Christopher Hitchens almost put his finger on the Antichrist

Saw a video clip of Hitchens objecting strenuously to the accusation that evolution influenced more murders in this world than religion ever did, claiming that for instance neither Hitler nor Stalin nor Mussolini nor Croatia were inspired by evolution but by Catholicism and by centuries of deification of human leaders. He said that fascism is really an expression of the Roman Catholic Right!

That really grabbed my attention. It's a very insightful observation, though he of course makes the common mistake of equating Catholicism with Christianity, and misses the point that evolution HAS inspired callousness toward human beings, Margaret Sanger and abortion being one obvious example, and Sanger's racist eugenics DID influence Hitler. Also the Communist regimes have been decidedly atheistic and extravagantly murderous.

HOWEVER, his point is worth thinking about. Russia had the Czars, which is the Russian term for "Caesar" and Germany had the Kaisers, which is the German term for "Caesar," both regimes having admired the Roman Empire with its Caesars and consciously seeking to reestablish that Empire, as in "the Third Reich" or third Empire, and as in "The Holy Roman Empire." Of course a final revived Roman Empire is exactly what a certain school of Biblical prophecy is expecting, based predominantly on the Book of Daniel, so it's interesting to realize that exactly such a revival has been attempted in the past. The Holy Roman Empire started in 962 and extended up to the 1800s, then there was a "second Reich" or empire under Wilhelm 1, and then it was Hitler who headed the "Third Reich." All these were conscious revivals of the Roman Empire! And all centered in Germany, though the same mentality also existed in Russia as well.

The Caesars are a type of the Antichrist, political leaders who came to regard themselves as gods, and any attempt to revive the Roman Empire would imply the same deification of the leader, which was clearly seen in Hitler though he didn't call himself Kaiser. Also, of course, the Roman Empire in its final form was Catholic and the Catholic pontiff and hierarchy continue to imitate the original pagan Roman leadership which goes back through the "mystery religions" to the pagan religion of Babylonia. We don't yet have the Fourth Reich or Empire but the mere existence of three historical forerunners suggests it's certainly going to come about, and probably quite soon. Daniel prophesied four great empires, the fourth to be an immensely powerful and evil "beast." {Later: I need to clarify that Daniel was talking about the series of empires that started in his own time, the Babylonian, the Medo-Persian, Greece under Alexander, and then the Roman Empire, not the wannabe-be Roman Empires I've noted here -- but they are no doubt dress rehearsals for that final Fourth Empire of Daniel anyway, which will be a revival of the Roman Empire but more powerful than any empire ever yet seen -- more directly satan/demon-empowered for instance}. What is a deified "Caesar" but an Antichrist! Lots of 'em even, and yet a final doozy to come.

As usual, an outsider such as Hitchens has fallen for the lie that Catholicism has anything whatever to do with Christianity, and therefore falsely accuses Christianity of the murders committed by Catholicism, but he does nevertheless seem to have made an important observation about fascism we should take notice of.

Hitchens also attacked Mother Teresa, mostly not for the right reasons but in my opinion anyone who puts down Mother Teresa can't be all bad. Her main offense to my knowledge was that she refused to give the gospel to the dying people she cared for, saying their own religion was good enough, thus consigning them to Hell without a chance of changing their minds. Hitchens would no doubt have put that on the plus side for her, of course. {Later: I watched a You Tube series Hitchens himself made on Mother Teresa in which he finds her guilty of neglect of those she cared for, specifically of failing to give medical help to some who would not have died if they'd had such help, treating them the same as those who would have died anyway. Also her staff didn't bother to sterilize needles they intended to reuse and the attitude was the people are dying so what's the difference? Also, her staff was not allowed to go for any kind of medical training that would have aided them in helping their patients, based on some wacko notion about trusting God. So he did have some valid objections to her work. However, one has to give some credit to her for doing anything at all for people nobody else was doing anything for, and for her stand against abortion.}

My understanding of all this is very rough, but I've been wanting to get back to the various topics connected with Roman Catholicism, the Antichrist, the demonic manifestations of "Mary" and the like, and these rough remarks should get me moving in that direction.

Here come the Christmas debunkers stumbling the brethren again

Tis the season to be jolly, ho ho ho and all that. But at this time of year we are also sometimes admonished by some who are perhaps too wise for the rest of us that Christmas is a pagan holiday that should be shunned by true believers.

When I first learned about the "true origins" of Christmas some twenty years ago by now, I was pretty shaken by the information and stopped celebrating it for a time. But over the years I've come to look at it differently. If you don't know its origin, if you celebrate it innocently as an opportunity to glorify Christ, or even if you DO know its origin but treat it as an opportunity to glorify Christ nevertheless, it really doesn't matter that the date and some of its trappings were taken from pagan holidays. Something done in innocence IS innocent.

I think the scripture that applies most particularly to this concern is 1 Corinthians 10:24-33:

1Cr 10:24-33 Let no man seek his own, but every man another's [wealth]. Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, [that] eat, asking no question for conscience sake: For the earth [is] the Lord's, and the fulness thereof. If any of them that believe not bid you [to a feast], and ye be disposed to go; whatsoever is set before you, eat, asking no question for conscience sake. But if any man say unto you, This is offered in sacrifice unto idols, eat not for his sake that shewed it, and for conscience sake: for the earth [is] the Lord's, and the fulness thereof: Conscience, I say, not thine own, but of the other: for why is my liberty judged of another [man's] conscience? For if I by grace be a partaker, why am I evil spoken of for that for which I give thanks? Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God. Give none offence, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God: Even as I please all [men] in all [things], not seeking mine own profit, but the [profit] of many, that they may be saved.

That is, don't even THINK ABOUT whether the food in the marketplace was sacrificed to idols (i.e. demons), don't worry about it, it's food given by God and idols are nothing. BUT of course if your brother is aware of the sacrifice and takes it seriously, then abstain for his sake. I don't know if this last concern applies to any Christians' attitude to Christmas, I rather doubt that it does but it would take some thinking about.

Those who insist that Christmas REALLY IS a pagan holiday are insisting that what is in our minds is irrelevant, that what the pagans call it is what it REALLY is. What do they want us to to do, simply eliminate some dates from our calendars altogether because they "really" belong to the pagans? What should we do, sleep through them? When we say "Merry Christmas" are we REALLY saying "Happy Death of Christ?" That's what they claim. What WE intend by the words is irrelevant to them. They superstitiously insist on an "objective" meaning to the words, as if there is simply no way we can avoid "eating the food sacrificed to idols" as it were, even though Paul tells us if we don't consider it at all then we are innocent of the charge. In contrast, our wise ones who know the "true origins" of the holiday, just as if they "know" the food in the marketplace was sacrificed to idols, are going to make us idolaters no matter what our intentions.

The great Charles Spurgeon also spoke against the celebration of Christmas, but if the information at this blog is correct, he nevertheless allowed it as an opportunity to preach Christ's birth and didn't condemn those who celebrated it.

As I note above, the word "merry" in the greeting "Merry Christmas" is sometimes condemned because the word "Christmas" "really" refers to the blasphemous Catholic ritual sacrifice of Christ, which of course cannot be merry, but is it fair to adhere to that meaning of "Christmas" which hardly anyone knows anyway? NOBODY thinks of the "mass" when wishing someone a Merry Christmas.

But apparently some object to the word "merry" apart from all that. Here's what Spurgeon said about the word as reported at the blog mentioned above:

Observe, this morning, the sacred joy of Mary that you may imitate it. This is a season when all men expect us to be joyous. We compliment each other with the desire that we may have a "Merry Christmas." Some Christians who are a little squeamish, do not like the word "merry." It is a right good old Saxon word, having the joy of childhood and the mirth of manhood in it, it brings before one's mind the old song of the waits, and the midnight peal of bells, the holly and the blazing log. I love it for its place in that most tender of all parables, where it is written, that, when the long-lost prodigal returned to his father safe and sound, "They began to be merry." This is the season when we are expected to be happy; and my heart's desire is, that in the highest and best sense, you who are believers may be "merry." Mary's heart was merry within her; but here was the mark of her joy, it was all holy merriment, it was every drop of it sacred mirth. It was not such merriment as worldlings will revel in to-day and to-morrow, but such merriment as the angels have around the throne, where they sing, "Glory to God in the highest," while we sing "On earth peace, goodwill towards men." Such merry hearts have a continual feast. I want you, ye children of the bride-chamber, to possess to-day and to-morrow, yea, all your days, the high and consecrated bliss of Mary, that you may not only read her words, but use them for yourselves, ever experiencing their meaning: "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior."

I wonder how often we'd be reminded of many of the great truths of scripture about God's incarnation as man in Christ's birth, such as this one, if we did not have Christmas as their occasion? How often would we hear the hymns we know as Christmas Carols, or the pure King James scripture and glorious God-exalting music of Handel's Messiah if not for Christmas?

So some treat the pagan definition of the date as if it were The Reality to which all else must bend. If it was originally celebrated as Saturnalia or as the birthday of Tammuz, this sort of mentality declares that it really IS Saturnalia or the birthday of Tammuz no matter what people make of it now. If the "yule log" belonged originally to a pagan festival then the mere mention of the word "yule" is to this mentality some kind of demonic invocation. This is absurd, and it is a violation of the spirit of the scripture I've quoted above. You CREATE the idolatrous mentality you attach to these mere dates and terms by equating them with their original meaning instead of recognizing that what they REALLY are has nothing to do with their original meaning but ONLY WITH WHAT THEY HAVE BECOME AND WHAT THEY ARE IN THE MINDS OF THOSE WHO CELEBRATE THEM. We do NOT celebrate "Tammuz's birthday" or "Saturnalia." We do NOT celebrate the "mass" either, so who cares that it refers to a Catholic blasphemy? If it is not that in the minds of those who celebrate it then it is simply not relevant. We KNOW Christ's actual birthday is not given in the scripture and we KNOW that if it were it would not be December 25th. SO WHAT?

You stumble your brethren and offend their conscience by making them aware of idolatries of which they would be completely innocent except for your meddling.

Hey, Mr. Wise Man. Say your birthday falls somewhere near Hitler's birthday and one year your family couldn't celebrate it on your actual birthday but chose another day for the occasion that just happened to be Hitler's birthday although nobody in the family knew that. Except Uncle Wilhelm who owlishly proclaimed that the family was not REALLY celebrating YOUR birthday, but REALLY celebrating Hitler's. Would he be right?

Just because witches and warlocks and idolaters have chosen a particular date on the calendar for their nefarious purposes does NOT mean we have to accept their definition of that date. May 1st is not "Beltane" unless you are a witch or a "neopagan," it's just May 1st.

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Later. I feel the need to offer a caveat here. Not about what I've said above but about other innocent appropriations of what really are idolatrous or demonic activities. Such as the use of oracles, the Ouija board, the practices of Eastern religions and that sort of thing. AND the knowing participation in Catholic idolatries such as the Mass or "veneration" (worship) of Mary and Catholic "saints" and the like. Even if done in complete innocence of the occultic and demonic nature of these things you may still be exposing yourself to their demonic influence, because there IS no truly innocent way to practice something that really is demonic in both origin and common use. It is possible that you may be protected to some extent by your innocence of their true meaning, nevertheless, but this is not the same thing as dates on a calendar which all belong to God, or food in the marketplace that also all belongs to God. But some things DO have demonic origins, EXCLUSIVELY demonic origins, and you DO expose yourself to their influence by using them at all.

I innocently accepted a mantra through a Transcendental Meditation ceremony some years before I became a Christian, unaware that the sound I was given is the name of a Hindu "deity" I was unknowingly invoking whenever I pronounced it in my mind. I also got involved with various oracles and discovered their amazing "uncanniness." There are demons behind them too. I was definitely exposed to demonic activity through these things, some rather frightening occurrences as a matter of fact. The mantra quite suddenly opened up a vision to me as I simply sat pronouncing it in my mind - an amazingly clear vision as if I had been transported to some other place altogether, that so startled and frightened me I couldn't ever practice TM again. Some things you cannot REALLY fool around with "innocently" no matter how ignorant you are of their true nature.

It is also important that people be warned of the true meaning of the Catholic mass so that they can separate themselves from such things, and the demonic nature of the supposed apparitions of "Mary" for the same reason. These things are demonic delusions that will capture innocent minds if not warned about them.

BUT the celebration of a holiday with the intention of glorifying Christ or even in a heathen sort of innocence that nevertheless associates the holiday with Christ as a festival of "Christendom" with no knowledge of idolatries associated with it, is not the same thing. This really is best understood in the terms of the scripture I've quoted above, a case where there is no demonic influence if it is not recognized.

Goodbye Christopher Hitchens

I cried when I heard Christopher Hitchens - "Hitch" - had died. {Later (12/21): I don't know why I cried. I really don't. I didn't like anything the man had to say. Maybe it was because I saw him in the video with Douglas Wilson which highlighted the cordiality of their relationship. Wilson treated him with a great deal of respect, which is a good thing, but I nevertheless thought Hitchens' arguments were unintelligent -- unbelievers simply do not and cannot "get it" and I've come to the conclusion that there's no point in trying to change their minds. Scripture SAYS they can't get it. You have to believe the basics before you can get it.}

He was an icon of the atheist debates over the last decade or so, and of the Left going much further back than that, though in recent years he had begun to object to some of the Leftist arguments. He had charm and wit and even when I hated what he was saying I couldn't dislike him personally. {Later: I'm not sure that's true. I think I didn't like him really. His charm was very self-consciously cultivated and I did not like that. He did have wit but not of any high level. Must have written this too soon after his death, which for some reason did affect me.} I made a point of listening to the debates he participated in that I could find on the internet. {Later: I also made a point of listening to the debates Dawkins did, and many others on the atheist Christian-bashing circuit, and I don't "like" any of those people}.

It disturbs me greatly when Christians say goodbye to an unbeliever with "rest in peace" because it's a form of lying and denial of the faith. They should know an unbeliever cannot rest in peace after death. It is true that "now he knows" what he denied in his lifetime about another world beyond this one. I wish he'd discovered it in this life but he didn't and much as I might wish he could "rest in peace" I'd be denying the truth if I pretended it were possible.

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David Horowitz counted him a personal friend both from his own leftist past and in his neo-conservative life, and he wrote this tribute to him. I also have to hope that David will eventually discover God as well.

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Later: Found this obituary by Douglas Wilson at Christianity Today. He finishes with "R.I.P" after expressing the hope that God might still have converted him at the end, fair enough though by all the signs I'm aware of he remained adamantly unconverted to the end. There is a DVD of Pastor Wilson and Hitchens traveling and debating together available at Amazon and elsewhere, also free on You Tube. They developed something close to a friendship during their debates.

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All the debates against Biblical Christianity come down to one thing in the end, which the Bible itself reveals:

1 Corinthians 1:23 But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness;

Christopher Hitchens would rail against the "immorality" of Christ's death for our sins, basically its "foolishness" as seen by a good Greek mind. Our message is foolishness to the world, they can't hear it, and sometimes they get all exercised against it and throw us to the lions for it.

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Wed Dec 21: Found This article by Peter Hitchens, Christopher's brother, on his completely different path from his brother's, back to Christianity. I think he does a very good job of making the case against his brother's atheism though of course he couldn't get Christopher to recognize it. But for me that was overshadowed by some of what he said about his own change of heart:

No doubt I should be ashamed to confess that fear played a part in my return to religion, specifically a painting: Rogier van der Weyden's 15th Century Last Judgement, which I saw in Burgundy while on holiday.

I had scoffed at its mention in the guidebook, but now I gaped, my mouth actually hanging open, at the naked figures fleeing towards the pit of Hell.

These people did not appear remote or from the ancient past; they were my own generation. Because they were naked, they were not imprisoned in their own age by time-bound fashions.

On the contrary, their hair and the set of their faces were entirely in the style of my own time. They were me, and people I knew.

I had a sudden strong sense of religion being a thing of the present day, not imprisoned under thick layers of time. My large catalogue of misdeeds replayed themselves rapidly in my head.

I had absolutely no doubt that I was among the damned, if there were any damned. Van der Weyden was still earning his fee, nearly 500 years after his death.

At around the same time I rediscovered Christmas, which I had pretended to dislike for many years. I slipped into a carol service on a winter evening, diffident and anxious not to be seen.

I knew perfectly well that I was enjoying it, although I was unwilling to admit it. I also knew I was losing my faith in politics and my trust in ambition, and was urgently in need of something else on which to build the rest of my life.

I am not exactly clear now how this led in a few months to my strong desire - unexpected by me or by my friends, but encouraged by my then unbelieving future wife - to be married in church.

But I can certainly recall the way the words of the Church of England's marriage service, at St Bride's in London, awakened thoughts in me that I had long suppressed. I was entering into my inheritance, as a Christian Englishman, as a man, and as a human being. It was the first properly grown-up thing that I had ever done.

The swearing of great oaths concentrates the mind. So did the baptisms first of my daughter and then of my wife who, raised as a Marxist atheist, trod another rather different path to the same place.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1255983/How-I-God-peace-atheist-brother-PETER-HITCHENS-traces-journey-Christianity.html#ixzz1hEMrZWVa

...entering into my inheritance, as a Christian Englishman, as a man, and as a human being.

I had a similar sort of feeling when I was finally solidly a believer -- along with the amazing discovery that it was all real, that God is real, that there is such a thing as salvation, that God purchased it for me, all the wonderful discoveries of this previously unthinkable and aggressively rejected and repudiated but now vividly real Reality beside which everything else paled into nothingness -- besides all that there was this sense of having "entered into my inheritance" that I had vaguely apprehended as a child, salvation, yes, but this was also the culture I had grown up in suddenly showing itself to be a Christian culture and me having been given its opportunities which I had repudiated. The first Christmas after becoming a believer that I experienced in a church I just sat there and sobbed uncontrollably as all those familiar carols were being sung, actually reclaimed in my case, pulled out of the darkness into the light, all of them remembered from childhood and heard off and on throughout over forty years of my life without really being heard, now suddenly full of meaning, full of the Truth that had now become mine. It was a joyful crying of course, but there was so much of the pain of the loss from those previous years in it now finding release it's almost hard to recognize the joy. Oh but joy there is. This is my inheritance, this is reality, this is what I was made for, this is what I had all my life but didn't know I had and only now really have. This great great real real God, this beautiful Savior for whom the most glorious of carols could never be sufficient, to whom we rightly sing adoration, adoration, adoration and lift our hearts to realms of glory that otherwise have no excuse for existing at all in the cramped dark outlook of this benighted earth.

I have to repeat that, it's so true:

...realms of glory that otherwise have no excuse for existing at all in the cramped dark outlook of this benighted earth.

"Grandeur" in the evolutionistic view of things? Oh Darwin, what you missed out on.

God might have allowed me such an exalted experience without the holiday of Christmas, I'm sure, but I have to think such a concentration of expressions of Glory in the Highest was intended by Him, and refuse to accept the debunkery of those who put it all down to a cheap Christianized version of paganism.

Yes I recognize that this post was supposed to be about Christopher Hitchens and I've taken it back to the recent post about Christmas, but oh well.

God's name in English ought to be "Jehovah" not "Yahweh"

The use of the name "Yahweh" in the place of "Jehovah" in sermons has been jumping out at me for some time now and finally I want to say a few things about why I think it's a very bad practice. I think this discussion belongs here rather than the Bible Hoax blog because it's a more general issue than a translational issue. The King James has "Jehovah" in only four places in the Old Testament. Westcott and Hort used neither "Jehovah" nor "Yahweh" but substituted "LORD" for "Jehovah" in their miserable revision, never content to leave the King James unmolested wherever they could make a change on the flimsiest justification, but at least the use of "Yahweh" can't be directly blamed on them -- indirectly, yes, I think so.

Here's Wikipedia on the Name Jehovah, a paragraph showing one place in the text where some of the modern versions have used "Yahweh" while "LORD" was the choice in others (where apparently Westcott and Hort's example was followed), whereas only the King James continues to use "Jehovah:"

At Exodus 6:3-6, where the King James Version has Jehovah

...the Revised Standard Version (1952),[34] the New American Standard Bible (1971), the New International Version (1978), the New King James Version (1982), the New Revised Standard Version (1989), the New Century Version (1991), and the Contemporary English Version (1995) give "LORD" or "Lord" as their rendering of the Tetragrammaton

...while the New Jerusalem Bible (1985), the Amplified Bible (1987), the New Living Translation (1996, revised 2007), the English Standard Version (2001), and the Holman Christian Standard Bible (2004) use the form Yahweh.

Even the name of God has to be a matter of democratic choice in our churches these days thanks to the current attitude of "scholarship" that leaves it up for grabs.

Many pastors and preachers rather pointedly use "Yahweh" as if it had some kind of established validation, however, apparently more concerned about meeting some notion of accuracy they've learned from somewhere than about contributing to confusion among Christians created by the use of new terms.

Is it more accurate? I don't know what weight to attribute to the Wikipedia article but it sounds like there's far from scholarly consensus on the subject, and why do we have to be accosted with changes that are a matter of scholarly dispute anyway? Shouldn't there be a conservative mindset that respects the poor Christian in the pew, protects us from matters that are beyond our judgment and from innovations that have to be unsettling at some level of our consciousness? This is one of Westcott and Hort's great crimes against the Christian church and their example no doubt inspired the use of "Yahweh" in later translations: Once it becomes acceptable to make casual changes in the text everybody feels free to get in on the act.

I've come to regard the change to "Yahweh" as an attack on the minds of believers, many of whom have spent a lifetime accustomed to the term "Jehovah." "Jehovah" is in the English-speaking mind, the English culture, in English literature, old sermons and old Christian books, and a few old hymns as well. But moving the ancient landmarks that would preserve the old territory intact is of minor importance to minds infatuated with "scholarship" and sounding erudite. Apart from the confusion -- and I even think it's cruelty of a sort -- of foisting novel terms on English-speaking Christians, the name "Yahweh" is mostly a scholarly conceit. There is nothing wrong with "Jehovah" and there is apparently good scholarly support for it too.

The name "Yahweh" sounds puny in comparison to "Jehovah" as well. Maybe that's a subjective judgment born of familiarity with "Jehovah" --I don't know-- but it sounds like a tribal deity rather than the God who made all things.

"Yahweh" is also much loved by the followers of the Hebrew Names heresy, which ought to be one good reason to resist it.

Heaven Stories article at Worldview Weekend

An article on various "heaven" stories: by a Justin Peters:

Here's part of the Summary from this lengthy article:

Summary

Thus far we have examined specific, current, and popular accounts of people claiming to have been to Heaven and to Hell. With these specific accounts still in view, we will now look at some of the broader challenges, both logical and theological, confronting anyone claiming to have made such journeys.

There is a logical problem with these accounts that is so glaring, it is hard to understand why more people do not take note of it; namely, these various accounts often contradict one another. The three individuals examined in this article only scratch the surface of those claiming to have been to the other side. Mary Baxter (who claimed she went to both Heaven and Hell), Betty Malz, Roberts Liardon, Jesse Duplantis, Kenneth Hagin, Richard Eby, Todd Bentley, etc. also would have you believe they were given a sneak peek into the afterlife. It takes only a cursory reading of these stories to realize that they all contradict one another – and often even contradict themselves! Colton Burpo reports that everyone in heaven, even God Himself, had wings. Piper saw many people in heaven but they apparently did not have wings. Some report that heaven is completely urban whereas Duplantis[43] says he saw homes out in the country. Some saw God on His throne, others did not see Him at all, and some, like Don Piper, can't seem to remember whether they saw Him or not. Colton claims that those in Heaven show no signs of age, yet Piper claims that his grandfather, Joe Kulbeth, still had his "shock of white hair."

Some heavenly tourists say that Jesus has brown hair, others say it is blond. Some report Jesus as having a purple sash about his waist, others say it is blue. Benny Hinn claims to see Jesus often and can even describe what He is wearing from day to day. Some, like Colton Burpo, say Jesus' eyes are blue, others say they are brown. One thing that all of the supposed accounts of Heaven have in common is a minimized description of the glory of Christ. Rather than a description like that in Revelation 1:14: "His chest was girded with a golden sash. His head and His hair were white like white wool, like snow; and His eyes were like a flame of fire," these accounts describe Jesus as being rather ordinary and non-glorious. God would never be the source of a vision which downplays the glory of His Son.

The list of contradictions is almost endless. The obvious point is that these accounts cannot all be true. In all likelihood, none of them are.

Now let's turn to the theological issues with all of these accounts. Though with varying degrees of specificity, all who have been to the hereafter and have returned describe people as having physical bodies. They report that the heavenly residents are perfect in every way showing no signs of sickness, disease, arthritis, handicaps, etc. They describe these glorified bodies as beautiful in appearance and perfect in function. There is only one problem with this: the redeemed in Heaven do not yet have their glorified bodies. This statement will likely surprise many readers and, unfortunately, the theological nuances are too involved to fully address here. It is, however, sufficient to note that the Bible teaches that those presently in Heaven are not yet in possession of their permanent, glorified bodies. In fact, Heaven itself is not yet in its perfected, eternal state. Those events will not transpire until the timing of Revelation 21. At present, Heaven is in its "intermediate" state, if you will, and the redeemed there are also in an intermediate state. In Revelation 6:9-11 and 20:4, John saw the "souls of those who had been slain because of the Word of God" and the "souls of those who had been beheaded" respectively. Those that John saw were not in possession of physical bodies but rather were in a non-corporeal state. The redeemed will be given glorified bodies at the rapture or Christ's return to earth (Parousia).[44] Therefore, the reports of people in the intermediate Heaven as possessing glorified bodies must be rejected.

The second theological problem is one which plagues all the books in the "I've been to Heaven and/or Hell" genre; they are all an attack on the sufficiency of Scripture. Even if an account does not directly contradict the Bible per se (and most do), these accounts propose to add to biblical revelation. In these accounts, for example, we learn that hell is 3,700 miles below the surface of the earth, that it is inhabited by ghastly creatures and giant spiders, the pit of fire is shaped like a giant human or maybe it's one mile in diameter (depending on whose account you read) and is ruled by demons – none of which can be found in the Bible. Likewise, Heaven apparently has suburbs, the flowers turn themselves to watch you as you pass by, the fruit is copper colored, individual homes are furnished with ball and claw Queen Anne furniture, people have wings or they don't (again, depending on the particular account), and the souls of babies fly around God on His throne. None of this is biblically supported.

All of this information is unbiblical at worst and extra-biblical at best. This leads us to the issue of new divine revelation knowledge. Is God giving certain individuals new revelation and speaking to them apart from and in addition to the Bible? If any of these accounts are even partly true, then the inescapable conclusion is "yes."

The implications of new revelation are huge. If it is necessary for us to know this information, why has God delayed nearly 2,000 years in giving it to us? Did the saints of previous generations have inadequate revelation of Heaven? Did they not have a sufficient supply of God's truth? If they did, then these and all other accounts of visiting the other side are entirely unnecessary and of no profit to the church.

Whatever God reveals and says to these individuals (most of these individuals quote God directly) should carry with it the very same authority as any verse of Scripture since God cannot speak less authoritatively on one occasion than He does on another. In other words, God cannot speak to us in the Bible and "really, really mean it" but when He speaks to individuals outside of the Bible whether in a dream, vision, audible voice, or trip to Heaven still mean it, but somehow mean it less so than He did in the Bible.

Heaven Stories posts continue to attract denouncers. In answer to the latest, this post is about Akiane Kramarik

I got another comment on my main blog post about the stories of children's visits to heaven.

Bob Barker has this to say to me:

I think its disgusting to go calling Akaini's [sic] work, the other child's heaven experience and 90 minutes in heaven demoniacally inspired.

Where is your proof that Akainie is tied to Hinduism and new age deception?

You mention that some of these people have a lot to answer to God for. But how about yourself, speaking against Gods chosen servants like this? ...

Saturday, November 12, 2011

In response I decided to do a whole post on why Akiane Kramarik's visions are NOT Christian.

First I need to explain that Akiane Kramarik is another who claims to have been to heaven at a very early age -- I've seen both age three and age four at different sources -- just like the two boys who have had books written about their experiences. Akiane has an amazing artistic ability, or really a technical skill at painting realistic images, that seems to have "come from God" in a more direct sense than we usually mean that expression. She also writes poetry which she says comes to her already composed. She is now about seventeen and apparently still communicates with "God."

Since I've been challenged on this so much I want to make the case for the demonic inspiration behind the heaven visits and visions, although I think what I've already written on the general subject ought to suffice. Apparently it needs to be spelled out more clearly because there is such an amazing lack of discernment about these things on the part of many Christians.

First of all there should be major questions asked about such claims since there is no Biblical reason whatever why God should give anyone a vision of himself these days. Instead we get books published by supposedly reputable Christian publishing companies presenting them as perfectly acceptable Christian experiences, which in itself no doubt influences Christians to accept them uncritically. Such visions were very rare even in Old Testament times, given to specially chosen prophets such as Moses and Isaiah, and in the New Testament there was only the Transfiguration witnessed by three of Jesus' disciples, Paul's encounter on the Damascus road, and then the visions of John recorded in the Book of Revelation. These visions had very specific objectives in the furtherance of God's revelation to humanity, AND they provoked amazement and fearful worshipful awe in those who witnessed them -- attitudes we NEVER see in ANY of the current supposed experiences of God or heaven. The credulity given to a "prophet" such as Joseph Smith in our time is indefensible enough, but now apparently many thousands of people who ought to know better are all too easily accepting that some small American children have been allowed to visit the true heaven.

There is really no other possibility than demonic influence. Small children could not imagine or make up these things on their own, they had to come from outside, just as Akiane and the boys who have had such experiences claim. There is also a general agreement between the separate accounts of "heaven" about the nature of "God" and "Jesus" which is also evidence that they were not simply made up, but came from some outside source. So, was that outside source God or the devil? This post is to give my reasons why it had to be the devil.

Here's at thread at EvC forums where I posted a number of comments on Akiane Kramarik and her art a few years ago. I got the same kind of responses there that I get on my post about the heaven stories here, that is, with few exceptions denouncing me for my point of view. Most of the posters there are unbelievers but I know one of my critics on that thread is a believer, apparently as undiscerning as other believers I know of who accept these heaven experiences so uncritically. Most who have commented on these phenomena here are probably Christians, but they don't provide enough information for me to know for sure. Some may not be Christians at all, but generic New Agey God-believers, deists or cultists who don't believe in the God of the Bible anyway.

Here is a page on Akiane's own web site where her experiences are described but in much vaguer terms than I remember finding earlier. She's described as having had a "spiritual transformation" at the age of four but not a direct experience of heaven which I recall is what she'd first described -- so I think they've toned it down:

•At 4, had a life-changing spiritual transformation, bringing the family to God.
•Her poems often arrive fully conceived.
•The inspiration for her art and literature comes from her visions, dreams, observations of people, nature and God.

•Her biggest wish: "that everyone would love God and one another".
•Her life goal: to share her love for God and people around the world.

This God she knows through visions and dreams is an awfully vague generic sort of God, the God of the cults, the God of the New Age, with no specific attributes that would connect him with the God of the Bible. She paints a man she calls "Jesus Christ," usually against a background of stars and galaxies -- which in itself is a hint that we are not talking about the UNCREATED God who made all things, who is outside all of it -- only the false gods are part of the cosmos. She claims to be inspired by her very unspecific nebulous "God," and her "Jesus" is no more than a handsome not-very-authoritative-looking man (in fact he's perhaps rather befuddled-looking, no Christ he). Christ is not described as the Savior in anything she says there, far from Almighty God who came to die for the sins of His people.

Here's a short You Tube video about her in which she says she believes God wanted to show her what he's like and what he's done with this world or something like that. Not a word about sending the Son of God to die for our sins. There is nothing Christian at all about her generic God, he's just a typical empty amorphous New Agey "God" with all the pseudoChristian cant words like "helping people" and "love."

There is also her experience of having the poetry come to her already written as it were. When does God do such things? But it's very common in occult practices, the doings of demons, much like "automatic writing" and even more like the whole books that were dictated directly to Jane Roberts (The Seth Books) and Helen Schucman (A Course in Miracles). Demons do these things, God does not.

What makes Akiane's vision specifically "New Age" is her notion about Jesus' supposed "missing years:" Here's another You Tube video about her. She describes her experiences starting at 6:10. At 6:40 is her painting called The Missing Years. This is that New Age notion, which I'll say more about farther down the post.

On that same video Akiane says right after the Missing Years painting that God gave her many ideas she doesn't understand at all, mentioning one about "pyramids." I have to suppose she didn't understand the "missing years" idea either, that it was given to her without her understanding, just as her poetry is also given to her.

Since her website is so vague about her early experiences of visions of God I'm including this link to a critic because at least he mentions what I know I had read some time back, and I think on her website, about her claim to have had an actual visit to heaven and personal encounter with God.

What makes Akiane so fascinating is not so much how well she paints, but rather the subject of her work and her inspiration. Akiane claims to have met God when she was just 3. He told her that she needs to paint and help the less fortunate. He also noted that he’d be there to guide her along the way.

It gets more bizarre when you discover that her mother is an Atheist and her father a recovering Catholic. Religion was never discussed in the house and the kids are all home schooled.

Wikipedia gives pretty much this same information, along with the same vague concept of "God."

Here's a report about her from April of this year. I see that most of the material in this article is taken from one at Christianity Today. They too just believe this stuff? I suppose this IS unfortunately the level of an awful lot of today's Christianity. Has nobody any discernment any more?

When asked how she knows that it's God who is speaking to her she said, "Because I can hear His voice....quiet and beautiful."

This ought to be a dead giveaway that we are not talking about the God of the Bible. Is this to be accepted as proof that it is God who communicates with her? "Quiet and beautiful?" Don't they know that scripture says the devil appears as an angel of light? That's his specialty. He was originally the most beautiful cherub in heaven. He can still muster an impression of that original beauty of form, voice, whatever, certainly enough to deceive an innocent child.

The article describes her finding a model for her paintings of Jesus, and one of the boys who had similar visions to hers said her paintings look exactly like the Jesus he also met:

The painting is startling. The eyes are loving and patient, but also piercing and fierce. He is beautiful. In fact, when Colton Burpo, the little boy who says he went to heaven at age three (see articles Part One and Part Two), saw the painting, he declared it to be the only one that ever captured what Jesus looks like. There have been many paintings since that one, though Prince of Peace is probably her most famous.

She also gives a generic vague explanation of why she believes she's been given these experiences:

People may wonder, “Why did Jesus choose to contact Akiane?"

“I have been blessed by God,” she said simply. “And if I'm blessed, there is one reason and one reason only, and that is to help others. I am donating a big portion of money to charity and to combat poverty," she said. "I want to help people. I want people to find hope in my paintings and draw people's attention to God."

There is no reason for Jesus to appear to anyone these days that I know of, certainly not to anyone who has access to a Bible and plenty of preachers and teachers such as we have in America, but let's say at a minimum if it really were Jesus talking to her He'd show her his nail wounds and tell her He died for her salvation, none of this mumbojumbo about "helping people." ALL the cults teach "helping people," the true God offers REAL TRUE TRANSFORMING salvation through the death of Christ, salvation that saves us from our Adam-inherited sin nature. Akiane is not saved, she's merely being exploited by a demonic intrusion into her mind.

The Supposed "Missing" Years of Jesus
What Akiane has learned through her visions is certainly NOT Christian. It's basically a New Age kind of teaching, which has roots in spiritism, theosophy and the like, and the mere mention of the notion of any supposedly "lost" or "missing" years in Jesus' life is a red flag clue to this. Akiane herself probably had no notion of its anti-Christian meaning when she first received this from her otherworldly communicant. Christians do not believe there were any "missing" or "lost" years in Jesus' life. There is simply a long period of His childhood that is not described in scripture simply because it is not of importance to the gospel, from age twelve to the beginning of his ministry around age thirty. New Age writers have claimed he traveled during those years and learned Eastern religion during that time, but the entire context of his life and ministry as shown in the Bible is the Old Testament, nothing outside that context. Clearly we are to assume he lived the life of a Jewish boy learning his earthly adoptive father's trade of carpentry and His heavenly Father's calling on His life through attendance at synagogue and temple.

Here's Wikipedia on the subject of the supposed Missing Years. It claims Jesus traveled in Tibet and India and learned from their sages and "holy men." This is taught in the Aquarian Gospel of Jesus the Christ written in 1908 but now part of New Age lore such as in Elizabeth Clare Prophet's teachings. The Aquarian Gospel was supposedly learned from the akashic records which is the name for an other-dimensional "library of knowledge" some people claim to be able to access. I think Edgar Cayce the psychic healer of the early 20th century claimed to get his healing knowledge from some such source out there in cosmic neverneverland. It might be tempting to suppose there is such a record "out there" that practiced Riders of the Cosmic Circuit can tune into, except for the fact that it's lying about who Jesus Christ is and that proves its satanic origin: end of story.

The message about the Aquarian Christ is not Biblical at all, but obviously based on Eastern religion. It supports a belief in reincarnation, for one thing, a direct contradiction with the Bible, and treats Christ as merely a sage who came to save through his example and teaching, concepts utterly at odds with the Biblical Christ but familiar in all the false religions. Eastern religion, spiritism, theosophy, pseudoChristian cults, channeling of spirits, all feed into today's New Age. It's all demonically inspired at its root.

The Christ of the Bible, of Christianity, is God Himself, God the Son -- yes, THAT God, the God of the Old Testament -- who came to be born in human flesh through the virgin Mary, who grew up in the teachings of the Old Testament and fulfilled the Old Testament prophecies of the Messiah promised from Eden through all the prophets recorded there, and died on the cross to pay for the sins of His people. Everything He taught comes from the Old Testament. He quotes nothing but Old Testament scripture and He quotes from just about every book, treating it all as literally true.

Christ lived a perfectly sinless life and then laid it down as a sacrifice as prescribed in the Old Testament so that those who believe on Him can inherit eternal life through Him. There is no other way. It is ALL based on the revelation of the Old Testament. Only someone totally ignorant of Christianity or consciously determined to distort its truth could accept the utter stupidity of trying to link His message and life purpose with Eastern religion.

There is no other kind of "salvation." We are fallen, we lost our connection to God through our first father Adam who disobeyed and plunged us all into spiritual and physical death ever since, through our simple genetic inheritance from him. We are subject to sin ourselves as a result of the sin nature we inherited from Adam, we are corrupted and blinded to God by nature. We have NO ability to save ourselves. The most holy man's example couldn't save us even if we were able to follow it because he's fallen too. ONLY a sacrifice of a perfect sinless Victim as decreed by God to pay for our sins could abolish the sin and death that separates us from God and restore our original spiritual fellowship with God.

Clearly these other notions of Christ MUST be demonically inspired, there is no other possibility. And this must be because the demons do not want anybody to learn how to be saved and they love to make us feel like we can do it all ourselves, be "gods" in our own right, which was Satan's lie to Eve in Eden.

Akiane was an innocent young child deceived by a demonic counterfeit of God, the same way the other innocent young children have been whose stories of visits to heaven have become so popular. It's also the way Joseph Smith was deceived, but he was a grownup and a con man to boot, and there are others who have been deceived the same way. Because in this case these are children, people are more than usually indignant against critics of their experiences and want to protect them from such as me, but they should want to save them from the devil's deception instead. You should be outraged at the devil's exploitation of children, which includes one child suffering terribly as the Malarkey boy is, rather than outraged at someone who calls it like it is. And you should be outraged at yourselves for trying to shut up this attempt to expose what is really going on. Pray for these children that they be set free and find the true Christ. Start with praying for yourselves, that you be disabused of your spiritual blindness.

Too many of today's "Christians" need a good sharp slap upside the head. WAKE UP!

The frequency with which such experiences are coming to people these days is certainly part of what is to be expected of the last days when the powers of Antichrist are coming to the fore.

Just felt like posting some (mostly old) contemporary Christian music

These are contemporary Christian songs I just happen to like and like to listen to occasionally. Some of them I have to admit are more "pop" than Christian, more flesh than spirit even if the words are true. I just happened to be listening to music and felt like posting some. I may add comments as they occur to me.

The first ten are from the Maranatha Singers, a group that formed out of Chuck Smith's Calvary Chapel during the "Jesus Freak" revival of the 70s:
Sing Hallelujah -- I'd say this is a "flesh" song. Very pretty, very moving musically, but just repetitive words that build and move the emotions rather than the spirit. To clarify, I mean something like MUSICAL emotions, that don't necessarily glorify the Lord even though that's the message in the words.
Lamb of God
Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty
Seek Ye First -- This one is based on scripture and I'd like to say it's of the Spirit but I really am not sure. Again it's pretty music that is fun to sing. However, this is the sort of song that might come to me "out of the blue" in answer to spiritual concerns I'm having, and when that happens it has to be the Spirit. The following six are in the same category for me:
Jesus, Name above all Names
The Battle Belongs to the Lord
Micah 6:8 -- Humble yourself in the sight of the Lord
Psalm 5 -- Give ear unto my words
As the deer panteth for the water (Psalm 42)
You are my hiding place.
Worthy is the Lamb -- Hillsong
Worthy is the Lamb Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir.
El Shaddai & thy Word -- Amy Grant
messianic Jewish music
Another messianic song
Messianic again Days of Elijah -- charismatic style worship with dancing. (Yeah, there are some problems with the theology in this song, even the fact that David didn't build the Temple, Solomon did; as well as the question whether having dancers on the stage is legitimate worship, but this is one stirring song).
another version of Days of Elijah -- Twila Paris. I may like her version better.
And here's another version of the same song demonstrating what a show can be put on by the flesh, even claiming it's the Holy Spirit, which it isn't. this is a song that definitely stirs the flesh, as so many contemporary songs unfortunately do.
As the Deer Panteth
My All in All -- Loved this song the first time I heard it -- at a charismatic program. It's a very pretty round. As with so many of the contemporary songs -- old hymns too for that matter though they usually have more substance to them -- it's all about what the Lord has done for us, and goes on doing for us, which is certainly major truth as far as it goes, but where is the message of what He calls us to do as saved sanctified believers? And IS He our "all in all" in our experience, the way we live, or is that wishful thinking? In the end too much "me" not enough "He"
I will rise -- it SOUNDS scriptural but is it? Is there scripture that says He going to call our name and we are to rise when He does? Am I missing something?
In Christ Alone
Psalm 51 Create in Me in a Clean Heart -- Keith Green
Easter Song --Keith Green
Oh Lord You're Beautiful -- Keith Green

The Keith Green Story -- Keith Green came to Christ at the same time as the Jesus Freaks but he had his own style altogether. I was only vaguely aware of the Jesus People during the 70s -- I wasn't a Christian until the mid-80s, and there was every kind of movement in those days of every kind of religion and philosophy imaginable, and it meant nothing to me. But now that I am a Christian I eat up the stories of others like Keith Green who made a mark in the Church as he did.

A New Hallelujah Gotta get in some Michael W Smith -- rock stars have nothing on us. Look at that crowd. Hey there are lots of born again believers there, in all these crowds, but how much is worship and how much mere entertainment? Anyway, on this one I wonder what's wrong with the "old" Hallelujah that he feels the need to sing of a new one. Some adorable Ugandan kids on the stage anyway.
I Surrender All Michael W Smith. with Coalo Zamorano singing it in Spanish.
Awesome God Smith's song that I mentioned on a recent Things of the Spirit blog post as a ditty that everyone loves to sing though it's far from evoking the true awesomeness of God, more a lot of emotion born of singing along with the crowd or something like that, kind of like a cheer for our team. One of those modern worship songs in which it seems words failed the songwriter, but obviously the words are secondary, it's the feeling that counts. Definitely fun to sing -- the crowd seems to start singing before the song actually begins in this case.

Some classic hymns, not necessarily in classic style:
Take My Life and Let it Be
another version same song
Fairest Lord Jesus