea Philippi? To confirm that he was the Christ, the son of a living God? You know, we always focus on what he did there. We never focused on why the where. Geography is a big deal in the word of God.

And when you understand the why he was there, it will blow your mind. What's the deal with the war in heaven? In Revelation chapter 12, when the woman gives forth birth and the devil, that old serpent and Satan comes and he grabs a third of the angels. When does that happen and what's the deal with that? What are the principality and powers and spirit spiritual wickedness in high places that Paul talks about.

Some of these guys are chained. What are these guys doing?

Are they the same as demons? We're going to talk about that.

You know, I shared a silly story with you about chicken and oatmeal and how certain things should never be combined. But know this. In. In. In.

In all. All c. Soberness and seriousness. It is dangerous to court interaction with any celestial being or spirit other than the Holy Spirit. And it's not unusual for humans to feel drawn to spirit beings because it's generally the origin of that fascination is the same same reason Eve interacted with the serpent. Hidden knowledge.

What do little girls play in their Ouija boards? Does Bobby like me? What is the name of my husband? Why do people go to psychics?

They want to know hidden knowledge and be sure there are familiar spirits. We'll probably talk about that as well. They've been around a lot longer than you and they know stuff.

I mean there's some psychics and so forth I'm sure are charlatans, but I'm sure any number of them are connected to the dark realm. When we reach out to these spirits, man, they would love to try to get access into your soul to connect with you. They'll tell you some things that are interesting. Did God really say?

And they will corrupt you and they will take you to a place over which you have no control. And I'm begging you, I mean even Satan can appear as an angel of light. I always wondered why the writer of Hebrews went to such exhausted of measures to talk about why angels are no big deal. Because like do we ever think that they did? And to say why would you go to an angel?

You have Jesus. And so I beg you, don't. Do not open that door for spiritual wickedness. You know, the Bible gives considerable space to explaining the evil interaction and impact of wicked spirit spirits on humanity. And the earth itself.

I mean, this whole business with Israel, what do you think that's about? You think that's about humans?

It's not about land as the news describes it, but it is about land from a spiritual. It's spiritual forces at war. But no matter what spiritual force we are talking about or where from where a demon originates, the Bible makes clear that all authority in heaven and in earth and under the earth has been given to Jesus. Jesus settled a number of spiritual scores at his death and resurrection. And not only does he have authority, authority, we have authority in his name.

That in his name and at that name every knee shall bow both over the earth, on the earth, under the earth, and confess that he is Lord to the glory of God the Father. We do not need to be fearful of demonic influences.

You need to keep the door closed. I will tell you that. I. I don't want to give some broad sweeping thing. If we open a door, they can only take what we offer. The serpent didn't push that apple in Eve's mouth.

He can only offer, but she had a reach and take it. And I'm telling you, you want to have a life that's free of Satan's influences. You keep those doors closed. You keep your lives holy. Because wherever, whenever we go out into something we know we shouldn't do, that is an open door.

And even at that, we don't need to be afraid. Because once we come back to our senses, huh? We have the name. The name. What did Jesus said?

In my name you shall greater works than these shall you do, because I go to be with my Father who is in heaven. The name of Jesus is powerful. And not just the name that we say it, but it is faith in that name that will raise somebody up. It is faith in that name who will deliver somebody. It is faith in that name that will calm the seas.

The name of Jesus.